Hi everyone - this is the release notes for the 2018.9b28 release candidate (which is currently the preview release) - read on for the full list of changes since our last release notes (our 2018.7 release).

Some of these have been available in our preview releases for a while now; if no further issues appear expect it to become a live release shortly.

Changes & Improvements

• Localisation: We now support three additional languages (with more to come): French, Japanese, and Chinese can be selected in the login screen. (German, Portuguese, Spanish, Russian are coming in a future update)
• Black Trees: We've fixed a long standing issue with trees turning black when billboarded into the background on Windows.
• Scripting: Our JSON Parser has been taken out back and retired. Our new JSON Parser will behave better (or else...). Expect less JSON related bugs when using json.serialize calls.
• Reflection Probes: Fixed an issue where realtime reflection probes were misbehaving.
• SteamVR: SteamVR now more reliably toggles on/off, without launching SteamVR when OpenVR is disabled.
• Settings Window: Various fixes relating to sliders and scrollbar sensitivity.
• Scripting: Scripts can now share more complex types between scripts via the SShared functions.
• Shop: Patterns sort so the newest are displayed first.
• Performance: The 'Quality Lighting' toggle is now part of the Older Computer performance preset.
• Archimatix: Adds new Archimatix Handles
• Avatar Inspector: Fixed an issue with clothing not displaying in the Avatar Inspector
• Room Editor: Holding the Alt key will allow you to place multiple copies of an item at a time.
• Runtime Inspector: Enables the Inspector! (See our previous blog posts)
• Male & Female Avatars: Updates to the general quality of our default avatars, adds additional sliders.
• Male & Female Avatars: Default skin textures have been overhauled & improved (look lots better!). Shader has been tweaked.
• Scripting: SGameObject.Avatar will now search children for the right component.
• Avatars: We now use 4 Bones for skinning calculations in all performance profiles. Helps improve elbows.
• Audio: Furniture and spawned items will now go into the SFX slider category
• Avatars: We now recalculate normals with slider modifications to produce better lighting on morphed-out avatars.
• Avatars: Eye darting ("Saccades") will no longer double-dart or freeze.
• Gigaregions: Initial support for Gigaregions (blog post soon)
• Flickr: The built-in flickr components have more options for customising which groups/feeds are shown. New Slideshow variant.
• Scripting: Object ownership is now determined a bit better.
• Space Navigator: Fixes some warnings when using on Linux (unfortunately only works on Mac/Windows for now)
• Clickables: Improved handling of scripted and spawned Clickable items - multiple actions will produce a popup menu, instead of firing the default action.
• In-Client Uploads: We now support in-client uploads of 'Furniture' 3D models. This is currently pending some additional work (and a tie to our new certified creator program) before being enabled to a wider group of users. You can upload personal-use models and textures from a wide variety of formats (FBX, Blend, OBJ, DAE and a lot more) directly from within the viewer.
• Scripting: Debugging scripts using VS Code is fixed
• VR: Improved some issues with rotation in VR (a overhaul of the controls is in progress as part of a larger controls update coming soon)
• Avatars: Fixed a weird stretching bug (maybe!)
• Scripting: Adds .Driver property to SModularVehicle to get an Avatar reference for the current driver.
• Vehicles: Fixes a Imperial/Metric mix-up on the Speedometer component. (At least we didn't crash a Mars lander...)
• Vehicles: Forces will now combine correctly in vehicle wheels; holding two keys will add forces, instead of using the last key pressed.
• Inspector: Testing a new 'Add Component' feature in the Inspector
• AudioReactiveAnimation: Adds a new option to override the specified Animation Controller Parameter
• In-Client Script Editor: Testing a in-client script editor (will only work on the preview grid; live grid will have some API functions removed to ensure safety, you can still use those via the Editor Pack/Review process. May be tied to Certified Creator program in a future update.)
• Facial Tracking: Improved performance of Facial Tracking system
• Inspector/Room Editor: Fixed a bug where the Transform component could conflict with the Room Editors own placement mechanics
• Scripting: Adds new Command Buffer API - you can now write your own custom Post FX shaders!
• Scripting: Adds new error tracing system, some errors will now deliver a Lua stack trace. (in future all errors will do so)
• Vehicles: Vehicles will now correctly synchronise their visibility for new arrivals in a region.
• Friends: Deleting a friend will now require a confirmation.
• Chat: New users will default to the New User chat, users older than 7 days will default to teh General chat channel.
• URL Handler: We now have a sinespace:// URL handler which allows you to launch the client to particular regions, items in the shop and such. (See Office Hours blog post from last week)