Stonefield Query for AccountMate Version 8.5

Stonefield Software is pleased to announce the release of version 8.5 of Stonefield Query for AccountMate. There are several new features in this version.

• A new report type, Tiled Dashboard, is now available.

• The new Edit button in step 2 of the Dashboard Wizard allows you to edit the selected report included in the dashboard.

• Dashboards now have a toolbar with buttons to pause/restart refreshing or move to the previous or next set of reports.

• Dashboards no longer display a blank cell while a report is being refreshed.

• You can now add a watermark to a report when you print or output to PDF.

• The new Include Totals output setting determines whether totals are included in Microsoft Excel data format documents.

• The Use Saved Email Settings option in the Schedule Report Wizard allows you to specify whether or not to use saved email settings.

• The Advanced Diagnostics setting in the Options dialog creates additional diagnostic files helpful for tracking down certain types of issues.

• The Other Data Sources dialog now has a Refresh button.

• Charts no longer show point labels for 0 values.

• The Commonly Used functions list in the Expression Builder and the list of function when you choose Is as the operator for a filter now both have fiscal year functions.

• You can now ignore certain filter conditions when scheduling a report.

• AccountMate 13.01 is now supported.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate Version 8.4

Stonefield Software is pleased to announce the release of version 8.4 of Stonefield Query for AccountMate. This is mainly a maintenance release but there are a few new features.

• A report can now be scheduled to repeat every so many hours.

• You can now specify that scheduled tasks be synced across time zones.

• The Schedules dialog now has an Import function to allow you to import schedules, such as when moving Stonefield Query from one machine to another.

• The Print Setup dialog now allows you to choose a different paper size and source, overriding the template settings.

• If a formula starts with "=", it's output as a formula to Excel.

• The email settings in effect at the time a report was scheduled was created are used to email the report when the schedule runs.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate Version 8.3

Stonefield Software is pleased to announce the release of version 8.3 of  Stonefield Query for AccountMate. There are several new features in this version.

• You can now specify additional files to attach to an email in addition to the file for the report.

• Cross-tab reports now support Highest and Lowest total types for date and datetime fields in the Data area.

• You can now specify the horizontal orientation—left, right, or center, with center being the default—for a chart included in a quick or cross-tab report.

• If you add another data source using the Other Data Sources dialog and that data source isn't available (for example, the other data source is a Microsoft Excel document located on someone's local drive), you no longer get an error message and Stonefield Query will still start up.

• You can now specify that a table added in the Other Data Sources dialog is non-reportable.

• There are several DataGrid enhancements:

  • The new Options dialog allows you to turn on "zebra stripes" (alternate row coloring) and specify what the alternate color is, display zero as blank, display a "splitter" between the grid and any text box for memo fields, auto-fit the grid to the column widths when the form opens, and select the font and size for the grid.
  • The mouse pointer displays as an up arrow (sort ascending), down arrow (sort descending), or "no" symbol (column cannot be sorted) when it's over a column header.
  • Logical (yes/no) fields now display as check boxes.

• You can now choose to not display a row field in a cross-tab report by setting its width to 0.

• The recipient of an emailed report is now logged to the diagnostic file.

• The tool tip for a field in step 2 or 3 of the report wizards now displays if a dynamic color or style is used for the field.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate Version 8.2

We are pleased to announce the release of version 8.2 of Stonefield Query for AccountMate. This is mainly a maintenance release but there are a few new features.

• Stonefield Query now supports Modern Authentication for email.
• You can now indicate that a stored filter is available for all reports or just the current report.
• More Avery label types are now supported.
• Diagnostic files more than 30 days old are now automatically deleted.
• Spreadsheet output was removed since it was almost never used and is superceded by new Microsoft Excel output formats.
• Choosing the new Yes to All option when importing multiple reports means you won't be prompted for each one whether it should overwrite the existing report.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate Version 8.1

We are pleased to announce the release of version 8.1 of Stonefield Query for AccountMate. There are several new features in this release.

• The new Data Grid button in the ribbon and toolbar output a report to a data grid window.

• Everywhere a password can be entered, such as the login dialog or the Email page of the Options dialog, now has a "show password" button that toggles whether the password is shown as plain text or "*****" (it's always stored encrypted regardless of the setting of that button).

• You can now control what folder scheduled tasks are placed in rather than always being in the "root" folder in the Task Scheduler.

• The Test Syntax button in the Customize SQL Statement step of the Customize Report Wizard now tests whether the SQL statement works with the database engine you're connected to; previously, it only tested whether it was valid in Stonefield Query.

• If Shutdown.txt exists at startup (created either by checking for updates or clicking the Shutdown button in the Displayed Logged in Users dialog), you are now prompted whether maintenance has been completed and if you respond yes, that file is deleted and startup continues.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate Version 8.0

We are pleased to announce the release of version 8.0 of Stonefield Query for AccountMate. Here are the new features.

