Blockpad - Blockpad 1.0.0

Release Notes for Blockpad 1.0.0

October 2021

Draw directly on reports and spreadsheets

You can now draw freely in reports and spreadsheets. To draw, either use the tools under the Draw menu directly, or go to Draw > Draw on Page and use the toolbar.

This includes the ability to make floating textboxes within documents and spreadsheets. As always, textboxes and drawings are part of the formula system.

Improved math layout

The Math Layout property includes new options for equation display:

Operator substitutions (including × · ≥ ≤ ≠ and :=)
Wrap long equations across multiple lines
Subscripts and superscripts with reduced text size
Hide namespaces (for example, show A1 instead of Table1.A1)
Show °, °C, and °F in place of deg, C, and F
Built-in function names in lowercase

Note that math layout settings do not change the formula syntax. The formula syntax is always the same, but you have more control over how it is shown on the page.

In addition, equation with Show Steps turned on use the value format from referenced variables.

Other layout improvements

Value fields now have a Type property, set either to Cell (fixed size) or Inline (fit size to text). Value fields can now specify padding and borders.

Equations can now specify padding and borders.

Paragraphs and sections can now specify background and borders.

Tables in reports can now be center and right aligned (in addition to left aligned). To set alignment, select the whole table (or set the caret to the beginning or end of the table), and set the alignment in the toolbar.

Spreadsheet columns can now be wider than a single page. (Formerly, columns were limited to the width of a page, even for a spreadsheet that was now shown as separate pages.)

Units

New units (kgf, metric ton / tonne, mg, μg, ng, MW, GW)

In the formula input box, units are now labeled as defined inside Blockpad's unit library, so you can see exactly how unit conversions are defined.

Formula features

New built-in functions (Hlookup, HlookupApprox, HlookupExact, HlookupInterpolate, Ifs)

The <> operator is now implemented as not equals, in addition to the != operator.

User interface improvements

Clean, consistent theme is now provided throughout the application.

The dark theme has been improved. When dark mode is on, you can separately toggle dark mode for file content through the application settings.

The gray and blue themes have also been improved.

Touch input is now available while editing files, including for drawing.

Support for spreadsheet navigation keys is improved. (Namely, the Up, Right, Down, Left, PageUp, PageDown, Home, and End, with any combination of Ctrl and Shift keys.)

The toolbar and menu now adapt better for smaller windows.

Multi-monitor improvements

UI font size setting

Improvements to docking tool windows

Language and regional setting support

The new Language property sets the spell-checking language for the entire file.

The following languages are now available for spell checking:

Czech
Danish
Dutch
English (UK)
English (US)
Finnish
French
German
Hungarian
Icelandic
Italian
Norwegian
Polish
Portuguese
Romanian
Russian
Spanish

Unfortunately, translations of the user interface are not yet available. We are working on this for the near future. If you can help us with translations for your language, please contact us.

The right click menu for spelling errors includes the Spelling Suggestions and Add to Dictionary tools.

An issue is fixed issue with the AltGr key (for relevant keyboard layouts).

Numerous issues have been fixed for different regional settings around the world. Now, the application should run smoothly for all regional settings.

Drawing tools

The Draw Freehand Line tool is improved.

The Remove Point tool allows individual points to be removed from a line after drawn. In particular, for lines with arrows or with freehand lines, you can select the object, then right click a point and click Remove Point.

While drawing lines, a new right click menu is available, with Undo and Done options. You can also middle click to finish drawing.

Style rules

In the style manager, you can now create styles by name to be applied to individual objects. For example, you could create a style called Result, to apply borders, colors, or fonts to specific equations that you choose. Named style rules, just as existing style rules applied to all objects of a given type, can have value conditions (for types with a value) to create many types of conditional formatting.

The style manager is improved to show only relevant properties and types, based on context.

Embedded images and PDFs

Blockpad now supports SVG, GIF, and WebP images (in addition to JPG and PNG).

There is now a dedicated tool to insert PDFs. Click Insert, choose PDF, then browse for the PDF to embed. As before, you can also choose PDFs while inserting any image.

An issue is fixed that prevented embedding PDFs from loading on some computers.

File management

Under the File menu, the new Save as Template tool is available. Saved templates are available on the local computer whenever using the new file tool, or when clicking All Templates on the blank tab page.

The sample files on the Blockpad website are now available through the Windows application. You can browse and open them from the blank tab page by clicking the Sample Files button.

Through the Windows application, you can now access and make changes to files you have created on the web app or have uploaded. (Note that co-authoring is not yet supported, even if you have set up sharing rules. Whenever a cloud file is saved, saving will override changes anyone else may have made to that file.)

Other notes

This release includes numerous performance improvements and bug fixes.

An issue is fixed with running the Windows application on Parallels for Mac. Note that our official Mac application is in testing and will be generally available in the coming weeks.

This release hides several partially implemented features, including 3D models, behind the Show Experimental Tools setting.

As of this release, the Excel add-in is not automatically installed, but it is still included. To install manually, follow the instructions for installing the Excel add-in.