What's new?

With the big feature updates behind us (multi-collections, image syncing, 64-bit support, Flex template, etc…), it is time for some smaller tweaks that were requested by our loyal users:

• More compact toolbar layout, to save screen space
• No more annoying Add to Collection / Wish List popup in Add Albums screen
• New “Transparent” styles for the Flex template, to show off your backdrops

Read more

Music Collector version 19 has arrived! Here’s what’s new:

• Manage multiple “collections” within one database file
• Automatic Cloud-syncing of your own “custom” images
• A new super-adaptive “Flex” template for the Details Panel

Read on for the full details:

Read more

We’ve made several tweaks to improve the trial mode experience and fixed a freeze problem:

• Trial mode improvements:
  • Bigger “+ Add Albums” button on the default toolbar.
  • Improved “My CLZ Account” messaging when logging in with a CLZ Account.
  • New hints to Sync with CLZ Cloud after adding some movies.
  • Removed the ugly blue “hint box” that appeared when starting with an empty database.
• Fixed:
  • Occasional freeze/hang problems after a period of program inactivity.

Fixed:

• Automatically syncing cover images could happen too often
• Edit Screens:
  • While using Next/Previous, the cursor position wasn’t always retained
  • After scanning an image, some of the buttons would sometimes not be enabled

Right after the release of v19, we started receiving reports from users that their image scanners would not be found when using the 64-bit version. Other users reported that the web-cam scanning would not work anymore.
A temporary work-around has been to use the 32-bit version of version 19.

In the meantime, our Windows developer Joe has been working hard to get both of these problems resolved and I am happy to report that both have been fixed in today’s version 19.0.5:

• 64-bit version now uses WIA to connect with image scanners. When acquiring, make sure to select the WIA driver for your scanner, not TWAIN.
• Scanning barcodes with your webcam scanner is working again.

If you have been using the 32-bit version as a workaround, please switch to the 64-bit version again (this is a choice during installation).

Then, please let us know your findings, is everything working again?

Other fixes in v19.0.5:

• In some cases, Tools > Options would forget your image scanner.
• Edit in List did not work for track lists.
• Track View: Select All checkbox did not respond.

We fixed an issue with index numbers automatically incrementing when they shouldn’t.

Fixed:

• Custom Image checkbox wasn’t always checked in certain situations (e.g. unrecognized barcode screen, drag/drop image on the details panel, or adding an album from music files)
• Images for items that don’t have a cover in Core didn’t upload automatically
• Images for items that don’t have a cover in your CLZ Cloud didn’t upload automatically
• Got rid of a couple of access violations in the main, filter and find cover screens
• Edit Screen: Covers tab: tabs weren’t high enough
• Import from Other Database:
  • Added 2 progress bars to keep track of the import
  • In rare cases you could get an empty extra collection tab after an import
• Fixed a rare “Range Check Error” happening for big databases
• Filtering of tracks didn’t work correctly for databases with multiple collections

You can now manage multiple sub-collections within one account. The collections will appear as little tabs at the bottom (e.g. like in Excel), so that you can easily switch between them.

Create and manage collections

Open the menu top left and click “Manage Collections” to:

• Create new collections
• Rename existing collections
• Remove collections
• Change their order (drag and drop)

Note: the CLZ mobile app currently does not support multiple collections yet (coming soon!). For now, you CAN sync multiple collections to the mobile app, but they will appear mixed together, as ONE database.

New: Notes as a column

The Notes field can now be added as a column in List View:

(example screenshot from Movie Connect)

Stability

We have fixed various stability issues in the program to get rid of some more access violation errors that were happening for a couple of users. We also fixed a problem where “File > Open Database” didn’t refresh the main screen to show the opened file.

• Got rid of some Access Violation errors
• “File / Open database” could show an empty screen

32-bit and 64-bit option

We’ve found that when running our program in 64-bit mode, some 3rd party external devices will not work or talk to the program such as:

• TWAIN image scanners
• Some barcode scanners
• Webcams (for barcode scanning)

If you run into issues where you your TWAIN image scanner, or your barcode scanner won’t connect or work, this is usually caused by the drivers of these devices which are not 64-bit compatible, and thus can’t talk to your Collectorz program.

We’re trying to look for a way to make them talk to the 64-bit version, but for now, to work around this, redownload the software from your CLZ Account page and during installation choose to install the 32-bit version!

New:

• The resizable panels in the add screen now have the same design as the ones in the main screen.

Fixed:

• iPad: Wrong initial panel layout in the main screen when the app is started in landscape mode.
• Clear templates: Track artists did not display when the album artist wasn’t set

Music Collector version 19 has arrived! Here’s what’s new:

• Manage multiple “collections” within one database file
• Automatic Cloud-syncing of your own “custom” images
• A new super-adaptive “Flex” template for the Details Panel
• 64-bit version for 64-bit Windows versions

Read on for the full details:

Read more

A useful update of your app today, that is, if you are using the app on an iPad:

All panels in the main screen (folders, list and details) are now resizable using draggable separators between the panels, so that you can customize the layout to your own liking.

• All panels in the main screen (folders, list and details) are now resizable using draggable separators between the panels, so that you can customize the layout to your own liking.
• The resizable panels in the Add screen have been updated to use the nicer look of the draggable separators.

