We’d like to take this opportunity to wish you all a very Happy New Year from all of us here. We hope 2013 will be a great year for you!

We’re also excited to announce the release of MIDAS v4.01.

The primary focus for v4.01 has been to further optimize the speed and performance of MIDAS v4. In our benchmark testing, on average,
MIDAS v4.01 is 15% faster than v4.00 !!

Whilst the main focus for this update has been on improving speed and performance, we’ve also included several new features too…

Full Screen Mode

If you’re running MIDAS in a browser that supports the new “Full Screen API”, you’ll now see a “Full Screen” link on both the login screen and within MIDAS itself. At time of writing this includes: Firefox 15+, Chrome 22+, Safari 5.1+, and Opera 12.1+.

Clicking a “Full Screen” link will make your MIDAS run in “full screen” mode – MIDAS will fill your entire screen! No tabs, address bar, taskbar or other items cluttering up your screen. You’ll be able to see your booking grid at its largest possible size!

You’ll be able to exit full screen mode at any time by clicking the “Exit Full Screen” link, or by pressing “Esc”

Additional Export Options

In v4.01, we’ve improved the Export function within MIDAS. You can now export Resources and Invoice Summaries in either XML, CSV, or TXT formats. This is ideal if you wish to use this data in 3rd party applications (such as Quickbooks, etc)

Set Operating Hours for all Venues at once

Whilst setting up your venue’s “Hours of Operation” is generally something you’ll do initially and then probably rarely change again, it can still be quite time-consuming clicking lots of green squares for each hour period during the week for each of your venues. That’s why in v4.01 we’ve added an “All Venues” checkbox.

If you select this box, when you click “Save Changes”, the Hours of Operation for the currently selected venue will be “copied” to all your venues!

Improved Booking Information “Client” Tab

The Client tab of the Booking Information Panel in v4.01 now also includes a list of the client’s Paid and Outstanding invoices when you “hover” over a booking for any particular client. You can further click any invoice from these lists to jump straight to that invoice!

Better User Experience when making “Booking Requests” on mobile devices

If you’re a regular reader of our blog, you’ll know we recently introduced a mobile version of our main website. We’re currently in the process of developing a mobile-specific version of MIDAS too. This should make an appearance sometime next year. In the meantime, however, for MIDAS v4.01 we’ve made the Public Booking Request feature much more “mobile friendly”. It’s now easier for members of the public to check room availability and make bookings requests through their smartphone or mobile device:

Keep Your Browser Up-to-date!

We want you to have the best possible user experience when using MIDAS in your favorite Web Browser. We support our scheduling software in all 5 major browsers. These are Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, Safari, and Opera. A list of the minimum and recommended versions for each of these browsers we support can be found at mid.as/browsers.

Keeping your web browser up-to-date is so important! That’s why, starting with v4.01, MIDAS will display a notification if your browser is too old to use MIDAS, prompting you to update:

Additionally, if your browser meets the minimum version we support, but falls short of the version we recommend, MIDAS will also show a notification:

(These notifications are enabled in MIDAS v4.01 by default, but may be turned off if desired)

Emerging Web Technologies

It’s a very exciting time for web based development. There are lots of new and emerging technologies and standards (such as HTML5 and CSS3). Some of these are already used by MIDAS v4 (such as the new “drag & drop to reschedule bookings” feature). If you’re stuck on an older web browser that doesn’t support these standards/technologies, you won’t be able to take advantage of all the features that MIDAS (and internet in general) has to offer. Plus you’ll be potentially exposed to web-based security threats that emerge all the time if your browser is not kept up-to-date.

To allow us to continue to develop new and exciting features for MIDAS, we have to “phase out” support for older browser versions, as they become too old, and newer versions are available. For instance, we took the decision in 2010 to drop support for Internet Explorer 7. Now that IE10 is available for Windows 8 (and now also available for Windows 7 users too), during the course of 2013 we’ll likely be dropping support for IE8. IE8 is a browser which is now nearly 4 years old – which by today’s fast evolving browser landscape is considered very old!

Don’t worry, MIDAS v4.01, is still supported on IE8. But the introduction of this new notification system with MIDAS v4.01 if your browser is too old will hopefully encourage users to update their browser, and in that way be prepared for when support ends for older browsers, such as IE8.

View the full Changelog for MIDAS v4.01 here

How To Get MIDAS v4.01

Existing MIDAS customers with valid Support Subscriptions can update to v4.01 from within the software (MIDAS Admin Options → Manage MIDAS → Update)

Customers who have their MIDAS “cloud hosted” by us – you don’t need to do anything! – We’ve already updated you to MIDAS v4.01!

If you’re not yet using MIDAS, why not start off the New Year by getting your organization’s room scheduling in order once and for all with our intuitive, easy to use, web based software MIDAS!?

