Version 8.0.1 added a Search button to the Geo Names Atlas. The main issue addressed by this ability is that the astrologer might not be able to find the desired city in the Geo Names Atlas because it is spelled differently. There can be wide variation in the Romanized spelling of Chinese city names, for example. If the astrologer's spelling of the city is in Google, he can usually find a page with its coordinates. Then, after selecting the country file in the Geo Names Atlas form, enter the search coordinates in the longitude and latitude form that comes up after clicking on the Search button at the bottom of the Geo Names Atlas form. Depending on the speed of your computer, it can take a few seconds for the program to search all the 155,000 cities in China (this is more than the entire ACS International Atlas). The Russia file is even larger. Still, you should find it quite satisfying to identify the program's spelling of your city, to select the city in the Longitude/Latitude Search Results list, and then to click OK to see it listed in the Geo Names Atlas. Click Okay on that form to have the city transferred back to the ACS Atlas Lookup form, where, after you make sure that the date and time are correct, Read Atlas will find the time zone for that place and date, and then Transfer to Natal will move it to the Natal Information screen.
Version 8.0.2 commented out some lines for the Here & Now Transits report that were forcing the interpretation to be from the inner planet to the outer planet, wrongly borrowed from the compatibility report routine.
Version 8.0.2 coincided with a change to the hsc3032.dll and hsc6032.dll calculation libraries to handle extra-planetary bodies with extreme eccentricity. Discovered this problem for the distant object Sedna, whose eccentricity is 0.849. The record for orbital eccentricity seems to be held by 2006 SQ372, a small trans-Neptunian object with an eccentricity of 0.976. It turns out that the calculation inaccuracies previously noted for the asteroids Icarus and Hephaistos, with eccentricities of 0.827 and 0.834, were due to this undiscovered and now corrected limitation in the calculation libraries. Am adding the files for Sedna to the distribution CD, as opposed to including in the collection of 28 asteroids that can be downloaded from the web site Updates page. Also decided to add the files for Eris to the CD.
Version 8.0.3 added the transits and progressions report command SwapTimeWithName. Normally, the time that a transiting, progressed, or directed aspect occurs will appear after the aspect name in each aspect heading. But if you select and insert the new report order command, SwapTimeWithName, into a template's report order list and move it above DoTransitsGrid, then the time will appear first, before the aspect name.
Version 8.0.4 fixed some problems putting declination aspects into the aspects list when Sort Parallels into Aspects List is turned On at Miscellaneous Preferences. This problem dates to version 7.1.25 when I expanded/improved the declination synastry display.
Version 8.0.5 added more warnings when File, Merge Chart Files would cause loss of chart records through overwriting, including testing if a smaller number of records will be overwriting a larger number of records.
Version 8.0.6 fixed a problem with the directed midheaven and house cusps of a progressed chart when the sidereal zodiac is selected.
Version 8.0.7 allows the program to calculate solar arc directions against saved Dec-L.E. and Dec-Antiscia charts. Although these saved charts are Derived Charts, that is, artificial charts, which are normally excluded from being the basis for many of the transformations on the Options menu, an exception can be made for the solar arc directions transformation, which consistently directs every point in the saved chart forward by the amount of the progressed Sun's motion.
If you have one of these Declination Equivalent charts selected in the Saved Charts listbox and you go to Options, Progress a Chart, the only Progression Type available will be Solar Arc Directions. It will be the same if you go to Options, List Transits and Progressions, and with the Type set to Progressions or Directions you click on Calculate.
If you want to easily see all of the Dec-L.E. and Dec-Antiscia charts that you have saved in your charts file, go to Options, Research Charts, and click on the Derived Charts tab. Select the radio button for Include Only and the checkbox at the bottom for Declination-Longitude Equivalents. Click to Begin Search. Then you can double-click to display a wheel for any of the charts found. If you X out of the Chart Information screen, that chart will remain selected at the Natal Information screen for you to use with the Options menu.
Version 8.0.8 fixed a problem that could cut off the last couple of lines of an Aspect Patterns report instead of putting them on a new page, especially if the CutOffAtPatternCount command is used.
Version 8.0.8 fixed a problem in the web-enabled version of AstrolDeluxe ReportWriter where the PC Atlas was not being loaded properly in order to get the time zone of a return chart.
