1 PSPP NEWS -- history of user-visible changes.
2 Copyright (C) 1996-2000, 2008-2016, 2017, 2019 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
3 See the end for copying conditions.
5 Please send PSPP bug reports to bug-gnu-pspp@gnu.org.
7 Changes from 1.2.0 to 1.3.0:
9 * Plain text output is no longer divided into pages, since it is now
10 rarely printed on paper.
12 * pspp-convert: New "-a", "-l", "--password-list" options to search
13 for an encrypted file's password.
15 * Improvements to SAVE DATA COLLECTION support for MDD files.
17 * Bug fix for CVE-2018-20230.
19 * The REGRESSION command now supports the /STATISTICS=COLLIN which
20 outputs collinearity metrics for the data.
22 Changes from 1.0.1 to 1.2.0:
24 * New experimental command SAVE DATA COLLECTION to save MDD files.
26 * MTIME and YMDHMS variable formats now supported.
30 - zlib is now a required dependency. (Previously it was optional.)
32 - Gtk+3.18.0 or later must now be used when building.
34 - The code implementing the sheet rendering has been removed. Instead we
35 use a third party library: spread-sheet-widget.
37 * The "NOMISSING" keyword when generating syntax for piecharts in the
38 frequencies command was omitted. This has been corrected.
40 Changes from 1.0.0 to 1.0.1:
42 * Bug fixes, including fixes for CVE-2017-12958, CVE-2017-12959,
43 CVE-2017-12960, and CVE-2017-12961.
45 Changes from 0.11.0 to 1.0.0:
47 * Translation updates.
49 Changes from 0.10.2 to 0.11.0:
51 * The REGRESSION command now has a /ORIGIN subcommand to perform
52 regression through the origin.
54 * The FACTOR command can now analyse matrix files prepared with MATRIX DATA.
56 * The FACTOR command can now print the anti-image matrices.
58 * The MATRIX DATA command has been added.
60 * Some inappropriate properties in selection dialogs have been corrected.
62 * A bug which could cause the HTML driver to go into a tight loop
65 * An error in the FREQUENCIES procedure, where the word "Mean" was
66 printed when "Variance" was appropriate has been fixed.
68 * The ncurses library is no longer required or used.
70 * A bug where the Mann-Whitney test would give misleading results
71 if run on multiple variables and MISSING=ANALAYSIS was specified
74 * Gtk+3.14.5 or later must now be used when building.
76 * Graphical user interface changes:
78 ** There is a new menu: Edit|Options
80 ** The Non Parametric Statistics Menu has a new item: "K Independent Samples".
82 ** Dialog boxes can now be canceled using the <Escape> key.
84 * The AUTORECODE command now accepts an optional / before INTO.
86 * The short form of the VECTOR command can now create string variables.
88 * Bug fixes, including fixes for CVE-2017-10791 and CVE-2017-10792.
90 Changes from 0.10.1 to 0.10.2:
92 * CROSSTABS implements a new COUNT subcommand to round case or cell
95 * Help will be opened as HTML in default browser if yelp
98 * When plotting scatterplots with only one dataset (the simple case)
99 the colour used for the dataset is now black. The previous default
100 from the Tango palette was too faint to see easily.
102 * The varible info dialog could previously only paste a single variable.
103 Now it can paste multiple variables.
105 * Bug fixes, including the following:
107 - T-test with independent samples GUI crashed with string
108 type variable as group variable.
110 - The variable info dialog showed the previous selected variable
111 superimposed with the currently selected one.
113 - The GLM command did not properly deal with missing values. This
116 Changes from 0.10.0 to 0.10.1:
118 * Bug fixes, including the following:
120 - A bug where certain dialog boxes could not be properly populated
123 - Various commands have been hardened against errors when called
126 * Translation updates. Thanks to our translators!
128 Changes from 0.8.5 to 0.10.0:
130 * The QUICK CLUSTER command has a /PRINT subcommand which shows
131 the initial cluster centres and the final cluster membership of
132 each case. The clustering algorithm has also been updated, so
133 as to produce better separated clusters.
135 * A Russian localisation has been contributed.
137 * The GRAPH command now has a /BAR subcommand to draw barcharts.
139 * If the DECIMAL character is set to COMMA then the ',' character
140 will not be treated as a separator by DATA LIST.
142 * The graphical user interface (psppire) has been changed as follows:
144 - It now uses Gtk+ version 3 instead of version 2. Accordingly, it has a
145 somewhat different look and feel.
147 - There is now a Graphs menu to access the GRAPH command.
149 - The status of dialog box widgets are now preserved between calls
150 to the same dialog box for the same dataset.
152 - The dialog box for the Logistic Regression command will now
153 infer that string variables or any varible with a "measure"
154 of Nominal or Ordinal are to be treated as categorical variables
155 and will generate syntax accordingly.
