================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.263.7 Beta ================================================================================ New Features - The "Save Logs" option is back. Options > Log now has a Save Logs checkbox that lets you choose whether PalaceChat keeps a copy of your chat logs on your computer. It is ON by default, so logs are saved just like before. Turn it off and PalaceChat stops writing chat logs to disk, your live chat and tab history keep working as usual, you just won't have saved log files to open later from the log archive. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.263.6 Beta ================================================================================ New Features - Decoration Editor (version 1): build your own nametag decorations right inside PalaceChat. Stack text and image layers, choose a transparent, solid, gradient or imported background (still image, animated GIF, MP4 or WebP), add motion effects, and save the result straight to your decoration bag. Right click a decoration in the bag to edit it again. This is the first release of the editor, more tools are on the way. Bug Fixes - When zooming a room in or out, door and spot images (and web video players) could leave a faint copy of themselves at their original, full size position. Zoomed rooms now redraw cleanly, with no leftover ghost. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.263.4 Beta ================================================================================ Bug Fixes - Prop bag thumbnails are now sharper and no longer look blurry or pixelated. Full-image props (such as photos) render crisply instead of being softened by rescaling, and the large-prop view is much cleaner. If an existing thumbnail still looks low quality, you can regenerate it: use "Rebuild thumbs" in Options > Performance to refresh them all, or right-click a prop and choose "Rebuild thumbnail" for just that one. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.263.3 Beta ================================================================================ Bug Fixes - Sound volume now adjusts correctly across all levels and is saved between restarts. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.263.2 Beta ================================================================================ New Features - New script commands to pause, resume and restart a web video (YouTube etc.) on a spot: WEBPAUSE, WEBPLAY and WEBRESTART. Handy for videos people can walk over, where the player's own controls are out of reach. - New script commands to pause, resume and restart a native door video or animation: SPOTPAUSE, SPOTPLAY and SPOTRESTART. One command covers them all (MP4, WebM, animated WebP and animated GIF) and figures out the type on its own. Use ME inside the spot's script, or the spot id, for example: 3 SPOTPAUSE. - The chat log's tabs are now icons instead of words: a speech bubble for General, an ear for Whispers, and a shield for God / Wizard. Hover over a tab to see its name. This lets the chat log be made much narrower. The classic chat log can also be shrunk much thinner now. Bug Fixes - In the classic chat log's dark mode, plain and system messages were showing as black text on the dark background and were hard to read. They now show in light text. ================================================================================ WINDOWS Version 5.0.262.8 Beta ================================================================================ New Features - New script command SETEMBEDOPACITY to make a web video see through, so the room shows through it (GETEMBEDOPACITY reads the current level). - New script commands WEBMUTE and WEBUNMUTE to mute or un-mute a web video on a spot. - SOUNDSTOP now also silences web videos. - New script command SOUNDRESTART to bring the room's sound back after SOUNDSTOP (video doors and web videos only). Bug Fixes - Smoother playback in rooms with web videos. - The decoration bag's "None" button label is now properly capitalized. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.262.7 Beta ================================================================================ New Features - Video with sound (MP4) - Audio and video now stay in sync. No more sound drifting out of time. - New script command VIDEOVOLUME to turn a video's sound up or down, perfect for doors that fade music in and out. - Nametag decorations (big update) - Worn animated decos no longer jump when you hover them. They start smooth from the beginning. - In the Deco Bag, each deco now animates when you hover it, and shows its fullest frame at rest so you can tell what each one is at a glance. - The decoration menu is now two clear items: a "Nick Decorations" on/off toggle, and "Decoration Bag" to pick one. - Right-click any deco in the bag to copy its ID. - Your deco now shows on ALL your tabs, not just the first one. Take it off and it stays off, even after a restart. - New "Deco Bag" button you can add to your toolbar from Customize Toolbar. Bug Fixes - Turning timestamps off in the chat log works correctly again. