After eight weeks of beta-phase Merlin 2.6 is now available as a free update. This version contains a revised import of MS Project 2007 files, as well as detailed revisions to the user interface, the workspaces, and the definition of columns and styles can now be much easier. Of course Merlin 2.6 also contains the usual bug fixes.

New Features

• The new web module is included as a demo in this version of Merlin. To publish your saved Merlin project file over the web, open the publish dialog, switch to the Web Sharing tab and click the start button. Click on the displayed proxy icon to launch your favorite browser or drag the icon onto Mail or iChat to announce your shared project. The following web browsers are supported: Safari 3, Firefox 3 and Internet Explorer 7.0
• The publish dialog owns now an icon for the Project Sharing, which represents the external address of the service. This can be dragged - for an easier communication onto an E-Mail, the iChat window or the Desktop. If the router supports the UPnP or NAT-PMP protocol, it will open the needed port automatically.
• The active set of columns can now be saved as a named column set in the View Options dialogue. A few demo sets are included.
• Style definitions can now be saved as a named style set in the View Options dialogue. A few demo sets are included.

Changes

• Project Stamp in the report can now optionally be deactivated.
• In the utilization view the colored boxes can now display two more values: "Actual working hours" and "Remaining working hours".
• In the Milestone Trend Report a new option to show or hide the "Milestone Labels" is available.
• The Milestone Trend Report shows the chart now over the whole width of the window and the paper print.
• QuickLook of Merlin files contains also the resources and the utilization. For the HTML export it can be set optionally.
• The import of MS Project 2007 mpp files is improved.
• The English and German help files are improved.
• The dialog for saving workspaces has been redesigned.
• The contents of some reports can be sorted by clicking on the table headers.
• For the Milestone Trend Report a new chart layout is defined.
• You can include the conflict state of activities in searches.
• MS Entourage 2008 is now supported in the Library.
• Implemented a "Project" column in activities and utilization view.
• The copyright notice for the reports has changed.

Resolved Issues

• Print headers, footers and margins were not retained in the Merlin file when saved.
• Assigned ressource initials in the advanced search were missing.
• User defined fields were empty after copy & paste.
• First time saving did not work after removing many file elements.
• The menu item "Save Selection…" did not work properly.
• In the Milestones Trend Report the expected bars were not visible in some cases.
• After importing CSV files Merlin could not save the project in some cases.
• While copying resources from one into another project, some of them were not pasted.
• Text notices were not imported from MindManager files.
• Using the duration shortcut "m" expands now to months and no more to minutes.
• If a user did not had the right to see financial values, the base cost were visible.
• The command "Choose target file" did not work.
• Merlin could crash under Tiger if the column "Milestones" were displayed.
• When importing a NovaMind file, the planned work was no more set for groups.
• There was an exception when saving a project with a localization different to English, German or French.
• The CSS definition for the e-mail address in the classic report was defect.
• Entering "FF" in the # predecessor column did not create an end-end dependency.
• The AppleScript implementation contained some conversion and time zone errors for durations.
• The resource type was not included in the XML export format.
• Under some circumstances the flag status column was not displayed correctly in utilization view.
• In the column Milestone there was a "0" displayed for group activities.
• Publishing to Billings when projects are combined was enabled but did not work.
• Merlin crashed rarely if you reverted the changes done to a combined file.
• In the new project assistent, date/time fields were shown in different formats.
• Some issues with the time calculation were fixed.
• Under some circumstances project files could not be saved.
• Copying activities without a given work value resulted in a work of 1 day after pasting.
• Under some circumstances the Information Report was empty.
• Some custom paper sizes were not retained in the Merlin print dialogue.
• Some time units did not work in the French localization.
• Sometimes the Quick Look preview showed an empty page.
• Activities with a slack of 0 could not be found in the advanced search.
• The tab for user defined fields was missing in the inspector for linked projects.
• When synchronizing the assignments of a specific resource, notes did not appear in iCal.
• Some .OO3 files could not be imported.
• The import editor did not work properly.
• Under some circumstances, resource leveling did not close gaps between consecutive activities.
• Opening of combined projects is improved.
• Searching was not possible when the visible time range was limited.
• It was not always possible to undo changes in user defined fields.
• Special characters in the names of user defined fields did not always work correctly.
• Planned values were incorrect when viewing a master file that was generated using the "Separate Selection" option.
• Under some circumstances resources could not be deleted.
• In some cases Merlin crashed when projects with passwords were combined.
• Under some circumstances circular dependencies could be created.
• The settings for resource leveling were not saved in any case.
• The menu item for inserting the current date and time in the text area was grayed out.
• In some cases it was not possible to open Merlin files under Mac OS X 10.4.11.
• The window layout was not saved in the workspaces.
• Under some circumstances, Merlin crashed when showing the EULA dialog.
• The quicklook page and the exported web page were not localized to the system language.
• Red (critical) Gantt dependency lines turned black when they were selected.
• Editing was possible for popup column rows that showed no content.
• Durations specified in unit "months" did not respect the "manMonthDays" project setting.
• The column "base cost accrual" was empty for project rows.
• Resetting of actual values was not always saved correctly to project files.
• Freshly created material resource assignments hat a work value of 100% instead of 1kg.
• Under some circumstances, wrong utilizations were used for calculating expected values.
• The roles of resources can now again sorted manually in the project settings.