• You can now choose to display a Microsoft Office-like ribbon rather than a toolbar and menu at the top of the Reports Explorer.

• The Microsoft Excel - Data Only and Microsoft Excel - Data-Only (Fast) output types were replaced with a single Microsoft Excel - Data Format output type. Any reports or scheduled tasks using Microsoft Excel - Data Only or Microsoft Excel - Data Only (Fast) now automatically use Microsoft Excel - Data Format instead.

• You can now specify that a field should be output as a bar code in quick and label reports.

• You can now use multiple page columns in a quick report. This is useful for reports that don't have many fields: rather than having the right side of the page empty, another column of records can be output there.

• A new date format is available: Abbrev. Month/Year. This displays a three-letter abbreviation for a month, such as "Jan 2021" for "January", which allows columns in a report, especially a cross-tab report, to be narrower.

• You can now use a dynamic expression for both the foreground (text) and background colors of a field in a report. Also, dynamic colors and font styles are now supported when you output to Microsoft Excel - Data Format.

• You can now specify an email address to be notified when a scheduled report fails due to an error.

• The Scheduled Tasks dialog has three new features: you can stop a running task, you can disable a task without deleting it, and you can select multiple tasks and delete or disable/re-enable them.

• The Preview window has some new features:

  • The new left panel, which can be expanded or collapsed, contains bookmarks, page thumbnails, and search results.
  • There are more choices for Pages to Display: all the way up to 11x5.
  • You can now zoom a report up to 6,000%.

• You can now get the CC email address to use for a report from a field.

• Fields in the group header of a quick report are now left-aligned with each other if they appear on separate lines.

• Turning on the Auto-Fit to Page setting for a cross-tab report now causes the font to be reduced automatically if it can fit all of the columns on one page.

• The GetValueForParameter function now accepts a format parameter.

• Hovering your mouse over the file name in the Output page of the Reports Explorer now shows the type of output as a tooltip. This is helpful because, for example, several output types use XLSX as a file extension.

• The SQL statement generated for a report can now be up to 16,000 characters; previously, the limit was 8,000.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate 7.6

We are pleased to announce the release of version 7.6 of Stonefield Query for AccountMate. Here are the new features.

• You can add a new data source to report on, such as another database or a Microsoft Excel document. Note: you have to be an Administrative user with an Ultimate license to use this feature.

• Related to the previous item, if there is no relationship between the tables used in a report when you add a field in step 2 of the report wizard, you are now prompted to create one rather than just being given a warning.

• You can now visually see the relationships for the tables in a SQL statement by clicking the View button in the Customize SQL Statement step of the Customize Wizard.

• You can now prevent a user running a report from ignoring an ask-at-runtime filter condition.

• The Reports Explorer now shows how long the last run of a report took. This is also available in Usage Reporting.

• You can now force all users to log out by choosing Display Logged in Users from the Tools menu and clicking the Shutdown button. Users have three minutes to finish what they're doing and exit the program or it is terminated. This is handy if you need to install a new version or perform some maintenance that requires all users to be out of the program.

• You can now use Microsoft SQL Server or some other database to host Stonefield Query's data tables, such as Users and Reports, rather than them being DBF files on disk.

• You no longer get a warning message if the Everyone group doesn't have any data sources selected in the Maintain Users and Groups dialog. That allows you to turn off all data sources for all users and then turn it on group by group.

• By default, the Login dialog displays the name of the last user who logged in. You can prevent that by adding AutoLoginName=N to Data.ini.

• Previously, the Login dialog showed a list of data sources available to the system, whether the user who logs in can access them or not. Now, it doesn't display any data sources until the user name is entered and then only shows the data sources that user can access.

• The Logged In Users menu item is now only available for Administrator users.

• You can now specify whether you want to support newer email protocols or not (some mail servers require it) in the Options dialog. You can also now turn on email logging, which is helpful if emails cannot be sent for some reason. You can also determine which of several SSL/TLS settings should be used rather than just on or off.

• You can now customize the subtotals line in the group footer of a report using a template.

• The new SpelledOut function spells out a numeric value. For example, SpelledOut(5.25) returns "Five dollars and 25 cents".

• You can now specify whether a cross-tab report with a page field has column totals or not.

• A message is now displayed if login fails.

• The Windows account a scheduled report runs under no longer has to have run the application to specify email settings. Instead, the email settings for the user who scheduled the report are used.

• The image in the Sample page of the Reports Explorer is now scrollable.

• You can now access our Customer Portal from an item in the Help menu.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate Version 7.5

We are pleased to announce the release of version 7.5 of Stonefield Query for AccountMate. Here are the new features.