157 * The pspp-convert utility can now decrypt encrypted syntax files.
158 The encrypted syntax file format is unacceptably insecure, so to
159 discourage its use PSPP and PSPPIRE do not directly read or write
166 * The following functions for transformation expressions are new:
168 - REPLACE, for search-and-replace of one string with another.
170 - STRUNC, to truncate a string and trim trailing spaces.
172 - MEDIAN, to compute the median of its arguments.
174 - The TRUNC function in expressions now supports additional arguments
175 for truncating to values other than integers and to indicate a level
176 of rounding fuzz. The default rounding fuzz may now be controlled
177 and displayed with SET FUZZBITS and SHOW FUZZBITS, respectively.
179 * Bug fixes, including the following notable ones:
181 - The correlation coefficient in the paired samples t-test
182 procedure is now correctly calculated when presented with
185 - The ESCAPE subcommand has been removed from GET DATA /TYPE=TXT.
186 For compatibility, the behavior that ESCAPE enabled is now the
187 default and only supported behavior.
189 - Rendering of the variable and data sheets in right-to-left locales
192 - The Mann-Whitney test, when run on a dataset containing values
193 of the group variable, other than those defining the test groups,
194 would incorrectly calculate the ranks. This has been corrected.
196 * The IMPORTCASES subcommand on GET DATA is now ignored, for
199 Changes from 0.8.4 to 0.8.5:
201 * The FREQUENCIES and CROSSTABS commands can now generate barcharts.
203 * The FACTOR command can now perform PROMAX rotations.
205 * SPSS/PC+ system files are now supported on GET and other commands
206 that read SPSS system files. The pspp-convert program can now read
207 SPSS/PC+ system files. Writing the obsolete SPSS/PC+ system file
208 format is not supported.
210 * SYSFILE INFO can now read SPSS/PC+ system files and SPSS portable
213 * FREQUENCIES: A bug was fixed where an assertion failure occurred
214 when an empty dataset was presented.
216 * The GRAPH command is now available. Initially it supports
217 scatterplots and histograms.
219 * The RND operator in expressions now supports additional operands
220 for rounding to values other than integers and to indicate a level
221 of rounding fuzz. The default rounding fuzz may now be controlled
222 and displayed with SET FUZZBITS and SHOW FUZZBITS, respectively.
224 Changes from 0.8.3 to 0.8.4:
226 * Formatting of SYSFILE INFO output was made easier to read.
228 * Bug fixes, including the following notable ones:
230 - FREQUENCIES works properly for string variables. (This bug was
231 introduced in 0.8.2.)
233 - CROSSTABS now correctly computes all of the measures that it
234 offers. Some measures have been removed because they were not
237 - The NPAR TESTS calculation of significance for the RUNS
238 subcommand has been corrected.
240 - Planned comparisons in ONEWAY ANOVA now correctly handle negative
243 - The COUNT command now correctly treats missing values as
246 - Conformance fixes to Open Document output format.
248 Changes from 0.8.2 to 0.8.3:
250 * Independent T-Tests displayed the standard error of the difference
251 and the confidence interval for the unequal variances case, where
252 the equal variances case should have been. This has been fixed.
254 * REGRESSION now recognises /STATISTICS=CI(x) which causes confidence
255 intervals for the coefficients to be printed.
257 * When DESCRIPTIVES calculates Z scores, it now omits cases filtered
258 by the current FILTER settings.
260 * PSPPIRE graphical user interface improvements:
262 - Dialog boxes with source variable lists can now choose the sort
263 order; right click and select from the popup menu.
265 - File|Open now allows an encoding to be selected for opening
268 - File|Display Data File Information|External File... now allows an
269 encoding to be selected.
271 - A problem with the Means dialog has been resolved (bug #41433).
273 - Several problems related to the input of spreadsheets have been
274 fixed (bug #41657, #41620
276 * System file related improvements:
278 - With ENCODING="DETECT", SYSFILE INFO can now help the user to
279 pick an encoding for reading a system file that does not identify
282 - SYSFILE INFO now accepts an ENCODING subcommand to specify the
283 character encoding of string data in the system file.
285 - Variable labels over 255 bytes long are now accepted without
286 truncation (bug #41863).
288 - System files that contain duplicate variable names may now be
289 read successfully (bug #41475).
291 Changes from 0.8.1 to 0.8.2:
293 * Charts are now rendered with colours from the Tango palette instead
294 of fully saturated primaries.
296 * Support for new system file variants:
298 - PSPP can now read and write ZCOMPRESSED system files, which
299 compress data much more effectively than older "compressed"
300 files. (The older format is still supported.)
302 - PSPP can now decrypt encrypted system files, using the new
303 pspp-convert utility. The encrypted system file format is
304 unacceptably insecure, so to discourage its use PSPP and PSPPIRE
305 do not directly read or write this format.
