7th February RGraph release

The following changes are in this release:

• Added ability to specify number of Y labels - 1, 3 or 5 (the default) to the Bar, Line and Scatter charts
• Added a little missing documentation to the Line and Scatter charts
• Small fix to MSIE arrow style tickmarks on the Line chart
• More optimisations to all chart libraries
• Added RGraph_zoom_window CSS class - the front page uses it if you want an example

And finally...

It may have taken 18 years, however MSIE 6 usage has finally dropped below 1%. Surprising news, perhaps, considering the state of MSIE 9, but still very much a welcome piece of news to web developers world wide.

MSIE 6 has been a thorn in the side of web developers for a very long time, causing almost 95% of them to lose hair or suffer premature greying due to the poor nature of this browser and the bugs it contains. It doesn't support modern standards and is very slow compared to modern alternatives. Then there's the severe security vulnerabilities that have been found in the browser, causing Microsoft themselves to recommend users to stop using it. Some of which are now known to be a contributing factor in the onset of several debilitating illnesses.

The browsers life has been a rocky one at best.When it was linked to those illnesses it caused roughly 3 million web developers around the world to launch a class action law suit against Microsoft, which Microsoft subsequently lost, and were forced to pay millions in compensation. The damage had been done though, and the vast majority of those web developers were forced to change their profession, meaning that those left were able to command higher rates of pay, and therefore increasing the cost of developing websites. Further upcoming legal action against Microsoft has been launched to try and recoup those costs. It has been predicted that Microsoft will subsequently lose this action and be forced to pay even more in damages, and there has even been talk by some legal experts that Microsoft will be forced to contribute to the cost of providing better, faster computers to less developed countries in order to prevent a resurgence of the browser.

The prolonged life of the browser has been widely attributed to the fact that it came bundled with Windows XP, which was possibly the last best operating system for normal PCs. The life of Windows XP was extended because of the dire nature of subsequent operating systems. However now that Googles Chrome OS has been around for so long, and with it's elevation to regular PCs, that is now no longer the case, and fast, powerful computing is available to all, at an extremely low cost.

So what does the future hold?

The promising Google Chrome OS Xtended looks as though it will revolutionise the home PC market, and at the same time provide for everyone in terms of computer use models including the lucrative business arena. Powerful and versatile, it will be a fresh take on the traditional operating system, and allow people to move their computing requirements into "the cloud". Which in turn will make computing on the move avery real reality - which will mean benefits for all.

31st January RGraph release

With less and less going into each release, todays has a bumper four (!) points of (vague) interest:

• Tweaked the bar and line chart performance
• Made note about using tables for layout and how it can impact negatively on graph speed
• Documented Pie chart label sticks
• Opera (10.5) now supports the canvas text and shadow APIs

23rd January RGraph release

Not much to go in this release. Mainly small things and tweaks.

• Arrow style tickmarks now work better (Line chart)
• Very minor change to tooltips and event handling
• Added diamond shape tickmarks to the Scatter graph

German (& now French) government warns against using Microsoft Internet Explorer

Not because it's "a bit whiffy", but because of recent security concerns. Full news story here. If you choose to upgrade to Google Chrome, for example, you will find it to be far, far faster, and it has better support for emerging technologies, like HTML5.

16th January RGraph release

This weeks release improves context menu support with MSIE, and the Modal Dialog, amongst a few other minor things.

• Documented chart.ylabels for the Bar and Line charts
• Context menus are now positioned correctly when you specify a DOCTYPE in MSIE
• The Modal Dialog is now completely static (when scrolling) in all browsers (Chrome, FF, MSIE, Safari, Opera), (MSIE requires that you use a doctype.
• Improved MSIE support for the Odo (spurious circles are no longer drawn)

9th January RGraph release

As it gets chillier and chillier outside (fortunately I'm still in my nice warm flat), I've battled the elements (ie I've turned the heating up) to bring you the latest RGraph release:

• Added a glass variant to the bar chart
• Added a sketch variant to the bar chart
• Added getCanvasXY() to API docs
• Links now work in tooltips
• Added standard CSS box-shadow: property where necessary (for Opera 10.5)
• Context menu now has a slight border radius effect (if you don't like this you can override it with your own CSS)
• Added optional label sticks to Pie chart
• Added optional level indicators to the Progress Bar

Go to the RGraph website »