v4.0.0.dev9

[benoit-pierre]

Plover 4.0.0.dev9

Plover is going through a huge overhaul to make for a better experience for our users, and developers, too.

Warning: Version 4 is a major change and the configuration file it creates is not compatible with Plover 3 or earlier. Please backup your plover.cfg

Installation Guide

Read the Installation Guide to see which file you need to download.

Features

Core

• A new SET_CONFIG command can be used to change the configuration with a stroke, e.g.:

  "O*EP": "{PLOVER:SET_CONFIG:'translation_frame_opacity':100}",
  "TR*PB": "{PLOVER:SET_CONFIG:'translation_frame_opacity':0}",

  to change the opacity of the "Add Translation" dialog on the fly. (Add set config engine command #989)
• Speed up loading dictionaries. (steno_dictionary: fix StenoDictionary.__setitem implementation #1022)
• Be more restrictive with macro names: only accept valid identifier, so for example == is not handled like a macro anymore. (translation: be more restrictive with macro names #1025)
• Ignore case when processing builtin commands / metas. (Make using builtin commands / metas more user-friendly. #1069)
• Add user friendly names for built-in metas, e.g.: {:retro_case:cap_first_word}, {:retro_currency:$c}, {:attach:attach^}, etc... (Make using builtin commands / metas more user-friendly. #1069)
• Improve orthography rules. (Updated ortho rules for Magnum/Stanley's theory rules.. #1092, Cherry-pick part of #1092 #1212)
• The configuration is now automatically saved on change, rather than on exit. (Improve config handling #1123)
• Add prefix strokes (syntax /STROKE) that will only translate if they are at the beginning of a word. Word endings can be specified with {:word_end} or {$}. (formatting & translations: add support for prefix strokes #1157)
• Add support for conditional formatting (based on the text following a translation): {=REGEXP/TRANSLATION_IF_FOLLOWING_TEXT_MATCH/TRANSLATION_IF_NOT} or {:if_next_matches:REGEXP/TRANSLATION_IF_FOLLOWING_TEXT_MATCH/TRANSLATION_IF_NOT}. (formatting: look ahead support #1158)

User Interface

• Add menu entry for opening the configuration directory ("File" => "Open config folder"). (gui_qt: Add open config folder action #981)
• Automatically focus the input field and pre-select the previous input when the lookup window is activated. (focus the input field when the lookup window is activated #1009)
• Improve the configuration dialog for serial machines: automatically scan available ports and default to the first one. (Save default machine config options, including serial ports #1036)
• The "Add translation" stroke lookup now returns entries for all enabled dictionaries and is debounced to improve performance. (Show dictionary on add translation #1084)
• Added translation into Spanish. (Add translation into Spanish #1165)
• A new command, {PLOVER:SUGGESTIONS}, is available to open the suggestions window with a steno stroke. (Add command to show suggestions window #1184)
• Add support for saving dictionaries:
  • save a copy of each selected dictionary
  • merge the selected dictionaries into a new one
  • both operations support converting to another format (Add dictionaries "save as..." support #1244)
• Added translation into Dutch. (Add Dutch UI translation #1264)
• Added Italian translation. (add Italian translation #1268)

Linux

• The distribution Python is now built with optimization. (Update distributions to Python 3.6.8 #1068)
• Expand the list of supported key names in key combos to include non-US specific keys (like ISO_Level3_Shift). (Load non-us keyboard related keysyms from xkb #1082)
• The default configuration directory on Linux is now ~/.config/plover (~/.local/share/plover is still supported for backward compatibility). (Improve config handling #1123)

macOS

• The minimum version supported by the macOS bundle is now 10.13 (High Sierra). (circleci: update xcode version #1156)

Windows

• The distribution is now 64bits. (Update plugins, development and distributions requirements, and the distributions' Python version #1023)

Bugfixes

Core

• Fix retrospective insert space macro when the previous translation involved suffix keys. (macro: fix retrospective insert space with suffix keys #995)
• Fix updating a dictionary mapping: ensure reverse lookups data stays consistent. (steno_dictionary: fix StenoDictionary.__setitem implementation #1022)
• Fix keymap validation: properly fallback to default keymap when invalid. (config: fix keymap validation #1065)
• Fix lookups by translation: do not ignore lower priority dictionaries when a match is found in a higher priority one. (steno_dictionary: fix StenoDictionaryCollection.casereverse_lookup #1066)
• Fix wordlist support for system plugins: try loading from the system dictionaries root (and not Plover assets directory). (system: fix wordlist loading for plugins #1116)
• Configuration save operations are now atomic. (Improve config handling #1123)
• Fix forced lowercasing of all engine command arguments. (Argument for custom command plugins should not be forced lowercase #1139)
• Fix implicit hyphen handling with numbers only strokes on some theories (e.g. Melani). (steno: fix stroke implicit hyphen handling #1159)
• Fix unbounded memory use in the lookup functions used by the Suggestions window. (Fix memory leak caused by defaultdict access in suggestions feature #1188)

Dictionaries

• Fix a number of invalid entries in the main dictionary. (Fix invalid dictionaries entries #1038)
• Tweak orthographic rules so "reduce/{^ability}" result in "reducibility" instead of "reducability". (Add missing orthography rule alias #1096)

User Interface

• Fix a possible crash on close when opening a read-only dictionary in the editor. (Error when attempting to edit a read-only dictionary #897)
• Fix possible crash when changing machine parameters in the configuration dialog. (gui_qt/config: fix a possible crash #1041)
• Fix internationalization of machine types in the configuration dialog. (Fix machine type i18n support #1061)
• Fix tools shortcuts. (Fix tools main shortcuts #1062)
• Fix crashes due to GUI exceptions reaching the event loop. (Add default GUI exception trap #1135)
• Fix an exception caused by an incorrect assertion that would prevent enabling and disabling extension plugins if they weren't on the first row. (Fix wrong assertion to allow enabling/disabling extension plugins not on the first row #1171)
• Fix changes to the list of enabled extension plugins not being saved to the configuration file. (gui_qt/config: fix configuring extension plugins #1230)
• Fix missing translations. (setup: fix inclusion of translations #1248)

Linux

• Fix output capitalization issue. (Fix output capitalization issue on X #1153)
• Fix a race condition that may freeze Plover while toggling with keyboard input machine. (Lock the display on use in KeyboardCapture for X #1163)

macOS

• Fix an issue where permissions had to be granted to "env" on macOS Catalina 10.15. (Use C launcher instead of sh to fix Mac permissions issues #1152)
• Mac notifications no longer have "Plover" as their title. (osx: Fix notifications not showing as from Plover #1271)

Windows

• Fix Unicode characters output. (Custom system's Unicode key labels confuse Plover's verbatim stroke output #991)
• Fix installer's icon. (Fix Windows installer #1027)

API

Breaking Changes

• StenoDictionaryCollection.casereverse_lookup now returns a set (instead of a list). (steno_dictionary: fix StenoDictionaryCollection.casereverse_lookup #1066)
• The API for providing i18n support as been changed: see doc/i18n.md for more information. (Fix and improve i18n support #1258)

New

• plover_build_utils.setup now provides a new babel_options helper for configuring Babel for i18n support. (Fix and improve i18n support #1258)

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This discussion was created from the release v4.0.0.dev9.

[benoit-pierre]

For installing on macOS Big Sur, see: #1235.

If you're stuck on a macOS version older than 10.3 (High Sierra), see: #1231.

[paulfioravanti]

I love the friendly meta names, and use them extensively in my dictionary outlines. Only issue is that when I do, they don't appear in Plover's lookup anymore. Was that intentional, or should I open an issue?