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dcsTools Event Log Viewer Release Notes

Release notes include changes, enhancements and corrections by date and version number of the application.

Version 2.7.0.130 - 04/05/2023

  1. IMPORTANT COMING CHANGE. This the last version of dcsTools Event Log Viewer that will support Windows 2000. Future revisions will no longer support Windows 2000.

  2. Enhancement. Support for Windows 11 has been added.

Version 2.6.0.125-05/05/2020

  1. Enhancement (Windows XP & above only). When viewing multiple event logs, dcsTools Event Log Viewer now uses a tabbed interface as a default for each loaded event log. This simplifies switching among event logs. If you prefer the original legacy method, you can turn off this feature using the View | Tabbed Windows main menu item.

  2. Change. Previously, the event log window caption and main window caption contained the fully-qualified path and file name of the current event log. This behavior has been changed to display a shortened display using an ellipsis (...) to indicate the full file name display has been shortened. This makes it easier to display multiple event log window tabs without having to use the tabbed interface scroll buttons.

  3. Change. Support for operating systems released prior to Windows 2000 has been dropped. In order to use dcsTools Event Log Viewer, the host operating system must be Windows 2000 or later.

  4. Fix. When closing dcsTools Event Log Viewer with multiple event logs open and at least one had been modified with either bookmarks or notes, dcsTools Event Log Viewer would prompt you to save the edited event log twice for each modified event log. dcsTools Event Log Viewer now correctly only prompts the user one time for each modified event log.

  5. Fix. Occasionally, dcsTools Event Log Viewer would incorrectly save the state of the event log child window when closing. dcsTools Event Log Viewer now saves the state of only the active child window when closing.

  6. Fix. A manually-created event log item (created using the [Insert] key) was not properly saved when user saved the modified event log containing books marks and notes. Now, when an event log record is manually created, fields are populated so as to keep this "marker record" adjacent to the records immediately following it, based on date & time. The event message is "User-Inserted" and the notes field is initialized.

  7. Fix. If a user attempted to create or edit a note for an event log item that had been created manually by using the [Insert] key, an AV would occur.

Version 2.5.0.115 - 01/27/2016

  1. Enhancement. dcsTools Event Log Viewer has been updated to support Windows 10.

  2. Fix. Event log save prompts have been updated to remove extraneous text.

Version 2.4.0.100 - 04/04/2014

  1. Enhancement. dcsTools Event Log Viewer now detects Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012 and Windows Server 2012R2 operating systems and adjusts its display accordingly.

  2. Fix. The proposed file name when saving an event log to disk (*.evf) did not have the correct file extension.

Version 2.3.0.90 - 06/26/2013

  1. Enhancement. Event log files that are saved to disk (*.evf) in dcsTools Event Log Viewer are now stored in a compressed format, reducing the required disk space significantly. Event log files previously saved in dcsTools Event Log Viewer can still be opened, viewed and edited. All new saved event logs are stored in the compressed format.

  2. Enhancement. The event viewer's navigator bar has been enhanced to add a "Refresh" button. Clicking on the "Refresh" button has the same effect as the [F5] keyboard shortcut and the pop-up menu item Reload Current Log File.

  3. Fix.dcsTools Event Log Viewer would occasionally fail to correctly determine a file about to be opened is a saved event log file. The file extension was being evaluated in a case-sensitive way and has been changed to be case-insensitive.

Version 2.2.0.85 - 08/14/2012

  1. Change. The View | Visual Appearance menu item "XP" has been changed to "Native" to reflect newer operating systems that support this appearance type.

  2. Fix. On certain operating systems with multiple monitors, the dialog that appears when opening a file is placed on the wrong monitor. This problem has been corrected.

  3. Fix. Occasionally, an AV would occur when closing an event log dialog. This has been corrected.

Version 2.1.3.75 - 05/19/2011

  1. Enhancement. Support for selected Wide Orbit Automation event files has been added. Specifically, the files DAClntJni.log, ddserver.log, and radioautomation.log, along with others that match the format of one of these file types, can be loaded and displayed correctly.

  2. Enhancement. When opening an event file, a filter for all files with an extension of ".log" has been added.

  3. Change. An additional column for the message type (Type) has been added. Some Wide Orbit Automation files contain this information. As a default, the column is not displayed.

  4. Fix. Custom filtering on the date field was not working properly due to extraneous spaces in the date string. These extraneous spaces are now trimmed when opening an event log file and filtering on the date field now works as expected.

Version 2.1.1.60 - 05/07/2010

  1. Enhancement. Application icons for dcsTools Event Log Viewer have been updated.

  2. Enhancement. dcsTools Event Log Viewer now includes a custom icon used in displaying associated files in Windows Explorer when event log files are registered during installation.

