[PENNMUSH-ANNOUNCE] PennMUSH 1.7.6p0

[Alan Schwartz]

PennMUSH 1.7.6 (patchlevel 0) is now available by ftp from
ftp.pennmush.org, in the directory /pub/PennMUSH/Source.
Patches from older versions will be available shortly.

This even-numbered release is a "stable" release, and will be maintained
for bugfixes only. The initial release of PennMUSH 1.7.7 (the development
branch) will come soon after this one, and will initially be the same,
but will be actively developed for new features as well as bugfixes.

The former releases, PennMUSH 1.7.4 and 1.7.5, are now deprecated, and
only limited support will be available for it from the developers. Users
of both versions are strongly encouraged to upgrade to PennMUSH
1.7.6/1.7.7.

Major changes from PennMUSH 1.7.4 include:

  * NEW LICENSE! PennMUSH versions 1.7.6 and later are released under
    the Artistic License, an OSI-approved, GPL-compatible license.
  * New @locks and ways to specify them, along with lock flags,
    including inheritable locks.
  * Improved ability to restrict access to commands and functions
  * Support for accented characters in MUSHcode and object naming.
    Locale-based string collation.
  * New commands: @nspemit, @notify/any, @drain/any, @sitelock/remove,
    @link/preserve
  * New functions: checkpass(), nspemit(), textfile(), accent(),
    stripaccents(), ord(), chr(), iname(), lplayers(), lvplayers(),
    lvcon(), lvexits()
  * Improved functions: regedit, comp, trig functions, dist2d, dist3d,
    mix, munge
  * Substantial internal improvements for improved performance,
    stability, and maintainability/hackability.
  * Telnet negotiation support
  * CPU time limiting per queue entry, and overall limits on number
    of parser calls.

As usual, read the README file for information on how to report bugs,
suggest features, or heap praise.

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Javelin@M*U*S*H (mush.pennmush.org 4201) |           Alan Schwartz         
     Paul@DuneMUSH                       |       dunemush@pennmush.org
  Javelin@Belgariad, and elsewhere       |     PennMUSH Server Maintainer
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   PennMUSH God's Guide: http://www.pennmush.org/~alansz/guide.html
        PennMUSH Source: ftp://ftp.pennmush.org/pub/PennMUSH/Source
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