EduPhant v2.0b2 available

Aliacta International Corporation has released EduPhant v2.0b2, a 
major upgrade to its text-encodings savvy and cross-platform 
PostgreSQL database client.

Whether you want to learn SQL or need a tool to look at the inner 
working of the PostgreSQL server while you program a client 
application for it, EduPhant will be the answer.

You can use EduPhant regardless of your language or favorite 
operating system since it supports any text encoding PostgreSQL 
supports, and it works on Mac OS 8 and 9, OS X, Windows, and Linux 
for which we have an experimental build too now.

Many other SQL clients dumbly enter data in PostgreSQL in their 
operating system's default text encoding, regardless of the encoding 
in which your database has been defined.  This results in corrupted 
data that isn't usable cross-platform or with other clients that do 
respect the text encodings like EduPhant.  The corruption is most 
noticeable with non-ASCII characters like an accented "e." But with 
EduPhant you will be sure of your data's integrity, even for UNICODE.

EduPhant also makes it easy on you. It's SQL templates will allow the 
novices to quickly pick up the SQL syntax and logic, or they will jog 
the memory of the more advanced users.  Plus they make it a breeze to 
rapidly construct your SQL queries.  You can also store your own 
custom SQL templates.

When you click on cells or headers of the query results table or of 
the database overview table, you enter their content into your query 
-- another very practical feature to reduce typing (and typos).

Under EduPhant's help button you'll discover links to key 
documentation on the Internet. You won't have to waste countless 
hours simply to find your way around. Instead, you'll have a single 
source to all the necessary information at your fingertips.

EduPhant also supports STDIN and STDOUT, which is very rare.

You can connect to PostgreSQL 6.4 and later. Version 7.3 is 
recommended. (For instructions on how to get and install PostgreSQL, 
please download our other product pgSQL4RB to consult the relevant 
chapter in its manual.)

All of this makes EduPhant probably the best and safest 
cross-platform client around for working with PostgreSQL.  Oh, and 
did we mention it's free?



Release Notes:

Changes since 2.0b1:
2.0b1 wasn't a public release but was available a few days on our 
site for our own experimentation purposes.  It had a 20 minutes limit 
on connection time with PostgreSQL and an expiration date which are 
now removed and a few other minor changes were made, especially to 
solve a problem with the Windows version.

Changes since 1.0b1:
Version 2.0 is a major upgrade from version 1.0!  There are many new features.

Corrected bugs:

- The only known bug in 1.0b1 was that EduPhant could sometimes 
wrongly report the database text encoding with PostgreSQL 7.2 and 
below.  It did know which encoding to deal with, but could sometimes 
stick a wrong name on it.


New features:

- EduPhant can now open multiple document windows which allow you to 
connect to several different databases simultaneously.

- You can save your connection documents.

- Amongst the SQL templates there's a new button called "Custom" in 
which you can store you're own SQL statements.  (They are saved with 
your Eduphant document.)  Just to the right of it there's a smaller 
button without caption that allows you to execute your custom queries 
instantly without modifying the query field.

- You can easily hide the log and choose not to work with message boxes, etc.

- The structure of your database is shown in a table and you can 
click on its items to add them to your queries.  E.g. instead of 
typing a column name in your query you just click on it in the 
database overview.  (In 1.0b1 you could already click on items of 
your query results.)

- You can now copy and/or save several chunks of information: the 
query field, the query results, and the log.  Saving is possible in 
Unicode UTF-8 or your system's default text encoding.

- There is support for STDIN and STDOUT.  You can assign a file on 
your hard disk to these and then do a "COPY mytable FROM STDIN" for 
instance.

- The broken links in the "Help" button have been updated.

- EduPhant can now check whether there is a new version of itself 
available.  You can set this in the preferences.  (This requires an 
active internet connection of course.)



Links:

- Product page
<http://aliacta.com/products/eduphant.htm>

- Download page
<http://aliacta.com/download>

- MacPAD plist
<http://aliacta.com/pad/eduphant.plist>