• Clicking a data point in a chart in a dashboard may now refresh other charts in the dashboard. This allows you, for example, to have a chart showing sales by year and another chart showing sales by month in a specific year. Clicking a year in the first chart changes the year used in the second one.
• Related to the previous feature, you can have a chart in a dashboard automatically cycle through its X-axis values as filter values for other reports in the dashboard.
• You can now specify that a chart included in a quick or cross-tab report should appear on its own page.
• Charts now show "(None)" instead of a blank series.
• The Output each group as a separate file option for outputting to file or email is now supported for chart reports.
• The paging control in a chart now only appears if there's more than one page of data points.
• Column heading objects no longer appear on the last page of a report containing a chart at the bottom.
• Negative numbers formatted to display with parentheses are now right-justified on the last numeric position rather than on the closing parenthesis.
• You can now specify vertical alignment for objects—top, middle, or bottom—in the Advanced Report Designer.
• Microsoft Excel documents created by outputting a report using Excel Data-Only (Fast) output now support the desired font and size for each column and display fields formatted as % properly.
• Tooltips are now supported. You can specify the tooltip for a field in the Properties dialog and that tooltip appears when you hover the mouse over a value for that field in the Preview window, in a PDF file, and in a HTML file.
• You can now enter comments for a folder when you create or edit it and the comments are shown on the Information page of the Reports Explorer.
• The default value for the Weeks starts on setting in the Options dialog is now the same as your Windows Regional Settings.
• You can now report on several fields in the reports table, including Comments, Created By, and Created At, in the usage reporting module.
• Preview functionality in the Advanced Report Designer that was removed in version 7.2 was restored.
• The default for the Display grid lines setting is now turned on.
• Cross-tab reports output to Excel Data-Only (Fast) now handle numeric row fields as numeric and don't include subtotals.
• You can now optionally sum a numeric field in the row of a cross-tab report.
• You can now specify a list of values for the user to choose from in the GetValuesForParameter function.
• You can now create and populate a ValuesCollection object using the new ValuesCollection function.
• Emailing using SMTP now handles email servers that use a newer protocol for SSL.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate Version 7.4

We are pleased to announce the release of version 7.4 of Stonefield Query for AccountMate. Here are the new features.

• There's a new option when emailing a report: Embed report in email. Turn this on to include the report as HTML in the body of the email.

• There's a new output type: Microsoft Word Merge to a PDF file.

• Output to Microsoft Excel Full Format (XLSX file) and Microsoft Word (DOCX file) is now supported from a scheduled task since those formats no longer need the application (Excel or Word) to be installed on the system and run during output.

• Output to HTML is now supported when emailing.

• Users who have the Advanced setting turned off can no longer view snapshots for report runs nor turn that setting on in the Options dialog.

• Grouping formulas that contain ask-at-runtime filter conditions now put the values of those conditions into the Parameters collection of the report object so they can be used if necessary, such as in a report header.

• You can now change the Data group or table for an existing formula when you edit it from the Formulas dialog. You still can't change those when you edit the formula from step 2 of the report wizards.

• If you want to manually create the result set for a report in the AfterData script of the report, enter "*:" for the SQL statement in the Customize Report Wizard to indicate that Stonefield Query should not retrieve any data itself.

• You can now pass a single default value rather than a collection of values as the default parameter for the GetValueForParameter and GetValueForField functions if you aren't using the between or is one of operators.

• The Check for Updates function now works with our recently changed web server.

• A better message is displayed if testing the email settings in the Options dialog fails.

• <img> tags are now supported in HTML content when the Display as setting in the Field Properties dialog is set to "Formatted HTML".

• Information for several data.ini options was added to the documentation.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate Version 7.3

We are pleased to announce the release of version 7.3 of Stonefield Query for AccountMate. Here are the new features.

• Cross-tab reports have a new engine that is significantly faster and more flexible than the older engine. New cross-tab reports default to using the new engine while existing reports use the older engine. You can change which engine a specific report uses with the Use older engine setting in step 5 of the Cross-Tabulation Wizard.

• You can now specify that the chart included in a quick or cross-tab report appears at the end of each group (page field in the case of a cross-tab report), showing just the data for that group, rather than at the end of the report. The Display chart after each group setting in the Other page in step 2 of the Chart Wizard controls that.

• Cross-tab reports now have an Auto-fit to page setting that if turned on causes columns to be spaced across the page if necessary.

• The new Display totals page setting in step 5 of the Cross-Tabulation Wizard allows you to specify whether a totals page appears at the end of the report or not when the report has a page field.

