ChangeLog

BALL 1.1 was released on 21 June 2005

BALL is now provided under the LGPL and BALLView under the GPL.

The version 1.1 brings support for MacOS X and and a large numer of prominent fixes and improvements in BALLView. Most of these improvements are related to an improved user interface and some new models and animation possibilities. We also did some features changes related to the Python support.

Changed

• New license model: BALL is under the LGPL, BALLView under the GPL
• Improved the Python support, adapted to SIP 4.2.x
• BALLView
  • General overhaul of the user interface of BALLView
  • Improved focus camera on molecular structures
  • Insides of surfaces are now drawn correctly
  • PovRay files are now much smaller, especially for meshes, and are rendered faster by PovRay
  • Improved backbone and cartoon model quality by using a triangulated tube model
  • BALLView config files are now always stored in the users home directory
  • Modified color or model settings are now visible after pressing apply.
  • Disabled server in BALLView by default
  • Storing PNG and POV export filenames in config file, so files will not be overwritten accidentally

Added

• Support for Darwin (MacOS X), including support for shared libraries and native QT
• FragmentDatabase
  • added fragments for nucleotides
  • fixed some minor details in other fragments
• Python support: added more classes to the Python SIP interface
• Proxy support for TCP transfers
• Documentation for BALLView in the folder BALL/doc/BALLView
• Tutorial and demo in the Help menu of BALLView
• new models for rendering nucleic acids and for visualizing forces
• Cartoon model now gives a choice of cylinders and ribbons
• OpenGL vertex buffer objects to accelerate display of triangluated surfaces
• Highlighting of atoms for which the setup of a force field fails
• Improved ball&stick model now renders double, triple and aromatic bonds
• Ability to create animations, either as on-screen presentations or for movies
• OpenGL rendering now allows for depth cueing, material paramters may be adjusted
• Stereo display using side-by-side mode or shutter glasses
• Clipping planes
• Support for drag and drop of molecular files and python scripts
• Ability to disable model or coloring updates for a representation
• Splitting of surfaces (e.g. to cut out a binding pocket or the like)
• Improved labels for atoms, residues, etc.
• Esc key now switches to last used mode in Scene
• Enter key now focus on selection or on first loaded system if no selection exists
• Its now possible to hide secondary structure entries in the MolecularControl
• History for boolean expressions
• Python scripting
  • Hotkey support for starting any (BALL-)Python command from BALLView
  • Support to quit program from Python interpreter
  • Support for starting Python script from command line

Fixed

• Several bugfixes in the file formats
• CygWin support was temporarily broken
• Fixed the Python support to work with an official SIP release (4.1.1)
• BALLView
  • (hopefully) no more crashes from MDSimulations and minimizations, when strange energies occur
  • Handling of light sources positions
  • Selection in MolecularControl with CTRL and SHIFT modifier
  • several problems in Cartoon and Backbone model
  • several problems with POVRay export
  • rendering of two-colored objects, when one part is selected
  • creation of models for multiple selected items
  • "default" button in preferences reset settings of the current tab only
  • multiple loading of the same file will create will result in unique names for the systems
  • Molecular dynamics dialog: toggling export to trajectory file was broken
  • ResidueIndexColorProcessor now no longer considers water residues
  • Visualization of contour surfaces had sometimes incorrect normals
  • Several core dumps related to missing mutex locks
  • Several memory leaks, e.g. in OpenGL renderer
  • Problem with linking of C runtime library under windows
  • H-bond model: showed only first H-bond of an atom and had a problem with the normals of the discs