307 * Missing values for long string variables are now read from and
308 written to system files in an SPSS-compatible fashion.
310 (Earlier versions of PSPP that supported missing values for long
311 string variables wrote them to system files in an SPSS-incompatible
312 way. To fix the problem, read the system file with this version of
313 PSPP and then save a new copy of it.)
315 * pspp-convert, a new standalone utility for converting SPSS system
316 and portable files to other formats, is now included. The initial
317 version supports comma-separated value files as output format.
318 pspp-convert can also decrypt encrypted system files.
322 - zlib is now a required dependency. (Previously it was optional.)
324 Changes from 0.8.0 to 0.8.1:
330 * Changes to existing commands:
332 - CROSSTABS: The requirement that one expected count must be less than five
333 before Fishers Exact Test will be reported has been removed.
335 * PSPPIRE graphical user interface improvements:
337 - A new set of icons has been contributed.
339 - Syntax windows now parse syntax in "auto" mode, which in practice
340 should mean that both "batch" and "interactive" syntax now works,
341 instead of just "interactive" syntax.
343 - The variable pane of data windows now include a Role column.
347 - System files written by IBM SPSS 21 are now read without warnings.
349 - System files written by "VOXCO INTERVIEWER 4.3" are now read
352 - PSPPIRE should now more gracefully handle syntax files that contain
355 Changes from 0.6.2 to 0.8.0:
361 - DATAFILE ATTRIBUTES
368 - LOGISTIC REGRESSION
372 - PRESERVE and RESTORE
376 - SAVE TRANSLATE to CSV and tab-delimited files
378 - VARIABLE ATTRIBUTES
380 * Changes to existing commands:
382 - AUTORECODE has a new GROUP subcommand.
384 - CROSSTABS has been re-implemented to fix numerous bugs.
386 - EXAMINE: /MISSING=LISTWISE is now the default.
388 - DO REPEAT command has been reimplemented. Now, when DO REPEAT
389 contains an INCLUDE or INSERT command, substitutions are not
390 applied to the included file.
392 - FILE HANDLE has a new ENDS subcommand to select CR or CRLF new-lines.
394 - HOST has been updated to use more modern syntax.
396 - Most commands that work with data files now support a new
399 - MISSING VALUES can now assign missing values to long string
402 - ONEWAY: the POSTHOC subcommand is now implemented.
404 - The following new subcommands to NPAR TESTS have been implemented:
405 COCHRAN, FRIEDMAN, JONCKHEERE-TERPSTRA, KENDALL, KRUSKAL-WALLIS, MANN-WHITNEY,
406 MCNEMAR, SIGN, WILCOXON, and RUNS
408 - SET and SHOW no longer have ENDCMD, NULLINE, PROMPT, CPROMPT, and
409 DPROMPT subcommands. The defaults are now fixed values.
411 - SHOW now has a JOURNAL subcommand, to show the location of the
414 - VALUE LABELS can now assign value labels to long string
417 * Other language changes:
419 - The new DATASET commands replace the "scratch file" PSPP
420 extension, which is no longer supported.
422 - Strings may now include arbitrary Unicode code points specified
423 in hexadecimal, using the syntax U'hhhh'. For example, Unicode
424 code point U+1D11E, the musical G clef character, may be
425 expressed as U'1D11E'.
427 See the "Tokens" section in the PSPP manual for more information.
429 - In previous versions of PSPP, in a string expressed in
430 hexadecimal with X'hh' syntax, the hexadecimal digits expressed
431 bytes in the locale encoding. In this version of PSPP, X'hh'
432 syntax always expresses bytes in UTF-8 encoding.
434 See the "Tokens" section in the PSPP manual for more information.
436 * PSPPIRE graphical user interface improvements:
438 - Added support for non-ASCII characters in strings, labels and
441 - A "Split Window" function is available, which makes it easier to
442 see different parts of a large data file.
444 - Data files can now be opened by specifing their name as the first
445 argument. This means that on a properly configured desktop, double
446 clicking on an icon will open the file.
448 - Foreign formats, such as Gnumeric, OpenDocument and CSV can be imported
449 via using an "intelligent" application assistant dialog.
453 - The new "cairo" output driver supports output in PostScript, PDF,
454 and SVG formats. Its functionality is a superset of that of the
455 "postscript" driver, which has been removed. You must have Cairo
456 and Pango installed to build the "cairo" driver.
458 - Charts are now produced with Cairo and Pango, instead of libplot.
459 Without them, the new graphing features will not work. If you do
460 not have Cairo and Pango installed, you must run `configure' with
463 - The plain text output driver now properly supports multibyte UTF-8
464 characters, including double-width characters and combining
467 - Output to OpenDocument format is now supported.
469 - The HTML output is much improved.
