Tcl/Tk 8.6.14 Release Announcement (February 28, 2024)

Summary of Changes since Tcl/Tk 8.6.13:
--------------------------------------

This is a patch release, so it primarily includes bug fixes and corrections
to erratic behavior.  Highlighted changes are noted below.  The changes file
at the root of the source tree contains a more complete list.  The Timelines
of all changes are online.

	http://core.tcl-lang.org/tcl/timeline
	http://core.tcl-lang.org/tk/timeline

   * [TIP 402] revise path normalization for x-platform UNC path support
        *** POTENTIAL INCOMPATIBILITY ***

   * Harmonize Tk's parse of numbers (screen distance, etc) with Tcl
        *** POTENTIAL INCOMPATIBILITY ***

   * Iconlist ignores options db for fg text color; affects dialogs
        *** POTENTIAL INCOMPATIBILITY ***

   * Aqua: XPutImage() swaps red and blue channels
        *** POTENTIAL INCOMPATIBILITY ***

   * [encoding convertfrom] handling of incomplete code sequences
        *** POTENTIAL INCOMPATIBILITY ***

   * Harmonize handling of ~ in paths across platforms.
        *** POTENTIAL INCOMPATIBILITY ***

   * Fix menu clone binding misbehavior, menu-20.1[2-6].
        *** POTENTIAL INCOMPATIBILITY ***

   * Improved multi-thread fork performance on modern systems.

   * Improve performance of large treeview destruction.

   * Improve performance of large image insertions into text.

   * Improve widget creation performance due to poor font caching.

   * Fix notebook tab appearances when placed on edge other than top.

   * Enable treeview display of partial final line.

   * Win: restore [exec %var%] that was dropped in 8.6.13.

   * Allow [chan create {} $cmd].  Enables simulation of server channels.

   * Allow return from [tk scaling] in safe interps.

   * Prevent navigation by word exposing clues to masked entry contents.

   * Fix crashes or hangs in...
      - [chan pop] with pending input
      - thread finalization of reflected channels
      - [label .l -bitmap floppy]
      - [set tcl_precision 15; expr 6.4623485355705287e-27]
      - [tk busy forget] and [tk busy hold]
      - channel read into "string" Tcl_Obj can BO, and perform poorly
      - KVO crash after destroying Aqua's first root toplevel
      - Test treeview-6ee162c3f9
      - Test tailcall-bug-784befb0ba
      - Tests menu-40.[12]

   * Repair memory leaks and errors
      - Eliminate undefined realloc() calls
      - Silence many warnings from -fsanitize=function
      - Flawed interfacing with XIM
      - Tcl_UtfToExternal writing to one-byte buffer
      - Tcl_UtfToUniChar() handling of 0xC1.
      - Tk_ConfigureValue could call wrong free() routine.
      - tests getuncichar-1.* in utf.test
      - ...and many more

   * No more support for 32-bit Cygwin

   * ::tcl_platform(osVersion) updated to report Windows 11

   * Accommodate macOS deprecation of sprintf()

   * Silence macOS 14 warnings about secure restorable state.

   * Code changes to support ASan use-after-return detection

   * Revise Tcl_MakeFileChannel() to better partner with pledge()

   * Prevent false [clock format] error reports on FreeBSD

   * Region clip & copy make better use of OS facilities.

   * Update handling of Apple FourCC creator codes.

   * Text selection omits first character, text-38.1

   * Windows: improved support of non-BMP pathnames

   * Fixed some Y2038 limitations

   * Fix photo color drawing on X11 32-bit visuals.

   * Fix <<MenuSelect>> regression on menus with -tearoff

   * Correct rounding of [nsFont pointSize].

   * zlib comment/filename error handling (zlib-8.19, zlib-8.2[012])

   * Prevent theme change attempts after Tk finalize.

   * Make dialogs robust against parent destruction.

   * Make [tk_chooseColor] robust against failed grab.

   * Fix menu parsing of @x,y indices.  menu-22.[6-9]

   * Fix inconsistent results from [font measure].

   * Fixed [clock scan|add] handling of abbreviated options

   * Avoid endless loops replacing [unknown] or [history].

   * Fix polluted error messages from [send -option].

   * [image create photo -format png -data \xff\xff\xff\xff\xff\xff\xff\xff].

   * Fix failing winTime-2.1 on Windows

   * test string-2.20.1 failed on big endian platforms

   * Updated bundled packages, libraries, standards, data
      - Itcl 4.2.4
      - sqlite3 3.44.2
      - Thread 2.8.9
      - TDBC* 1.1.7
      - tcltest 2.5.7
      - libtommath 1.2.1
      - zlib 1.3.1
      - Unicode 15.1
      - tzdata 2024a

Reproducible: Always