Updates for 9.6.3

* Release notes * New website links * Call for PR's and funding * Bump version in manual
SoarGroup · Jun 28, 2024 · b0f11a5 · b0f11a5
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diff --git a/ManualSource/manual.tex b/ManualSource/manual.tex
@@ -189,7 +189,7 @@
 % soar version information
 \newcommand{\SoarVersionMajor}{9}
 \newcommand{\SoarVersionMinor}{6}
-\newcommand{\SoarVersionRevision}{2}
+\newcommand{\SoarVersionRevision}{3}
 
 
 % to add functions to .glo file:

diff --git a/SoarShuffler/Soar_Projects_Filelist.txt b/SoarShuffler/Soar_Projects_Filelist.txt
@@ -300,7 +300,7 @@ SoarSuite_$VERSION
   $SOAR_GROUP_REPOS_HOME/Release-Support/scripts/setup.$LAUNCH_EXTENSION=$ROOT
   $SOAR_GROUP_REPOS_HOME/Release-Support/scripts/SoarJavaDebugger.$LAUNCH_EXTENSION=$ROOT
   $SOAR_GROUP_REPOS_HOME/Release-Support/scripts/VisualSoar.$LAUNCH_EXTENSION=$ROOT
-  $SOAR_GROUP_REPOS_HOME/Release-Support/txt/Release_Notes_$VERSION.txt=$ROOT
+  $SOAR_GROUP_REPOS_HOME/Release-Support/txt/Release_Notes_$VERSION.md=$ROOT
   $SOAR_GROUP_REPOS_HOME/Release-Support/txt/README=$ROOT
   $SOAR_GROUP_REPOS_HOME/Release-Support/txt/license.txt=$ROOT
   $COMPILE_DIR/libCSharp_sml_ClientInterface.$DLL_EXTENSION=bin/$PLATFORM_DIR

diff --git a/txt/Building_Soar.txt b/txt/Building_Soar.txt
@@ -2,12 +2,14 @@
 Building Soar
 =============
 
+TODO: Update this file to reflect the new build system.
+
 To get the most up-to-date build instructions and tips, please visit the
 following pages on the Soar wiki:
 
 (1) Windows Build Instructions
     http://soar.eecs.umich.edu/articles/articles/building-soar-aa/80-building-on-windows
-    
+
 (2) Linux Build Instructions
     http://soar.eecs.umich.edu/articles/articles/building-soar-aa/81-building-on-linux
 

diff --git a/txt/README b/txt/README
@@ -1,27 +1,28 @@
 =========================
-=    Soar 9.6.2 README  =
-=      October  2023    =
+=    Soar 9.6.3 README  =
+=      June  2024    =
 =========================
 
-Welcome to Soar!  Soar 9.6.2 is the current, stable version of Soar. It is a maintenance release, meaning no major features were added, but it does still represent a lot of work in the form of bug fixes, code modernization, and usability improvements.
+Welcome to Soar!  Soar 9.6.3 is the current, stable version of Soar. It is a maintenance release, meaning no major features were added, but it does still represent a lot of work in the form of bug fixes, code modernization, and usability improvements.
 
-* VisualSoar contains several new features, including custom support for custom templates and a new "find all productions" search option. There's also now a manual included.
+* VisualSoar has improved support for version control and collaboration, including datamap import, opening projects read-only, and reduced commit noise.
 
-* The debugger now supports full-featured log filtering, and the display is now compatible with dark mode. We also include new shortcuts for zooming in and out.
+* The debugger has been made more stable for dynamic environments that add and remove many agents.
 
-* SoarCLI now exits on EOF, making it possible to control it via pipes (or tools like expect).
+* Chunking now creates singletons by default. This should be a better default for most projects, but it can
+be disabled with `chunking automatically-create-singletons off`.
 
-* Some Soar warnings and static analyses have been improved to give the user more actionable feedback around malformed rules.
+* SVS can be disabled/enabled for just substates.
 
 The full release notes can be found in their own file.
 