471 * The "pspp" program has a new option --batch (or -b) that selects
472 "batch" syntax mode. In previous versions of PSPP this syntax mode
473 was the default. Now a new "auto" syntax mode is the default. In
474 "auto" mode, PSPP interprets most syntax files correctly regardless
475 of their intended syntax mode.
477 See the "Syntax Variants" section in the PSPP manual for more
480 * The "pspp" program has a new option --syntax-encoding that
481 specifies the encoding for syntax files listed on the command line,
482 as well as the default encoding for syntax files included with
483 INCLUDE or INSERT. The default is to accept the system locale
484 encoding, UTF-8, UTF-16, or UTF-32, automatically detecting which
485 one the system file uses.
487 See the documentation for the INSERT command in the PSPP manual for
490 * Text data files that PRINT and WRITE creates now use the system
491 native line ends by default (CRLF on Windows, LF only elsewhere).
492 Use the new ENDS subcommand on FILE HANDLE to override the default.
494 * A new Perl module allows Perl programs to read and write PSPP
497 * A tutorial chapter has been added to the user manual.
499 Changes from 0.6.1 to 0.6.2:
503 - Dutch, thanks to Harry Thijssen.
505 - Brazilian Portuguese, thanks to Michel Boaventura.
507 Thanks for translations are also due to the coordinators at
508 translationproject.org.
510 * Statistical bug fixes:
512 - REGRESSION: Report correct standard error of the estimate (bug
515 - T-TEST: Report correct significance of paired sample T-test in
516 the common case (bug #26936) and corner cases. Thanks to Mike
517 Griffiths and Matej Cepl for reporting these bugs.
519 * Build fixes and changes:
521 - Fix build with GTK+ 2.17.4 and later.
523 - Make running "make" after running "configure" with different
524 settings reliably rebuild version.c.
526 - Cygwin and MinGW build fixes.
528 - Fixes for building with recent gnulib.
530 - The Makefile now honors two new variables, PSPP_LDFLAGS and
531 PSPPIRE_LDFLAGS, that affect linking of the PSPP and PSPPIRE
532 binaries, respectively. This makes building easier for some
535 - Fixes for "configure --enable-relocatable" (bug #25508).
537 * Data file bug fixes and changes:
539 - Fix reading text data files that contain a mix of white space
540 and commas. Now "a ,b" is treated as two fields containing "a"
541 and "b"; previously it was treated as three, with an empty field
544 - Fix writing corrupted .sav files on Windows.
546 - Fix writing variable labels longer than 252 bytes to save files.
547 Thanks to Robert Westlund for reporting this bug.
549 - Fix writing corrupted .por files (bug #26034).
551 - Fix reading .por files whose initial lines are not padded out
552 with spaces as expected.
554 - PSPP will no longer issue warnings about some .sav file records
555 or values that it does not understand. These warnings were
556 harmless, but needlessly alarmed some users.
558 - Fix crash reading empty string fields from PostgreSQL databases.
560 * Bug fixes that affect PSPP and PSPPIRE:
562 - Users may now control precision of output statistics. Instead
563 of hard coding the width and decimals of output numbers, respect
564 the default format in most instances. Counts are now normally
565 displayed with the format of the weight variable, if any.
567 - Fix crash when an INSERT command specifies the name of a file
568 that does not exist (bug #24569).
570 - Fix crash when CROSSTABS specifies a long-string variable (bugs
573 - Fix crash drawing pie charts with many segments.
575 - Fix crash when NUMERIC specifies an invalid format.
577 * PSPPIRE bug fixes and changes:
579 - On Windows, write the output file to the user's home directory
580 instead of the current directory, to better match user
583 - Some data editor fixes.
587 - Fix typo in BINOMIAL section of user manual (bug #25892).
589 Changes from 0.6.0 to 0.6.1:
591 * Statistical bug fixes:
593 - Report correct standardized regression coefficients in linear
594 regression output (bug #23567).
596 * Bug fixes that affect PSPP and PSPPIRE:
598 - Avoid crash with pie charts (bug #24014).
600 - Don't append % to count totals (bug #24003).
602 - Don't crash on bad input (bug #24031).
604 - Don't crash if "end data." is not left aligned (bug #24115).
606 - Change default workspace value to 64 MB, to avoid unnecessary
607 disk accesses on modern machines.
611 - Add ".sav" or ".por" suffix to filename when saving with Save_As
614 - Make it possible to reopen the output window on Windows (bug
617 - A POSIX regular expression library is now included and used
618 automatically if the host does not have one or has one that is
621 * Build fixes and changes:
623 - Work around bug in GSL that prevented build with recent GCC
624 versions without manually adding -fgnu89-inline to CFLAGS.
626 - Also warn about missing prerequisites as we encounter them (bug
629 - Distribute necessary files to allow users working from the
630 distributed tarball to configure with --enable-gui-tools.
