SAYING GOOD BYE TO SEPTEMBER: LAST SEPT'15 BUILD OF ZET UNIVERSE NOW AVAILABLE FOR INSIDERS

Hi everyone,

I hope that you were able to read our blog post from last Wednesday, where we shared more details on our current work on the upcoming SDK (Software Development Kit). If you missed it, we welcome you to read it, as it gives a good glimpse on our internal engineering processes and practices. We continue to be humbled by the amount of feedback and excitement we are seeing from the Zet Universe Insider community.

This week (albeit late) we are glad to return to our normal weekly schedule, and share the latest build with you - Build 2.0.5751.2855. Although most of the changes in it are under the hood (as we continue the refactoring process of our .NET class library), we are pleased to bring a few new features and bug fixes into the product as well. 

Getting Started:

• If you are new to the Zet Universe Insider Program and haven't installed Zet Universe, yet, please visit the Set Up Your PC webpage to download the latest build's installer.

• Otherwise, as usual, the newest build is available via the magic of Zet Universe Update system, powered by Squirrel for Windows. To get it, you can go to Settings --> Update, and click on "Check Now" button to get it now.
• Total download might range from a few hundred kilobytes up to 8MB, depending on the number of updates you've applied already to your copy of the Zet Universe Insider Preview.
• Once the build is downloaded, Zet Universe will begin the installation. Once it will finish, it will ask you to restart the app.

SO, WHAT'S NEW FOR YOU, OUR INSIDERS?

Searching using the advanced search query syntax: most of the modern search systems use the same approach for constructing search queries. Everything that you can search upon is viewed as a combination of search parameters (think "title", "author", "text", etc.), and you can construct an advanced search query by specifying values specific to these parameters. So, for instance, you could type something like "title:Palantir" to find all documents that have "Palantir" in their title (and only in the title). Well, today we are glad to introduce the advanced search query syntax available for you in Zet Universe Insider Preview!

Starting today you can use four different fields to search for the data, in addition to simple search queries:

• title:value searches in the item's title only
• body:value searches in the item's body only (e.g., contents of a file or a web page)
• kind:value searches for object of the given type
• keyword:value or keyphrase:value searches for the items that have the given keyphrase​

Searching for similar documents by keyphrase: a popular feature of the Alpha version of Zet Universe, it allows you to find other documents that contain the same keyphrase. To use this approach, open the properties of the given item, choose "KEYPHRASES" in the menu, and click on the specific keyphrase to start searching for the documents containing it.

WHAT'S FIXED?

Rebuild Index now re-indexes all files and webpages, in addition to item names and kinds: Zet Universe uses the full-text index to perform very fast searches across your projects. Although the index requires almost no maintenance, however, if the index can't find a file that you know exists in an indexed location, you might need to rebuild the index. Rebuilding the index can take several hours, and searches might be incomplete until the index is fully rebuilt. In the past, by using this feature, you could get only item names and kinds indexed; starting today you'll be able to get item's contents and keyphrases indexed, as well.

To rebuild the index:

1. Open Settings pane,
2. Click on Options,
3. Click on "Rebuild Index",
4. When prompted to confirm "rebuild", click "Yes".

Item kind is shown when you rename an item which kind is defined in the third-party component: in Zet Universe, all external data sources (think Dropbox folders, local folders, email folders, etc.) are represented as items with special kinds. During the startup, Zet Universe loads all components, and components are allowed to register their own kinds. Until today, however, custom kinds were not used in the "Rename" dialog. Starting today, custom kinds are shown the same love as the built-in ones (documents, pictures, etc.).

When file is added to the local folder while Zet Universe isn't running, after starting up Zet Universe, the file will be picked up now: starting today, Zet Universe will correctly analyze the local folders for files added when Zet Universe wasn't running.

WHAT'S STILL BROKEN?

• You can't drop items from other project spaces by using search results... Just yet. Instead, you'll get an error message.
• Zet Universe still doesn't re-connect after waking up if it had no internet connection before the computer went to hibernation.
• There is no UI to change the default file store when multiple file store data sources are added to the project space. Zet Universe will use the first added data source to save files you've added to the project space.
• You can't drag-n-drop items from the "Navigation Pane" to the project space using touch. As a workaround, use mouse or pen.
• Changes (renames, etc.) to files stored in the folders located in the user profile won't be picked up while Zet Universe is running. There is no workaround. Although there is a fix, it won't be available until the next build. We are sorry for this bug.

WHAT ARE THE NEWS ON THE SDK FRONT?

Well, our promise was to deliver first bits of the SDK by the end of September. Technically speaking, the end of September is tomorrow, and not today, but the hard fact is, we are a bit behind the schedule. The good news is, we've closed about 90 refactoring issues during the last two weeks (normally, we close 20-40 issues per week). 

To give a better understanding, let me explain that technically Zet Universe is a platform for data processing and visualization, and it is extendable by first-party and third-party components. We call them:

• Apps, 
• Information Processors.

These components are then picked up by Zet Universe during the startup. How do they extend Zet Universe?

• Apps work like a gateway to the external data sources, allowing you to connect your data from services like Dropbox, Gmail, Exchange, etc., to your projects in Zet Universe, 
• Information Processors work with the imported data, allowing you to do full-text search queries, see keyphrases for the selected kinds of documents, see the authors of the given documents, and so on.

Both kinds of components are connected to Zet Universe via the .NET class library we call "ZU.Core.Developer" (SDK library), which was envisioned as the tiny component defining all necessary interfaces for external components to successfully register with and work inside the Zet Universe platform.

However, although we've envisioned this library as a tiny component, we had to understand the use of this library under different circumstances, and we also had to use some of its functionality in our first-party components. Thanks to the first two months of public testing of Zet Universe we are now ready to clean up the SDK library, and so during the last two weeks we've done just that: refactoring.

The refactoring process in our case means that:

• we moved implementations to the product libraries,
• we kept their public interfaces in our SDK library,
• we removed references to external and own components from the SDK library.

So far, we've done most of the job (there are about 10 more classes we have to move to the higher levels of the platform), but we are already very pleased with the actual results:

• SDK library's size is now 93KB (compare that to a few hundred kilobytes),
• SDK library references only standard .NET 4.5 libraries,
• Entire product's setup's size is 8MB (vs. 12MB).

WHAT'S NEXT?

In the upcoming release we will finish the refactoring process of the SDK library, and start working on the advanced plugin platform to make it the main way for new components to plug into the Zet Universe Platform. Once this will be done, we'll start shipping the SDK builds to you, in addition to the weekly builds.

Again, we are sorry for releasing this Flight so late, and we are glad for your support and patience. 

Thank you again to our Zet Universe Insiders for your continued support and participation. 

As always please continue to give us feedback, suggestions, and problem reports via the UserVoice forum, use the Zet Universe Insiders Group on Facebook to connect with other Insiders for help and tips on problems you hit.

Thanks,
Daniel and the team