Release log

Release log

This is the list of the InterFormNG2 releases and the major new features in each release:


Version 4.0.0

Alert
Important: InterFormNG2 now runs on Java 17. So you need to install Java 17 on Linux and the IBM i platform, if you want to InterFormNG2 on either of these platforms. Java 17 is embedded in InterFormNG2 on the Windows platform. External jar files e.g. for database drivers should be copied to a special libext folder.
Alert
Important: For the IBM i platform: Java 17 does not include fonts like e.g. in Java 8, so you need to ensure, that at least one font is available for Java. This is solved by installing fontconfig as described in the section, Java 17 font issue.

User interface

  1. New color theme and overall design for the front-end. The color theme and overall design has been changed for improved user experience. An introduction to the new interface is included in this section.
  2. New dashboard design with user-configurable widgets.
  3. The dashboard list of recent templates and workflows are now related to the logged in user account (was previously stored in the browser).
  4. The output counters on the dashboard have been replaced by job counters that count every workflow instance. The old total value is added to the total job counter. The weekly counter is reset to 0.
  5. New dashboard statistics for workflow health has been added.
  6. The library folder is not longer deleted when you attempt to rename it to the same name with different character case.

Printing

  1. PCL6 (enhanced) format is now an option for laser print output. This has been tested on a limited range of printers, so it is highly recommended to test the output thoroughly before moving to production. Alternatively PCL5 can  PCL6 can be selected as the mime type of a printer and it can also be generated with the Create PCL6 document workflow component.
  2. The predefined variable, interformng.zpl.includeLabelWidth which can trigger the ZPL label width in the ZPL output now also works for non-custom page sizes.
  3. The predefined variable, interformng.zpl.includeLabelWidth which can trigger the ZPL label width in the ZPL output now also works correctly for standard page sizes.
  4. In PCL5 output, positions below 0 (e.g. closer than about 6 mm from the left edge of the paper) is now force-moved to 0 and causes a warning to prevent strange locations of graphical elements.

Workflow

  1. A new workflow component has been added for calling a stored procedure in a relational database.
  2. New workflow components for sending and receiving messages on Azure Service Bus.
  3. New workflow components for storing/reading the payload from a time-limited persistent store, as an alternative to using file system or resource library for temporary storage.
  4. New workflow component, SharePoint to attachment.
  5. The XPath wizard introduced in v3.5.0 is now available for use in more places, including the workflow editor.
  6. Some deprecated workflow components have been removed from the selection list when inserting a new workflow component.
  7. For the workflow components, To FileSystem and To Windows-share, a warning has been added if file conflict resolution is “Append version” and the number of files in directory is above 1000.
  8. The workflow component, Multicast and merge now works again (was broken in v3.5.0).
  9. Correction so the codepage setting on the workflow component, From IBM i output queues (multiple) will actually be used.
  10. Correction to JavaScript workflow component to ensure that string values returned by XPath lookups are compatible with JavaScript string type.
  11. Correction to on error workflow not working in workflows with certain special components such as First in, first out queue.
  12. Change to how compiled workflow files are updated, hopefully preventing them from being locked in a disk-full scenario.
  13. Correction to a newly created workflow starting as suspended if a previously deleted workflow with the same name was suspended at the time of deletion.
  14. Correction for ActiveMQ input component failing if the workflow name contains certain special characters.
  15. Webservice input can now return other status codes than 200 and custom http headers.
  16. Added support for minimum age for input files (Using file lock technique) when reading from a folder.

Designer

  1. It is now possible to do a printout directly from the template designer.
  2. Option for horizontal alignment of dynamically positioned elements in table cells.
  3. TIFF images used in a template are now visible in the designer result view and can also be viewed in the library.
  4. Base64 image URLs containing spaces and newlines no longer cause an error when used in document templates.
  5. In the template designer it is no longer possible to drag-drop move a table row/column that is below a row/column expression or to delete a row/column that is below a row/column expression. These invalid actions could cause the template to become corrupted.
  6. When changing the unit of template page margins, the values are now re-calculated to the selected unit.
  7. Correction to Excel designer showing a warning "reference to unbound variable" even though the variable is defined.
  8. Correction to the language setting on template defaults which previously always showed "en" even when something else was selected.

