What's new in Prism 6.02?

This page lists the changes in Prism Windows from 6.01 to 6.02. If you are updating from 6.00, see what was new in 6.01.

This page is only about Prism Windows. A separate page lists updates in Prism Mac from 6.0b to 6.0c. 

Installation and activation (improvements for IT people)

• Silent activation can now use HTTPS or HTTP.
• You can include a <user> tag in the StartupConfig.xml file.
• Prism now ignores empty rows in StartupConfig.xml, instead of rejecting it.
• Added info about the minor version in the file properties of the MSI installer.
• If you have two license files on your computer, Prism will check both rather than stopping when it finds an invalid one.
• Allows  /Quiet switch for the MSI installer. 
• More detail is added to the log file when there are problems with the serial number file. 
• If Prism Windows is unable to obtain a MachineID due to problems with the WMI, Prism now shows a helpful message.
• Using VPN doesn't prevent activation.

Important improvements

• When exporting to tiff, png, jpg, or pict, you can specify the desired width in pixels as well as in inches/cm.
• Displays graphs and galleries much faster, taking advantage of multcore CPUs.
• Made it possible to reformat an individual point in a Grouped graph.
• When exporting, choose  between EMF and EMF+ format. EMF is the format Prism 5 and earlier used. EMF+ is supposed to be better, but it all depends on how you are using the file. There is a similar choice in Preferences about what format to use when copying a graph or layout to the clipboard.
• You can select a custom tick labels (or even part of a label) and use the toolbar buttons to change its size or format.
• Enabled the choice to create legends with "Symbols only", "Symbols & Lines", or "Lines only" for Grouped graphs displaying symbols.
• When given a choice to plot legends as lines or symbols & lines, you can now choose long lines. This is helpful to distinguish dotted from dashed lines.
• Fixed the problem where Prism could not be launched while a VPN connection was active. 
• If you have labels or numbering on both sides of the axis, you can now separately drag the numbers/labels on each side towards or away from the axis.
• Improved copy-paste to Adobe Illustrator when using the EMF+ format (and also provide now the EMF format). Problems fixed include fonts, open symbols, graph size and more.
• Improved autocomplete. If you delete the suggestion, it won't pop back.
• If you used the "Browse" button in the File Export library, Prism sometimes exported the wrong file format. 
• If you changed the justification of row or column titles on the data table, it was impossible to change that justification on the graph. Fixed. 
• When you used the command to create a new graph, Prism sometimes took you to the last created graph. 
• The last label of the X axis sometimes was cut off when the graph was placed on a layout. 

Improvements to interface

• You can open multiple files from the File..Open dialog. Hold shift or control while selecting the file names.
• Improved Delete Sheet dialog. Now it has checkboxes to selet the sheets to delete, and can be stretched to a larger size.
• Right click on a bar in a column graph, and the Format this bar command is now available. 
• Made it possible to open the Position dialog from the Format Object dialog opened for a scale bar.
• If there is only one info sheet (global) in the project, and all other sheets are part of the family, then made the info sheet be part of the family too.
• If you open a file by double-clicking on it, Prism will now notice if there is a newer backup version of that file (saved by automatic backup), and ask which one to open. 
• Made it possible to paste column titles from Clipboard into Results tables (above non-empty columns).
• Scripts. Lets you use the "%F" variable (name of current file) be used even outside a ForEach file loop.
• Rearranged Create New Layout dialog so page orientation choice is above the Arrangement of graphs choices.
• Added buttons to select all and select none to the "Add Data Sets to Graph" dialog.
• Notes on info pages now automatically wrap to fit the window. 
• Improved automatic snapping when you drag text on a graph or layout.
• A useful message is shown when you attempt to plot the geometric mean when any values are zero or negative.   
• New preference choice to not use antialiasing. On most computers, antialiasing makes the graph look much better on screen. But on a few computers, it makes things look worse, so now we let you turn off antialiasing.
• Renamed choices in the dropdown for XY tab of the Welcome dialog to: "Mean (or median), Upper/Lower limits" and "Mean (or median), +/- error".
• Made Prism change "set origin" to "automatically" in the Format Axes dialog when the user removes the left axis.
• If you choose to center (or right justify) multiline row/column titles, that choice now applies to the graph labels too.
• You can now select two or more data sets on the 'Data Sets on graph' tab of Format graph dialog, and then move them up or down the list (to change plotting order).
• If you ask Prism to plot the geometric mean and some points are negative or zero (making the geometric mean undefined), Prism now shows a floating note to explain the problem. 
• When nudging objtects on a graph or layout by clicking arrow keys, Prism showed a "wait" cursor. 