 ====================
 Official Soar Manual
 ====================
 
-The 9.6.2 edition of the Soar Manual is included here for your reference. You can also view it online at:
+The 9.6.3 edition of the Soar Manual is included here for your reference. You can also view it online at:
 
-https://soar.eecs.umich.edu/downloads/SoarManual.pdf
+https://soar.eecs.umich.edu/soar_manual/
 
 =========
 Launching
@@ -191,3 +192,15 @@ Announcements and high-level questions and discussions related to Soar can be fo
 
 - First join the mailing list at https://groups.google.com/g/soar-cognitive-architecture
 - Then send your questions to soar-cognitive-architecture@googlegroups.com
+
+If you discover issues with Soar or would like to request a new feature or documentation,
+please do not hesitate to file bugs or feature requests on our issue tracker at github:
+
+     https://github.com/SoarGroup/Soar/issues
+
+To avoid redundant entries, please search for duplicate issues first.
+
+Pull requests and patches to improve Soar, its documentation or tools are very welcome.
+
+If you would like to fund further development of Soar, please reach out to John Laird:
+[laird@umich.edu](laird@umich.edu).
diff --git a/txt/Release_Notes_9.6.3.md b/txt/Release_Notes_9.6.3.md
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 # Soar 9.6.3 Release Notes, 2024
 
-This release of Soar includes TODO: summary here
+This release of Soar includes lots of VisualSoar goodies.
 
 ## Breaking Changes
 
@@ -10,34 +10,51 @@ This release of Soar includes TODO: summary here
 ## New Features
 
 * Visual-Soar improvements (thanks to amnuxoll)
-  * TODO
+  * A datamap can import the datamap of another project
+  * Projects can be opened read-only
+  * Less change noise, i.e. more friendly towards version control
+  * Automatically opens the last project on startup; new "Open Recent" menu option
+  * Parser now supports LTI predicates
+  * Lots more smaller improvements
 
 * You can pip-install Soar! (thanks to ShadowJonathan)
   * `pip install soar-sml[compat]` is a drop-in replacement for manually installing Soar somewhere and adding its path to your PYTHONPATH environment variable.
   * Note that this does not come with the debugger or other Java applications.
 * New svs commands `--disable-in-substates` and `--enable-in-substates`. By default SVS copies the entire scene graph into each substate. This can be disabled with `--disable-in-substates` to save memory and improve performance. This can be re-enabled with `--enable-in-substates` if you need to access the scene graph in substates.
+* Python bindings are now compatible with all Python versions 3.2 and up, rather than only with the minor version that was used to build Soar. This is thanks to the work of ShadowJonathan.
+
+## New Website
+
+Thanks to Moritz Schmidt, we have a new website! The URL remains the same: https://soar.eecs.umich.edu. New features include:
+
+* HTML versions of the manual and the tutorial
+* Snappy full-text search based on lunr.js
+* Much improved editing/deployment workflow based on GitHub pages. We also get the full power of GitHub actions, and use it to automatically check for dead links, for example.
+
+Note that some pages and download links still need to be ported. The manual and tutorial still need to be fully inspected for correctness, and the images in particular still need work.
 
 ## Other Changes
 
 * Bug fixes
   * Improved Java Debugger stability when adding/removing multiple agents during an application lifetime
   * SVS can no longer be disabled when the current state is a subgoal. Allowing this previously led to undefined behavior.
+  * Fixed `Agent.GetLastCommandLineResult()` returning true when the last command actually failed
+  * Lots of Visual-Soar bug fixes (thanks to amnuxoll) around parsing, file saving, data preservation, and more
 
-* Visual-Soar bug fixes (thanks to amnuxoll):
-  * TODO
+* Java debugger can now be built for ARM Linux (though this is not distributed at this time)
 
 * Infrastructure improvements
-    * TODO
+    * ARM Mac now built in CI
 
 * Cruft and cleanup
-    * TODO
+    * lots of compiler warning fixes, and compiler strictness increased
 
 ## General Information
 
 Soar can be downloaded by following the download link on the Soar home
 page at:
 
-     http://soar.eecs.umich.edu/articles/downloads/soar-suite
+     https://soar.eecs.umich.edu/
 
 Soar releases include source code, demo programs, and a number of
 applications that serve as examples of how to interface Soar to an
@@ -70,3 +87,8 @@ tracker at github:
      https://github.com/SoarGroup/Soar/issues
 
 To avoid redundant entries, please search for duplicate issues first.
+
+Pull requests and patches to improve Soar, its documentation or tools are very welcome.
+
+If you would like to fund further development of Soar, please reach out to John Laird:
+[laird@umich.edu](laird@umich.edu).