PDF

  1. Limited support for creating PDF documents that are PDF/UA-1 compliant.
  2. Embedded and attached files inside a PDF can now be extracted as attachments.
  3. The workflow component, PJL wrap PDF now also works for existing PDF files without setting the workflow variable, render.page.last to an integer value.

Export and import

  1. New option to import/export translation properties files to Excel or XLIFF format.
  2. New option for selective import of workflows (only import some of the workflows in the zip file).
  3. To export workflows you now first need to select the workflow(s) and then click the export icon on the upper right.
  4. Translation resources used in variable elements or transformation templates are now included in the template export with dependencies.
  5. Correction to selection of resources in resource export UI to prevent all folders with the same name being selected across all resource types.

Email output

  1. It is now possible to use plain text as the body of e-mail messages (previously only HTML was possible). The is illustrated in the section, email input.
  2. New workflow input component, Read from email server has been added. This can be used for monitoring an email inbox for incoming emails.

License key

  1. Missing license module errors will now show which license module that it needs.
  2. License modules now show Valid from and Valid to (dates copied from the license).
  3. License information for Windows can now also be obtained through PowerShell3 (and not just WMIC command).

Windows share

  1. Windows share connection settings can now be defined in tenant settings.
  2. Massive improvements and changes to Windows share, making it more like “normal” OS file system access. This includes a lot of new workflow components, additional built-in functions and a URL extension, which makes it possible to refer to files found via a Windows Share via a simpel URL. All the additions are listed in this section.
  3. Windows Share (SMB Protocol 2/3)

Storage improvements

  1. New setting for automatic daily database maintenance, reducing database growth and improving long-term performance (Only when using the default setup with embedded database).
  2. New job log setting for reduced job log content. This will reduce the amount of storage space used by the job log.
  3. A new printer queue setting on the tenant settings has been added. If enabled the payload is deleted once the print job is successfully completed, thereby conserving storage space.
  4. A new option, Include in e-mail log has been added on the on the email workflow components: Create PDF email, To email server and Send an HTML email to only log the email sending event without logging the entire email message, thereby conserving storage space.

Performance improvements

  1. Reduced memory usage when creating documents from templates.
  2. Performance improvement when using translations with a locale that has no matching translation resource.

IBM i

  1. The Upload Spooled file dialog will now suggest library names once the queue name is entered. In the From IBM i output queue workflow component, the library name is now optional if the queue name only exists in one library.
  2. When IBM i connection settings are changed, restart all workflows that reads from a data queue so they use the new connection settings.
  3. Spooled files of *USERASCII type are now ignored without error when read by the From IBM i output queue workflow component.
  4. Automatic cleanup of temporary fonts in the folder /iformng2/tmp/tempFontFiles is no longer done. That is no longer needed as Java 17 removes old temporary fonts.
  5. It is highly recommended to stop scheduling jobs, that run the command, IFORMNG2/NG2CLEAN. This deletes old unused fonts, but might even delete temporary fonts, that are still used.

Modules

  1. The eSignAnyWhere integration components now also support the new version 6 of the eSignAnyWhere API (requires new envelope format).
  2. New setting for the remote output client to use chunked download. Chunked download is useful if there is a bad connection between InterFormNG2 and the remote client. This can e.g. be the case if InterFormNG2 is running in the cloud.
  3. Correction to remote output which now also works when using an external database with the custom InterFormNG2 connection pool.

Other

  1. A new section in the manual, Backup and Replication has been added. This includes details and recommendations for backup and configuration of replication/mirroring of the IFormNG2 folder.
  2. New option for high-availability setups where a primary InterFormNG2 instance holds the master resources and replica InterFormNG2 instances synchronize resources from the primary.
  3. Added delete and update operations to the printer APIs.
  4. It is now possible to use secrets from Azure Key Vault for password/secret fields in settings and workflows.
  5. Database column name with unusual characters (like #) are now transformed to valid XML names when using SQL select.
  6. Correction to job log warning being created for a missing barcode text even when barcode error handling is set to ignore.
  7. The fonts used by the front-end are now embedded in the application.
  8. Using ng:resourceExist to check the existence of a resource will no longer update the "last used" time.

You can find  all versions by following these links:

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