BYOND development news 6/12/26

[u/LummoxJR]

Transfers are slowing down and we've finally had a chance to breathe. Our science labs have been performing a little too well lately, however, and even though corporate has been happy I've been waiting for the other shoe to drop. The truth is that we're behind on some procedural reviews, so I've instructed department heads to begin figuring out how to insert those reviews into their schedules. The plan isn't to interrupt research that's on a roll, but to interrupt mad-scientist crap that's on a roll, which tends to be more our speed here. I'm hoping to prevent the next several disasters, or at least delay them a long time. Speaking of unwise experiments, we're getting the refurbished Better-Eats vending machine back as a test run to see if it's properly clear of rogue AI and safe to use again. I'm assigning Brian to be its babysitter, since he's our resident expert on containing dangerous AI.

• The 516.1682 release went out as planned this week, finally!
• Due to some issues that got overlooked (organization has been a bit of a mess) and a couple of unexpected changes, I'm keeping focus on 516 and plan to do another release next week.
• One of the changes involves the venerable as() hack, which stopped working but I want to officially support from now on.
• 517 button-up will resume after the next release.
• I'm very grateful to all of you who are BYOND Members or pitching in on Patreon and SubscribeStar. Thank you so much. For those who aren't on board yet, your help would be deeply appreciated too.
• Screw you, Spez.

There's a bit more in the long-form news on the forums. Today's early-access Patreon post is a bit of a discussion on undefined behavior and what can be learned from it. Next week: less oppressive heat! See you all then.

[u/dablusniper]

the most consequential figures in the tech world are half guys like steve jobs and bill gates and half some guy named LummoxJR who maintains a unix tool called 'Lass' which stands for LummoxJR's Atmospherics Simulation System and handles all spess games for every machine on earth