Analyses

• If you use the Resimulate Again command (red die icon, F9) or the "SimulateAgain" script command, data tables that contains link(s) from Simulation analysis (or from any analysis inherited from Simulation analysis) will also be updated.
• Made the red dice icon (simulate again) be available on the data, analysis result and graph sheets, if simulated data were pasted as link onto a data table which was analyzed.
• Frozen simulations will not be recalculated when you invoke the Resimulate Again command.
• Warns you if you try to do a Monte Carlo simulation using a frozen simulation, or if the simulation analysis does not have any random error or outliers.
• Sped up Monte-Carlo calculations.
• Added a floating note into the results of multiple t-test analysis to document your choice about pooling standard deviations.
• The Wilcoxon matched pairs test results now show the number of pairs analyzed.
• Added floating note with explanation in the results of transform analysis if the input data table has no X values.
• Fisher's test (Chi-square analysis) can now be performed even if you enter huge values, so Prism doesn’t need to switch to the chi-square test instead.
• Added floating note to results of Mann-Whitney test with tied values to explain that Prism is reporting an exact P value, something that Prism (prior to v6) and most other programs cannot do.
• Added a floating note to the 'Column Statistics' results, if the input table is the results of a Frequency Distribution, as such results are unlikely to be useful.
• Fixed the Column Statistics analysis, which always computed 95% CI of median even if you selected a different confidence level.
• Fixed the Cubic spline analysis to show interpolated values (details).
• Fixed Transform analysis to perform transforms that combine X and Y even if the X values are a generated series.
• The Multiple t tests analysis shows  P values with more digits after the decimal point.   
• Fixed the “How effective was the pairing” conclusion in the paired t test and the Wilcoxon mathed pairs test. Details.
• Improved outlier detection in nonlinear regression when you compare two models, so it does not depend on which model was chosen first.
• Fixed the problem when the interchange of X and Y in the Transform analysis did not swap the X and Y column titles.
• Fisher’s exact test mistakenly reported that the one-tail P is "undefined" in rare cases.
• Fixed the rule for the initial value for the parameter Ki of Morrison equation in enzyme inhibition.
• Improved wording of message if you tried to perform the One-way ANOVA analysis with data entered as mean & SD (or SEM), without N (which is essential), or if each column had only one value.
• Fixed typo in the name of equations group - "Enzyme kinetics - Substrate v Velocity".
• Replaced the misleading column title 'Mean' with 'Proportion' or 'Percentage' in the Survival Proportions table of survival results.
• Fixed results of 't test' when a third data set was added to analyzed data table.
• Fixed subcolumn labels used in results of Monte Carlo analysis.
• Replaced "Mean" with "Median" as subcolumn title when you choose medians from Row Means/Totals analysis.
• Fixed the problem with cumulative frequency calculation when an extra row sometimes appeared.
• Mann-Whitney test. If there are no ties, and the correct one-tailed P value is 0.5, Prism incorrectly reported it as 1.0. If the correct two-tailed p value equals 1.0 it is correctly reported as ">0.9999" in the Mann-Whitney results, but incorrectly reported as 2.0 in a Monte Carlo analysis of the Mann Whitney test.  
• Compare Observed and Expected distributions. In some cases, it was impossible to enter a decimal point when entering the expected values.
• Mann-Whitney test simulations. When the P values was actually 1.00, it sometimes reported 2.00. 

Bug fixes:

• Fixed plotting of errors bars (tiny error bars sometimes were missing the bottom half).
• If you selected an entire data set column on a data table, and then chose to format those points a certain way (color), the point defined by the first row wasn’t reformatted.
• Prism will no longer plot the geometric mean when any value is negative or zero.
• Clone a graph (from Welcome) sometimes randomly changed graph sheet name.
• Exporting using file names that include a period now works. Before, Prism was trimming the name at the period. 
• When the computed error bar extends down to a negative value (which can’t be shown on a log axis), Prism no longer attempts to plot it on a log axis and shows a error message.
• Fixed the problem with overlapping superscripted numbers in axes labels in scientific format.
• The total value didn’t always automatically update in a parts-of-whole graph. 
• Improved automatic renaming of sheet names (you rename the data table, and the results and graphs rename).
• Made it possible to convert Prism 4 OLE object to Prism 6 OLE object in MS Office document.
• Fixed look of Cyrillic text in labels on graphs and layouts
• The size of some graphs couldn’t be increased to fill page.
• If you deleted all the data, and then pasted new data, color assignments on the graph, and curve formatting, could change.   
• The Magic dialog sometimes changed sheet names
• Fixed the problem when the right line of the graph frame was not visible on a grouped graphs with data table with only one row.
• The color and symbol drop down menus were incomplete when you used a custom Display DPI settings. Details.
• Fixed the problem when the graph disappeared from the page after moving it.
• Fixed the problem when Prism did not plot all the data on a grouped graph.  
• Fixed the problem plotting error bars that extended beyond axis limits.
• Fixed the problem when symbols chosen from characters palette appeared reverted to regular symbols after copy/paste operation.
• When you hold the mouse pointer over a data point, the tool tip comes up faster.
• Paste link from Excel didn’t work with more than 65,000 points.
• Fixed the corruption of default grouped graph with thousands of rows.
• Fixed the problem when a number format appeared changed after reopening a file, if data table font size was changed in Preferences.
• If you used the Edit Links dialog to change the Excel file linked to Prism, that update was not reflected in the tooltip.
• Data linked to Excel file appeared corrupted on updating, if it was situated in grouped data table and included row titles.
• Fixed the problem when starting Y value and major ticks interval unexpectedly changed on changing minimum range value. Case 389415.
• When you paste link Prism data to a Prism table, it now remembers the links even for empty cells .
• You can now open .pzfx files via Open command used inside ForEach loop in a Prism script.

• Allows you to include a port indication in the URL specified in LabArchivesConfig.txt