Version 8.0.8 makes a small change to the progressions list - it automatically turns off Insert Progressed to Progressed Planet Aspects if the checkbox List Orb dates collated with Exact dates is not checked. The Progressed to Progressed aspects really only make sense when they appear for the Exact date, not at the start or end of the list.
Towards the end of version 8.0.8 started distributing a new transits calculation dll, HST3032.DLL, that ensures getting aspects within orb even if the aspect is beyond a house cusp conjunction that has no orb.
Version 8.0.9 stops trying to close the old-style WinHelp upon program exit. Thought that this was causing Unable to load DLL error at program exit on a 64-bit Windows 7 machine, but that message may have been related instead to some incompatibility with a loaded version of Microsoft Access. Be aware that 64-bit Windows 7 will restore the correct versions of system files when it boots up, so error messages that appear right after installation should go away after you restart the computer.
Version 8.0.10 makes a small change to the progressed interpretation report. The program was checking if the Enter Orb or Leave Orb for a progressed aspect contained "0.0" and if it did the program skipped showing the Enter Orb and Leave Orb dates, but that meant that if the orb for the start date was "0.02" that no enter date and leave date would display. Changed it to check for "0.00".
Version 8.0.11 does not make any change to the program itself, but the version number marks the September 23, 2011 date when a major new acstt.dat file of time zone change tables starts to be distributed on the AstrolDeluxe CDs.
Version 8.0.12 improves the Geo Names Atlas comparison of its region to the PC Atlas region, improving the odds of matching the PC Atlas city with the Geo Names Atlas city.
Version 8.0.12 adds to Customization, Print Courtesy, a new frame In Case of Printing Problems and a checkbox Do Not Initialize Printer. One customer with an HP PSC-1210 All-In-One Printer on Windows 7 was not able to print anything from the Chart Information screen, although he was able to print the simple Subject Data List from the File menu of the Natal Information screen. Checking this box bypasses printer and font initializations that were sometimes necessary with earlier versions of Windows and which may have confused this particular model of HP printer.
Version 8.0.13 fixes More Chart Data for Client Info and Notes to not register a change in the data just from retrieving saved data. This eliminates the annoying message about the chart data having changed and do you want to save when you go to switch away from that chart.
Version 8.0.14 updates the Stamina functions library that is integrated with AstrolDeluxe to the latest version, from 2006.
Version 8.0.14 makes a fix to creating the composite chart. The composite chart for actress/dancer Ann-Margret, born at latitude 64 deg. North and her husband Roger Smith was messed up, with Aquarius on both the Ascendant and Descendant. Made sure that composite cusps 7 through 12 are all 180 degrees from cusps 1 through 6.
Version 8.0.14 added to Options, Research Charts, Search Two, the ability to find charts with a particular one of the eight possible Moon Phases: New, Crescent, First Quarter, Gibbous, Waning, Disseminating, Last Quarter, Balsamic.
Version 8.0.14 fixed a problem where the first person's name on a composite chart comparison could change in response to the double name question. It also enabled the reportwriter commands SubstituteMajorForMinorAspects & SubstituteSextileForQuintileAspects for the composite interpretation reports.
Version 8.0.14 fixed a problem with the planet in house search. The two options, 'Using an Advance Orb' and 'Use cusp proximity' were stomping on each other. If a searcher wanted to use both, the program was acting as if the house cusp had been changed to include the advance amount, so for example, if both were set to 3 degrees it was not finding a planet that was 1 degree inside the house - fixed so that the cusp proximity search is based on the actual cusp of the house. Also ensured that the cusp proximity search would work on planets in advance of the cusp if the desired proximity is less than the advance amount.
Version 8.0.15 expanded the 8 Moon Phases to 16, where these are: 1) New, 2) New-Crescent Cusp, 3) Crescent, 4) Crescent-First Quarter Cusp, 5) First Quarter, 6) First Quarter-Gibbous Cusp, 7) Gibbous, 8) Gibbous-Waning Cusp, 9) Waning, 10) Waning-Disseminating Cusp, 11) Disseminating, 12) Disseminating-Last Quarter Cusp, 13) Last Quarter, 14) Last Quarter-Balsamic Cusp, 15) Balsamic, 16) Balsamic-New Quarter Cusp.
Each of the eight existing 45-degree moon phases was shortened by 10 degrees to make room for the addition of a 10-degree cusp leading to the next phase. This allows the interpretations to be more accurate.