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.262.5 Beta ================================================================================ - Prop bag thumbnails look right again. Small props (like a tiny combined avatar) now fill their thumbnail instead of shrinking down to a dot. If some of your older props still look small, just right click them and choose Rebuild Thumbnail, or use Rebuild All Thumbnails to refresh the whole bag at once. Works on Windows and Mac now. - Fixed a crash that could happen when closing Preferences with certain fonts selected. - Fixed the chat log archive opening on its own when you minimized the program. - Fixed unreadable text in some popup boxes while using a dark theme. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.262.4 Beta ================================================================================ - Fixed a crash that could happen on startup or when closing Preferences if a font with a very long name had gotten saved. Fonts load cleanly now. - If you logged off and reconnected quickly, your name could come back with a number stuck on it (like "Name 1") because your old session hadn't dropped off the list yet. It keeps your real name now, and only renames when it's genuinely another tab using the same name. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.262.3 Beta ================================================================================ New Features - Operators (wizards, gods, owners) now have a "Room ID" entry in the room list right click menu. Click it and the room's ID is copied straight to your clipboard. BUG FIXES - Drag props into your bag You can now drag a prop from the room floor, or one you're wearing straight into your prop bag, just like on Windows. - Drop arrow in the bag While dragging a prop into the bag, a little arrow shows where it will land. - Prop bag won't make duplicates Dropping a prop you already have into the same bag no longer adds a second copy, a quick note in the log lets you know it's already there. - Fonts stay put The name tag, chat bubble and log fonts stopped resetting themselves to a random font. They keep your default now (or whatever you pick), and your choice sticks. - Long menus scroll Long dropdowns like the font list now scroll, so you can reach every option instead of just the first screenful. - Chat log stays live The chat log no longer freezes after switching room tabs, it keeps updating on its own, no need to close and reopen it. - The chat log no longer freezes after switching room tabs, it keeps ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.262.2 Beta ================================================================================ BUG FIXES - Sticker search window works right The Giphy / Pixabay sticker window now closes properly and stays in front instead of slipping behind the main window. Its Source and Category menus let you switch as expected. - Palace tabs keep their color The room tab bar no longer turns gray when you open Preferences or switch to another window. - Dark theme on the Name and Address fields The User Name and Address fields now follow your dark theme like the rest of the app. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.262.1 Beta ================================================================================ BUG FIXES - Preferences dropdowns work again The dropdown menus in Preferences (themes, fonts, sizes, and the rest) weren't opening on Mac, so you couldn't change those settings. They all open and select normally now. - Adding pictures to doors works again The "Add" button in the room editor (for adding pictures to a door) stopped responding. It's back to normal. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.262.0 Beta ================================================================================ BUG FIXES - Dark themes: dropdowns are dark now Every dropdown menu (fonts, sizes, languages, spot type, browser identity, FPS, and the rest) was still showing up white on dark themes. They all follow the theme now, list included. - Spot Info: missing options came back Forbidden, Mandatory and Landing pad had vanished from the Spot Info options. They're back where they belong. - White text boxes follow the theme A few input fields that stayed white on dark themes (the translate box, the cache size field) now match your theme. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.261.9 Beta ================================================================================ NEW FEATURES Themes! Pick a look from Preferences > Appearance. Three built-in options (classic gray, light, dark) plus seven brand-new themes designed so you have a wider color palette to choose from: Ocean, Dracula, Solarized Dark, Solarized Light, Monokai, Nord, Sunset. Window title bars flip to dark Aqua when you pick a dark theme and back to light Aqua on a light one, independent of your macOS Light/Dark system setting. Want your own colors? Open the theme editor and tweak any of the 14 color slots, then you can save it with a new name, export it and share it with your friends that can import your json file! Embed layering for Doors! Two new scripting commands let you control exactly how a WEBEMBED sits in the room composition. EMBEDLAYER picks where the embed renders in the stack: 0 ME EMBEDLAYER embed below everyone, avatars walk over it 1 ME EMBEDLAYER embed above props, below name tags 2 ME EMBEDLAYER embed above name tags, below chat bubbles 3 ME EMBEDLAYER embed on top of everything WEBCLICKTHRU controls whether clicks reach the embed: 1 ME WEBCLICKTHRU clicks pass through to the room so people can walk under or through it 0 ME WEBCLICKTHRU embed catches clicks again (the default for YouTube controls, web games, etc.) Both take ME (the current spot) or a numeric spot id. The image layer dropdown in Spot Info now also offers a separate row for the embed so you can set it from the room author UI. Prop search inside the app Click the search button in the Prop window to bring up the new sticker search dialog. Type "pumpkin", "cat", "sparkle", get back a grid of free stickers and short clips. Click one to import. Animated stickers and short MP4 videos open in the Advanced Prop Editor so you can crop, tune frame timing, and chroma key, static stickers drop straight into your bag. NOTE: Our production API keys are still in review, so during these first days search may temporarily pause if we hit the public rate cap. Please don't abuse it so everyone can beta test it! BUG FIXES - HTML chat log wraps long text again A line of "aaaaaa..." with no spaces was making the log scroll sideways forever and hide the timestamps. Long words now wrap inside the chat bubble where they belong. No horizontal scroll bar anymore. - Tabs show full names again Tabs at the top of Main were truncating palace names even with plenty of room. Tabs now size to the full name like they should. - Same nick on multiple tabs When you opened a second tab in the same palace using the same nick as your first tab, both tabs stayed on the same name. Now the second tab automatically picks the next free suffix, just like when another user joins with your same name. ================================================================================ WINDOWS Version 5.0.261.8 Beta ================================================================================ NEW FEATURES - Animated prop playback control via IptScrae 8 new commands to script animated WebP props from room and cyborg scripts: PROPPAUSE, PROPPLAY, PROPRESTART, PROPSEEKFRAME, PROPISANIMATED, PROPFRAMECOUNT, PROPCURRENTFRAME, PROPISPAUSED. Note: affects every visible instance of the prop ID (worn AND loose copies) ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.261.7 Beta ================================================================================ BUG FIXES - Animated loose props you can actually click on now Dropping a rain or snow prop on the floor and right-clicking to copy or take used to mean timing your click to a frame where there happened to be a pixel under the cursor, and then timing the menu click again. Right-click now works on the prop's full area, no timing tricks needed. - Friendlier IptScrae script errors When a room script breaks, the error window now shows a plain explanation in orange plus a yellow caret (^) pointing at the trouble spot in your script. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.261.6 Beta ================================================================================ BUG FIXES - Long nicknames no longer break the chat bubble A super long nick used to overflow and tear the bubble visually. Now it wraps cleanly inside. - Bookmarks menu shows all your palaces again Some users were only seeing a handful of bookmarks in the menu and had to open the editor to reach the rest. - Crash after random SSL hiccups A small number of testers were crashing right after a flaky download or connection drop. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.261.5 Beta ================================================================================ New Features - Animated WebP background and doors cache First visit to a room with an animated WebP images decodes every frame and saves them to a small .pcc file next to the source .webp. Re-entry takes about 1 second from the cache. Animation starts immediately (a touch slower than full speed for the first loop while frames finish decoding in the background, then snaps to native). On by default. Toggle in Options > Performance > "Cache animated WebP frames to disk". - Cache manager dialog A new "Manage..." button in Performance opens a per-palace breakdown showing how much disk each palace is using and lets you delete individual palaces or wipe everything. Status label turns orange past 2 GB and red past 5 GB as a soft heads-up. Source .webp files are never touched, only