• Turning on the new No summary at the first grouping level setting in the Format page of the Field Properties dialog for a quick report allows you to have a summed parent field in the detail band that only shows the parent value in the group footer but the sum in higher level groups and the report summary band. For example, suppose you have a report that's grouped by Customer Name (from the Customer table) first then by Invoice Number (from the Invoice Header table) and includes Quantity Ordered, Extended Price (both of those from the Invoice Details table), and Freight (from the Invoice Header table). If you sum on Freight, the total in the group break for each invoice will be too high because it sums Freight (which is a field in Invoice Header, which is the parent table for Invoice Details) for each detail record. Turning this setting on for Freight tells the report to not include the sum for Freight in the group footer for Invoice Number but do include it in the group footer for Customer Name and to only sum up at that level.

• If you turn on the new Use "Other" for non-top records setting in the Customize Report Wizard, records outside the top values are combined into a single "Other" value. For example, if you turn on Select only top, choose 10 for the number of records, and turn on Use "Other" for non-top records, rather than displaying only the top 10 records, the report shows the top 10 plus an Other record with all other records combined.

• Formulas are no longer automatically tested for correctness; you are prompted whether you want the expression tested or not. It might be useful to choose No if the expression takes a long time to evaluate.

• Formulas using complex SQL expressions are now better supported.

• You can now schedule a report on the last day of the month.

• You can now specify which database to use when scheduling a report.

• The Reports Explorer now shows on the Information page the number of reports and folders contained in a folder when you select that folder.

• Turning off the new Check for new or modified report files at startup setting in the Options dialog speeds up startup performance.

• You can now specify the increment and minimum/maximum values for the right-axis when two data fields are used in a chart.

• The Continue running reports if cannot connect or one report fails setting now applies to all users.

• Fields with Show percentage of total turned on now show "100%" in the summary band.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate Version 7.2

We are pleased to announce the release of version 7.2 of Stonefield Query for AccountMate. There are lots of new features in this release.

• A new script is available for reports in the Customize Report Wizard: BeforeOutput. This script allows you to change output settings for the report before it's output to file or email.

• If a subreport has an ask-at-runtime filter condition that matches a filter condition in the main report, the value of that filter condition for the main report is used for the subreport and you are no longer prompted for the value (similar to the way this works for linked reports).

• Cross-tab reports can now have a page field, which appears in the page header and causes a page break when its value changes.

• You can now specify the number of points per page in a chart that's part of a quick or cross-tab report.

• You can now specify whether the Y-axis scale of a chart is determined automatically and, if not, what the minimum and maximum values are.

• Gauges are now centered in their preview window.

• The Scheduled Tasks dialog has a Diagnostic button that displays the content of the most recent diagnostic file for the selected task.

• You can now append to an existing Microsoft Excel document when outputting to Excel full format.

• You can now specify whether an Excel document has gridlines.

• You can now choose the merge type, Letter or Directory, when outputting to Microsoft Word Merge. This affects where pages break in the generated Word documents.

• The new Shadowed setting allow you to specify whether the data shapes in bar, column, pie, and donut charts are shadowed.

• A chart in a quick or cross-tab report can now be different than the main report. For example, a cross-tab with Country in the row, Order Date (displayed as Year) in the column, and Sales Amount in the data can have a chart has Order Date (displayed as Quarter) as the x-axis and Sales Amount as the Y-axis (that is, Country isn't used in the chart).

• You can now turn on Subtotal on This Field for a date field formatted as an aggregate date (such as Quarter or Year) in the rows of a cross-tab report.

• You can now create a template that displays only the page header rather than both the page header and report filter.

• You can now press Enter to add a line break in the Expression Builder for report headers and footers, the message of an email, and the Customize Report Wizard.

• The Expression Builder button is now available for the custom description of a filter condition.

• In the Expression Builder, clicking the Values button to display the Values dialog and selecting a value now inserts that value into the expression.

• You can now use loReport.GetReportHeader(.T.) in a report template to display the page header without the report filter.

• If you import a template with the same name as an existing one, you're asked if you want the imported template to overwrite the existing one or be imported with a new name.

• The last page of the Formatting Options step in the Chart Wizard is now labelled "Other" because it contains other settings.

• You can no longer use the Edit Chart button for a chart that's part of a quick or cross-tab report because it doesn't work properly.

• You can no longer use the Print Preview function in the Advanced Report Designer since it isn't reliable.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate 7.0

We are pleased to announce the release of version 7.0 of Stonefield Query for AccountMate. There are lots of new features in this release.

• Multiple license types are now available. This allows you to decide what set of features you would like to have.

• You can now evenly spread the columns across the page in a quick report by turning on the Auto-fit to Page setting. This setting adds extra space between the columns so the fields take up the entire width of the page.

• You can now sort a cross-tab report by a data field. This can be used to, for example, show customer sales by country and product with the largest customers (by sales) at the top and smallest at the bottom.

• You can now specify the number of columns to display in a dashboard. If the total number of cells (rows multiplied by columns) is less than the number of reports, the reports are cycled through in sets at the specified interval. For example, if you specify two rows and two columns, only four reports can be displayed at a time, so if the dashboard contains six reports, the first four are displayed, then the next two, then the first four again. The interval is now in seconds rather than minutes. Also, you can now add more than 9 reports to a dashboard.

