To: gnome-announce-list@gnome.org, gnumeric-list@gnome.org
Subject: Gnumeric 0.49 is out.
Gcc: nnml:mail.2000-03
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Hello guys,

   Version 0.49 of the most advanced, beautiful, powerful, impressive
and under-aged, open sourced, free software spreadsheet has been
released.

   This time we got so much work done, it is not even fun to start
writing the list of new features.  There are so many of them.  But
here I go.

* What is in this release

    * GUI engine improvements

	* Redraw improvements (Jody Goldberg, Jon K Hellan)

	  Cursor redraw speed improvements (Jody Goldberg and Jon K Hellan)

	  Selection now softens the color against lavender, instead of
	  inverting the selction, making Gnumeric look beautiful.
	  Thanks Jody!

	  Redraw speedups (Jody Goldberg and Michael Meeks)

	  Underlining support has been added (Jody Goldberg)

	* Lots of GUI polishing (Jon K Hellan)

	* We now have a file history (Mike Kestner, Jon K Hellan)

        * Enhanced border support (Jody Goldberg)

	  Combo box for manipulating borders (Jody Goldberg)

	  We now print borders (Jody Goldberg)

	  Partial double-lines are supported (Jody Goldberg)

        * Mostly correct sizing of MS Excel for columns, rows and
          objects, which keeps us as the best spreadsheet when it
          comes to importing Excel files (Jody Goldberg).

	* It is now possible to select ranges for formulas in other
          sheets, not only in the current sheet (Jody Goldberg)

	* We now have a zoom combo in the toolbar (Erdi Gergo)

	* While editing, there is visual feedback on ranges and cell
	  references (Miguel)

	* Color combo box has been improved (Dom Lachowicz, Jody Goldberg)

	* New font selector using a text combo box (Jody Goldberg)

	* Style preserving column/row insertion(configurable, defaults
          on) (Mike)

	* Paste across Gnumeric instances preserves format now (Almer
	  Tigelaar) 

	* Text importer is now popped-up when pasting text from other
	  applications (Almer Tigelaar)

	  The importer preview is also faster, and it is interactive

	  More separators to choose from on CSV imports.

    * Engine improvements

        * Undo: further work has proceeded in undoing more commands
          (Jody Goldberg)

	* Style undo/redo (Michael Meeks)

        * We now parse interbook references (Jody Goldberg)

	* Error parsing improvements (Jon K Hellan)

	* More errors are checked inside our functions that were not
	  cached in the past (Dom Lachowicz)

	* Text Format Importer moved into the core of Gnumeric (Almer
          Tigelaar)

	* Fixed display of pre 1900 dates (Morten Welinder)

	* Fixed display of very large numbers (Morten Welinder).

	* Lots of warning killing (Morten Welinder).

	* Workbooks now use GtkArgs to keep track of their properties
	  (which will simplify exporting them trough Bonobo
	  properties) and they are now saved into our XML file format
	  (JP Rosevar).

	* Sort modes are directly accesible from the toolbar (JP
          Rosevar). 

    * New features

	* Graphics (Miguel)

	  For the first time graphics can be displayed.  This is still
	  in the "disabled by default" mode, as the code is not
	  finished: we sill do not save nor restore the state of
	  graphics, and they are still missing titles, axis drawing,
	  and a couple of methods.

	  The graphics wizard is not completed, so currently you have
	  to select your range of data to plot, and click on the plot
	  button, select the graphic, and the click on "finish".  The
	  rest of the wizard is not working.

	  Volunteers to hack on it, are welcome.

	  This is still an unsupported feature in Gnumeric.  

	  The graph component as every other nice Bonobo component can
	  be used in other applications (not only in Gnumeric).

    * Solver (Jukka-Pekka)

	* Added `>=' and `=' constraint support for the Solver tool.
	* The Solver input variables can now have the negative values too.
	* Added `Int' constraints support by implementing the
	  Branch-And-Bound algorithm.
	* The Solver parameters are now saved/loaded when the workbook
	  is saved/loaded.
	* Implemented `Answer Report' generation for Solver.
	* Started implementation of `Sensitivity Report' generation for
	  Solver (currently, not very useful though).
	* Major GUI improvementes for Solver, i.g. Solver constraints
          can now be cell ranges, not just cells.
	* Solver documentation added.
	* Added `Advanced Filter' tool.
	* Added the following distributions for the random number
	  generation tool:
	  - Poisson
	  - Binomial
	  - Negative binomial
	  - Exponential
	* Minor improvements for the AutoSave tool.
	* GUI improvements for the Data Analysis tool.
	* Added RandExp(), RandPoisson(), RandBinom(), RandNegBinom(),
	  and RandBernoulli() functions.

    * GUI

	  New icons from Tuomas Kuosmanen (Tigert)

    * CORBA

	* Many bug fixes to the CORBA API and to the CORBA engine
          support from Jon

    * Plugins

        * Python plugin got massively revamped, improved and the API
          is a lot closer to the internals in Gnumeric.  Many new
          things can be done with it (Jon K Hellan)

	* GNOME Basic has been integrated into Gnumeric (support is
          conditionally compiled, and only if you have GNOME Basic
          installed in your system).  (Michael Meeks)

	* Glad-ified the Plugin manager (Dom Lachowicz)

	* Guile plugin can register now function in categories (Ariel Arios)

     And as usual, there are a load of bug fixes that were tracked
down (thanks again to Jody, who did most of the bug tracking work on
Gnumeric).