New: quick search box in the Folder Panel!

Another useful addition to your software today, as we added a Quick Search box in your folder panel.

Especially useful for those long folder lists, e.g. when using Artists as the folder field. Just type a few letters of the artist’s name and the folder list will instantly “filter down” to the matching artists, while you type!

See it in action:

New: Redesigned app icon

We designed new icons that give new users a better indication of what the app actually does (as opposed to just a different color CLZ logo), but still obviously belong together, when shown together.

Fixed:

• List did not scroll to top when the status bar was tapped

A nice time-saving feature was added to your Music Connect software today:

Next / Previous buttons in the Edit Album screen

These buttons let you go through your album list to make changes, while staying in the Edit Album screen. Just use the Next or Previous button on the bottom left.

While doing so, the screen will keep you on the same tab and same field, making it super-easy to make changes to same field(s) for multiple albums.

A small UI tweak today, made necessary because of the growing number of field options for the folder panel: the folder field menu is now grouped into 3 categories.

This should make it easier to find the field you are looking for.

Some of you reported some issues in the Edit Screens in Music Collector using macOS Mojave, which have now been addressed and fixed!

Fixes:

• Searching for persons (artists, composers, conductors, musicians, credits) wasn’t working (dropdown wasn’t opening to show all options)
• The dropdown to choose a role for a credit/choose instrument for a musician didn’t open
• Dragging and dropping of images on the template or edit screen didn’t do anything
• Linking of music files to existing albums wasn’t working
• Update from Core wasn’t filling in track times (if track times were empty)

By default, the Alphabet Bars for Music Connect uses the first letter of the Artist. You can now switch it to use the first letter of the album title, just click the little “gears icon” on the right of the Alphabet Bar:

Do you like to customize your software to suit your needs or just your personal taste? Then we have big news for you today, as we have just introduced four “Skin” choices in your Music Connect software:

• Default (the standard look, as it was before, so dark toolbars, light content)
• Dark (dark toolbars, dark content)
• Light (light toolbars, light content)
• Blue (shades of blue, with yellow highlights)

On top of that, we have given you 3 template style choices for the Album Details area: Dark, Light and Blue. Either to match your Skin choice, or to mix to up, it’s up to you.

Both the Skin and Template selectors can be found in the Settings screen, under Customization.

Screen shots:

Default Skin:

Dark Skin:

Light Skin:

Blue Skin:

A new grouping option is now available in your Connect!

Click the folder icon top left and select Release / Publication Year to see all your items neatly grouped in a year folder. Click on a year to see all items that were released/published in that year!

We still had a couple of persistent Access Violation and List Index Out of Bounds errors happening in the Add Albums screen. We managed to capture them and the Add Screen should be more stable now.

We also fixed a problem with the quick search in the main screen that could throw an error.

Should you still get such errors, please contact us and let us know!

The Add Albums Automatically screen is now called “Add Albums from CLZ Core” and includes improvements to make it both easier-to-use and easier-on-the-eye.

• Single Search Box: Just one box for searching (e.g. like Google or Amazon). No more separate Artist and Title boxes. Just enter (part of) the artist’s name and (part of) the title and you will get the best matching results. (see the screen shot below with “metallica justice” results”)
• Big blue buttons for the main actions, Searching and Adding, can’t miss ’em 🙂
• Automatic Preview, just select a result (no more need for double clicking)
• Use the popup in the “Add” button to change it to add to “Collection” or “Wish List”

• Easier way of adding multi-disc albums: Add multi-disc albums by selecting multiple results from your search. Just check the boxes next to the results to compile a multi-disc album and add it to your collection straight away:

Adding Multi-Disc Albums by Artist and Title:

Adding Multi-Disc Albums by Barcode:

We’ve changed some code in various screens to make the program more stable and even less prone to random Access Violations.

After many support conversations with helpful users, we finally found out what the problem was: a dodgy 3rd party HTTPS component.
So we have now completely replaced that component with a better, more modern one, which seems to have resolved all Access Violation problems.

Fixed:

• Stability: Took care of Access Violation errors that could pop up because of the old HTTPS component
• Add screen: “Change Cover” could break the preview panel

This week, we added several new settings and improvements, all based on your feedback:

New setting for the List View: Wrap column content

This new “Wrap column content” setting can be found in the Settings screen. It lets you choose if text in the List View columns should wrap to multiple lines or not.
The default is YES / Checked. Uncheck this setting to keep your List View row as single rows, resulting in a cleaner list and more rows in view.

New Date Format setting

Also found in the Settings screen, this new selector lets you choose how dates are displayed, anywhere in the program where date are shown.
Choose from:

• 7 January 2018
• 07 Jan 2018
• 7 Jan 2018
• January 07, 2018
• January 7, 2018
• Jan 07, 2018
• Jan 7, 2018
• 07/01/2018
• 7/1/2018
• 07/01/18
• 7/1/18
• 01/07/2018
• 1/7/2018
• 01/07/18
• 1/7/18
• 2018-01-07

Core IDs can now be added as columns in the List View

Now available in the Column Selection screen for the List View: The Core ID fields.
E.g. for movies, add the Core Movie ID and Core Media ID fields to your lists, to quickly find movies that are not linked to our Core entry yet.