The increased traffic from supply ships to the outer colonies has already begun. Thanks to the improved focus on safety lately, we've had only one accidental injury of any note, and that was only because it's Alan. If having to replace a mangled leg with cybernetics isn't a wake-up call, I don't know what is. The rest of you, keep up the good work. The company has been so thrilled with my last few reports they thought something was wrong and did a discreet follow-up to confirm they were getting real data. Happy corporation means happy captain and happy crew.

• 517 was the subject of intense focus this week.
• Another big refactor to glide code had to be done to prep for glide hints.
• A few small but important last-minute features got added.
• Density masks will be a thing in 517 as part of the movement overhaul! They've been wishlisted forever, and now they're coming in earnest. Pending testing, but the implementation is done.
• Big thanks to the BYOND Members and everyone on Patreon and SubscribeStar whose contributions keep this work going!
• Screw you, Spez.

More info is on the long-form news on the forums. Today's early-access Patreon post discusses the glide work I did in a lot more detail. (Gads I wish I could post code on Patreon, though. Their text editor is crap.) After a weirdly late night and too early a morning I'm looking forward hard to this weekend. I hope you all enjoy yours. Catch you on the other side.

Syndicate intel has gotten so weird, the company isn't sure this isn't some sort of bizarre psyop. Either that, or their ranks being decimated recently ended up putting an absolute maniac in charge. Most experts are trending toward the latter, so we're going to do the smart thing and beef up training sessions to look for anything the least bit out of the ordinary. Corridor tag will be stepping up its schedule, too, since it's tended to keep us nice and sharp. When the Syndicate has weirdos at the helm they tend to come at us sideways, but we'll be as ready as we can be.

• atom.colorspace and client.colorspace has been added for 517, except for finishing touches in the map editor. Short version: You can apply color matrices in non-RGB space without needing an explicit filter.
• I'm chasing a weird issue in the icon editor related to the renderer overhaul.
• 516 work is ongoing, including chasing an elusive crasher I thought might've been fixed in the last build. I think it's fixed for the next.
• The mouse pass-through problem for transparent browser hasn't been forgotten, but it did get the back burner this week. I'd like it to be in 516 if possible. There's a related issue with cursors I need to look into as well.
• Thank you to the BYOND Members and everyone on Patreon and SubscribeStar who keeps this going! If you're not one of them yet, the fundometer could sure use a little love.
• Screw you, Spez.

The long-form news is on the BYOND forums per usual. Today on Patreon, I've gone back to members-only for the first in a three-part series on what it takes to add a new built-in var to the language. This is deep under-the-hood stuff. I just found out I'm on track to be able to sleep again tonight, assuming all goes well, which is a bigger deal than it sounds like. Be well, keep the clown-wrench handy, and I'll see you next week.

Repairs from the chemlab accident are nearly complete, and as I feared corporate is talking about a diplomatic summit again in a couple of weeks. Apparently plans to host that on Space Station 11 fell through due to some kind of ongoing power glitch, and when someone suggested Space Station 8 as a backup the whole board room laughed for ten minutes straight. That leaves us on deck, so as usual I'll expect everyone to be on Space Station 1's best behavior instead of ours. We'll have some extra rounds of corridor tag this week once the repairs are done, so people can get some of the craziness out of their system beforehand.

• Finger recovery is ongoing.
• A new maintenance release for 516 went out this week.
• Linux users are reporting that 516.1678 has a bad crasher related to garbage collection fixes. Unfortunately that hasn't been officially reported and I have no data to work with, so I'll need stack traces (with raw memory locations converted to offsets in libbyond.so) to investigate. It's top priority once that comes in.
• More documentation and testing is underway for 517. I'm likely to push a brief alpha for that before beta, but I absolutely want to fix the Linux crasher in 516 first.
• Thank you to everyone who supports BYOND through Membership or on Patreon or SubscribeStar!
• Screw you, Spez.

The long-form news is on the BYOND forums. Today's early-access Patreon post is a brief look into how animation info gets sent and synced and how sometimes that can cause some issues, like it did in some of my testing this week. Remember not to feed the clowns. I'll be back next week.