• You can now specify the minimum and maximum values for a gauge. The goal value is now optionally shown as a goal marker on the gauge.

• Fields containing HTML and rich text (RTF) content can now be displayed as formatted text.

• The performance of outputting a report with a large number of records (tens of thousands) to Microsoft Excel Data-Only (Fast) was greatly improved (90% faster) and produces smaller XLSX files.

• You can now format a field to display negative numbers in parentheses rather than with a minus sign (for example, (123.45) instead of -123.45).

• You can now specify the title settings for the right axis in a chart that has a field plotted on the right axis.

• You can now create a stacked chart when there is no series field but there is more than one value field.

• You can use the new built-in variable ChartTotal to display the total of a chart, such as in the title of the chart.

• A new type of formatting is available for date fields: Day, which displays Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, etc.

• When you compare a field to another field in the Filter Condition dialog, the drop-down list of fields to compare to now includes fields from other tables in the report, not just the ones from the selected table.

• You can now drill down from a report using an aggregate date (such as Month/Year) to one using a filter on a date range.

• You can no longer sort a chart by values if there's more than one values field or if there's a series field because the chart doesn't support sorting on more than one set of values so the sets don't match with the x-axis.

• The Select Values dialog, which appears when you click the Values button in the Filter Condition dialog or the Expression Builder, now has a Search option so you can search for values.

• The value for a filter condition can now be used in the custom description of the condition.

• The Preview window has new zoom levels: 1000%, 800%, and 500%.

• Expression builder buttons are now available for the header and footer of a report and for the subject and message of an email, making it easier to enter expressions for these things.

• The GetValueForField and GetValueForParameter functions now accept a parameter indicating which value for "is between" and "is one of" conditions is returned.

• You can no longer schedule a report to output to any Microsoft Excel format other than Microsoft Excel Data Only (Fast) or any Microsoft Word format because the other formats require running Excel or Word behind the scenes and they cannot be reliably run from a scheduled task as Microsoft themselves admit.

• The Format function can now use < and > as delimiters for placeholders in addition to { and }. This allows it to be used in expressions, which use { and } as the expression delimiters; for example, {Format('<0:c2>', MyValue)} works but {Format('{0:c2}', MyValue)} doesn't because of the confusion of the two uses of { and }.

• The default Add Missing Values setting for date fields in a chart is now turned off.

• You can now include commas in values passed to filter conditions in a parameters file by escaping them (prefixing them with a backslash); for example, <value value="My Company\, LLC"</value>.

• Cross-tab reports now use weighed averages rather than average of averages when Average is used for a data field.

ClickBase Competitive Upgrade

With the ending of support for ClickBase for AccountMate, finding a replacement may be difficult. Stonefield Query is that replacement.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate provides a step-by-step method to create professional business reports from information stored in AccountMate. Anyone can create detailed reports, high level overview, drill-down, charts/graphs, pivot tables, and more in minutes rather than hours. Stonefield Query for AccountMate works with the latest version of AccountMate SQL and earlier versions.

Stonefield Software is offering AccountMate users a 50% off competitive upgrade from ClickBase to Stonefield Query for AccountMate until June 30, 2018.  That includes one Report Designer license and five Report Viewer Subscription licenses. Contact sales@stonefieldquery.com for more details.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate webinars

Stonefield is presenting a webinar for AccountMate Business Partners on Stonefield Query for AccountMate and our new ClickBase competitive upgrade on Wednesday, January 17, 2018 at 1:00 Eastern. Register today on the AccountMate Business Partner web site.

We are also presenting a webinar for AccountMate users on Stonefield Query for AccountMate and our new ClickBase competitive upgrade on Wednesday, February 7, 2018 at 1:00 Eastern. Register today at https://www.accountmate.com/education/webcasts.asp

Stonefield Query for AccountMate Version 6.0

We are pleased to announce the release of version 6.0 of Stonefield Query for AccountMate. There are lots of new features in this release; the major ones are:

• You can now add subreports to quick reports.

• A new type of formatting is available for date fields: Fiscal Year. For example, if the Year Starts In setting in the Options dialog is set to November, a date of 12/06/2016 displays 2017 (since it's in the 2017 fiscal year) when the date is formatted as Fiscal Year.

• You can now include reports that have ask-at-runtime filter conditions in a batch report. When you run the batch report, it now prompts you for all unique conditions for all reports at the start of the run and uses those values for the conditions in all reports. That way, you aren't asked more than once for the same value.

