Understand 2.5
This weekend we released Understand 2.5 (build 507). Its main changes include:
- Instant Search – a new feature which permits instant searching in even the largest bodies of code. Indexing starts after parsing ends. It operates in the background without holding up any other activities. When complete the search box in the upper right instantly answers your queries.
- Dependency Graphs - these replace our old dependency graphs with new layout, saving, and cool clustering, save, undo, and redo options. They use a much updated layout engine, which we will roll into our other graphs and use to create new ones in the coming months.
- Simplified Licensing – Understand 2.5 includes all languages and all features. The only licensing difference, in terms of price, is the use of floating or specific developer licenses. Understand 2.5 does use a new license – your old one will not run it permanently. Instead, it will operate for 30 days, giving you time to request a replacement license if you are under maintenance. This is done directly from Understand or via our website.
- Pricing - we’ve removed all levels and language variants. Understand 2.5 has it all. This will be our path going forward with new features as well. The new price is a little higher and the only differentiation is if you need a Single Developer or Floating License. If you are under maintenance you can update to Understand 2.5 without any cost. Nor will the higher price affect your maintenance going forward. It will remain 18% of your purchase price annually.
- TrackBack Removed – this will be missed by many users, but we needed to focus on core analysis capabilities.
Take heart, the engineer who wrote much of it will be taking it open source very soon. Look for an announcement here. To be notified by e-mail send a request to support@scitools.com. - Menu Revamping – menus were moved about and standardized to be more in common with most applications. Additionally, edit menu items are now contextual with editor and graph operations. As an application ages, menus become complex and suffer from bloat. We wanted to simplify and reduce clutter.
- License Manager GUI with Improved Diagnostics – our old license manager does not need to be updated. If it is updated, or for new installations, a new License Manager GUI simplifies operation. Additionally, the server and clients have many more diagnostics embedded to diagnose any licensing manager problems.
- And many hundreds of bug fixes and minor improvements.
We know change can make winners and losers. We’ve tried to make every user a winner with Understand 2.5. If we failed for you, let us know how, and we will try to sort it out and make you as happy as we can.
March 12th, 2010 at 8:12 pm
This looks/sounds good but in the future, when you make a change liek this that will cost money, please, PLEASE, send an email notification! I downloaded 508 not knowing of this change and had to go about resetting my license etc. Your motification could have helped me at least defer some effort (also, this means that notification that 507 was to be 2.5 would have helped prepare my efforts too).
I don’t mind change, as long as I’m notified of it.
Regards,
Marty
March 15th, 2010 at 12:16 pm
Marty, we should have been more clear, the upgrade to 2.5 will not cost anything as long as your maintenance is up to date. There is a new license format so we’ll need to upgrade licenses as people adapt Understand 2.5. I’ll make a post clarifying the details.
Thanks,
KevinG
April 20th, 2010 at 9:43 am
Hi Kevin,
We use floating license in our Organization. I just installed Understand 2.5 on a new laptop; but it gives an error (unable to connect) when I try to use the license server information. The same license information works fine on another PC on the same network which though has another version of Understand – 2.0 (build 466).
Reading through the support site, it seems I need to update the license on the server for the software to work on the new laptop. But I also see a line saying that, the licenses are not backward compatible. I don’t think it is feasible to ask everyone using understand to update to version 2.5 on their machines so that new license can work.
This being the case, I would like to know if there is an option to download previous versions which does not have this license change?
Thanks
Lee
April 20th, 2010 at 12:33 pm
Hi Lee,
What we’ve been doing is leaving the old licenses on the license server as well, so 2.0 and 2.5 can both use the license. We put an expiration date on the 2.0 licenses, usually 6 months to a year, to give other users plenty of time to upgrade. That way everyone is happy. If that works for you, go ahead and send keys@scitools.com an email and we’ll get your license file upgraded.
Thanks,
KevinG