the cached frames. Bug Fixes - Live Directory stops hijacking the menu bar Opening the directory used to replace PalaceChat's menu bar with the directory's own. ================================================================================ WINDOWS Version 5.0.261.3 Beta ================================================================================ Bug fixes - WebP room backgrounds no longer disappear after download. - Door / spot WebP transparency is now actually transparent. - Animated WebP door / spot transparency is also now transparent. New Features - Less lag when editing rooms with heavy backgrounds. - Opening Room Info or Door Info on a room with an animated WebP or video background now pauses the BG animation until you close the editor. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.261.2 Beta ================================================================================ Mac keyboard shortcuts - Cmd+Q now quits the app. It was opening the Smiley Faces window instead because our menu had grabbed Cmd+Q for itself, hijacking the system shortcut every Mac user has in muscle memory. Reported by a beta tester right after hitting Cmd+Q to leave and getting smileys in their face instead. - Cmd+M now minimizes the window. It was opening the Avatar Macros editor. - Cmd+, now opens Preferences (the universal Mac convention). It was making the chat text smaller, which made the standard "open settings" shortcut useless. All three menu entries are still in their menus, you can still reach them with a click. They just gave back the keyboard shortcuts to the system so the Mac behaves like every other Mac app. New: prop bag safety net - Auto-backup of your prop bag at startup. Turn it on in Options > Props. Pick how often (every start, weekly, or monthly) and how many copies to keep (1 to 5). Backups live next to your other PalaceChat user data so iCloud Drive can sync them if you have that set up. - Restore from a backup. New button right under the auto-backup section, lists every backup with date and size. Pick one, confirm, PalaceChat closes, and on next launch your bag comes back. Your current bag gets saved as a pre-restore snapshot so you can roll back if needed. - Crash protection on bag rendering and prop reads. Corrupt entries from sync hiccups, antivirus interruptions, or partial saves no longer take the whole app down. When PalaceChat sees damage it offers to repair on the spot. - Rebuild thumbs button in Options > Performance. When your thumbnails look like garbage but the actual props are fine, this wipes the cache and regenerates from scratch. Now with a real progress bar and ETA so you can see it working instead of wondering if it froze. New: prop editor improvements - When editing a prop, you choose what happens on save. New popup in Options > Props with three options: overwrite the original in place (new default, intuitive Edit), new prop at the start of the bag, or new prop at the end of the bag. The old behavior (always new prop at the start) is option 2 if you prefer it. - Right-click Duplicate on a prop creates a copy right next to the original with a fresh ID. No more save-as-new-then-move dance. - Right-click Rebuild thumbnail on a single prop. Same as the global rebuild but for the one prop you care about when only that one looks wrong. Bug fixes - Chat log hides cleanly when you minimize the main window instead of leaving a ghost panel floating on screen. - Chat log can be narrower now. Minimum width dropped from 420 to 310 pixels, useful on small monitors or when you have a lot of windows tiled. - PALACECHAT script command returns a cleaner version number. v5.0.261.1 used to push 50026101 onto the IptScrae stack, now it ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.260.7 Beta ================================================================================ Mac fixes - Right-click on a prop in the bag opens the contextual menu again (delete, wear, etc). It had stopped showing the menu and was starting a drag instead. - Click and drag in Combine mode now picks up multiple props as the cursor passes over them. Before this, left-click drag did nothing and you had to click each prop one by one. - Right-click with a tiny finger movement no longer starts a drag by mistake. The contextual menu still pops as expected. - Renaming a prop category from the bag actually works now. The cell used to look editable but every keystroke went to the chat textbox at the bottom of the main window. A small popup window asks for the new name instead. - Animated props up to 3 MB. Heavier sticker-style animations save and load correctly now. Anything past the old 1 MB line used to get silently dropped on the way to your bag. - Bookmarks window no longer crashes when you double click on an empty row or below the last bookmark. