VCF variants support: we've added a new direct-access data backend for reading VCF files that have been compressed and indexed with bgzip and tabix, along with a new track type (HTMLVariants) optimized for viewing the sometimes-huge amounts of detail (particularly genotypes) associated with VCF variants.
Wiggle track types now by default choose a y-axis scale dynamically for the region being displayed (set as "autoscale": "local" in JBrowse configuration JSON). This is a big win for usability! Thanks to Gregor Rot and Raymond Wan for pushing for this feature!
If configured to do so, JBrowse can now display a dropdown **dataset selector **on the left side of the menu bar (similar to the one in GBrowse) that lets users switch between multiple datasets in the same JBrowse installation.
The default "Simple" track selector now has a search input at the top that can quickly filter the list of displayed tracks to find the text you type.
JBrowse now ships with a REST datastore backend that lets developers serve data to JBrowse from custom back-end systems. See the JBrowse REST feature store API documentation on the GMOD wiki.
And the full release notes:
Added a direct-access data backend for reading variation data
directly from VCF files that have been compressed with bgzip and
indexed with tabix. See the JBrowse Configuration Guide on the
GMOD wiki for details about how to add directly-displayed VCF files
(issue #211).
Added a new HTMLVariants track type based on HTMLFeatures with a
feature-details popup optimized for displaying variant details.
Added a text box at the top of the simple (i.e. the default) track
selector that finds tracks in the track list matching the typed
text (issue #210).
Added support for autoscale: "local" in Wiggle, FeatureCoverage,
and SNPCoverage tracks, which automatically sets the scale of the
y-axis based on the range of the data being displayed in the
current view. Thanks to Gregor Rot and Raymond Wan for championing
the need for this (issue #203).
Added an optional dropdown selector in the menu bar that allows
switching between multiple datasets. To enable it, add a
datasets array in your JBrowse configuration, and set a
dataset_id in each of the trackList.json (or other) files that
are optionally loaded by the dataset selector. See the JBrowse
Configuration Guide on the GMOD wiki for details (issue #134).
Added a new datastore class, JBrowse/Store/SeqFeature/REST that
fetches data from any back end system that implements the simple
REST API it uses. See the JBrowse Configuration Guide for details
on how to implement its REST API. Thanks to Brett Thomas, Daniel
Troesser, and Brad Chapman for pointing out the need for this
(issue #227).
By default, JBrowse now continuously updates the browser's URL bar
to contain a URL that will show the current JBrowse view directly.
This is enabled by default only if JBrowse is running from the
default index.html included in the JBrowse distribution.
HTMLFeatures, Alignments, and Alignments2 tracks now accept a
maxHeight configuration variable specifying the maximum displayed
height of a track in pixels. Features that would cause the track
to grow beyond its maximum height will not be drawn (issue #222).
The refSeqDropdown configuration variable; the reference sequence
selector is now shown for any number of reference sequences, with
its length limited by the refSeqSelectorMaxSize variable (see
next item).
Added support for optional refSeqSelectorMaxSize and
refSeqOrder global configuration variables that set the maximum
length of the reference sequence dropdown selector, and specify the
sort order of the reference sequences in that selector,
respectively. One instance in which this is particularly useful is
in displaying annotations on early-stage, incomplete genomic
assemblies: to display the N biggest contigs in the assembly in the
reference sequence selector dropdown, one can set refSeqOrder to
length descending, and set refSeqSelectorMaxSize to N. Thanks
to Ignazio Carbone for pointing out the need for this. (issues #234
and #235).
Fixed some bugs causing memory leaks when scrolling and zooming,
especially on tracks with a lot of data like BAM tracks. Thanks to
Gustavo Cerquiera for pointing this out (issue #220).
HTMLFeatures tracks now accept style->label and
style->description configuration variables variable that can be
set to a function callback that returns a string with the feature's
label or long description, respectively (issue #9).
Wiggle/XYPlot, Wiggle/Density, and FeatureCoverage tracks now
accept function callbacks in their style->pos_color,
style->neg_color, style->bg_color, and
style->clip_marker_color configuration variables. Function
callbacks are passed two arguments: the feature object (with start
bp, end bp, and score of the quanititative region being shown, and
the track object (which can be used to access track configuration
data, along with many other things). (issue #133).
Wiggle/XYPlot tracks now accept an array for their variance_band
argument, allowing users to set the position of the variance bands
to show (issue #133).
Wiggle/XYPlot tracks now accept a style->variance_band_color
configuration variable, allowing users to set the colors of the
variance bands. The variance band color should usually be specified
with a partial opacity. Default is 'rgba(0,0,0,0.3)', which is
black with 30% opacity (issue #133).
Added an "About JBrowse" popup dialog, which supports an
aboutThisBrowser configuration stanza containing a title for the
main browser window, and a description to be shown in a pop-up
dialog when the title is clicked (issue #206).
Where possible (i.e. supported by the data store), JBrowse will now
pop up a warning if a local data file is opened that contains no
data for the current reference sequence (issue #178).
Fixed bug in which hard- and soft-clipped regions were erroneously
counted toward the overall length of a BAM alignment (issue #229).
Fixed bug in which dragging the vertical scroll bar marker on the
right side of the track pane did not behave correctly. (Julien
Smith-Roberge, issue #223).
Fixed bug in which the navigation location for some reference
sequences can get messed up when ref.start != 0, or ref.end !=
ref.length (issue #215).
Fixed bug in which navigating via sequence dropdown selection
ignores previous location on selected sequence, whereas with
navigation text box entering just a sequence name navigates to
previous location on that sequence (if visited previously). Thanks
to Gregg Helt for implementing this fix (issue #216).
Fixed bug in which the initial default view of a previously
unviewed reference sequencestarts at 80% centered view, but any use
of reference sequence selection pulldown takes it to 100%. Big
thanks to Gregg Helt for implementing this fix (issue #217).
Fixed bug in which iframe popups did not display correctly in
Internet Explorer 9. Thanks to Steffi Geisen for pointing this out
(issue #233).
Improved JSON syntax error messages in server-side scripts (issue #214).
Increased the default display timeout (blockDisplayTimeout) on
HTML-based features tracks from 5 seconds to 20 seconds.
Added a new-plugin.pl helper script that makes the skeleton of a
new JBrowse plugin.
Added an add-json.pl helper script that advanced users can use to
set arbitrary value in JSON files from the command line.
Fixed a bug in which the --conf option to prepare-refseqs.pl
did not support comments in JSON conf files (issue #213). Thanks
to Keiran Raine for pointing this out.
Fixed some missing dojo/dijit nls directories in the non-dev
release zipfile.
Fixed a bug with handling of timeout events in HTMLFeatures tracks.
Thanks to Matt Henderson of KBase for pointing this out.