Updates and improvements

• Choice of grading scale for classes (Standard, Standard with +/-, and Pass/No Credit)
• Ability to edit cutoffs for grading scale (i.e., “83” and up for a B, “87” and up for a B+, etc.)
• Add, edit, and display letter grades on transcripts.
• Choose which courses are included in GPA calculations on transcripts.
• New “Compressed” view for daily and weekly Calendar views – looks like monthly calendar view, but for a day or a week at a time.
• Option for Notes to control whether or not they are displayed on the calendar.

Fixes

• Eliminated the irritating delay that happened when you updated a completion status.
• iPad/iPhone version no longer gets occasionally out of alignment when swiping from day to day.
• Printing improvements (see below)

Note regarding Printing

Getting the layout for printing to be just right on all browsers and operating systems continues to be a challenge.  This release makes some improvements, but there will still be times where things do not come out right for some folks.  Please let us know any time your printout looks odd.  If you can also tell us what you were trying to print (e.g., weekly calendar view, in color), and what browser (IE, Chrome, etc.) and operating system (Windows 7, Windows 8, OS X, etc) you are using, it would help us eliminate those problems.  Thanks!

This release involves some significant changes to Homeschool Planet.  The programming for the new Grading feature is fairly complicated, and required some extensive changes, so even with our thorough testing we still expect that you will find a few new problems.  Also, because of the nature of the changes, you may find problems in other parts of Homeschool Planet as well.  Please be sure to let us know right away if anything seems wrong, even in small ways, and even if you are not quite sure if there really is a problem.  If anything seems odd, just send us a note.  Thanks!

Updates and improvements

• Grading and Transcripts (see important Note below)
• Ability to change subject of class after it is created
• More assignment text shown in calendar view, especially when zoomed
• Faster loading, calender refreshing
• Option to avoid sending empty Daily or Weekly digests
• Option to set your “daytime hours” and limit calendar display to those hours
• Choose the first day of your week (so weekends appear together on left or right)
• Choose the day on which weekly digests get sent
• Choose the time at which digests get sent

Fixes

• The behavior of the zoom slider is much improved
• Only refreshes when necessary when switching between day/week/month views
• Fixed problem where class subject was getting copied into title field
• Fixed problem where deleted holidays were still being displayed
• Fixed problem where marking days off messed up assignment schedule

Other changes

• The mobile version, for phones and tablets, has been updated.  On the plus side, it is now MUCH more usable and touch-screen-friendly.  On the minus side, it is now limited to a single day at a time view, and you cannot edit your schedule from your phone or tablet.  You can still mark attendance and mark assignments as complete, but other changes will require you to use the desktop version.

Note regarding Grading

The new Grading feature allows you to group your assignments into categories, and to specify what percent of the final grade is contributed by each category.  Since many of you have existing assignments that you may want to grade, we have put all of your assignments in the special category “Unassigned”.  This category is not normally available, and you will not be able to place assignments into it yourself.  It exists only so that when you set up grading for a class with existing assignments, we can give you an easier way to select categories than having to scroll through and set each one individually.

Updates and improvements

• Attendance tracking
• School years, with holidays
• Ability to print to-do and shopping lists
• Description field for classes (e.g. allows “English – vocabulary”, and “English – creative writing”, etc.)
• Support for non-US date formats (e.g., 24 February 2013, 24/2/2013, etc.)
• Red/Yellow/Green colors for assignment completion boxes
• Added a favicon to appear in browser tabs and bookmarks

Fixes

• Correctly delete “every day going forward” for activities with custom schedules
• Homeschool Helper remembers when you select “Always do it this way and stop asking”
• Homeschool Helper now skips assignments with no text (i.e., assignments created just to attach a reminder)
• Eliminated unnecessary question about shared assignments for activities with only one student

Other changes

• The “Mark Vacation Days” has been replaced with the ability to mark days off in the new “School Years” feature