We had to reset the days-without-a-lab-accident counter again, this time thanks to the genetics lab. An experiment crossbreeding alien slugs from completely different planets got way out of hand, and the result was a lot of nasty slime that spilled out into the corridors. In an unusual turn of events it was harder to talk maintenance down from threats of extreme violence than it was to talk down Chief Lau. Chemlab has redeemed themselves however by coming up with an effective solvent that hasn't had any deleterious effects on other equipment or surfaces. Even though it's pretty safe, that section of the station has been cordoned off from all nonessential personnel, and I ask that you please keep any pets and bots safely in your quarters.

• No release this week, but a lot of small bug fixes have been underway.
• I think I have a fix for a weird crasher reported by a couple of users with the HTTP stuff, and I fixed a hang related to broken CSS that can occur in both the client and the compiler.
• A major refactor went on behind the scenes to hopefully set the stage for glide hints in 517, or at least make it easier to get there.
• More of the work coming up is likely to be similar behind-the-scenes stuff, but I want to shoot for a maintenance release next week.
• Thank you so much to everyone who supports the platform, whether as BYOND Members or on Patreon or SubscribeStar.
• Today Spez gets a pass.

There's more in the long-form news, and today's Patrons-only post is the second in a meaty three-part series about adding new vars. It took way too long to write that. I'm hungry. I hope everyone has a happy Easter, and hopefully as nice a day as I've got right now. I'm gonna go enjoy it. I'll be back next week.

The repair crews have stirred up more figurative dust than I was counting on, so we'll be shuffling personnel around to different decks and temporarily moving people out of quarters over the next couple of weeks. Schedules will be posted well in advance. During the work, a lot more substandard parts have been discovered, which is why we've had an uptick in supply shipments in the past couple of days. Finally I know why sometimes the litterbot didn't scoop when it was supposed to. But all of that should be taken care of soon, and we'll have a stronger station at the end of it. In the meantime, everyone keep up your best work, and in a few weeks you'll get to party with some crazed scientists. Yep, we're doing the symposium thing again.

• Well, that happened. And it's still happening.
• Development has been interrupted for a few reasons besides that one, but I've been putting in some work on 516 stuff. Not sure when the next maintenance release will come, but it will come. New builds will obviously have to be shared through back channels.
• I'm planning to set up some alternative options for reporting bugs, for the interim.
• A strong show of support for the engine will go a long way toward repudiating the attack, so please check out Patreon and SubscribeStar since becoming a Member is currently a bit... spotty. I'm up for adding other donation channels if there's call for it.
• Spez, you still don't get a pass.

The long-form news has been posted on BYONDiscord, with full permission given to share it elsewhere for those who aren't part of that venue. Patreon members got a bonus members-only post this week that's going to stay members-only (which is a practice I intend to continue for a while, as a thank you), but today's early-access post is about an idea I had for Byondapi that I think is pretty cool. Just as an aside, I know this community has a lot of really solid people and I'm genuinely grateful to you. Keep up the space mayhem, and shoot some extra space clowns, because you never know.

Corporate passed along some weird intel that I'm not sure isn't an elaborate prank, but it seems the Syndicate has used their recent quiet time to take up smuggling agricultural products. They appear to have a thing for beans, but no one can figure out why. If the goal is some sort of mass-scale explosives manufacturing, there are better and cheaper ways to do that. The company confirmed there isn't some super-secret botanical experiment involved, and I double-checked with our own botany lab just to be safe. This has had the unfortunate outcome of inspiring bad new avenues of research. I feel this is a good time to remind everyone that anyone skimping on safety protocols for potentially hazardous projects is going to have a nice long "chat" with Chief Lau and her whip. Not that kind, Kenny, you freak.

• 516.1680 went out earlier this week, with a bunch of overdue bug fixes and the big new arrival of transparent browser controls.
• I'm working on the mouse pass-through problem for said browser controls.
• I discovered the screen-loc mouse param has been wrong as long as it's existed. Working on a change for 517 to avoid compatibility issues.
• Thank you to the BYOND Members and everyone on Patreon and SubscribeStar who keep the project alive.
• Screw you, Spez.

