DNA sequence manipulation software - (Sep/26/2007 )
Hello all,
I have been doing a lot of cloning in the last ten years, and even though there are a few good free softwares available out there, there were many functions that I thought were missing from them.
Will the help of one of my friends who is in computer sciences, I decided to try my hand at programming and designed/wrote a program with what I considered were the most important and missing features ( within the limits of my capacities 
)
The result came out quite good, and with the help of the university I set up a website where it can be downloaded for free, for those who would be curious to give it a try.
It's called "PlasmaDNA", and the address is http://research.med.helsinki.fi/plasmadna/
Feedback or comments welcome!
Alexandre
Hi Alexandre,
Thank you for your generous offer. I downloaded your program and installed it into my Mac computer. But PlasmaDNA could not run in my Mac. My Mac is equipped with OS 10.4.10 and an Intel processor. Is there any compatible issue here? Thanks.
Hi,
This is quite strange... I am always worried about compatibility issues since I am not a computer expert, but your settings are identical to mine 
I just went to another laboratory that use Mac, and I downloaded the program from my site and it seems to work there. Do you mean it doesn't start at all when you launch the application? If that's the case, the only thing I can think of is:
- What you download is a .zip file, which you need to decompress with a program like StuffIt expander
- The result is a folder containing the application and some database files. You can put that folder anywhere you want, it doesn't matter, but just make sure you keep the application in the folder with the extra files since it needs them to launch properly.
I really hope this will help,
Alexandre
Hi Alexandre,
Thank you for suggestions. Yeah, that is strange. Later I removed the program from my Mac and use Stuffit to decompress the Mac version again. PlasmaDNA still could not run properly in my Mac. When I tried to run it, I just saw my mouse wheel spinning and spinning and nothing show up in my computer screen. But when I turned off my Mac, my Mac asked me to force quit the PlasmaDNA program. This means the program was running, but somehow hide behind and I could not see it. The PC version of PlasmaDNA is running fine in my PC.
Hi,
I am very happy that the PC version works for you and that you were willing to give it another chance. I hope you like it.
About the bug, thank you for reporting it. I never heard of it before, but I am afraid it might have happened to others and they just deleted the program thinking the whole thing was crap 
I sent you a PM with some suggestions of things you could do to help me locate the bug, if you would be so inclined.
Alexandre
OK, thanks to the help of ionchannelbk and others, the problem has been found.
It seems that, for some Mac users, Stuffit de-compresses the folder incorrectly. Instead of a normal "domains.pdat" database file, it creates an empty "domains.pdat" file, which the program freezes trying to open, and a temporary "domains.1.pdat" file, which is the correct one. Why it does that, and why in only a fraction of Mac users, is beyond me.
In any case, I will put a new compressed file on my site this week-end. In the meantime, those who have encountered this bug can easily solve it, by first deleting the empty "domain.pdat" file, then changing the name of "domains.1.pdat" to "domains.pdat".
I haven't heard of any other problem, I hope now it works as it should for everyone!
Alexandre