See What’s New in This Version for a complete list.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate Version 5.2

We are please to announce the release of version 5.2 of Stonefield Query for AccountMate. There are lots of new features in this release.
Report Designer

• There are two new settings on the Grouping page of the Properties dialog for fields in step 2 of the Quick Report Wizard: Retrieve all records and Number of records per group. Turn off Retrieve all records and enter a value for Number of records per group to limit the number of records per group. You can combine this with sorting on one of the fields in the detail for the group to see the oldest or newest record. For example, suppose you want to see only the most recent activity for a customer. To do that, group on customer name, set Number of records per group to 1, and sort on the activity date in descending order.
• There's a new setting for formulas: Calculate value at group level. This setting allows certain formulas to be re-calculated at the group level rather than just being summed, such as profit margin or other types of ratio calculations for which summing and averaging don't work. To indicate that the formula should show group values in a report, set the Summary option for the formula in the report to a new choice: Group Calculation.
• A new type of filter operator is available for date fields: Is. When you choose this operator, you can select a date type to compare the field to, such as This Week, Last Year, or This Month to Date, from a drop-down list.
• Dashboards can now include all types of reports, not just charts and gauges. Note, however, that the dashboard window doesn't scroll so it's really only appropriate for short, informative reports.
• Step 2 of the report wizards now shows information about the field under the mouse pointer in a "balloon" tip. For the Available fields list, the balloon shows any comments about the field. For the Selected fields list in a quick report or label, the balloon shows how the field is formatted in the report: whether it's grouped or summed, what numeric or date format is used, and so on. This allows you to see at a glance information about the field without having to click the Properties button.
• You can now select more than one grouping field for a grouping formula. This is necessary for a formula that, for example, show sales for a certain date range by customer and product.
• A new type of output is available: Microsoft Excel - Data Only (Fast). This is similar to Microsoft Excel - Data Only but is faster and doesn't require that Excel is installed on the system. This format works better that Microsoft Excel - Data Only with scheduled reports because Excel doesn't always work correctly when run from a scheduled task.
• You can now specify whether category and series fields are sorted in ascending or descending order in a chart.
• You can now specify a background color for fields in a report in the Properties dialog. Sample text shows what the colors of the field will look like in the report. You can also revert to the default color for the field by turning on the new Use default color setting.
• You can now export and email a report layout to someone in one step: right-click the report in the Reports Explorer and choose Email Report File, enter their email address, and click Send.
• The Filter page in the Reports Explorer and report wizards has a new setting: Warning if no filter when report is run. This used to be a global option in the Options dialog but is now available on a report-by-report basis. The setting in the Options dialog was changed to Default warning if no filter when a report is run and it now determines what the default is for that setting for new reports.
• You can now specify the font for X-axis, Y-axis, and point labels in charts.
• When you output a cross-tab to a Microsoft Excel PivotTable, the PivotTable now supports the Show percentage of total, Show difference from previous column, Show percentage change, Column totals, Row totals, Display date as, and numeric format settings for the cross-tab report.
• The Options dialog no longer has a Date Format setting; the application now always uses the date format specified in the Windows Control Panel.
• If no output settings are specified when a report is run from the command line, the saved output settings for the report are used if there are any.
• If an advanced layout report has any images, such as a company logo, those images are included in the SFX file for the report. If you export the report and send the SFX file to someone but forget to send them the image files used by the report, the Import process they use to add the report to their reports list creates a new folder called Images and puts the images imbedded in the SFX file there. The benefit of this is that you no longer get an error about a missing image in this case.
• Some settings in the Options dialog now affect all users on a network: Create and display report snapshots, Send summary queries to database engine, Week starts on, and Year starts in. These settings are saved in Data.ini in the Data subdirectory of the program folder rather than in the Windows Registry where other settings are saved.
• The Show totals in group headers setting for quick reports is now available for advanced layout reports.
• The positions of the Advanced Layout, Chart, and Edit buttons in step 5 of the Quick Report and Cross-Tab Wizards was changed a little to accommodate other controls.
• The Alignment setting in the Properties dialogs for fields now displays icons for left, right, and center alignment.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate 5.1

We are please to announce the release of version 5.1 of Stonefield Query for AccountMate. There are lots of new features in this release.

