What Changed in June, July, August and September 2026

What changed in January to May 2026

Monday 1 June 2026

• Changes to try to reduce JS errors from pages not being fully loaded (Set_Section_Collapse and readCookie from pages)

→ Release 9.44.3.2

Wednesday 3 June 2026

• A catch for faulty boat size parameters added
• Added automatic error reporting to the background processor

→ Release 9.44.4

Thursday 4 June 2026

• A purge of old failed background jobs (over 50 days)

Friday 5 June 2026

• Partial fix to first buglet in issue 1390 - you return to the gazetteer top-level page, wherever you call from, but a lot better and probably all that is necessary.

Saturday 6 June 2026

• People tend to miss the ability to customise things, so:
• Changed "preferences" to "settings" which seems to be the widespread term for it these days
• And the icon to a cog from a wrench
• Moved it further up the menu to make it easier to find. It will mess with people's muscle memory for a while, but that doesn't seem to discourage Apple or Google or Samsung, so...
• Started on a "help us" plugin for places with the pub attribute set

Monday 8 June 2026

• Added a trap and catch mode for endless hacking attacks on the API
• Fixed bug in background processing to remove circle maps (detected by code in the previous release)

→ Release 9.44.5

• Added ability to reset the 'is a pub' attribute (but not to create it)

Tuesday 9 June 2026

• Fixed complicated bug where setting a newly created amenity to be the icon for a place did nothing
• Turned on the "Pub Attribute" help us plugin.

→ Release 9.44.6

Wednesday 10 June 2026

• Fixed a newly introduced bug where you couldn't add a new amenity if one was the symbol for the place

→ Release 9.44.6.1

• Added a trap to prevent pinchpoints being deleted

→ Release 9.44.6.2

Sunday 14 June 2026

• Proper test for whether the "edit distances" option is shown in the menu for waterways

Tuesday 16 June 2026

• Missing code added so that settings for amenity specific fields (for pubs and boatyards atm) are properly saved

→ Release 9.44.6.3

• Added display of specific fields to amenity popups. Configuration driven, so no need to change code if anything changes or is added

→ Release 9.44.7

Wednesday 17 June 2026

• Work on editing place details. Main aim is to force checking on the relative location of bridges and locks, but the code was a bit ancient so some tidying up was done at the same time. In all:
• Improved the lines between sections to reduce missing or duplicated ones
• Removed code to support winding hole/bridge pairs as that was no longer used
• Removed spare ?> from the end of the page (below the "spur" question)
• Added a blank first entry to the lock/bridge relation drop-down
• Added code to prevent submission if it's still blank and appropriate message

→ Release 9.44.8

Saturday 20 June 2026

• Fixed obscure bug in options that upset page distance and dimension options sometimes
• Pre-release fix of a bug in the new specific fields updating code

To Wednesday 15 July 2026

• Work on PDF output
• Refactoring of PDF code to better integrate itinerary PDFs and checklists.
• Started on new "one pass" itinerary PDF generation
• Working on ideas for a new "guide" format
• Added additional anti-hack to messages and callback. Yet more effort that could be spent on improving the site to protect against stupid wanking arseholes.

To Sunday 9 August 2026

• Lots more work on PDF
• New map generation serverside using headless Chrome
• Tidied up the code a lot and deleted several dead chunks
• Download and open links for PDF - will spread to other output later

→ Release 9.45 (beta only)

• Added a conditional mode for buttons and used to show experimental PDF only to very selected users.

→ Release 9.45

To Friday 21 August 2026

• Lots of work on the new maps for PDF, including some stonking investigation of how to run headless chrome (and later chromium) on virtual X buffers and so enable clear and reliable screenshots on different architectures.

