===== What is new in stable version 8.8.0 ======

This release of the Dinamica EGO software introduces some improvements and addresses bugs (compared to stable version [[what_is_new_8_7_0|8.7.0]]):

=== Core Enhancements ===

  *   **System, Memory, and File Management:**
      *   Updated version to 8.8.0.
      *   Added functionality to **force `mimalloc` to deallocate unused memory**.
      *   Changed pure allocations to use smart pointers.
      *   Implemented **fallback to system default temporary directory** when the user-defined directory is unavailable.
      *   Refactored code by moving the functionality for determining the effective storage mode when opening an image into `MapUtils::determineStorageMode()`.
      *   Fixed regression caused by validating a file for writing: the software will **not create a new file if a file does not exist** during validation.

  *   **Data Structures (Tables, Tuples, and Variants):**
      *   Used a **standard comparison method for `Tuple`/`TupleView` and `Variant`**, fixing the incorrect ordering of Tuples with different sizes.
      *   **Reduced variant memory footprint**.
      *   Methods were added to **recover all table indices at once but behind a lock**.
      *   Sequence generation for lookup table constants was refined: the **new default behavior allows a single sequence only if it represents more than 20,000,000 entries per table**; otherwise, the table is written in expanded (non-sequence) form.
      *   Fixed a problem where different ordering of keys/values on a Table could result in writing a table with a header without the `str` type.
      *   Fixed bug that was causing an **infinite loop when converting a table into weights**.

  *   **Scripting and Concurrency:**
      *   Added a flag to `ScriptReader` to **ignore undefined variables**, which prevents errors on missing variables and allows partial script fragments to be parsed; this flag was also exported to Java.
      *   Added parameters to `calculateProgress()` to **specify the lower and upper progress limits** that should be reported. An additional entity was defined to report progress during execution.
      *   Fixed potential **race condition** that might occur if a worker is selecting a task while the GUI is querying the worker's task information.
      *   The copy of `TaskMutex` and `TaskLock` was removed to prevent Undefined Behavior (UB), and memory ordering on `TaskLock` was fixed.

  *   **Image and Spatial Data Handling:**
      *   **Cropping functionality** was implemented using the `CropMapToExtents` functor.
      *   Optional **cropping extents were added to `LoadMap` and `LoadCategoricalMap`**, allowing only a specified portion of a map to be loaded.
      *   Fixed implementation of **`Bounds` to correctly deal with constructing its limits** using consecutive calls to `combine()`.
      *   **`Bounds` now keeps its type**, allowing it to represent a point or a region.
      *   Improvements to `BaseRasterImageWindow`: **allow a categorization to be assigned** that might be different from the peer image, and ensure this modified categorization is passed along when copied.
      *   Fixed bug related to retrieving the bottom-right coordinate of a region by `GetRegionInfo` and `GetAllRegionsInfo`.

=== Graphical Interface Enhancements ===

  *   **Performance and Responsiveness:**
      *   **Improved responsiveness of tables and lookup tables** by showing a loading icon and executing the load operation in the background.
      *   **Speed up lookup table visualization** by using a cache of the table keys.
      *   Fixed a bug where the **resolution of the lookup table chart is completely off when using a hi dpi display**.

  *   **Script Editor and Memory:**
      *   The GUI was updated to **allow pasting incomplete script fragments** from the system clipboard by utilizing the core's ignore-undefined-variables flag.
      *   Script modified properties are written explicitly **on save** instead of on every write operation.
      *   Functionality was added to **force freeing reserved memory** after script runs or when a script editor is closed.

  *   **Utility Updates:**
      *   Updated CRAN mirror list, refreshing URLs/names and removing outdated entries.
      *   Fixed bug that caused an error when trying to copy the log text to the clipboard without selecting text first.

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