Changes To Menus
A number of changes have been made to the menus from earlier versions, and this document supersedes the help file..
The Search menu has been removed, and redistributed as follows:
 

Analysis Line Promotion - improved version
You can now promote from any level to any other lower level. All analysis is maintained, and the old main line, in whatever board you are promoting to, is turned into analysis, with any analysis after the insertion point also maintained. In other words, nothing is lost, but the game is restructured.

Any open analysis boards are closed to do this. If this is necessary, you will be warned, and have a chance to back out.
The method is either to select a line and use the main menu (Position - Analysis - Promote), or right click on a selected line and use the popup, or (quickest) use drag and drop (see below). Promotion is done as far as the main line of the board in which you selected the analysis line - i.e. if the board in which you select the line is itself an analysis board, promotion will only be done as far as its own main line.

Drag 'n Drop.
You can drag moves from the move list, or lines from the lines list to various places, as in the table below. Dragging and dropping with any other combination of source and destination will have no effect. The symbol * used in the destination column means that you can drop anywhere in the designated area. If the symbol * is not shown, the exact position of the drop is used.
 

Normally a merge is almost instantaneous, although there is a lot of processing taking place. However, when I tried merging a complex tree of more than 2500 lines into a game without any analysis, it took an appreciable time (around a couple of minutes on a Pentium 200PRO with 128MB extra memory) - but at least it worked!.

New Method of Adding Analysis
Double click on a move in the main line. You will get a board with green surround (adding analysis) and showing all the moves in the main line up to the point at which you clicked. You may edit this is any way you like, overwriting it, or adding new moves. To turn it into analysis, go to the Position menu (or use the right click menu) and "Attach". Alternatively, if you have "Attach on close" checked in the menu (it is checked by default), the analysis will be attached when you close the board. This means that you can now have analysis without having to have a main line. (If you double clicked on the last move of a game, then added more moves, this will become analysis – a posible continuation rather than an extension to the main line). This should be useful for games in progress, coupled with the new promotion options. One minor restriction is that for technical reasons you can only have one of these boards open at once. Before adding another line, you must "Attach" or abandon the current one.

The old method stays for the moment for those who are used to it. Even here there is a way, albeit a clumsy one, to add a possible continuation without having to have a main line. Just use the menu Game - Result to set a result. "Incomplete" (Game – Result – Incomplete) is probably best. Then add analysis to the last move using the old "IF" method. When you later add more moves to the main line, the old "result" is removed, but the analysis stays. This has always been possible (and requested) – but I only realised how to do it while working on the latest changes!

Trees
Tree Files and Display – Some inevitable compromises...
Tree files are simply GMS files with a lot of analysis. ("Simply" is a bit of an understatement, in view of the amount of new code which has gone in to support them!) This is not ideal, but better than nothing. There will be better ways of displaying the data in V3, but I was not about to reinvent the Tree control for WIN31! By keeping Trees as GMS files, you can put them in separate files, or mix them into any other file. They can be named differently from games (see below). But since tree files can be very large, my own feeling is that they are better handled on their own.

A Tree will show a summary of results from each line in the Analysis Lines window, and the result of each line at the end of its moves (if a result was recorded). Unfortunately, there is nowhere to store the text details of each line (such as who played who) given the current file format. This is a drawback, I know, but if you have an XRF file of the same tree (see below), you will at least be able to look up more details of lines there. It is also very awkward, given the current database design, to transfer comments and annotations from their source games to the tree, so I have not done so. I hope you can live with this for the sake of the extra features until V3 comes along. (You may like to know that in version 3, trees are automatically created as a consequence of the database design - now completed).

I have tested trees up to 4000 lines, resulting in Analysis 16 levels deep (one game in the Ruy Lopez branched at move 36!). The display in the list of analysis lines has been altered to simplify navigation, and a horizontal scroll bar has been added.

Tree Name
In v2.5 the tree takes its name from the Remark field in the Game Details, if this field is not blank. Otherwise, it will try first to use the Opening, and then the Player names. If you make a tree from the search dialog (see below), you will be able to type in a name for the tree in that dialog. To name an otherwise anonymous Tree,  go into the Game Details as if for a normal game, and edit the Remark field.

Making from the menu
You can make a tree which is saved on its own, or add a tree to the current game. If you use the menu (Position - Analysis - Make (or Add) Tree) to do this, you will also be able to choose between using the current file or all files. When a tree is made it is immediately displayed in the current game (if "adding") or on its own, so that you can go into Game Details and edit the name (Remark field – see above). Note that all the old Search options are now to be found in the Position menu, which seems more natural.

Making from the Search Dialog
You can make a tree from the Search Dialog by clicking on the Make Tree box. You can also give the tree a name (Position tab). Trees can only be constructed from exact position or ECO code searches. If you select the Make XRF box as well, you will also get the normal Cross Reference file (otherwise the program will make a temporary one). The program will ask you for a name for the XRF file (unless it’s to be a temporary one), and when the search has completed, it will ask you for a name for the tree file, which it will then make from the XRF file (temporary or otherwise).

One obvious consequence of this is that you can now effectively make Opening Books from any ECO code.

Navigation
Trees can be very large, and it can be difficult to find what you want in them (as I discovered during debugging!). A few tools have been added to make things easier. To find any line starting with a certain move (e.g. Nd2), use Position - Analysis - Find Line. Type in the move you're interested in, and use Next or Previous as required. Once a line has been defined in this way, you can use Control + N or Control + P to look for the next or previous instances of the same move in the list of lines. Those familiar with Windows may prefer to use F3 and Shift F3 to do the same thing. Note that this way of finding a line does not take move number, depth of line, or colour into account. Also note that in order to use Control + N for this purpose, the old use of this key, which turned the board algebraic surround on or off, has been replaced by Control + A.