• AccountMate 9.3 for SQL is now supported.
• Several changes were made to gauges. First, the gauge has a new, more attractive appearance, including an option to show the current value using "digital" digits like a speedometer. Second, the performance of gauges on some systems was dramatically improved. Third, there are several new settings: you can specify that the goal comes from a specific value rather than a field, saving you having to create a formula for this purpose; you can specify the font and color of the gauge labels; you can specify band end values as amounts instead of percentages; and you can specify at what percentage the goal value appears. Also, the "distinct" setting in the Customize Wizard is now available.
• You can now edit labels using the Advanced Report Designer, allowing you to move fields around or tweak the layout.
• The new Grid Bars option for charts draws alternating horizontal bars in a chart, making a more attractive chart.
• The new Scheduled Tasks function in the Tools menu allows you to display the status of your scheduled reports, including last run date and result, and edit or delete schedules.
• The new Find Reports Using a Field and Find Reports by Name functions allow you to see which reports include a particular field, either in the report itself or in the filter conditions for the report, or to find reports containing text you specify in the name.
• A new Summary option for grouping formulas, Combine, allows you to combine the values of a field from several records. This is useful, for example, to create a formula that lists all of the products purchased by a customers in a single record rather than one record per purchase.
• The Formula Editor has a new code editor button. This button allows you to create and edit custom functions without having to put code in RepProcs.prg and without having to exit Stonefield Query every time you make a change to the code.
• The Formula Editor also has a new security button. This button allows you to indicate which user groups can see the formula and which can modify or delete the formula. The Formulas dialog now only displays formulas the user has access to and only enabled the Edit and Remove buttons if the user is in a group that has those permissions.
• The Formula Editor also has a Default Summary setting. This allows you to determine if numeric fields are automatically summed, averaged, or summarized in some other way by default.
• The Formulas dialog can now filter the list of formulas to only those in a certain table or Module. It also has a new Reports button showing you which reports use the selected formula.
• The report wizards have a new Save As button that allows you to save the report as a new report rather than having to first choose Copy and then edit the copy.
• You can now turn on the Ask at runtime setting for a filter condition using an expression as the value to compare to. In that case, the evaluated value of the expression is displayed as the default value for the condition in the ask-at-runtime dialog.
• The Filter Condition dialog no longer has a More button; the dialog is always expanded so the options in it are more discoverable. Also, there are new Ends With and Does Not End With operators and a new Custom Description setting.
• You can now select the direction (ascending or descending) of the sort of a group in the Advanced Report Designer.
• You can now indicate whether a header row of field names is included when outputting a report to Microsoft Excel data-only, comma-delimited, or text files.
• You can now specify the starting month of a fiscal year in the Options dialog so dates displayed as quarter use the correct quarter number for your fiscal year.
• The Maintain Users and Groups dialog now has a spot for the email address for each user. This address is used to send emails to technical support if the user hasn't filled in the settings in the Email tab of the Options dialog.
• You now get a warning when running a dashboard if any of the reports are missing.
• Temporary files more than a week old are now deleted when you close Stonefield Query to keep your temporary files folder from getting too full.
• You can no longer enter an email address formatted as "Some Name <somename@somecompany.com>" because that causes a scheduled report to fail.
• The Automatically sum numeric fields setting in the Options dialog was removed, as it's now controlled on a field-by-field basis.
• You now get a warning if you schedule a report to output to or email a file on a mapped drive, since drive mappings don't work well in scheduled tasks.
• Step 2 of the report wizards no longer has Add All and Remove All buttons, since those were were rarely used and accidentally using them causes changes you likely didn't expect.
• Turn on the new No message if no records setting for dashboards to not display a warning if there are no records for a particular chart in the dashboard.
• Importing a report containing an updated formula is now easier. In previous versions, if a formula was edited (for example, the expression was changed) at another site and a report containing that formula was exported and sent to you, importing the report didn't update the formula at your site. Instead, you had to delete the formula before importing the report. Now, when you import a report containing an existing formula that's different than your copy of the formula, you're prompted if you want to replace your formula with the one in the report.
• Importing an update to an existing report is also now easier: you are prompted if you want to replace the existing report with the one being imported. If you choose No, the imported report is given a new name (the same behavior as in previous versions).
• You now get a printer dialog when clicking the Print dialog in the Preview window for a chart.
• The dialog displayed when you click the Email button in the Preview window now has the same options as the Output page of the Reports Explorer.
• If another user is logged in with the same name, the application doesn't terminate but instead redisplays the Login dialog.
• You can now specify a width greater than 1000 for a chart, which is helpful if it's output in landscape.
• The Schedule Wizard now remembers the user name and password in the last step so you don't have to enter them every time you create a schedule.
• The size and position of the Select Email Addresses dialog is now remembered.
• If you use an ask-at-runtime filter condition for a grouping formula, the ask-at-runtime dialog now displays the name of the grouping formula so you can tell which formula the dialog is asking for values.
• You can now choose "Expression" for the Compare to setting for a filter condition using a formula.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate Version 4.3

We are pleased to announce the release of version 4.3 of the Stonefield Query AccountMate. Here are the new features in this version.

