Shop’NCook Blog

I have just uploaded the new release 3.4.3 of Shop’NCook Home, Shop’NCook Menu and Shop’NCook Pro. You can download it now here.

Registered users of version 3.4 can update to version 3.4.3 for free and do not need a new registration number. To install or update, just run the installer on top of your current installation. Like usual, it is always a good idea to make a back-up of your data before installing a new version.

The Mac release is again compatible with Mac OS X 10.2 and 10.3. At the same time, all the small quirks on Leopard have been fixed. The Windows release is now signed, meaning that XP and Vista users will not see all the time these annoying “Security warning” message and can confirm they have the original copy of the software.

The new features include:

• a much awaited Paste button in the wizard;
• supports drag & drop of recipes - just drop the whole recipe text onto the recipe panel to import it;
• supports drag & drop of pictures - just drop a picture onto a recipe to add it;
• new Toggle button in the recipe editor to transform conveniently a line of instructions into an ingredient line and vice versa;
• On Mac, supports now the pict image format that is used in particular by FireFox and Internet Explorer browsers.

In coming posts, I will show some of the new features in action.

The installers released last week are not compatible with Mac OS X 10.2 and 10.3. All my apologies to the users who had problems with them. I am working on it and will fix this problem soon. Meanwhile, Mac OS X 10.2 and X 10.3 users can download the previous installers below:

• Shop’NCook Home, previous US edition - download now
• Shop’NCook Home, previous International edition - download now
• Shop’NCook Menu, previous US edition - download now
• Shop’NCook Menu, previous International edition - download now
• Shop’NCook Pro, previous US edition - download now
• Shop’NCook Pro, previous International edition - download now

Update: The latest release is now compatible with Mac OS X 10.2 and 10.3. The previous installers are not available anymore. Download the latest installers here. More info…
Above links are only for Mac OS X 10.2 and 10.3 users. They will not work on Leopard or Windows. All other users should download the installers from the download page.

Shop’NCook is now officially supported on Vista - sorry for the long wait to all the Vista users. The shopping list printing problems on Vista have been also fixed.

New installers are also available for Leopard with the cooking view fixed.

You can download the new installers here:

• Download Shop’NCook Home
• Download Shop’NCook Menu
• Download Shop’NCook Pro

This update is recommended to all Vista or Leopard users. If you are not using Vista or Leopard, you don’t need to update.

Upgrade note for Vista: if you have been using Shop’NCook on Vista with a non-compatible version, it is possible that some of your files have been virtualized. Virtualization is the way of Vista to cope with non-Vista-aware applications. When a file is virtualized, it is placed in a folder that mimic the program installation folder, instead of being placed in the installation folder itself. To see if you have been virtualized, open the folder Program Files\Shop’NCook 3.4 (or Shop’NCook Menu 3.4 or Shop’NCook Pro 3.4). If there is a button named “Compatibility Files” on the toolbar of the folder, some files have been virtualized. If this is the case, you need to open the “Compatibility Files” folder, that is folder VirtualStore\Program Files\Shop’NCook 3.4 (or Shop’NCook Menu 3.4 or …) and copy back the virtualized files to their corresponding place in the real folder Program Files\Shop’NCook 3.4 (or …). After this operation, you can run the new installer. Note also that you will need an administrator account to run Shop’NCook on Vista.

Upgrade note for Leopard: if you had to do an Archive & Install installation of Leopard, the content of your Applications folder - including Shop’NCook 3.4 (or Shop’NCook Menu 3.4 or Shop’NCook Pro 3.4) has been archived. You need to move this folder from its archival place back into the current Applications folder before running the new installer. Like always, it is also a good idea to make a back-up of the installation folder before upgrading.

My Leopard CD was finally in the mailbox yesterday. I had received numerous e-mails during the past week reporting that Shop’NCook installers did not work on Leopard… so I was quite impatient to test Shop’NCook myself on the new operating system of Apple.

Beside the installation problems, I have found the following issues on Leopard:

1. Preview of print out: launching of the Preview application fails. Workaround: starting by hand the Preview application before previewing a print-out.
2. Help, Get Recipe button, Buy Now button: launching of Safari fails. Workaround: starting by hand Safari before activating these functions.
3. Cooking view: displays an invisible screen that blocks further input. Workaround: you can unblock the program by pressing the escape button to close the invisible screen. The recipes can however not be seen in full screen mode on Leopard.
4. Some minor cosmetic problems.

As a temporary solution, I have made new installers for Leopard. They are now live on the site. If you need to install or reinstall Shop’NCook Home, Menu, Pro or Reader, you can download the new installers below:

• Download Shop’NCook Home
• Download Shop’NCook Menu
• Download Shop’NCook Pro
• Download Shop’NCook Reader

Note that only the installers have been modified. It is not a new release of Shop’NCook, the installed content is the same. You do not need to reinstall the program if it is already installed.

I will release an update in one or two weeks to fix the other issues that I can fix. Problems 1 and 2 come apparently from a bug of Leopard - I may not be able to do something until Apple releases an update - but they are relatively minor and should not interfere with the usage of the programs.