Recipe Software

Current Version is 5.9, released Jul 15, 2009

(What's New?)

Upgrade Instructions

Look in the Home Cookin title bar to see which version you are currently using.

Find your registration date:

Version 5.4 or later: Click the Help tab. The registration date is displayed at the top of the Help screen.

Version 5.0 to 5.3: Click the About button in the upper right corner of the program window. The registration date is displayed at the bottom of the About dialog.

Version 4.9 or earlier: Click the Setup tab. The registration date is displayed on the Setup screen.

If your registration date is LESS than two years old, there is no cost to upgrade. Go to step 5.

If your registration date is more than two years old, you must renew your registration to use the new version. A new registration code will be emailed to you promptly (upgrades do not include a CD or any additional recipes):

Home Cookin Upgrade (Download Only) 19.95 Buy Now

Download the new trial version.

Open the installation program, and follow the prompts to install.
(Do not uninstall your old version until you are sure the new version is working well.)

Double-click the desktop icon to open Home Cookin.

Home Cookin will scan for previous versions.

Select the old version you want to copy recipes from.

Assuming everything proceeds normally, the new version should now include the recipes, groceries, and meal plans from your old version. When you are confident everything is working well in the new version, you may uninstall any old versions using the "Add or Remove Programs" applet in Windows control panel.

Home Cookin Recipe Software History

Version 6.45 - In development...

Fixed a memory leak that prevented photo loading and icons to disappear.
Added automatic update system for easier upgrades.
Redesigned the recipe screen for easier reading.
Improved smart formatting of recipe ingredients.
Version designation changed to Version.Revision Number.
Minor shading improvements to interface buttons.
Redesigned a new Meals screen.
Recipes can now be printed directly from Meals screen.
Reorganize main navigation tabs.
Added new About screen.
Improved formatting for Mastercook and Meal Master exporting.
Improved management of user settings.
New text entry boxes for "Find" and "File Selector" operations

Version 5.9 (2009.44) - Released Jul 15, 2009

Fixed a bug in the settings management.
Fixed buffer overruns in print routines.
Fixed minor sizing issue for meal calendar.
Fixed photo import to eliminate crashing and add support for PNG photos.
Improved file selector for easier navigation of drives and folders.
Improved internal graphics displays.
Improved recipe import for easier importing.
Added checks for missing printers.

Version 5.8 (2008.43) - Released Nov 12, 2008

Fixed a bug in the upgrade processing.
Upgrade searches are now limited to default installation folders, uninstall entries, and shortcut icons on the desktop and start menu. This greatly improves the upgrade scans and avoids false detections of backups.
Minor change to the file header update.

Version 5.7 (2008.42) - Released Nov 01, 2008

Upgrade Processing:

Streamlined upgrade procedures.
Reduced time to scan for previous versions.
Added version header to recipe data file to improve future version identification.
Blocked folder from upgrade scan that only contained trial data from version 5.5.

Recipe Operations:

Improved selection of grocery items. Click ingredient name on Recipe screen to quickly find grocery items.
Servings can now be set to zero for recipes that don't have serving sizes (crafts, pet foods, etc.). Servings are not displayed or printed when set to zero.
Card position can now be adjusted when printing individual index cards.
Manual import now allows overlapping of field selections. This can be useful for capturing multi-segment recipes with easier editing later.
You can now select and right click a line in the Manual importer before saving your selections. This allows basic cleanup operations without having to edit the full recipe.

Meal Planning:

Added check boxes for meals to allow printing or deleting only selected meals.
Added option to print meal list at the end of a grocery list.

Miscellaneous:

Improved screen slider operation to provide better control with long lists.
Corrected the spelling of the "Mispelled Words" title in the spell checker.
Improved pasting function for entry of registration code. A new paste button will extract the registration code, even if you copy an entire email.
Improved detection of default web browser.
The recipe editor can now paste photo's that have been "copied" in Windows explorer listings.

