Rayfront Update

Rayfront 1.0.3 Update

Changes from 1.0.2 to 1.0.3:

• The program version string is changed to "Rayfront 1.0.3".
• Installation paths or project paths with spaces can't prevent simulations anymore on Windows.
• Simulations that fail to start will give better indications of the reasons of the failure.
• Log file entries only show the name of the executed programs, and not their fully qualified path.
• Rayfront refused to start when the hosts file contained a __library__ entry, but no setup for the current host.
• Editing functional expression directly in modifier editing dialogs works again.
• Killing or suspending a simulation could cause an error in some cases.
• Simulations could fail on Linux due to a broken qsort() routine in the system libraries. The included Radiance binaries now avoid calling that routine.
• The help buttons didn't work on Linux with KDE2, as Netscape doesn't cooperate with virtual Desktops under X11. Thanks to the "vhtml" program by Muhammad Muquit, we now have a workaround for this problem.
• The help buttons don't flash a DOS box any more before loading the help pages in a browser on NT and Win2k (and probably XP).
• The help buttons now also work with the consumer versions of Windows, such as Win95, Win98, and WinME, although a flashing DOS box may be visible here. Note that those system versions are not officially supported, but users report that Rayfront still works fine with them most of the time.
• Rayfront handles errors more gracefully that are caused by write protected files, refusing to start a simulation when it can't write its data to disk.
• Rayfront remembers the scaling you specified when importing from Autocad/Intellicad or from a DXF file. The same scaling now also applies to views and measuring fields imported from Autocad/Intellicad, and can be set in the respective dialogs. If you change the scaling in any of those places, then the new value will be the default in all of them for future imports.
• Several bugs have been fixed in the dxf2rad program.
• On Windows, the rpict program now also produces status reports one by one in the specified interval instead of all together at the end of its run.
• All drop-down selection boxes can now scroll horizontally. This makes it more practical to work with long names that may happen to come with imported data, such as from the 3Dsolar modeller.

Warning: Do NOT apply this update (or any other updates) to a demo version of Rayfront. You will not improve, but break your demo this way. In any case, the current demo is already on the version level 1.0.3.

Installing on Windows

The installer for Windows can be downloaded here (2887196 bytes).

Double click on the installer "rf103update.exe", and select the installation directory of your existing Rayfront 1.0 installation. The installer will then determine wich platforms your installation supports, and update all required components. The installer will refuse to proceed if no existing Rayfront installation is found.

Installing on Unix Systems

The installer for unix systems can be downloaded here (2582218 bytes).

You will need the GNU gunzip program to decompress the archive, and tar to extract the files from it:

 $> gunzip rf103update.tgz
 $> tar xf rf103update.tar

This will create a directory "rf103update". Cd into this directory, and run the "install.ksh" shell script. You can make this script executable with chmod(1) and run it directly, or run a ksh with the file name as argument:

 $> ksh install.ksh
 Please enter the directory of your existing
 Rayfront installation:
   [/usr/local/rayfront] :

The script will ask you for the location of your existing Rayfront installation. It will then determine wich platforms your installation supports, and update all required components after a final confirmation. The installer will refuse to proceed if no existing Rayfront installation is found.