These Moon Phases appear 1) for an individual chart at Display, Chart Analysis; 2) on a new search tab at Options, Research Charts, Search Two, By Moon Phase; and 3) in the separate Edit Interpretations program at Start, All Programs, Halloran Software at Add New, Frequency. The reportwriter adds a new MoonPhase command at Interpret, Report Options, Report Order, Report Items right before the DoBalanceSignElements command near the bottom. This command, inserted into a natal template or composite template, will grab the correct one of the 16 moon phase delineations entered into the interpretation database by the Edit Interpretations program. A future natal interpretation report will have good delineations of these 16 moon phases.
Version 8.0.15 fixed a problem where the Report Express menu could get into a loop if the user selected to do a StarMatch report or Composite Compatibility report and clicked Cancel instead of selecting the second person from the list displayed at the right side. Also ensured that if the user started doing a Journey Progressions report or Journey Returns report, but clicked Cancel at the form requesting the type of report that the Report Express process would terminate.
Version 8.0.16 initializes the planet retrograde flags when creating the composite chart. I noticed that the composite chart had the retrograde flags of the 2nd person to be compared, although the planets are the composite midpoints of two separate planets and have zero motion, neither direct nor retrograde.
Version 8.1.1 changed the name for the composite interpretation report on the Report Express menu from Composite Compatibility to Composite Couples.
Version 8.1.2 fixed a problem that could happen with the name of the two people at the top of the composite report if, after creating the biwheel and the single composite chart, the user saved the composite chart record to file before generating the interpretation report.
Version 8.1.3 implemented a change to the program installation that tries to increase the Windows permissions level assigned to AstrolDeluxe ReportWriter by briefly calling the installed winast32.exe program as one of the final acts during installation. The setup132.exe calls it with "exit" on the command-line and so instead of loading all the way, winast32.exe starts loading and then immediately exits. My hope is that this will prevent customers from encountering error 75 when they try to delete a saved chart, a problem that always disappears if they right-click on the AstrolDeluxe ReportWriter shortcut and select Run as Administrator, which increases the program's Windows permissions level.
Version 8.1.3 also added a test that moredata.chk exists before trying to delete it when the user wants to toggle off More Chart Data on the Customization menu - if the file moredata.chk does not exist, trying to kill it was causing error 53, File not found. This relates back to a change made at minor version 7.1.17. If your charts.cht file has a companion charts.mdb file and you really do not want More Chart Data on, perhaps because something has gone wrong with the Microsoft Jet Access subsystem on your computer, then I suggest renaming the charts.mdb file to have a different name. This is as good a place as any to mention how if you cannot see the *.mdb extension or any other three-letter extension when you are out in My Computer and looking at your files, it is because the default in Windows is to hide the extensions for known file types - you can turn off this frustrating feature at Folder Options, View by unchecking the box Hide Extensions for Known File Types. In Windows XP, Folder Options was on the Tools menu, but Vista/Windows 7 moved Folder Options to the Organize menu.
Version 8.2.1 fixed an aspect pattern display problem that was occasionally causing one of the planets and vertices of an Octile Hexagon pattern to drop from the pattern, first noted for the chart of Ed Sullivan, born 9/28/1901 at 3:30 AM in Manhattan, NY. Also changed the routine to not be so aggressive in removing Octile Hexagon duplicate patterns just because they share some of the same vertices.
Version 8.2.1 adds a feature first created for the new Astrology for Windows, version 3, where if you retrieve a saved composite chart and compare it to a natal chart and create a new composite chart, the name of the composite chart will have the word Triad in it. If you save that new composite it will be in the saved charts listbox under the last name, but with the first name followed by -Triad and the initials of the first names of the two components of the first composite chart. For example, my Triad chart with the composite of my parents is listed under Halloran, John-Triad-RK, where R and K are my parent's initials.
Version 8.2.1 added a scroll bar for the Natal House Advance Orb Width to the Customization, House System form. This sets a global variable that is used at Display, Chart Analysis where the house that a planet is in appears in parentheses () after the planet's zodiac location. In order not to upset existing users, the default advance orb is set to 0 degrees, even though Astrology for Windows, version 3, uses a default value of 4 degrees at its Customization, Horoscope Report Options form.
The Composite Compatibility feature that is new with version 8.2 depends in part on the house placements of the planets in the composite chart. In order to get the most accurate results, I recommend that you set the house advance orb at Customization, House System to between 2 and 5 degrees. Unlike the zodiac signs, where a planet at 29d 59m Pisces really is in Pisces, house cusps are more like power points - a planet that looks like it is in the previous house, but which is close to the next house cusp, lends its power, nature, and influence to that house. The signs color the expression of the planets' energies, but the planets' energies affect the affairs governed by each house. House placements can only be considered when birth times are known.
