Requesting A Copy of Blue Line

To request a copy of this software, please and I will reply to your email with the ~205kB blue_line.SIS file attached. This way I can at least start to keep track of who has the software. Anyone who does choose to make a donation to St. Mary's, Cheltenham bell funds will automatically be sent any updates if and when they happen. (Instructions on how to make your donation will be sent with the software.)

Blue Line was written in OPL Basic making extensive use of the nListBox OPX available on the Internet from Neuon.

Latest Releases

Ver 4.08 - 10/04/02
First release to the general public.
Ver 4.09 - 16/04/02
Corrected formatting of text during ringing. Changes of methods did not line up with calls.
Ver 4.10 - 6/05/02
Fixed a minor problem with compositions. In previous versions the 12 & 13 spliced compos would not parse due to a repeated "B" & "C". The compositions were corrected, and the program will now allow repeated letters like "B,B,..." instead of insisting on "B,,..".
Ver 4.11 - 17/05/02
Added a new feature to determine the lead head type from the lead head and place notation. The results have been extensively compared with those in the place notation libraries to ensure they are the same (however, there is bound to be something small I have missed). During this development work, a bug was found in the parsing of lead heads when reading in methods from the libaries. A bug with calls who's place notation was longer than two changes was fixed and now calls in Scientific Triples can be specified, for which an example file is now included. Under some circumstances the timeout feature when ringing did not notice you had taken too long to press a key. This has been fixed so that it will only fail once at most at midnight. Finally, a trivial screen redrawing problem was fixed when cancelling a library search with no new method.
Ver 4.12 - 26/05/02
Added a simple composition to Scientific Triples. Added audible warnings for calls and changes of methods, two different pitches to distinguish the two, each with a short double beep, so as not to be confused with a beep on mistake. Changed the "Ringing Bell" to "Place Bell", as it did not make sense during ringing of spliced or compositions and is now more helpful. Fixed a bad bug with ringing compositions where the second call in a string such as "...METH call, METH call, ..." would be omitted. It looks like this is a fix for a 'feature' introduced in Ver 4.10. Improved support for differential methods by detecting they are in fact differential and using the correct number of leads per course when vewing the line and numbers. Array limits have been reviewed so the "Weewillywinkie Hybrid Maximus" and "Doublehelix Differential Major" may now be read from the place notation files..
Ver 4.13 - 22/06/02
Corrected minor bug where drawing was interrupted by the OS after restarting Blue Line after a backup or change of application focus. Compositions of Erin did not work correctly. Fixed composition parsing with a new and different implementation, to cope with all known boundary cases more reliably. Now create a separate file for the aspects database (to solve a problem with a single OPL string exceeding 255 characters). Added "File Types" list button to interpret the library file names. Better parsing for mehod names in library files (e.g. Namebob -> Name Bob). Learning or Ringing Type printed on screen to remind the user which was selected. New improved "graphics" icon. Added Splash screen at startup and for the "about" menu item. Fixed dimming of "zoom" menu items when switching between "numbers" and "line" views. Now allow an even smaller font to be used in numbers view. "Home" and "End" key now defined. Displayed line widths increase with zoom. Improved zooming in & out by keeping the center view fixed. Addition checks for options t alter on method change. Drawing options can now be automatically changed when the method is changed. Or you can be prompted for suggested changes, or they can be disabled. Added toolbar button icons for Series 5 users. Revo users can only have text OR icons but not both, so you get text only (sorry).
Ver 4.14 - 29/06/02
When the method being viewed had more bells that the methods being rung to spliced or compositions, the program would crash if the selected bell to ring was greater in value than the number of bells in the method newly selected method - FIXED. Also a minor fix to the colour of the method titles printed after dismissing the "grid" view. Finally, one of the automatic option changes only worked when changing from methods with more than one hunt bell. Improved the action of the toolbar buttons during a redraws (mainly affected Series 5 users who have the extra button).
Ver 4.15 - 08/07/02
Fixed a minor bug with annotation where during a redraw, lines would be drawn all over the screen.
Ver 4.16 - 29/07/02
