[Freeciv-Dev] Announce: freeciv 1.9.0 released!

[David Pfitzner <dwp@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Dear Freeciv People,

As my parting act as maintainer, I am pleased to announce that 
Freeciv 1.9.0 has been released, and is now available from the 
Freeciv web site.  Go to:

   http://www.freeciv.org
   http://www.freeciv.org/download.phtml

Or directly from the ftp site:

   ftp://ftp.freeciv.org/freeciv/stable_version/
   ftp://ftp.freeciv.org/freeciv/stable_version/freeciv-1.9.0.tar.bz2
   ftp://ftp.freeciv.org/freeciv/stable_version/freeciv-1.9.0.tar.gz

Or from CVS, with tag R1_9_0.

Contributed packages in various formats are of course welcome,
(eg, upload to incoming and email the webmaster) and should 
appear on the download page soon.

Thanks to all those who have contributed in many ways to making 
Freeciv a fun and exciting project.  Following is an extract 
from the NEWS file for this release, giving an overview of all 
the latest features and improvements.

Regards,
-- David

------------------------ NEWS -------------------------

Welcome to Freeciv 1.9!

This is release 1.9.0.

With this release the Freeciv maintainership has changed again, 
with David Pfitzner resigning and being replaced by Jeff Mallatt.
We also farewell Martin Willemoes Hansen as webmaster, replaced
by Paul Zastoupil.  Thanks again to all our developers, who continue 
to work so hard.

This release includes lots of changes, outlined below.  Those who 
are interested in seeing the detailed changes should check the 
ChangeLog file.

WHAT'S CHANGED SINCE 1.8.1:

 - Internationalization added.  Some aspects still need improvement,
   and in particular currently only works well if client and server 
   both use the same language.  Initial (partial) translations 
   included are: de es fr hu pl pt pt_BR.
 - Improvements to "trident" tileset, and this set is now the default.
 - New ruleset support for NATIONS, and many new nations added --
   there are now 32 nations in the default nations file.  Also allow
   multiple leaders choices for each nation, allow longer player
   names, and allow specifying/choosing sex of leader.
 - New ruleset support for TERRAIN, and changes to allow Civ2 style
   terrain with more specials, multi-terrain rivers, and new farmland
   infrastructure.  Moved some server options into terrain ruleset,
   and added new rule option regarding movement along rivers.
 - New ruleset support for GOVERNMENTS, and more general unit upkeep.
 - The contents and layout of the graphics files is now described in
   user-editable 'spec' files, instead of being hardwired into the
   code; see README.graphics for details.
 - Changes to city graphics: can now see cities grow.  Also, code
   support for different city styles for different nations, and for
   technology dependent styles, but lacking good graphics except for
   the default style.  Cities show a small flag when occupied by one 
   or more units.
 - From Civ2, added Paratroopers unit and Airbase infrastructure.
 - Initial window size of Gtk+ client is smaller, to fit better on
   smaller screens, and can now resize detached chat/output window.
 - City report enhancements: New "Change All" dialog to convert all
   production of a given item to some other item (both clients); can
   select multiple cities and issue commands (Gtk+ client only); can
   sort by different columns (Gtk+ client only).  Can also select
   multiple items in the Trade Report (Gtk+ client only).
 - In Civ2 style, can select which infrastructure item to pillage, and
   multiple units can pillage together.  Can now pillage fortresses,
   as well as new farmland and airbase infrastructure items.
 - More fields added to Demographics Report, and now configurable from
   a server option.
 - Added more information to "Active Units Report", and renamed to 
   "Military Report".
 - New cursors added for Goto, Nuke and Paradrop modes; <Escape> key
   cancels Go-To/Paradrop/nuke mode; pollution on city squares is now
   always clearly visible; improvements to refresh method for pixmaps
   in Gtk+ client; various other improvements to both clients.
 - Autosettlers no longer convert Plains/Grasslands to Forests, but
   will now Transform terrain.
 - AI can build spaceships, although does not do so very aggressively
   or intelligently yet.
 - Server and client may specify a different metaserver to use.  There
   is now a metaserver running on www.freeciv.org, and that is now the
   default metaserver (http://www.freeciv.org/metaserver).
 - New server option for "turn blocking" mode, in which players will
   never miss a turn even if sometimes disconnected.
 - More flexible rulesets for units and techs (advances) allowing
   variable number of items in each (up to 200) and no longer any
   techs with hardwired effects depending on position in ruleset file.
 - Appropriate helptext now appears in ruleset files, allowing
   modpacks to give modified help to correspond to modified items.
 - Format of ruleset files is changed, no longer compatible with
   those for 1.8.0 and 1.8.1.
 - Removed science bonus of +1 per city per turn.
 - In Civ2 mode, overflight of a hut causes it to disappear, and can't
   build cities next to each other.
 - Rapture_size now 3, to conform to Civ2.
 - Settlers and Engineers now cost shield upkeep as well as food
   upkeep (depending on government type) as in both Civ1 and Civ2.
 - Helicopters do not lose hitpoints when over an airbase.
 - The amount of food required for a city grow is now ((citysize+1) *
   foodbox), instead of (citysize * foodbox); new behavior matches
   both Civ1 and Civ2.
 - Some re-organization of data directory, in adding data/scenario,
   and graphics now in data/trident, data/engels and data/misc.
 - Preliminary support for compiling the server on Mac (but networking
   code not yet ported).
 - Progressively moving code out of client gui-dependent directories.
 - Lots of bug fixes, code cleanups, and help-text improvements.