• Turned off the conditional mode, so made experimental available to all

• Early development work on the new PDF mode but nothing fit to be seen in public yet

→ Release 9.45.0.1

Saturday 22 August 2026

• Added "open or download" block to CSV export to resolve issue 1401.
• Tidied up the PDF generation, removing dead code, rationalising what is in which file etc
• Removed unused logfiles and extended for future development
• Fixed code that should have put a quotation in the printed itinerary if turned on by options

Monday 24 August 2026

• Removed links to old PDF generation and made the new version the normal one

→ Release 9.45.1

Friday 28 August 2026

• Improvements to stoppage information in routes:
• In the block of navigational notes, distinguished between "CRT information" and actual waterway stoppages. The latter get a warning icon.
• Likewise, links to navigational notes in the text now get a warning icon and message if the note is an actual stoppage
• Yet more bloody coding to stop bloody dickheads trying to do bloody SQL injection attempts. This time on the bloody flow control
• And more killer words in the API trap list as well. About 80% of the actual errors we get are this scumbags.

→ Release 9.45.2

Sunday 30 August 2026

• The recent glut of drought-related stoppages has shown a few problems in the way I was integrating stoppages into navigational notes. I've tidied all the code up and made it a lot more understandable, and it works better as well.

→ Release 9.45.3

• A code tidyup for PDFs, removing obsolete files and relocating the navigational notes to where it belongs now
• Made navigational notes for PDFs match the earlier work and so they are displaying properly

→ Release 9.45.3.1

Monday 31 August 2026

• Added an indication of winter stoppages to stoppages in routes and to navigational notes
• Made navigational notes say "until further notice" until a date a year out
• Stopped photos in navigational notes being stretched when there is a lot of text. Centred them vertically instead.

→ Release 9.45.4

Wednesday 2 September 2026

• More work on improving stoppages:
• They appear as red lines on travel maps (changeable from the menu on settings→output→stoppages)
• The dates of your trip exclude them from navigational notes properly

→ Release 9.45.5

Saturday 5 September 2026

• A couple of on-the-fly patches as the new stoppage date code caused other long-standing bugs to emerge
• Added several new classes of "stoppage". The list is now:
• Real stoppages
• Opening times
• Trees down
• Facility out of action
• Fishing match
• Floating market
• Waterways festival

→ 9.45.6

To Monday 7 September 2026

• Links in stoppages now go directly to the CRT stoppage page, not to ours
• Improved organisation of stoppage code across routes and pages
• Added the new formatting and icons to stoppages on pages
• Fixed the display of fishing matches
• Improved finding stoppages for structures for gazetteer

Tuesday 8 September 2026

• Added highlighting for stoppages on feature pages

Wednesday 9 September 2026

• Completed work on the stoppages for feature pages
• Stoppages of a single place (such as a lock) now show as red circles

→ Release 9.45.7

To Tuesday 14 September 2026

• Links to CRT stoppages are now direct rather than via our summary of the stoppage
• Work on useful map display
• Created a new "maps" page
• Gave it a link straight from the main menu
• Added a simple "where is my nearest place" tracking page
• Included the existing "my maps" into this (addresses issue 1408).
• Made that based on your current location if no home mooring and it's available
• Added a stoppage map with a simple date filter (initial work on issue 1410). To be improved.

→ Release 9.45.8

To Friday 18 September 2026

• Caching for stoppage details (reduces delay and server load when viewing stoppage maps)
• Added MySQL JSON data type to the language
• Added a stoppages geodata table with the points along the stoppage and the display configuration all there for easy access
• Changed the map displays to use this
• Fixed the ability to increase/decrease the stoppage date by a day (which didn't work!)
• Added a slider to allow you to move forwards by up to a year

Note that you will see fewer stoppages than before. This is because previously were being displayed that should have been filtered out (such as completed or minor ones not affecting navigation).

→ Release 9.45.9

Saturday 19 September 2026

• Long-standing gap in stoppage handling when they cross waterway boundaries has been fixed. This involved lots of changes and is a full release in its own right.

→ Release 9.45.10

Sunday 20 September 2026

• Fixed issue 1414 (bridges over locks resetting to "unset") in a patch

Monday 21 September 2026

• Better defaults on new maps:
• If there is no geolocation, then it uses a default UK style for the stoppage map.
• If there is geolocation, the stoppage map will be centred on your location at a reasonable resolution
• Added details when marker places are converted to real ones which should trigger circle maps for them

Tuesday 22 September 2026

• Completed partial programming to say that a route has been planned avoiding stoppages
• Added a warning about long days

→ Release 9.45.11