Fixed a bug-fix that stopped the screen redraw after shortcut keys had been used (e.g. to display the grid or the PN dialogue box). PN dialogue box now optionally clears the currently defined calls for a method (before it just deleted them, even for trivial changes to the method name). Added new methods and touches to the "Regular" example file. Software version number now appears on the splash screen and in the help file instead of just in the control panel's "Add/remove" utility. Altered the icons used in the toolbar of series 5 machines.
Ver 4.17 - 03/08/02
Fixed a bug-fix causing a crash when entering compositions longer than 255 characters, the user is now prompted with a problem to fix. Added "Petts23" and "45Spliced" example files.
Ver 4.18 - 15/09/02
Added the ability to "play" a plain of the method with different pitched beeps. It is unlikely that real bells sounds will ever be used due to a large pause introduced between playing different sound files which I cannot (yet?) avoid. Fixed a bug with the "part" number changing up to one lead too early (due to a bug fix in Ver 4.13), and added the display of the last part-end change to help check new compositions entered via the composition editor. (The current part number and the last part-end are displayed whilst ringing and change at the same time, at first this might be counter intuitive!) Ensured that any strings used to add methods to the current set are within the 255 character string bound. Added a new check for options to change automatically (or with prompting) - if the second bell is a hunt bell, turn off dots & numbers. Whenever creating a new method set, you are unable to choose an existing file name, likewise with "Save As". Slow method library searches may be cancelled by the user pressing a key.
Ver 4.19 - 5/1/03
Added the code necessary to check the calls requested in half lead spliced compositions. Changed the hotkey for "check composition" to CTRL+K so that CTRL+C can be used to copy text. Fixed a bug with ringin compositions with half lead calls that caused Sandleton's 14 part 23 Spliced to fail. Added many more multi-spliced composition files.
Ver 4.20 - 1/2/03
Found the complete set of compositions for Leary's 15-23 spliced and noted the existing composition I had was really only an arrangement of Smith's, so the "Learys23" has now been updated. Blue Line now checks for repeated abbreviations and warns the user when an abbreviation is changed (but doe not refuse to accept it). If any abbreviations are left repeated at the end, you will be unable to exit the method manager. You may now search for a method over multiple place notation libraries. Entering the empty substring when searching over all files will build a menu of all methods in your libraries in the selected directory, which is long (!) and takes a significant amount of time. You can always press a key to stop the search at any time though. Changed the way the line thickness is chosen when viewing methods without numbers, whilst ringing methods and viewing the grid. People mentioned that it was hard to see the line if not facing the PDA square on, and the Revo has no backlight to make matters worse. Several other display features have been "improved" at the same time.
Ver 4.21 - 21/6/03
Fixed a bug with half lead compositions printing the part end change a lead late. Added a drawing option to put dots and numbers at all half leads.
Ver 4.22 - 20/7/03
At a request from a user, added a lead counter for all ringing modes where more than one lead is rung at a time. This in turn lead to the addition of a "faults per lead" measure and a slight re-arrangement of the ringing status information on the right hand side of the screen. Now the guess at the default calls for methods of lead head types "2z" and "8z". Also a bug with ringing spliced where pressing a bell number after a change of method is called, but before the blow where the change takes place has been corrected. Now when you press a bell number you will be ringing the stated method.
Ver 4.23 - 12/10/06
A user found a bug - after all this time! When entering the place notation for the whole course so that the first lead end is rounds, the software sees all the bells as fixed. This causes problems with working out the best methods presentation. The understandable situation was 'Plain Hunt Minor' entered as "&-1-1-1,1" rather than 'Original Minor' as "&-,1" as would have been done when extracting the method from the place notation file 'O6'. A check has now been entered for this condition and the user informed of the cause of the problem. Lastly, a new composition file has been added for PAB Saddleton's "11 Triples" spliced.

Please feel free to send me any feedback and suggestions or bug reports, although I cannot only promise to implement anything. However, hopefully you will agree there is a good chance after seeing the above development work.