632 - Append $(EXEEXT_FOR_BUILD) to output file name when building
633 q2c, fixing build problems on Windows.
635 - GSL 1.8 or later is now required.
637 - Build errors with --enable-relocatable were fixed.
639 * The German translations were removed, since native German speakers
640 found them too poor to be useful.
642 Changes from 0.4.0 to 0.6.0:
644 * The PSPP license is now version 3 or later of the GNU General
645 Public License. Previously, it was version 2 or later.
647 * PSPP now has a graphical interface, called PSPPIRE. This
648 interface allows you to enter data and variable definitions
649 interactively. Commands may be executed in syntax form, or by
650 using the interactive dialog boxes available from the dropdown
653 * A few sample syntax files are now included in the `examples'
656 * Numerous major and minor bugs have been fixed.
660 * The INSTALL file now reflects the details of how to install
661 PSPP. It is a tailored version of the generic installation
662 instructions, instead of a verbatim copy.
664 * iconv, which is ordinarily installed as part of a Unix-like
665 system, is now required. If you don't have it already, you can
666 install GNU libiconv (http://www.gnu.org/software/libiconv/).
668 * libxml2 and zlib are new optional dependencies. They are
669 required to use PSPP's support for reading Gnumeric files.
671 Statistical procedure changes:
673 * REGRESSION is a new procedure for fitting linear models to data
674 via least-squares estimation.
676 * NPAR TESTS is a new procedure for non-parametric tests. In this
677 release, it supports binomial and chi-square tests.
679 * RANK is a new procedure to rank variables. It supports numerous
682 * FREQUENCIES can now output histograms and pie charts. These
683 features were present in earlier releases, but not documented.
685 User interface changes:
687 * In many situations where PSPP once terminated with a fatal
688 error, PSPP now recovers and continues execution.
690 * PSPP is now able to start up and run even if it cannot find its
693 * Journaling of interactive commands to a disk file is now
694 implemented. By default, journaling is enabled, to a file named
695 `pspp.jnl' in the current directory. SET JOURNAL may be used to
698 * The use of `+' between syntax file names on the command line to
699 prevent the dictionary from being cleared between their
700 executions is no longer supported. All syntax files are now
701 executed as if `+' had been specified.
703 * The -d/--define and -u/--undef command line options are no
704 longer supported. Instead, use /usr/bin/env or shell primitives
705 to define or clear environment variables before invoking PSPP.
707 * If a syntax file named named `rc' is found in a configuration
708 directory (such as $HOME/.pspp), it is executed before any
709 syntax file specified on the command line. The -r or
710 --no-statrc command line option may be used to disable this
715 * Output configuration options have changed. Please refer to the
716 manual for a full description of the available options.
718 In consequence, you will need to reinstall your "devices" file.
719 "make install" will do this for you.
721 * Most error messages are now written to PSPP output files by
722 default. SET ERROR can be used to disable this behavior.
724 * When invoked interactively, PSPP now by default produces output
725 on the terminal, piping it through the "more" program.
726 Previously, by default output was written only to file
727 pspp.list. On most terminals, the page length used for output
728 automatically adapts to the terminal size, even if the terminal
733 - This driver now supports charts in output. Charts are written
734 as separate files that the main output file refers to. By
735 default, charts are written in PNG format to files named
736 pspp-1.png, pspp-2.png, and so on.
738 - Configurations are provided that use VT100 (and xterm)
739 line-drawing characters in tables. The option "-o list-vt100"
740 requests use of this device for output to pspp.list.
744 - The default paper size is now determined using the PAPERSIZE
745 environment variable, or the LC_PAPER locale category on
746 systems that support it. If these are not set, the default is
747 now A4, instead of US letter. To make US letter the default,
748 set PAPERSIZE to "letter" in your environment.
750 - Font metrics are now read from AFM files, instead of
751 Groff-format metrics files. PostScript fonts can now be
754 In consequence, you will need to install an AFM file for each
755 font used in PostScript output. "make install" will install
756 AFM files for the standard PostScript fonts, including the
757 ones that the PostScript driver uses by default.
759 - Standard paper sizes no longer need to be specified through a
760 configuration file. The "papersize" configuration file is no
761 longer needed, or supported.
763 - The PostScript prologue is no longer obtained from the
764 "ps-prologue" configuration file. This configuration file is
765 no longer needed, or supported.
769 - The HTML prologue is no longer obtained from the
770 "html-prologue" configuration file. This configuration file
771 is no longer needed, or supported.
773 Command language changes:
775 * The following commands are new:
777 - GET DATA, which currently supports reading Gnumeric files and
778 text data files. It will be extended later to read other
779 types of foreign data.
781 - CD, to change the current directory.
783 - INSERT, to execute a syntax file.
785 - DELETE VARIABLES, to remove variables from the active file
788 - ADD DOCUMENT, to add text to active file documents.