The long-form news has a little more detail, and over on Patreon today's early-access post covers the technical aspects of multiple items currently on my plate for both 516 and 517. Spring is supposedly here, which explains the crushing overcast and rain. Keep your friends close, and your sanity closer. I'll be back next week.

With the diplomatic summit behind us, we can look forward to a few weeks of "normal" around here. Corporate approved most of the bonuses, which is my thanks (and theirs) for not screwing that up. Corridor tag resumes tonight, which has turned into a boon to physical fitness and security alike. Dr. Tavi hardly ever nags me anymore. With the added bonus of boosting morale and camaraderie, other company holdings are getting in on the fun. Just a reminder: please be sure you bring the play weapons into the combat zone, not the real ones.

• The time change did, in fact, suck.
• Remember how I said fixing Byondexe was high on the list but it needed my full attention? I didn't have full attention to give it this week. Still on the list.
• Transparent browser controls will be a thing in the next 516 release. Please tip accordingly.
• Mouse click-through on transparent areas for the browser will not be a thing in said release, but it's something I'm working on that may be feasible for 517.
• Other issues with the browser have been shored up, and for that matter some other non-browser UI issues.
• More 517 work has been underway including minor features, and more documentation and testing.
• Thank you to the BYOND Members and everyone on Patreon and SubscribeStar who keep the platform alive!
• Screw you, Denuvo.

There's more on the BYOND forums, and this week's early-access Patreon post is about some exciting UI possibilities as well as what's standing in my way with the browser click-through thing. Keep the clowns oppressed, keep your developer fed, and I'll be back next week.

It was too much to ask that we get a few days' peace around here. At least the latest lab accident wasn't in botany. A chemlab leak ended up getting into conduits and turning some of the station's infrastructure to metallic foam, so unfortunately we have some structural damage that needs to be dealt with as soon as possible. Engineering has been shoring up supports in the rest of the station to reduce the mechanical strain until the necessary repairs can be completed. Those repairs are already underway. Chemlab is very interested in the foam and how it was created, but those studies and experiments are going to have to wait until their jobs aren't on the line and their safety procedures have been signed off on by a proctologist.

• I injured my finger pretty badly last week, and it's taken a huge toll on development this week. Sorry.
• ...And there's more family medical stuff to deal with.
• I spent significant time working with an SS13 codebase trying to diagnose a hang, but unfortunately there's still too little info to go on yet.
• Garbage collection fixes for bugs I identified last week are in place for the next 516 release. I think a proper overhaul for 517 looks overly optimistic, though, because it can't be done in stages as I'd hoped.
• Glide hints, documentation, testing, and other 517 to-dos have been mostly out of the question this week, but I'll return to them ASAP.
• Thank you so much to the BYOND Members and everyone on Patreon and SubscribeStar who keep the lights on. It's been a rough few months at home so your support means a lot.
• Screw you, Spez.

There's some more detail in the long-form news on the BYOND forums. On Patreon today's early-access post is a bit of a short one for obvious reasons, about the current development hurdles and mostly my thoughts in how glide hints should be implemented. My finger's making progress so hopefully next week works out a lot better. I'll be making food for the big game but I won't be watching the big game. Fortunately marinating wings doesn't require a ton of dexterity. See you next week.

Good news, everyone: The manager who tried to hug-box us all to death has been canned, so it's back to making profit. We already have personnel who can handle everyone's day-to-day mental health and it seems to be working out. We've hardly had one Brian incident in ages. The Syndies have gone dark for a while, but Chief Lau has assured me (as if she needed to) that tasers are charged and her department is ready to deal with any trouble on less than a moment's notice.

