Release Notes for JMRI 4.7.0 release

Date: February 26, 2017

From: Bob Jacobsen

Subject: Test Release 4.7.0 of JMRI/DecoderPro is available for download.

Notes:

This is a special-purpose test release to get more experience with an new serial library. The content is very similar to JMRI 4.6.

This is a test release. Please post a note if you encounter any new or old bugs! And please back up your JMRI files before installing this, in case you want to go back to an earlier version.

Some of the changes involved are quite extensive. They may require a certain amount of experience before they are working well. Therefore, this test release should be considered experimental.

JMRI is now only available under the GNU General Public License. For more information, please see our copyright and licensing page.

Known problems with this release

• There's a problem creating or changing C/MRI preferences. If you've already configured your C/MRI connection before installing this version, it should continue to work, but you probably won't be able to add, remove or modify the C/MRI node configuration. This should be fixed in JMRI 4.7.2.

New warnings for this release:

• The serial interface library has changed in this release. This has the following known effects:
  • The Digitrax MS100 is expected to be usable on all supported platforms.
  • The JMRI_SERIAL_PORTS environment variable and --serial-ports command line argument are ignored. These options will be restored when merging this into the main JMRI development effort.

Older warnings

See the JMRI 4.6 release note for warnings predating the 4.6 development series. These may be relevant to you if you're updating from an earlier version.

(Since JMRI 4.5.6) As part of fixing the TMCC throttle issue, the handling of TMCC preferences was changed. If you have a TMCC connection configured, please go to the "Defaults" pane in the Preferences window and make sure that the TMCC connection is selected for the appropriate device types.

(Since JMRI 4.5.2)This and future releases of JMRI may not function on OS X if the Java SE 6 provided by Apple is installed. OS X operating system updates routinely remove this version of Java SE 6. Please raise any issues concerning this on the user's group.

To remove Java SE 6 from OS X, follow these steps (these steps assume JMRI is installed in the folder /Applications/JMRI, if not, adjust the following paths as needed):

1. Open Terminal.app.

   El Capitan only: Reboot into Recovery Mode by restarting your Mac and pressing Cmd-R until the Apple logo appears. Once in Recovery Mode, select Terminal from the Utilities menu.

2. Run the command /Applications/JMRI/PanelPro.app/Contents/Resources/uninstall-java6.sh It can take up to a half hour to complete. Wait for the message Removed Apple Java SE6.

   El Capitan only: Run the command bash /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD/Applications/JMRI/PanelPro.app/Contents/Resources/uninstall-java6.sh /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD It can take up to a half hour to complete. Wait for the message Removed Apple Java SE6.

3. El Capitan only: Restart your Mac.

(Since JMRI 4.5.2)Support for directly executing AppleScript within JMRI has been removed due to changes in macOS and Java outside our control. If you require the ability to use AppleScript, you may be able to add this capability on your own by visiting JMRI AppleScript Support, but please be aware that this may not work on upcoming releases of macOS or Java.

(Since JMRI 4.5.1)Internal turnouts and sensors need to have complete, individual system names. The names "IT" and "IS" (without any suffix) are no longer permitted: "IT12" is fine, but just "IT" is not. Most panel files that contain these should automatically migrate them to new names when saved, but in some cases you might need to manually update them.

(Since JMRI 4.3.3) You can now set the order of your startup items: If you're opening panel files, running scripts, etc as the program starts up, there's a preferences pane that lets you easily set the order in which those happen. If you've set the order manually (e.g. by editing configuration files) in the past, please check this preference to make sure it's set the way you want.

(Since JMRI 4.1.2) Jython has been upgraded to version 2.7.0 with the following potentially breaking changes:

• The decodeJmriFilename() function is no longer available by default. Use the FileUtil.getExternalFilename() method instead.
• The simple propertyListener object is no longer available by default. Create your own, following the examples provided in the jython folder in the JMRI distribution.
• jmri_defaults.py included in the JMRI distribution is no longer executed by default, but will be executed before any other Jython scipts if included in your User Files location.
• The default behavior of python.cachedir.skip is now true. If using a custom python.properties file, include "python.cachedir.skip=false" in that file.
• Certain Python scripts are too large to be evaluated in Jython. If a script fails with the java.io.IOException: Mark invalid error, set "jython.exec=true" in a custom python.properties file or rewrite the script to be less than 100,000 characters per file. Note that when using "jython.exec=true" it may be desirable to run the included script jmri_bindings.py as a startup action to emulate the evaluation environment used when jython.exec=false.

(Since JMRI 4.1.1) Decoder definitions that use the "ivariable" form are now deprecated. Definitions included with this release have been converted to the new form. If you have decoder definitions with the older "ivariable" form, they will no longer validate, but can still be used for the first couple of test releases in this series. Please ask on the JMRI Users group for help converting them, or just drop them and use the current definitions.

Download links:

Changes since production release 4.6:

This release is mostly about the update of the serial libraries. It's otherwise quite similar to JMRI 4.6.

The list of included commits is available from our GitHub code repository.

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