Version 8.2.1 adds a page of Composite Compatibility calculations to the bottom of the Display menu. The page ranks the compatibility of couples for FRIENDSHIP, BUSINESS, and MARRIAGE by comparing the aspects and house placements in the couple's composite chart to the extensive frequency tables for married, divorced, and famous couples that I compiled in the Spring of 2012 while working on the Composite Couples interpretation report. The page also ranks the couple in different power areas, based on how close and how many are the contacts that each planet has in the composite chart, ranking their power in such areas as: WILL, FEELINGS, INTELLIGENCE, HARMONY, ACTION, SPONTANEITY, DISCIPLINE, INDEPENDENCE, COMPASSION, and COERCION. If the couple's birth times are known, then the page will also rank how much they focus on different life areas, such as: WE, OURS, DAILY CONCERNS, INTIMACY, CREATIVE PROJECTS, SEARCH FOR MEANING, RELATING TO OTHERS, MUTUAL SHARING, EXPLORING THE WORLD, PUBLIC LIFE, GROUP ACTIVITIES, and SPIRITUAL ONENESS. The program looks at both the number of planets in each composite chart house and at the power of that house's ruling planet. All rankings are in percentages compared to the range of observed values for a random population of composite charts.
In order to throw some light on what is behind the FRIENDSHIP, BUSINESS, and MARRIAGE rankings, the page ends with a display of the top aspects and planet placements that contributed the most to a high ranking and to a low ranking. If the composite chart had a planet house placement that contributed to a high BUSINESS ranking, then there will be a final line that mentions the strongest planet house placement that contributed to the BUSINESS ranking.
The captions for the Composite Compatibility page are all read from a file Keywords.txt, so as long as you respect the format and layout of this file, you can change the captions.
Version 8.2.1 ensured that the size of the image at the center of the chart wheel is consistent even at different screen resolutions. It also improved the positioning of the numbers and glyphs on the single, double, triple, and quad wheels at very high screen resolutions.
Version 8.2.2 tests that the assigned TrueType glyph font (normally Halloran) is still installed in Windows. If you upgrade your computer from Windows Vista to Windows 8, it preserves your AstrolDeluxe settings, in which you may have Use Astrological Font turned on for the text tables or for the wheel in Customization, but after upgrading to Windows 8 you will need to reinstall the separately purchased add-on of the Halloran fonts from the AstrolDeluxe ReportWriter CD. If the font test fails, the program will revert to normal mode where Use Astrological Font is not turned on.
Version 8.2.3 adds to the Here and Now Transits Report the ability to use the optional report command SubstituteMajorForMinorAspects, in order to have interpretations for major aspects like the square substitute for minor aspects like the semi-square.
Version 8.2.4 gets a new version number to signify an update to the transits calculation dll, hst3032.dll. "The update fixes a problem that in some cases could cause missing transits in the chronological transits list after a transiting planet changes direction (was only when Use Orbs are not selected for the transiting planet - you were doing exact aspects only, no enter orb or leave orb dates for the transiting planet. The problem only happened for certain charts, but when it did, it could also make the calculation seem sluggish)."
Version 8.2.5 adds the ReferNever command to Interpret, Report Options for transits or progressions reports. It is normal in some cases for a transits or progressions interpretation report to refer the reader to another date in order to read a particular transiting or progressed aspect delineation, such as to a date when the aspect is closer or exact, in order to avoid duplication. But if you select and insert the new report order command, ReferNever, into a template's report order list and move it above DoTransitsGrid, then delineations will appear in full every time.
Version 8.2.6 fixes a zodiac sign font size problem that was happening when Use Astrological Font, Wheel, is turned on at Customization and when the regular chartwheel is on the screen and one chooses File, Print with Grids. The glyphs down in the grid for the zodiac signs were printing too large because a wrong value parameter was being passed to that routine.
Version 8.2.6 expands the scope of In Case of Printing Problems, Do Not Initialize Printer at Customization, Print Courtesy to not bring up the printer dialog box. A couple of customers that were able to print okay to their printers from Windows 7 reported being unable to from Windows 8 and this may be attributable to an incompatibility with the Common Dialog control.
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Last modified on March 13, 2013.
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