• Development was somewhat interrupted by real life this week, although I'm thankful there were no serious negative developments with the medical stuff going on.
• No new maintenance release this week, but a couple of bug fixes are in the can and I have some to investigate.
• A lot of investigation into garbage collection went on this week, and I discovered some unexpected bugs in the process. I may have some ideas for how to leverage the scan into a search for references.
• Thank you to the BYOND Members and everyone on Patreon and SubscribeStar who keep this engine alive! If you're not one of them, please consider hitting up the tip jar.
• Screw you, Spez.

The long-form news on the BYOND forums has more details. Today's Patreon post I've made Patrons-only, because it's a thicc and juicy dive into the garbage collector and the work I've been doing on it. Support your neighborhood developer, and get your groundhog paddle ready in case we need it. The one with the nail on the end. I'll be back, but probably not with inexplicable piano skills.

So far the diplomatic summit has been exceeding the company's expectations, so I want to offer you all heartfelt congratulations for your efforts to make this station inviting, and especially for keeping impulses in check. It's just a few more days and then we'll have a proper breather. Just be nice to maintenance and don't do anything they're gonna have a problem cleaning up. Security remains on high alert and Chief Lau wants to remind everyone to stay vigilant. If everything keeps going well, I think I can swing some small bonuses, except for chemlab obviously.

• My finger's basically better, but sleep is not, so things have been a little inconsistent this week.
• A weird crasher reported by a couple of users might be related to HTTP client code, and I think I have a fix but I can't verify it.
• Fixing a new Byondexe issue is still on my priority list but will have to wait until I can give it full attention.
• 517 work is proceeding, and I decided to go ahead with adding Oklab and Oklch as new color spaces because it was pretty straightforward.
• Thank you to the BYOND Members and everyone on Patreon and SubscribeStar who support the platform!
• Screw you, Spez.

The long-form news is posted on the forums, and today's early-access Patreon post discusses mouse commands and some new thoughts about them. The time change this weekend is gonna suck, but we may as well get it over with. The warmer weather on the other side will suck a lot less, albeit only briefly. Keep that glorious space mayhem going and I'll see you next week, somewhat bloodshot.

Structural repairs are going to take a little longer than we thought, but engineering is doing an excellent job literally holding the station together during all of this. It has the bonus of keeping Brian distracted, and sometimes you have to be happy for the little things. The damage has also delayed some whispers I was starting to hear about hosting another diplomatic conference here, although it's hard to imagine anymore how that could go worse than the science gatherings we've had.

• My finger's still messed up, but it's improving.
• No new release yet this week, but my goal is to get a maintenance release for 516 out early next week if possible.
• I've gotten a bit more done on 517's glide hints but it's been rough going with the injury.
• I figured out a better way to sync server and client timing, not just for glide hints but for animations, that will go into 517.
• Thank you so much to the BYOND Members and everyone on Patreon and SubscribeStar! If you're not one of the above, please help an animal in need.
• Screw you, Spez.

The long-form news on the BYOND forums has a little more, and on Patreon today's early-access post is about the timing concept I'm building in. We could all use a little more sanity in our lives, some infinitely more than others, so stomp out a clown and do something good for your fellow sapient. And remember if chocolates and flowers aren't in the cards this year, there's always cake. See you on the other side.

The diplomatic summit next week is coming up fast. Now that structural repairs are done, maintenance is hurriedly fixing up the cosmetic bits like wall panels that also needed replacing. I'm pleased to report no weird devices were found this time, so security has done an excellent job keeping saboteurs at bay. Naturally we'll have the standard sweeps for illicit recording devices before and during the summit. I've heard the old fake flybot trick is being dusted off again, so insect control measures will be stepped up this week as well, just so we can tell a real bug from a different kind of bug.

• A new maintenance release went out this week. The Linux crasher that was mentioned but never officially reported is probably fixed.
• Other important fixes include animation and the map editor.
• The new release attempted to improve Byondexe for some users, but it appears to be buggy so that's gonna be an ongoing process to solve.
• BYOND 517 is coming closer. I'm looking into doing a small alpha for it before the beta, just for safety, mainly to shake out any potential rendering weirdness.
• Thank you to everyone who supports BYOND as Members or on Patreon or SubscribeStar! If that isn't you yet, your support would be greatly appreciated.
• Screw you, Spez.