• You can now create batch reports. A batch report automatically runs several reports, outputting each to the desired destination. This is handy if, for example, you normally run the same three reports at the end of every week. Rather than choosing them one at a time, you can create a batch report that combines those three reports and just run it. You can even schedule batch reports.
• You can now append the output of a report to an existing Microsoft Excel output file. In that case, the report appears in a new worksheet (tab) within the spreadsheet. This even works if the file is already open in Excel. You can also now choose XLSX or XLS as the extension for a Microsoft Excel output file.
• Turning on the new Start each group on a new page option for the first row field in a cross-tab report causes each group of records to appear on its own page. You can also now turn on the Output each group as a separate file and Output each group as a separate email settings so each group is output to its own file or email.
• The new Delimited - Microsoft Excel Format output type outputs to a comma-separated values (CSV) file but uses Excel formatting so things like leading zeros are preserved when the file is opened in Excel.
• Formulas are now stored in the same folder as reports (in a file named CalcFields.DBF) so if the program runs on a workstation but reports are shared on a server, so are the formulas. For backward compatibility, the program will still look for CalcFields in the Data subdirectory of the program folder so you won't lose your formulas, so this works better for new installations rather than existing ones.
• You can now enter a formatted SQL statement in the SQL Statement step of the Customize Report dialog. For example, carriage returns and tabs are now permitted. This makes it easier to take a SQL statement from another application and paste it into a report's SQL statement. Note that this change now requires you to prefix procedural code with "*-" if you want to use code rather than a SQL statement (a rare occurrence).
• Microsoft Excel full-format output works better now: the output has a single page header at the top of the document and a single page footer at the bottom rather than header/footer sections where the pages would normally break, and the use of empty columns and rows for positioning is minimized.
• Stonefield Query now handles font scripts other than Western, such as Cyrillic or Greek. You can select the desired script in the Font dialog that appears when you click the font button in the Field Properties dialog of a report wizard or in the Advanced Report Designer.
• Clicking the Add All or Remove All buttons in Step 2 of the report wizards now display a prompt asking you to confirm if you want to do that to prevent inadvertently adding all fields in a table to a report or removing all fields from a report.
• The application no longer erases the diagnostic log (Diagnostic.txt in the Data subdirectory of the program folder) if KeepLog=Y is in Data.INI. This is useful for checking diagnostics over multiple runs, such as for scheduled reports.
• You can now resize dashboard windows to a much smaller size than before.
• You can now edit a chart that's included in a quick report with an advanced layout. The Size page in Step 4 of the Chart Wizard is now disabled in that case, since you cannot change the chart size.
• You can now click the serial number in the About dialog (available from the Help menu) to copy your serial number to the clipboard. This makes it easier to enter the serial number when creating a ticket in our online support ticket system.

Stonefield Query for AccountMate 3.3

We released version 3.3 of Stonefield Query for AccountMate LAN and SQL today. The list of new and enhanced features in version 3.3 is extensive; see the online help for complete details. Here are the major new features.

Report Designer

• The new Formula Editor allows you to create your own formulas without using the Advanced Report Designer or customizing the data dictionary.
• The new Show percentage of total option in the Format page of the Field Properties dialog automatically adds a new column to the report showing the percentage that the field is of the subtotal in detail lines, of the next level of grouping in subgroup footers, and of the grand total for group footers.
• Turn on the new Show totals in group headers option in Step 5 of the Quick Report Wizard and the Options page of the Reports Explorer to display group totals in the group header rather than the group footer.
• Stonefield Query now supports Crystal Reports reports. You can add them to Stonefield Query using the External Report Wizard.
• The Preview window is no longer modal, meaning you can open multiple instances. Also, the new Preview reports in tabbed pages setting in the Options dialog allows you to determine whether different preview windows are used when you run more than one report or whether the reports appear as different tabs in the same preview window.
• There are several new output options available. You can specify that a timestamp is added to the file created to prevent overwriting existing files, that the file emailed to someone shouldn't be deleted after the email is sent, and what filename to use for the emailed file.
• Previous versions of Stonefield Query create a report as a PDF file when emailing the report to someone. You can now specify the type of file used as an attachment.
• You can now specify that each group in a report should be output to a separate file or email and that the email address should come from a field in the report itself. This can be used, for example, to email invoices to customers; the report is grouped by customer name and includes the customer's email address, so each customer's records are emailed to them.
• You can now sort fields in database order or alphabetical order in Step 2 of the report wizards.
• You can now tell Stonefield Query to display in the Tables drop-down list only those tables related to tables already appearing in the selected list.
• Reports are now stored as export files with an SFX extension in a folder structure that exactly matches the folders in the Reports Explorer.
• The new Send summary queries to database engine setting in the Options dialog allows you to specify whether Stonefield Query or the database engine does data summarization. This may significantly improve the performance of certain types of reports.
• The new Run report with no records option in Step 5 of the report wizards and the Options page in the Reports Explorer allows you to run a report when there are no records that match your conditions.

Stonefield Query Wins Another Award

At the 2008 AccountMate Synergy conference earlier this month, Stonefield Query won the Vertical Solution Partner Award for Innovative Integration. We are honored to receive this award and thank AccountMate Corp. for being an outstanding business partner.