Category: Development

What’s new in MIDAS v3.15

MIDAS v3.15 is nearing completion, so we thought we’d take a moment to tell you about this upcoming update!

Improved Hours of Operation

The most exciting improvement in v3.15 is a complete redesign of the “Hours of Operation” screen for your venues. Previously, you were able to set a single opening and closing time for each day of the week per venue. Outside of these hours, no bookings would then be permitted. This worked great if a venue was open from say 9am-5pm. However, if there were multiple open/closed periods during a single day – i.e. 9am – 1pm, 2pm – 5pm, the “Hours of Operation” settings could not accommodate for these.

So, following feedback from our customers, we’ve made this possible in v3.15:

Hours of Operation

The “Hours of Operation” screen is now a grid of 24 x 7 squares. Each square represents a one hour period of time. Clicking a green square will turn it red. A red square means that the venue is closed during that particular hour of the week. Clicking the square again will turn it green, meaning that it is open during that hour.

You can also close a venue in 15 minute increments by right-clicking a square in the grid instead of left-clicking. For example, right clicking on a full green square once will close that venue for the first 15 mins of the selected hour. Right-clicking for a second time will close the venue for the first 30 mins of the hour. A third right click will close the venue for the first 45 mins of the hour. Continuing to right-click will allow you to instead close the venue for the last 45, 30, and 15 minutes of the hour.

Sort Bookings on Print Outs

There’s also a new print setting in v3.15. This allows you to change the sort order in which your bookings are printed. In previous versions, printing a set of bookings will print them in chronological order. In v3.15, you’re now able to sort them by venue, type, client, or indeed any other booking field. You can also sort in either ascending or descending order too!

Find Similar Bookings Across Custom Date Ranges

We’ve also introduced a date range selector on the modify/delete similar bookings screen. This allows you to restrict the search results to a specific date range. Previously, a similar bookings search would return all future matching bookings. Depending on how far in advance you add bookings to MIDAS, this could return a large number of results. So this new filter is more efficient, by only returning only those matching bookings you’re actually interested in.

There are also a number of small issues that have been addressed in v3.15 that were identified since the release of v3.14 in October last year.

Want to try v3.15 for yourself now? – Why not become a Beta Tester. We’re looking for people to “road test” upcoming versions of our software to help us identify any issues/bugs before they are released. This is crucial in ensuring a rock-solid product, so we’d really appreciate your help! – You don’t need to be a programmer, and you can spend as much or as little time beta testing as you’d like, all we ask is that you have a play and if you spot any issues let us know so we can fix them!

If you’d like to help make our software better by becoming a tester, please visit mid.as/betatesters


What’s new in MIDAS v3.14

Work on our next update to MIDAS, v3.14 is nearing completion, so we thought we’d take this opportunity to tell you about a couple of the new features in this forthcoming update…

The biggest area that’s been updated in this release is the “My Messages” module.
Starting with version 3.14 you’ll be able to:

Receive notifications when consumables are low

The person(s) responsible for purchasing consumables can be informed when they need to re-order!

Low Consumable Warning
Low consumable notifications

Receive notifications when specific resources are added to bookings

For example, catering staff can be automatically notified when refreshments are required!

Greater control over watch “triggers”

The addition of AND/OR logic allows greater control over what triggers your watch notification. For instance you can set up a watch to notify you when either a new booking is added to a particular room OR a new booking of a particular type is added. Alternatively, you can set up the watch to notify you when a new booking is added to a particular room AND is a particular type, and so forth

Watch Settings
AND/OR logic providing greater control over notification triggers

Automatically forward notifications and messages to your email

You can have watch notifications and internal messages from other users automatically forwarded to your email address. This means that you don’t need to log in to MIDAS to check for new messages!

Suppress notifications window when you log in

You can disable the “My Messages” pop-up which displays after you login whenever you have messages, reminders, or watches.

My Messages Settings
Notification Settings

Also, in v3.14 we’ve extended the “Statistics” module to now include a section for “Invoice Statistics“. In this section you’ll be able to select a date range, and MIDAS will show you statistics of all invoices sent during that period. You’ll be able to see how much has been invoiced, how much has been paid, and how much is still outstanding! …and you can breakdown these statistics by client, organization, or booking type!

Invoice Statistics
Invoice Statistics

You can now also Print Statistics to your printer via the main print icon!


MIDAS v3.13 – now with SSL support

v3.13 is primarily a maintenance release, improving performance, and fixing a number of bugs that were discovered since the release on v3.12 (See bugs.mid.as for a full list of bugs fixed)

However, a couple of new features have also made it into v3.13:

Improved support for SSL connections

In previous versions of MIDAS, SSL (https) connections have not been well supported. In v3.13, we’ve addressed this with a new “SSL Access” option. You’ll find this under MIDAS Admin Options -> Manage MIDAS -> Security.

With SSL (Secure Socket Layer), the connection between your browser and the server is encrypted. So if you’re worried about the potential for your MIDAS data to be intercepted during transit be sure enable SSL Access to your MIDAS!

If the server from which you are running MIDAS allows SSL connections, 3 “SSL Access” settings are available within MIDAS:

  • Disabled – Force all users to connect to MIDAS via http:// (https:// connections will be redirected to http:// connections)
  • Enabled – Allow users to access MIDAS via either http:// or https://
  • Forced – Force all users to connect to MIDAS via https:// (http:// connections will be redirected to https:// connections)

UPDATE – August 2012: If your MIDAS is “Cloud Hosted” by us, High Grade 256-bit encrypted SSL access to your MIDAS is now INCLUDED!

Automatically notify administrators when new booking requests are made

Following feedback from our users, we’ve now included options to allow MIDAS to automatically send notification emails to selected MIDAS Administrators whenever a new Booking Request is received by your MIDAS!

You can select which users receive this notifications via MIDAS Admin Options -> Manage MIDAS -> Web Requests.

Automatically Adjust for Daylight Savings Time (DST)

For a while now you’ve been able to specify the timezeone your MIDAS is running in. In v3.13, we’ve now added the option to “Automatically Adjust for DST”.

You’ll find this setting under MIDAS Admin Options -> Manage MIDAS -> Appearance.


Accept Public Booking Requests

We’ve been working for some time on the ability to allow non-MIDAS users to check your venue availability and make booking “requests” online. We’ve already implemented this with a number of our clients, and we feel it’s now ready to roll out to everyone, so you’ll find it included in the forthcoming v3.12

What is a “Booking Request”?

Well, a Booking Request isn’t an actual booking. When a Booking Request is received by MIDAS, it is added to the “Pending Booking Requests” screen. From this screen, a MIDAS user with sufficient privileges can then go on to approve the request (i.e. add it to MIDAS as an actual booking), reject the request, modify and add the request, or query the request with the person who submitted it.

Pending Booking Requests

What control do I have over public Booking Request settings?

…can I disable it, or only allow certain venues to be “request able”?

Yes, we provide you with full control over your public Booking Request settings. MIDAS will allow you to restrict public booking requests to certain venues only, or disable public booking requests entirely! Booking requests can also be prevented from being made too far in advance, or at too short notice. For instance, you may like to enforce that requests must be made a least 7 days in advance, and set it so that requests cannot be made more than 3 months ahead, or after a fixed date.

Here are the 5 simple steps for non-MIDAS users to make a Booking Request:

Step 1: Select Venue(s)

Step 1: Select Venue(s)

Step 2: Select Date(s)

Step 2: Select Date(s)

Step 3: Select Times

Step 3: Select Times

Step 4: Your Details

Step 4: Your Details

Step 5: Finished

Step 5: Finished

MIDAS v3.12 is coming soon… watch this space!