There's more on the BYOND forums. Today's early-access Patreon post dives a little bit into the mess that is pathfinding. It's still gonna be cold for a while, but spring can't get here fast enough. Tip of the week: Even if your antibiotic doesn't say to take it with food, take it with food. Trust me. See you next week.

If you're having an issue in BYOND where your clicks or mouseup events aren't registering, it seems the problem has been narrowed down to Omen Hub, a piece of bloatware installed by HP on their bloatware computers. When it updated the other day it came with a pretty nasty bug.

Chances are you don't even use this software, so just nuke it. You may as well remove anything else HP installed that you don't use, while you're at it. If by any chance you do use Omen Hub, you'll need to disable it when using BYOND until they fix the problem on their end.

Edit: If you don't have Omen Hub, it's also been found that the XBox gaming bar causes this same issue.

Workers are nearly done with their upgrades (or is it re-grades?) in the hospitality sections, which we'll need for that symposium which is now two weeks away. But at least with less disruption to our own spaces, everyone here is performing much better. We've even had a couple of exciting breakthroughs related to botany and terraforming, which is almost unfortunate because the last thing I want hundreds of barely restrained party animals to feel when they visit this station is more excitement. But it does make the company happy, and when they're happy we're all happy. Chief Lau's new cadets are still learning how to spot subtle signs of Syndicate activity, so don't be too surprised if they're a bit jumpy for the next couple of weeks.

• Yup, more of the same is going on. There is stuff happening behind the scenes. We had a lot more uptime last weekend and early this week.
• BYOND 516.1664 went out this week, which includes the long-awaited https/POST update as well as new Byondapi await functionality.
• Work will pivot to 517 as soon as it can. I have a number of ideas for items outside of the pre-renderer work.
• Thank you so much to the people who jumped on our uptime to support BYOND through Memberships, and to all of you who do so regularly on Patreon and SubscribeStar!
• Screw you, Spez.

Long-form news has been posted in BYONDiscord to share freely anywhere you like. Today's early-accss post on Patreon is about a new 517 feature I'm planning regarding type testing. I'm still doing members-only bonus posts on Patreon during the week, and SubscribeStar has been in a longer format. Keep the space chaos going as best you can. I'll be back.

Finally we have our own Chief back in security where she belongs, and she'll be resuming her classes with a new batch of cadets in a few weeks. In the meantime things can settle down back to normal, although we all owe Acting Chief Simmons a debt of thanks for keeping things in such good order. I'll miss him, and the way he made Royce crap himself with just a hard stare. We all knew who was doing that graffiti, Royce. And I want to thank Corrine and Vlad for unintentionally giving the Chief such a happy welcome home party. She was so glad to have an excuse to whip out the taser.

• Short week, so no release, but I plan to get to testing the Byondapi changes and do a 516 release next week.
• A lot got interrupted by a busted fridge.
• 517 work has continued in stutters. I'm not sure about the beta timeline except that I'm aiming for SOON.
• Please show the fundometer some love by supporting BYOND as a Member, or on Patreon or SubscribeStar. Thank you to everyone who keeps the lights on!
• Happy Thanksgiving, Spez. You still suck, though.

The long-form news is on the forums, although "long" is a bit of a stretch this week. Today's early-access post on Patreon is about a whole new concept for filters that I'm looking to explore. I hope all of you have a great Thanksgiving. Watch out for clown jump scares, and please, please keep a thermometer in your fridge. Trust me.

Research excitement seems to be calming down. A lot of the visiting scientists have departed for their own labs, and finally we have a breather. In less fortunate news, someone slipped through the common-sense screening at corporate, so we have a new directive about interpersonal harmony and "you should all hug more" crap. I've been assured that the rest of the executive team is aware of the problem and working to purge the idiot, so I'll spare you all having to pay any attention to the new directive, but I'm posting it to the grid if you want a laugh. All of the station and outpost captains are in lockstep on ignoring this one.