A second way of getting around, which may be more useful in many cases, is available whenever an analysis line is already selected - either by you or by the program as you play through the game. If you now use Shift UP or DOWN arrows, the program will highlight the next alternative at the same move (if any). This way you can quickly see all available alternatives at any move, which may be widely separated in the list of analysis lines for a large tree. The menu options Next Alternative and Previous Alternative (in Position - Analysis) do the same thing.

Both these searches wrap round - i.e. they automatically continue searching from the start of the list when the end has been reached, and vice-versa.

Making from an XRF file
When a suitable XRF file is open in a list window (suitable means that it has been made either from a search on an exact position, or an ECO code), the menu option "List - Convert to Tree" is enabled. Please note that any XRF files made before V2.5 are not convertible as there has been a small change to the format. However, 2.5 will of course still be able to use these files for all other purposes.
There is also an option (in the file menu) to make a tree directly from an XRF file without having to open it first. If the XRF file does not support trees (pre 2.5), the program will tell you.

Search Dialog – Save search criteria
There are now buttons on the Dialog to enable you to save and reload any set of criteria to a QRY file (Save/Load Settings).

Right Click Menus
There are now right click menus to be found in a number of places. The best way of finding them is by using the right button - for instance, select an analysis line, then right click - or right click on the board, and so on.

Validate
You can now validate files or games. This is an important check if you are finding that crashes occur when you use any multi-file functions, such as searching. This can be caused by a corrupt file, perhaps one which has not been used for some time, so the corruption has not come to light. Needless to say, such problems are very difficult to track down, so validation has been added as much for my peace of mind as yours! File - Validate option allows you to validate all files or a selected one. The program will attempt to repair any errors it finds. The bad news is that most types of error (such as corrupt indexes) cannot be repaired. The good news is that by far the most common errors are a type that can be repaired - internal errors within a game. As a rough guide, when validating my own collection of about 150,000 games, I found no errors which could not be repaired.

It is nevertheless a good idea to back up all your data files before validating them. If validation reports that a game cannot be repaired, you should probably try to delete it, although if the culprits were internal references, it may be impossible for the program to find the different parts of the game. There is a last resort option (see below) to delete faulty analysis. If all else fails, you will probably still be able to extract all the valid games to a different file, and then delete the old file. If a corrupt index is reported (unlikely), you will probably be able to extract all the games either side of the corrupt index (e.g. if the error is reported at game no 12, extract games 1-11 and 13 onwards). However, the program does not try to do this automatically, as further errors could have serious consequences for the remainder of the validation checking.

Other action to try on validation failure: Use the options in the Tools - Options - System tab to deal with games separately. (Note that these options do not apply to file validation - they only work on a game by game basis). These options allow you to proceed a step at a time. Until you check Validate on Open, the game will be opened anyway (if possible), so that you can try to see what the problem is yourself. If you check Validate on Open without checking Attempt Repair, any faulty game will not be opened. If you check Attempt Repair as well, a faulty game will be opened only if it can be repaired (and you should then re-save it, of course). In the last resort, check Delete Orphans to remove any analysis that the program cannot attach to a parent line (and this is by far the most common cause of validation failure). This may of course have a far-reaching effect, but may be better than losing the game altogether. It is not a good idea to check any of these options unless you are specifically investigating a particular set of games, as although it may appear to make little difference to the speed of opening or saving a game, you will certainly notice a slow down if you do a search or any other multi-file operation with these options on.

You may also validate any currently open game (Game - Validate), though if it seems to be working OK, it's probably fine. (If it's not broke, don't try to fix it!)

Keyboard shortcuts
Delete (Analysis line). You can now delete an analysis line by selecting it and pressing the Delete key. This will only have any effect when the Analysis list window has the focus, and since you can’t tell by looking, that effectively means just after you’ve selected the line you want to delete, and before you click on something else – which is more or less what you’d do anyway!

Control Double Click on Analysis lines
In order to simplify viewing of analysis lines without all the lines which lead to them being opened, it is now possible to view an analysis line on a separate board as though it was the main line. Hold down the Control key when double clicking on an analysis line. The line is then opened as if it was a new game, starting at move 1. If you want to save it separately, you can do so, though you might like to complete the game details first, since these will be blank.

Control + S
This will now save a game - or call Save As if that is appropriate. Save Into may be reached through Control + Shift + S.
Other new shortcuts are Control + A, Control + N, Control + P, F3, Shift F3, Shift + UP/DOWN.  See under Trees - Navigation.

Other changes
XRF files do not now abort when a game cannot be found, but if there are missing references, the search analysis dialog may refuse to show certain subsets of data (though it will show the complete set satisfactorily - or rather, as much as it has managed to find).

Copy Moves to Clipboard will now copy only the moves in the active board - so if this is an Analysis Board, it will not copy the game moves, only the ones in the analysis line.

Save Into now works correctly in that it subsequently allows a normal Save as well as a Save As.

Import from and Export to PGN will now cope with starting positions. PGN imports have also been tweaked so that a faulty move in analysis - which occurs more frequently than a mistake in a main line - is ignored and does not cause a "bad game" error. The analysis in such cases is imported up to the point that the error was encountered.