Why not give MIDAS a try now, and Read what some of our existing customers say

New Year… New Start

As a New Year is an ideal time to make a fresh start with your room bookings, to celebrate 2013 we’re offering 13% off new purchases throughout January! – simply use Promo Code “NEWYEAR13” on our website when making your purchase.

Again, on behalf of everyone at MIDAS, we wish you all the very best for 2013!

The post Happy New Year! – MIDAS v4.01 Now Available! appeared first on MIDAS - Room Booking System | Blog.

Much of the original MIDAS code was re-written from the ground up, and many new features were added. Since then, we’ve been working hard on making MIDAS even better, and we’ll soon be releasing v4.01.

The primary focus for v4.01 has been to further optimize the speed and performance of MIDAS. In our benchmark testing, on average,
MIDAS v4.01 is 15% faster than v4.00 !!

Whilst the main focus for v4.01 has been on performance, we’re also squeezing in a few new features too:

Full Screen Mode

If you’re accessing MIDAS in a browser that supports the new “Full Screen API”, you’ll see a “Full Screen” link on both the login screen and within MIDAS itself:

Clicking a “Full Screen” link will make your MIDAS run in “full screen” mode – MIDAS will fill your entire screen! No tabs, address bar, taskbar or other items cluttering up your screen. You’ll be able to see your booking grid at its largest possible size!

You’ll be able to exit full screen mode at any time by clicking the “Exit Full Screen” link or by pressing “Esc”.

At time of writing supported browsers include: Firefox 15+, Chrome 22+, Safari 5.1+, and Opera 12.1+.

Additional Export Options

In v4.01, we’ve improved the Export function within MIDAS. Now you can export Resources and Invoice Summaries in either XML, CSV, or TXT formats. This is ideal if you wish to use this data in 3rd party applications (such as Quickbooks, etc).

Set Operating Hours for all Venues at once

Setting up your venue’s “Hours of Operation” is generally something you’ll do once. Still, it can still be quite time-consuming clicking lots of green squares for each hour period during the week for each of your venues. That’s why in v4.01 we’ve added an “All Venues” checkbox.

If you select this box, when you click “Save Changes”, the Hours of Operation for the currently selected venue will be applied to all your venues!

Improved Booking Information “Client” Tab

The Client tab of the Booking Information Panel in v4.01 now also includes a list of the client’s Paid and Outstanding invoices when you “hover” over a booking for any particular client. You can further click any invoice from these lists to jump straight to that invoice!

Better User Experience when making “Booking Requests” on Smartphones/Mobile Devices

If you’re a regular reader of our blog, you’ll know we recently introduced a mobile version of our main website. We’re currently in the process of developing a mobile-specific version of MIDAS too, which should make an appearance sometime next year. In the meantime, however, for MIDAS v4.01 we’ve made the Public Booking Request feature much more “mobile friendly”. It’s now easier for people to check room availability and make bookings requests through their smartphone or similar mobile device:

Keep Your Browser Up-to-date!

We want you to have the best possible user experience when using MIDAS in your favorite web browser. We support our scheduling software in all 5 major browsers (Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, Safari, and Opera). A list of the minimum and recommended versions for each of these browsers we support may be found here.

Keeping your web browser up-to-date is so important! That’s why, starting with v4.01, MIDAS will display a notification if your browser is too old to use MIDAS, prompting you to update:

Additionally, if your browser meets the minimum version we support, but falls short of the version of your browser we recommend, MIDAS will also show a notification:

These notifications are enabled in MIDAS v4.01 by default, but may be turned off if desired.

It’s a very exciting time for web based development – there are lots of new and emerging technologies and standards (such as HTML5 and CSS3). Some of these are already used by MIDAS v4 (such as the new “drag & drop to reschedule bookings” feature).

If you’re stuck on an older web browser that doesn’t support these standards/technologies, you won’t be able to take advantage of all the features that MIDAS (and internet in general) has to offer.

Plus you’ll be potentially exposed to web based security threats that emerge all the time if your browser is not kept up-to-date.

To allow us to continue to develop new and exciting features for MIDAS, we have to “phase out” support for older browser versions, as they become too old, and newer versions are available.

For instance, we took the decision in 2010 to drop support for Internet Explorer 7.

Now that IE10 is available for Windows 8 (and soon to be available for Windows 7 users), it’s likely that in the not too distance future we’ll be dropping support for IE8 too. Internet Explorer 8 is now nearly 4 years old – which by today’s fast evolving browser landscape is very old!

Don’t worry, MIDAS v4.01, will still be supported on IE8. The introduction of this new notification system with MIDAS v4.01 will hopefully encourage users to update their older IE8 browsers. That way they’ll be prepared for when support ends for older browsers, such as IE8.

UPDATE: 1^st January 2013 – MIDAS v4.01 is now available!

The post What’s new in MIDAS v4.01 appeared first on MIDAS - Room Booking System | Blog.