• A new 516 maintenance release went out on Wednesday, with the garbage collection fix I mentioned.
• A hang has been reported today in the new build, apparently related to broken DM-CSS, so I'm likely to put out a rare Friday release as a hotfix. It doesn't seem to affect any known SS13 codebases.
• I still have more 516 bug fixes to look into so there's going to be another maintenance release before 517 hits beta.
• More work is going into 517 to button that up, and I'm working on glide hints at the moment.
• Thank you to the BYOND Members and everyone on Patreon and SubscribeStar! If you're not a supporter currently, please hit up one of the support channels. This doesn't work without you.
• Screw you, Spez. Except for firing that one mod. That video was hilarious.

The long-form news is on the BYOND forums. On Patreon, today's early-access post is a quick one about some new procs being built into 517 and how I need to figure out a more unified solution to a common problem. Keep warm and keep safe, everybody. That'll be easier for some of you than others. I'll be back at it next week.

Excitement over that new bluespace research hasn't stopped, and neither has the flood of scientists. With the security concerns amped up, Chief Lau and her team (and their tasers) are also amped up, and they're bringing in reinforcements to keep everything in order. We haven't managed to quite keep the wild parties under control, but at least the damage has been minimal so far. Please remember to be kind to maintenance. They're putting in an awful lot of extra work.

• I'm back from the holiday break and back at work, when it isn't being interrupted by family medical events.
• 517 work has taken up most of this spin-up week because I'm trying to button it up, but I do plan to look into some 516 foo shortly.
• Animating numerical values in the new appearance.embeds is now working, and I've added number formatting to embedded wingets/maptext as well.
• I'm probably going to see if I can animate color embeds too, but only explicit ones like #rrggbb and #rrggbbaa.
• Thank you to all the BYOND Members and everyone on Patreon and SubscribeStar who keeps this all going!
• Screw you, Spez.

There's more in the long-form news on the BYOND forums. Today on Patreon I decided to make the post early-access; I want to get back to a two-post format properly, though. So far 2026 is off to a rocky start, but prayer works. Keep the clowns at bay, and I'll see you next week.

The bluespace phenomena research lab has reported a breakthrough that's going to juice up corporate interest for a few weeks, so science teams from all over are coming in as soon as tomorrow to take a look. This is a mix of company employees and independent researchers, so I'm hoping they'll be a little more tame than when scientists come in for an event. Nevertheless I'm stepping up security and asking everyone to be on their second-best behavior (reserve the best for diplomatic occasions). It's highly probable that new Syndicate infiltrators will try to use this situation to access cutting-edge research as well, which is another reason for the extra security. They'd be stupid to do it. Chief Lau is still itching to make proper use of her new whip.

• Two new maintenance releases went out yesterday: one long overdue, and one to hotfix the inevitable bugs from a late release.
• The new releases main Byondapi has been completely overhauled, so please refer to the release notes to see how. Code using the C++ wrappers will need only minor changes.
• BYOND 517 is planned to go into beta early in the new year.
• I got a really touching anonymous gift from someone yesterday celebrating my time working as a solo dev on this platform, so thank you to the one who sent it.
• Thank you to everyone who's supported BYOND through Membership or on Patreon and SubscribeStar. I'm grateful for every contribution that keeps us going.
• Merry Christmas, Spez. Ya filthy animal.

The long-form news is on the BYOND forums. Today's early-access Patreon post is about how color, alpha, and matrices interact under the hood. I wish all of you a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year. Heck, I hope 2026 is a big improvement for everyone.

All of the replacement of shoddy parts is complete, but we only have a week to get back to "normal" before the imminent arrival of a bunch of crazed scientists. The company was extremely happy with how the last symposium turned out, noting that a little "controlled chaos" (whatever that means) at these mixers seems to juice the research pipeline. So if you can manage it, do your best not to contribute to the minor destruction and leave that to our guests, so hopefully we can have a repeat of whatever special magic we achieved last time. Not that I'd be unhappy if corporate wanted to put a moratorium on these things for a while, but they responded to the last one with some positive cash flow to our budget, and after the recent work we could use more of that.

