copied from https://www.unitystation.org/blog/weekly-update-6 by Bod9001 Welcome to the sixth edition of our weekly update blog post! We've been hard at work this week fixing and refactoring various aspects of our funny spessman game. While we don't have much audiovisual material to showcase this week, we have made significant progress behind the scenes. As always, please keep in mind that these are just some of the noteworthy changes we've made. You can find a comprehensive list of all updates on our

Fixing memory leaks

Over the past month, Havietisov (also known as "Angry Sonic Dude" on Discord) has been diligently working to study and fix memory leaks on our server. Through his efforts, he identified a significant number of references from a previous round that were still being stored in memory, causing the application's RAM usage to increase over time. As of the time of writing, Havietisov has already submitted four pull requests, gradually improving the memory footprint and greatly enhancing the server's longevity and performance. We're incredibly grateful for his contributions to the project!

Separating Character Customization

In the latest update, NoooneyDude has been focused on improving the character customization system by separating some of the saving processes. This move is part of our effort to transition from using Firebase to Django for our account system. We've encountered limitations with Firebase and have also discovered that it's blocked in some countries due to its association with Google. By separating the character customization system, we're taking a step towards a more efficient and robust account system that can support our growing player base and particular needs. We appreciate NoooneyDude's efforts in this regard and look forward to sharing more updates with you soon!

Alien UI and evolution has been fixed

After the recent Mind Rework, aliens were a somewhat neglected. One issue that arose was a broken UI for evolving. However, we're pleased to announce that this issue has been resolved in the latest update. While the fix may still be a bit rough around the edges, we have plans to revamp all custom playable creatures such as AI, blob, and aliens. Our goal is to convert these elements to the new health system, being currently enhanced by Bod9001 to allow for even more flexibility and ease of extension. There are going to be more news about this new approach soon, so keep an eye on it!

Fixes and improvements to StationHub

CorruptComputer has been hard at work improving the Stationhub launcher, which is used to launch and join Unitystation games. Although the latest version has not been released yet, you can expect to see it soon with some exciting new improvements, including:

• No more intimidating debug console when opening the program.
• No more unused tabs on the graphical interface.
• Improved MacOSX build that can now be launched by simply double-clicking (although you will still need to allow it to run as Apple blocks any unknown app from running by default).

We're also in the process of gaining ownership of the Flatpak repository for the launcher, which was previously maintained by Rane. We're grateful for Rane's contributions and once the transfer is complete, we plan to update and improve the performance of the Flatpak version of the launcher. That concludes this week's update. We hope you enjoyed reading about the latest fixes and improvements we've been working on, even if it seems a little less eventful than usual. We have some exciting pending improvements on the horizon, including updates and fixes for Pog station, as well as several system improvements for health and robotics. Keep an eye out for these updates in the coming weeks, as you might be surprised by what we have in store. We want to take a moment to express our gratitude to everyone who puts time, heart, and effort into Unitystation, including all our contributors. Without your support, we wouldn't be able to achieve all that we have so far. If you want to stay up to date with our progress, don't forget to join us on Discord and consider supporting us to help us continue improving the game. Thank you for reading, and we'll see you next week!

[ 2023-03-04 18:55:58 CET ] [ Original post ]