790 - CLOSE FILE HANDLE (a PSPP extension; see below).
792 - XEXPORT, a PSPP extension that is a transformation equivalent
795 * The following functions for transformation expressions are new:
797 - DATEDIFF, for computing the difference of two dates.
799 - DATESUM, for advancing a date by a specified duration.
801 - VALUELABEL, to obtain the value label for a value.
803 * PSPP now supports very long string variables (over 255 bytes
806 * MATCH FILES now supports the FIRST and LAST subcommands.
808 * Previous versions of PSPP prohibited using commands to both read and
809 write a single file at the same time. Now, PSPP allows this, and
810 the new version of the file atomically replaces the old version.
812 * The following commands are no longer available. They will be
813 re-implemented in a later release:
815 - CLEAR TRANSFORMATIONS
821 * The PROCESS IF command, which was deprecated, has been removed.
822 You may replace any usage of it by SELECT IF following
823 TEMPORARY, which has the same effect.
825 * The output format for variables created by VECTOR may now be
826 specified as part of the VECTOR syntax.
828 "Scratch files", a new PSPP extension:
830 A scratch file, like a system file, consists of a dictionary and
831 any number of cases. Small scratch files are stored in memory;
832 one that grows too large is written to disk. By default, any file
833 handle whose name begins with # is assumed to refer to a scratch
836 Scratch files can be used just about anywhere a system or portable
837 file can be used. Also, portable files are now allowed in most
838 places that system files were allowed in previous PSPP version.
840 A new CLOSE FILE HANDLE command allows the storage associated with
841 scratch files to be freed. It also allows file handles to be
842 reassigned to new files.
844 For more information on scratch files, refer to the "File Handles"
845 section in the PSPP manual. For specifics of what commands now
846 allow what kinds of files to be specified, refer to the
847 documentation on those particular commands.
851 * Binary formats and IBM/360 formats, including ASCII/EBCDIC
852 translation, are now supported. Use FILE HANDLE to specify the
853 format of these files.
855 * Little-endian, big-endian, and VAX-endian formats are now
856 supported for integer binary formats when reading and writing
857 data files. The new RIB and WIB subcommands on the SET command
858 control endianness of integer data. The default is the host's
861 * IEEE 754, VAX, and IBM hexadecimal formats are now supported for
862 floating point binary formats when reading and writing data
863 files. The new RRB and WRB subcommands on the SET command
864 control the floating point format. The default is the host's
865 native floating point format.
867 * DATA LIST now supports the SKIP subcommand, to skip records at
868 the beginning of a file. For compatibility, DATA LIST now
869 treats N format as F format for FREE and LIST format input.
871 * The SAVE and XSAVE commands now support the UNSELECTED,
872 PERMISSIONS, NAMES, and MAP subcommands.
874 * The EXPORT command has been re-implemented to obtain better
875 results. Support for the UNSELECTED, DIGITS, and TYPE
876 subcommands has been added.
878 * For compatibility, PRINT now inserts a space at the beginning of
879 every output line, even lines that would otherwise be blank,
880 when OUTFILE is specified. (The behavior of WRITE is
883 * For compatibility, PRINT EJECT now inserts the digit `1' at the
884 beginning of each line that should begin a new page.
886 * For compatibility, WRITE now outputs the system-missing value as
887 a field filled with spaces. Binary formats are an exception.
888 (The behavior of PRINT is unchanged.)
892 * Input and output format descriptions have been rewritten. They
893 now precisely describe what is accepted on input and written on
896 * The descriptions of the PSPP system and portable file formats
897 have been extensively revised and improved.
899 For developers, the build system now requires Autoconf 2.60 and
902 Changes from 0.3.0 to 0.4.0:
904 Changes in build dependencies:
906 * The GNU Scientific Library (libgsl), version 1.6 or later, is
909 * libplot from GNU plotutils is optional. Without it, the new
910 graphing features will not work. If you do not have it
911 installed, you must run `configure' with --without-libplot.
913 * libgmp2 is no longer a dependency.
915 Newly implemented commands and statistical features:
917 * EXAMINE, including its graphing features.
919 * FREQUENCIES now supports percentiles.
927 * SORT CASES now sorts stably, that is, two cases with equal sort
928 criteria will be in the same relative order before and after the
931 * T-TEST (re-written).
933 * DATE and USE. These commands are parsed but otherwise ignored,
934 to enhance compatibility with certain command files that invoke
937 * VARIABLE WIDTH, VARIABLE ALIGNMENT, and VARIABLE LEVEL. These
938 currently have no effect on PSPP output, but their values are
939 written to and read from system files and thus may affect
940 third-party software.
942 * SET EPOCH implemented.
944 * DATA LIST FREE and DATA LIST LIST now support arbitrary field
947 * FILE HANDLE now supports custom tab widths.