Version 5.6 (2008.41) - Apr 03, 2008

Printing:

Page size now matches actual paper being printed. This should prevent problems with printers that refused to print index cards when letter size paper was indicated.
Added A4 print layout.
Increased left and right margins for Letter and A4 layouts. This should allow pages to fit binders better, especially with double-sided prints.
Slight margin increase within the card areas. This should reduce text being cut off when printing too close to paper edges.
Changed wording in print managers from margin to position to better reflect the actual operation.

PDF Cookbook:

Added new feature to Save PDF Cookbook.
Recipe selector lets you choose recipes for your cookbook.
Email PDF file to friends or family.
Upload PDF file to book printers such as Lulu.com to create real paperback or hardcover cookbooks.
Enter a title, subtitle, and author for your cookbook.
Index is generated automatically at the end of the cookbook.
Supports 6x9, 8.5x11, and A4 cookbook sizes.

Duplicate Finder:

Improved statistical algorithm to find more matches with fewer false detections.
Added user control of accuracy level.
Modified automatic marking of exact matches (Marks last recipe added, or the recipe that does not have a photo attached if dates match.).
Added icon to indicate recipes with attached photos.

Meal Calendar:

Recipes and Notes older than two months are now deleted automatically. This allows the calendar to advance properly, ensures the current week is always accessable, and reduces database maintenance.

Recipes:

Added popup quick entry for common measures in recipe editor (right click or escape key).
Added option to show or hide carriage returns
Added support for JPG and GIF file formats
Fixed bug when pasting some photos from clipboard
Added automatic resizing for images larger than 640x480

Importing:

Added error checking when importing zero-byte files.
Fixed incorrect serving size when importing some recipes.
Cancel button in spell checker reworded to Quit to better reflect the actual operation
(Quit spell checking, not cancelling the previous spell check operations).

Miscellaneous:

New upgrade process to simplify the transfer of recipes from old versions.
Added export feature to Grocery screen with a variety of export formats. This should allow transfer of grocery lists to palm and handheld computers.
Reworded error message when adding recipes to reserved chapters.

Version 5.5 (2007.40) - Released Apr 17, 2007

Vista Support:

Code signing, manifests, and file descriptors minimize browser and UAC warnings.
When installed to the default Program Files folder, data files are saved to the users My Documents folder. This also provides multi-user capabilities.
When installed in any other folder, program and data files are saved together (as all prior versions did).
Home Cookin now uses the InnoSetup installer to install and uninstall files. One of the benefits is smaller file sizes for downloading. Upgrade features were moved to the program startup.

Interface:

Window title bar now shows whether the program is the active window.
Some 3D shading effects were removed to enhance operational speed (Windows alphablending functions are fairly slow).
The recipe editor was reconfigured to eliminate the "very wide button" issue on high resolution screens, while maintaining compatibility with 800x600 screen sizes. This also makes the editor appearance more consistent with the rest of the program.
New background and popup images reduce the "pink" appearance that is seen on some LCD screens (laptops especially). This also improves readability of popup alerts. (If you prefer the old look, simply delete the background.bmp and popup.bmp files).

Recipe Editor:

Degree symbol can now be entered by pressing Control+D, or by right clicking the text.
1/4, 1/2, and 3/4 symbols can now be entered by pressing Control+1, Control+2, or Control+3.
Bug fixed that would sometimes mark text blocks incorrectly.
Text blocks are now managed better.
Ingredient cursor is now reset when resizing in the editor. This eliminates error conditions when the buffer size is reduced.

Miscellaneous:

Beta now expires on a fixed date to ensure users install the final release version.
Minor improvements to drive scan for previous version files.
Added printing option to start directions in second column.

Version 5.4 (2006.39) - Oct 20, 2006

Version 5.3 (2006.38) - Jan 26, 2006

Version 5.2 (2005.37) - Nov 04, 2005

Version 5.1 (2005.36) - Oct 19, 2005

Version 5.0 (2005.35) - Aug 23, 2005

First 32-bit version of Home Cookin.