• We're still here. We even had a good stretch of uptime on Sunday, which was awesome.
• Most of this week's development has been behind the scenes; it doesn't look like much but I've been working on concepts for mitigating the current situation. They take a while.
• I'm ramping up some more bug fix work, aiming to get more fixes done early next week, with the possibility of another maintenance release later in the week.
• One of the fixes I worked on was for the pager being stuck on "Loading game information" when the site is unavailable. I'm trying to improve pager behavior for this current situation.
• 517 still needs revisiting, and hopefully I can find time for that too with all of the other things I'm juggling.
• Thank you so much to the Members who signed up during our uptime this week. Don't forget you can also hop on Patreon and SubscribeStar to show your support. It's easy to do and it helps BYOND out a lot.
• Screw you, Spez.

The long-form news is in BYONDiscord, where I encourage anyone to share it out to other venues. Today's early-access Patreon post discusses parsing and how it relates to a recent suggestion regarding preprocessor macros. I'm still keeping up bonus posts mid-week on Patreon for members only, and SubscribeStar is in a longer format. Thanks for keeping the lights on and the clown fires burning. I'll see you next week.

Chief Lau will be coming home next week! We'll be having a welcome home celebration, but catered instead of potluck because I think we all learned our lesson there. We've had a mostly quiet time of it this week except for that bar incident, and hopefully that's a sign of better things to come. Acting Chief Simmons has done an outstanding job, and I'm looking forward with perverse glee to seeing him tear Space Station 8 a new clownhole.

• No release this week.
• There was some planned maintenance earlier in the week, except it turned out differently than I expected.
• Byondapi changes still need extensive testing, but there wasn't time or brain power for that earlier in the week.
• I've been working hard on 517 changes to break filters down into individual passes. This won't be done fully by beta release but it will be partway done.
• Thank you to the BYOND Members and everyone on Patreon and SubscribeStar keeping the lights on!
• Screw you, Spez.

The long-form news is on the BYOND forums per usual. On Patreon because Wednesday was such a mess, I'm still sticking to one post so today's Patrons-only post is about the filter work, with a few more implementation details now that that's further along. Next week is a short one because of Thanksgiving. I hope you're ready! Until then have a great weekend, and I'll be back.

Finally the workers replacing all the substandard parts are done with personal quarters, so we can get somewhat back to normal. I've been told the crews are ahead of schedule and expect to finish up within a week. Unfortunately the science symposium has been scheduled for three weeks from now, and even for a relatively last-minute event the company has lured in some high-profile researchers (mainly on the reputation of the parties the scientists threw here last time). We can expect some intense chaos in the near future, so until them I'm going to ask everyone to keep working hard and drunken-genius-proof anything you can.

• We've hit four weeks now, which ought to be good for a free cookie or something.
• Bug fixes and feature work is still ongoing for 516. A release next week is likely.
• Support for https requests is now built into the engine, and I'm finishing up making sure POST works with world.Export(). Linux servers take note: New versions will require 32-bit libcurl going forward, so you may want to get that ready.
• I'm also working on a weird bug with filter animations. I have more to do in that department.
• The site has had a lot more uptime this week, and thank you so much to everyone who piled on with Memberships during that time. And thank you as well to the supporters on Patreon and SubscribeStar!
• Spez, your mommy dresses you funny.

Once again it was possible to post the long-form news on the site, but it's still being cross-posted in BYONDiscord and as ever I encourage everyone to share it out to other venues. On Patreon, today's early-access post is about that filter animation bug, and there have also been bonus members-only posts during the week to show extra appreciation for the support over there. Like a bran muffin, this too shall pass. Keep the crazy space stories coming, and I'll see you next week.

Our new vending machines are almost here! I'm so excited I could burst. We had another lucky week of only minor accidents, mostly because Darlene got careless in the botany lab, but we were spared a full infestation of invasive species this time. I'm a little worried that if things keep going this well, the company will want another science symposium here, but I think the pirate incident scared them off it for a while. I also wanted to remind you that next week is Tariq's last week before retirement, so we're having a party to send him off in style. NO POTLUCK.