  3. Fix. The event log search dialog was incorrectly positioned in version 2.1.0.55.

Version 2.1.0.55 - 04/29/2010

  1. Enhancement. dcsTools Event Log Viewer is now aware of multiple monitor host systems and properly saves and restores its position on the correct monitor.

  2. Enhancement. dcsTools Event Log Viewer now reports the host operating system in more detail and has been updated to reflect the release of Windows 7.

  3. Enhancement. If changes have been made to bookmarks, users are now prompted to save the event log to file when closing the event log view.

  4. Enhancement. A second status indicator has been added to the main display to reflect changes in book mark activity.

  5. Fix. If dcsTools Event Log Viewer was closed without first closing any open event logs, settings for the display table columns were not saved.

  6. Fix. If a user opened an event log in the current event window, no prompting occurred if the current event log had been modified. Users are now presented the option to save the original event log prior to opening another one in the same window.

Version 2.0.1.50 - 05/27/2009

  1. Fix. When saving an event log in binary format, a suggested file name was not always present in the save dialog window.

  2. Fix. Following the save of an event log in binary format, the main window's caption was not updated to reflect the saved file name.

Version 2.0.0.45 - 03/07/2009

  1. Enhancement. A bookmark system has been implemented. Users can now set up to 10 bookmarks (markers) for each event viewer window displayed. As a default, bookmarks are not displayed in the viewer but their visibility can be toggled on and off.

  2. Enhancement. You can now add a free-form note to each displayed event record.

  3. Enhancement. Displayed event log files can now be saved in binary format, including bookmarks and user notes. If multiple event log files are loaded together in the viewer, all records are saved to a single binary file with bookmarks and user notes. The result in this case is a single file containing the merged event records.

  4. Enhancement. You can now optionally change the vertical size of the display rows in the the event viewer, which displays more text in data columns that are not wide enough to display all information. When the display rows are made larger, text wraps at the column border if it cannot fit on one display row.

  5. Enhancement. You can now optionally display a data navigator in the event viewer. To show or hide the data navigator, use either the main menu View | Data Navigator item or the pop-up menu's Show Data Navigator item.

  6. Enhancement. The method of reading event log files has been changed to better handle non-ASCII characters that might be embedded in the file. In particular, if a ^Z (hex 1A) character appeared in a file previously, the file load would stop at that point as it was interpreted as an end-of-file marker. Now, the data is loaded initially in binary format, ensuring the entire file is loaded. A side effect of this change is slightly improved load performance, most noticeable when opening large event log files.

  7. Change. The order in which multiple event files are loaded has been changed to make the process of loading multiple event files into a single event viewer window more intuitive. Previously, when a user selected more than one event file to be opened, the files were loaded into the viewer in the order of last selected to first selected. This process is now reversed - the first file selected by the user is loaded first, then the second file and so on.

  8. Change. The dcsTools Event Viewer main menu location is now fixed. Previously, the menu could be floated, docked and hidden altogether. Now, the main menu always appears across the top of the main display as expected.

Version 1.2.0.39 – 02/19/2007

  1. The help documentation has been modified to work with Windows Vista. Vista does not support the traditional help file (*.HLP). The help documentation is now supplied as a compiled HTML file (*.CHM).

    Microsoft Security Update 896358 not only fixes a vulnerability in HTML Help, it prevents HTML Help files from execution if the CHM file is installed on a network drive. CHM files installed locally continue to work.

    Symptoms: When you open a CHM file from a UNC path or from a network drive even if the network drive is mapped to a drive letter, the HTML Help viewer opens and instead of displaying the topic, it displays an error message "Action canceled" in the topic pane.

    Solutions: Install the application on a local drive to avoid this problem. Alternatively, there are some registry changes that can be made manually to re-enable using CHM help files from a network drive. A free HTML Help Registration Utility is available at the EC Software web site.

  2. A printable PDF manual is now included in the files distributed with dcsTools EventLogViewer. The manual is formatted for duplex printing.

Version 1.1.5.38 – 09/22/2006

  1. Changes have been made to improve performance when loading and closing large event log files – files that may have in excess of 1 million records.
  2. A menu item has been added to allow users to clear event log data in a view window.

Version 1.1.4.37 – 02/14/2006

  1. A memory leak that occurred when an event log file was closed has been fixed.

Version 1.1.3.34 – 01/28/2006

  1. Backward search functionality has been added.

Version 1.1.2.33 – 01/22/2006

  1. A problem with tabbing among the search dialog controls has been corrected. Tabbing from the Search Field list to the Search Options radio buttons now works as expected.

Version 1.1.1.32 – 01/19/2006

  1. The initial public release of dcsTools EventLogViewer.