949 Long variable names (and other identifiers) are now supported. Up
950 to the first 64 bytes of each identifier is significant. PSPP now
951 reads and writes system files compatible with SPSS version 12.
953 New --algorithm and --syntax command line options allow
954 SPSS-compatible or enhanced modes to be selected.
956 Support for transformation expressions has been rewritten and
957 significantly improved. Refer to the manual for details.
959 Calculation of moments (mean, standard deviation, kurtosis,
960 skewness) has been rewritten and should now be more accurate. In
961 --algorithm=enhanced mode moments may be more accurate than SPSS in
964 Numerous bugs have been fixed, too many to mention here. Many new
965 tests have been added, leading to the discovery and fixing of many
968 The ASCII output driver can now squeeze multiple blank lines into
971 Much of the code has been rewritten and refactored. It is now much
974 The FILE TYPE and REPEATING DATA commands have been disabled for
975 this release because their implementations were deemed too buggy to
976 be useful. They will be fixed and replaced in a future release.
978 New pspp-mode for Emacs (in pspp-mode.el).
980 Added rudimentary command-line completion for interactive input.
982 lib/julcal and lib/dcdflib are no longer used, so they have been
985 For developers, the build system now requires Autoconf 2.58 and
986 Automake 1.7. The included gettext has been updated to version
989 Some reports state that Texinfo 4.8, the latest version, may be
990 necessary to successfully format the documentation on some systems.
992 Version 0.3.0 changes since 0.2.3:
996 * Using alphanumeric variables in functions under AGGREGATE
999 * Under certain circumstances, the final case would be omitted
1000 from the results of an AGGREGATE operation. Fixed.
1002 * Undefined behavior was invoked by referencing a freed pointer
1003 under certain circumstances. Fixed.
1005 * A wrong record size was displayed when paging the active file to
1008 * Not having enough temporary space for sorting caused a core
1011 * Syntax errors in function descriptions on AGGREGATE caused core
1014 * A null pointer was dereferenced, causing a core dump, when
1015 PERCENTILES was specified on FREQUENCIES. This fixes the
1016 problem, but PSPP still doesn't calculate percentiles.
1018 * SORT always sorted in ascending order. Fixed.
1020 * Some minor memory leaks in the expression parser were removed.
1022 * Many assertions fixed for strict ANSI C compliance.
1026 * SET ECHO ON now implemented, but turned off by default.
1028 * PRINT specifier supported on END REPEAT.
1032 * System libgmp2 library is used if installed instead of
1033 unconditionally using the included libgmp2 subset.
1035 * Extensive code cleanup, which continues.
1037 * Added CORRELATIONS command parser, but not implemented.
1039 Version 0.2.3 changes since 0.2.2:
1043 * SPLIT FILE with a string variable caused a core dump. Fixed.
1045 * Nested INCLUDEs didn't work. Fixed.
1047 * The MATCH FILES procedure set the values of variables not present
1048 to 0. It should have been SYSMIS. This is now fixed.
1050 * The REMARK command was too aggressive about skipping lines. It
1051 didn't like being the last command in a file.
1053 * Comment parsing wasn't consistent with the rest of the code in its
1054 idea of where one command ends and another starts. This meant
1055 that sometimes commands would be mysteriously ignored. Thanks to
1056 Dr. Dirk Melcher <BZN-mdksh@t-online.de> for reporting this bug.
1058 * The TABLE subcommand on MATCH FILES worked only erratically at
1059 best. This fixes it. Thanks to Dr. Dirk Melcher
1060 <BZN-mdksh@t-online.de> for reporting this bug.
1062 * VARIABLE LABELS rejected a slash before the first variable
1063 specification, contradicting the documentation. Thanks to Walter
1064 M. Gray <graywm@northernc.on.ca> for reporting this bug.
1066 * Because of an incorrect optimization in memory allocation,
1067 CROSSTABS sometimes segfaulted when asked to output multiple
1068 tables. Thanks to Walter M. Gray <graywm@northernc.on.ca> for
1071 * CROSSTABS didn't display value labels for column and row
1072 variables. Thanks to Walter M. Gray <graywm@northernc.on.ca> for
1075 * WRITE didn't write line ends. Fixed. Thanks to Dr. Dirk Melcher
1076 <BZN-mdksh@t-online.de> for reporting this bug.
1078 * The TABLE subcommand on MATCH FILES worked only erratically at
1079 best. This fixes it. Thanks to Dr. Dirk Melcher
1080 <BZN-mdksh@t-online.de> for reporting this bug.