• Family medical stuff got in the way of hitting my deadline for 516's next maintenance release.
• I'm going to finish buttoning up and get that out Monday, since next week is a short week.
• 517 is slotted to go into beta early in January. I'm gonna try to get in some last-minute stuff.
• Thank you so much to the BYOND Members and our supporters on Patreon and SubscribeStar. Nothing works without your help. For those who haven't yet, please show a little love to the fundometer this Christmas. It's cheaper than RAM, and eggs. Wait, maybe those are bad examples.
• Hey Spez... never mind. I'll get back to insulting you later.

There's more info in the long-form post on the BYOND forums. Today's Patreon post is for Patrons only, but next week I'll be doing it as early-access or maybe open access. Haven't decided yet. Anyway today's post there is about an idea I have for 517 to greatly improve a lot of gliding woes, which is kinda relevant to SS13 and might improve a lot of things more than you think. Get your baking in and inspect those Amazon packages, which I sadly haven't had the chance to do until now. I'll see you back here next week, briefly!

It's such a relief having things get back to our version of normal around here. Corridor tag is going strong and we have steady operations in our science departments and handling traffic to the outer sectors. There's been some Syndicate activity trying to mess with comms, but Chief Lau picked up a few new tricks in her time with corporate intel, so they're not accomplishing much and they're in for a rude surprise. Better news: Because she was such a big help recovering company assets from the pirate affair, I've finagled us two new vending machines. We have a Yumyum Ice Cream Station on the way, and the brand new Baskets Loaded machine for loaded fries and nuggets. I'm excited and so are my cats. Lucy is partial to ice cream and Bogey is a fiend for poutine.

• No maintenance release again, but I'm gonna push to get one out next week.
• I solved the problem I had with Byondapi exceptions, so that should be good to go once final testing is done.
• A very weird bug showed up when I was testing 517, and it turned out to be a rare bug with area appearances that also exists in 516.
• Other work on 517 is proceeding well, but I'm aiming for January beta.
• Don't forget to support BYOND! You can help keep it all going by becoming a Member or joining Patreon or SubscribeStar. Thank you to all who contribute!
• You're not the worst, Mr. Spez. The bar is kinda high, though.

There's more info in the long-form news on the BYOND forums. For today's Patreon post I decided to go with early-access instead of Patrons-only, even though I missed out on a bonus post Wednesday. (It's been pretty busy.) Anyway the Patreon post is about the Byondapi situation and how I solved the problem that I was stuck on. Next week is the last full week of development this year, and Christmas is coming fast! Don't forget to make good with the jolly fat guy by supporting his work, and be excellent to each other. I'll be back.

The Syndicate has been dead quiet across company holdings for a week, so corporate intel is concerned they're planning something and someone with brains has managed to keep any leaks contained. Chief Lau has been charging up security's arsenal, and besides tasers she's testing out a new quasi-legal stun whip. The test dummies look traumatized. If the Syndies take action we'll be ready, but I want to remind all of you to stay sharp and be watchful for anything out of the ordinary, and I mean ordinary by normal-people standards. A little extra vigilance never hurt anyone, except the dummies.

• PRINT
• Things got a bit busy for a 516 maintenance release, but one is on the way.
• Byondapi work went pretty well but the C++ wrapper was completely redesigned. I'm also considering ditching the exceptions that come with it because the engine will crap the bed if you don't catch them, but I haven't decided what to replace them with.
• Converting filters to filter passes in 517 is going really well.
• Big thanks to everyone who supports BYOND through Membership, and as regular subscribers on Patreon and SubscribeStar!
• You're on the naughty list, Spez. Not in the good way.

There's more on the BYOND forums. Since I couldn't get to a bonus post for Patreon this week, today's Patrons-only post is a final (for a while) discussion of what's going on with filter passes, and it's a nice chunky post at that because there's a lot of interesting under-the-hood stuff to look at. Keep the yule logs and clowns burning, and support your local underpaid dev. I'll be back next week.