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.260.6 Beta ================================================================================ Bug fixes - Combine animation now keeps your drag order intact. Before this, if you drag-selected props (especially when scrolling kicked in mid-drag) the resulting animation could play frames in a different sequence than what you picked. Direction is now locked to whichever way you started the drag (top to bottom or bottom to top), so the output matches what you see. - Macros window no longer crashes on a damaged prop bag slot. - Get user details now goes to the chat log even when the new log is hidden. Before this, if you had the legacy log active and used the right-click "Get user details" item, nothing showed anywhere. Now the info lands in your active log, and when you switch back to the HTML log the styled bubble is waiting too. - Prop window does not open by itself anymore. Cyborg scripts that triggered a fresh prop download could pop the prop bag open without you asking for it, even with the menu unchecked. - MP4 video doors and backgrounds keep audio in sync after looping. The audio used to keep running while the video stuttered, so each loop the sound drifted further from the picture. Now the audio restarts at frame 1 every time the video loops, capping any drift at one loop. - The chat log no longer shows a stray black square after long sessions. The HTML log now does a quick re-layout when you open it, clearing a rendering glitch that used to need a close and reopen to fix. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.260.4 Beta ================================================================================ Bug Fixes - Fixed animated GIF imports on Mac coming in as a single still frame instead of capturing all frames. - Fixed prop bag showing all yellow placeholders after restart, and new WebP props from other users not showing up. Caused by an overeager auto-repair that flagged healthy props as damaged. - The new user info popup now shows the codes correctly. Fixes reg/z code swapping in busy palaces, guests showing as "no response", and breakage on nicks or rooms with parens or special chars. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.260.2 Beta ================================================================================ New Features - Operators can right-click any user in the room to get a styled info bubble with their rank, IP, current room, regcode, zcode and software version, all in a single quick popup. Hover the IP for a country/city geolocation tooltip. - Right-click yourself to get the same panel for your own account. Bug fixes - The new chat log now remembers if you had compact mode on. Used to reset to normal every time you reopened the app, ignoring the toggle from the hamburger menu. - Windows on second/third monitors come back where you left them. Before this, anything saved on a secondary screen got snapped to the primary monitor on the next launch. Applies to every window that remembers its position (Main, Prop Editor, Prop Window, Live Directory, prefs, chat log, log viewer, etc). - Prop bag corruption no longer crashes the client. If a slot in your prop bag goes bad (overnight sync, disk hiccup, antivirus poking files) the prop now shows the "update PalaceChat" placeholder while the client quietly re-fetches it from the server in the background. No more sudden close on a bad slot. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.260.1 Beta ================================================================================ New Features - Multi-select props with drag or Shift+click. Pick the first prop, drag to the last one (or Shift+click it), and every prop in between gets added to the combine in bag order. Tedious 12 click-by-click selections are gone. - Press ESC to clear the current combine selection and start over without leaving combine mode. - Right-click the bag while in combine mode to get a Cancel option that exits cleanly without combining. - Single click still toggles individual props on and off, so custom out-of-order frame sequences still work the same way. - Click on empty space in the bag to clear your current selection. Used to leave the previous prop highlighted "stuck" after you right-clicked one and dismissed the menu without picking an action. Bug fixes - "Switch to legacy" from the new HTML log now actually sticks. Before this fix, the HTML log was reappearing on top of the classic log as soon as anyone (you or another user) chatted in the room, leaving both logs visible at the same time. - "File X was not found" notifications stand out in the new HTML log now: red bubble with a tache icon. Plus the message itself surfaces in chat without needing the Log downloads option turned on. ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.260.0 Beta ================================================================================ The biggest update since the rewrite. Public beta of everything we shipped across the last months of internal builds. Chat translator - PalaceChat can now translate every chat message into your own language automatically. Open Options > Translator and pick the language you read. Whispers, shouts and room chat all get translated on the fly. Powered by our own servers, no per message API metering. - You can also translate what you SAY. Click the new globe button in your chat bar and pick the language THEY read. Your message goes out in their language automatically, while everyone else sees it exactly as you typed it. - Want a more exact translation? you can add your own api for different translation providers (OpenAI, google, etc) Video room backgrounds - Rooms can now have animated MP4, WebP, WebM an more file format backgrounds. Drop a video file as the room background just like you would with any image. - Per-spot video doors. Doors can now show a video clip (MP4/WebM/WebP/etc) as their picture, animating in place. - Audio support, off by default. You can use the new IptScrae SETSPOTVIDEOAUDIO for per-door control. (0=Off 1=On) - New IptScrae commands: PAUSEBGANIM, RESUMEBGANIM, STEPBGANIM and related for script-driven background control. Truly animated avatar props - Your avatar can finally move. Make your own animated props in the new Advanced Prop Editor by importing from GIF, WebP or any video file (MP4/WebM/AVI/MOV/MKV all supported). - Got old animations built from multiple props? Combine them into a single animated prop with one click. Tweak speed, add overlays (text, emojis, extra static images), and ship it. - Animated WebP props supported throughout the client: load, save, upload, render. Same wear-and-share workflow as classic GIF/PNG props, just with smooth animation. Advanced Prop Editor - All-new editor for power users. Side-by-side with the classic editor if you prefer the simple flow. - Import from PNG, GIF, WebP, MP4, WebM, AVI, MOV, MKV. - Frame management: reorder, dupe, delete frames, preview at any speed, per-frame paint tools. - Overlays: text, emoji, extra static images stacked on top of an animated base. - Combine multiple existing props into one animated prop. - Crop, shape masking, brightness/contrast, invert, rotate, flip, all apply across all frames at once. Nametag decorations - Crown your name with a custom ornament. Pick from the in app catalog or import your own design (PNG with transparency, animated WebP or gif supported), recommended file size is 512*128px. - Animated decorations supported throughout: import an animated WebP mp4 or GIF and your nametag ornament animates above your head. - Decorations sync across all clients in the room automatically. New users entering see your decoration on the first paint. - Right-click any user to offer them a decoration. - "Hide decorations" toggle if you want a cleaner view on busy rooms or slower machines. - Decorations dim during whispers so the conversation stays the focus, then go back to full opacity afterwards. - Animated "deco offered" notification with its own icon and bubble in the new chat log so you notice when someone gifts you one. - Tools menu entry for managing your decoration collection. Save the one you are wearing from an script, import your own, delete them, etc. - IptScrae integration: scripts can offer decorations programmatically (script-driven catalog displays, themed events, member rewards). New chat log - We have a new chat log with styled message bubbles, icons per message type (sign on/off, room enter/leave, whispers, pages, operator events, translator messages), color-coded by category, and a real dark mode. - Per-tab filters: General, Whispers, Operator events, Strict mode. Each tab keeps its own scroll position and read state. - Find-in-log search: Cmd-F brings up an inline search bar to jump to any message, with highlight and next/prev. - Compact mode toggle for denser reading. - Copy-friendly layout: select and copy a conversation block including nicks and timestamps in one go. - Toggle from View menu to switch back to the classic log any time. Both share the same data so nothing is lost when you switch. Performance - FPS caps for animated props and backgrounds (15 / 30 / 60 / native). Useful on laptops, older desktops, or while on battery. - Hardware accel options for the embedded browser (WebView2). - "Force low quality" toggle for embedded web content on slower connections. Mac native polish - Global menu bar correctly hosts the Prop Editor menu when its window is active. - Floating tool windows stay visible across app switches without blocking Main. Cascade minimize/restore with the main window. - Live Directory and other tool windows respect macOS keyboard navigation and full-screen behavior. - Async background image decoding so big rooms do not hitch on entry. Plus a long tail of bug fixes ================================================================================ MAC Version 5.0.260 Beta ================================================================================ All fixes and new features from the previous beta series are now folded into this release. The beta list resets here, anything new rolls out starting with 5.0.240.0.