1082 * VARIABLE LABELS rejected a slash before the first variable
1083 specification, contradicting the documentation. Thanks to Walter
1084 M. Gray <graywm@northernc.on.ca> for reporting this bug.
1086 * Because of an incorrect optimization in memory allocation,
1087 CROSSTABS sometimes segfaulted when asked to output multiple
1088 tables. Thanks to Walter M. Gray <graywm@northernc.on.ca> for
1091 * CROSSTABS didn't display value labels for column and row
1092 variables. Thanks to Walter M. Gray <graywm@northernc.on.ca> for
1095 * WRITE didn't write line ends. Fixed. Thanks to Dr. Dirk Melcher
1096 <BZN-mdksh@t-online.de> for reporting this bug.
1098 * MATCH FILES corrupted memory and dumped core on some syntax
1101 * MATCH FILES should set numeric values not available to the
1102 system-missing value, not to 0. Thanks to Dr. Dirk Melcher
1103 <BZN-mdksh@t-online.de> for reporting this bug.
1105 * KEEP didn't work properly on the SAVE procedure. Fixed. Thanks
1106 to Ralf Geschke <ralf@kuerbis.org> for reporting this bug.
1110 * Some systems didn't like the way open_file was coded. Thanks to
1111 Hankin <hankin@rogue.consultco.com> for pointing this out.
1113 * The SAVE procedure didn't save long string variables properly.
1114 Fixed by this patch. Thanks to Hankin
1115 <hankin@rogue.consultco.com> for this patch.
1117 * Minor documentation fixes for MATCH FILES.
1119 Version 0.2.2 changes since 0.2.1:
1123 * Fix behavior of PRINT SPACE for negative arguments.
1125 * Fix reading some unusual system files.
1127 * Fix LIST problems with very long variables. Thanks to Hankin
1128 <hankin@dunno.com> for this bug report.
1130 * Fix problems with some string format specifiers.
1132 * Fix use of $CASENUM in expressions. Thanks to Dirk Melcher
1133 <BZN-mdksh@t-online.de> for reporting this bug.
1135 * Additional DATA LIST FREE and DATA LIST LIST fixes. Thanks to
1136 Hankin <hankin@dunno.com> again on this one.
1138 * Sometimes you may encounter a PSPP script that has to be
1139 interpreted in interactive mode. Now you can use the -i flag to
1142 * Warnings for egcs 1.1.1 cleaned up. (However you'll get lots of
1143 `unused variable' warnings under gcc 2.7.2.3, fixing this will
1148 * The files in gmp need the internationalization directory in
1149 their include path. Thanks to OKUJI Yoshinori
1150 <okuji@kuicr.kyoto-u.ac.jp> for pointing this out.
1152 Version 0.2.1 changes since 0.2.0:
1156 * Remember to include examples/ directory in distribution :-)
1158 * Fixed gmp compile problems for some non-i386 architectures.
1159 Thanks to Hans Olav Eggestad <olav@jordforsk.nlh.no> and others
1162 * DATA LIST FREE and DATA LIST LIST parsing of input files is now
1163 matches the documented behavior exactly, and error messages are
1164 more helpful. Thanks to Mark H. Wood <mwood@IUPUI.Edu>.
1166 Version 0.2.0 changes since 0.1.0:
1168 Procedures now implemented:
1169 * CROSSTABS. Please see documentation for caveats.
1171 Transformations and utilities now implemented:
1174 * CLEAR TRANSFORMATIONS
1175 * DISPLAY (all subcommands).
1186 Support for input and output through pipes: "|command" and
1187 "command|" filenames; support for special filenames "-", "stdin",
1190 New command-line features:
1191 * New option --testing-mode: Invoke heuristics to assist testing.
1192 * New option --safer, -s: Don't allow certain unsafe operations.
1193 * New option --command=CMD, -c CMD: Perform literal command CMD.
1194 * rc file ~/.pspp/rc is executed before any other files.
1195 * Now multiple syntax files can be specified.
1197 Operator LAG is now implemented.
1199 Added missing FILE subcommand to REREAD.
1201 Table output manager completely rewritten.
1203 Device configuration file syntax changed. You will need to
1204 reinstall your `devices' file.
1206 New output driver for HTML.
1208 PostScript driver and prologue simplified.
1210 Many bugs fixed. General source-code cleanup.
1212 Added Texinfo documentation for:
1213 * PSPP system file format
1214 * PSPP portable file format
1215 * How to write input for q2c parser generator
1218 PSPP language is now fully documented. Please report any
1219 inaccuracies or omissions in the documentation.
1221 Changes for version 0.1.0:
1223 First public release. For changes from unreleased development
1224 versions, please see ONEWS.
1226 ----------------------------------------------------------------------
1227 Copyright information:
1229 Permission is granted to anyone to make or distribute verbatim
1230 copies of this document as received, in any medium, provided that
1231 the copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved, thus
1232 giving the recipient permission to redistribute in turn.
1234 Permission is granted to distribute modified versions of this
1235 document, or of portions of it, under the above conditions,
1236 provided also that they carry prominent notices stating who last
1240 version-control: never