RuleEngineers Changelog

July 23, 2026

v0.2.0-alpha

Added adaptive fading history trails to the Pattern Viewer and Rule Editor, with up to 255 trail-age levels, trail opacity and length controls, and increased visibility when zoomed out.
Added annotation overlays to Rule Editor and Pattern Viewer panels for precise alignment and position marking. Annotations persist across Rule Editor generations, remain independent of the simulation, and can be painted with Ctrl+LMB.
Added large random pattern support from 16x16 through 2048x2048, with a density control. Patterns larger than 512x512 enter performance mode.
Raised the maximum Pattern Viewer simulation speed from 30gps to 60gps.
Added Pattern Viewer maximization.
Improved performance when scrolling through already-computed Rule Editor generation panels.
Added Rule Editor panel outlines whose colors indicate panel state: blue for no undefined cells, cyan for at least one undefined cell, and green when the pattern set is endemic to the rule.
Refined the progress bar with per-pattern stripes, a stripe-under-cursor indicator, and light-blue stripes for patterns after the current one.
Fixed an inconsistency with rules that use variables in the Constraint Editor.
Improved Ctrl+Z behavior so undoing no longer dismisses the state bar first.

June 14, 2026

The Pattern Viewer is now hideable from Rule -> Show Pattern Viewer, and the Rule Editor expands from 3x3 to 5x3 when hidden.
Automatic rerandomization in the Pattern Viewer has been disabled.
Added blue constraint tabs with Golly-style constraints and variable support.
a always means all states.
Right-clicking the grid in a constraint card places the selected variable, and Ctrl+RMB links two variables to the same state.
Added buttons to make and clear variables, with variables shared across all constraint tabs.
Added a green Direct Editor tab with editable rule cards, Ctrl+M toggling, minrule/randomize actions, and fine-grained rule tuning.
Added Export Annotated Ruletable, optional transitions for non-locked sections, and variable declaration import/export support.
Fixed the red breakage marker map color, added a high-state mouse tooltip, and tightened several tab and play/pause edge cases.
Expanded documentation for the new tab types and constraint editor.
Broken-pattern red markers now highlight dependencies when an earlier pattern is edited.

May 5, 2026

Added File -> Export -> Golly and File -> Export -> Hensel.
Replaced automatic rerandomization with an explicit Randomize action.
Added pattern viewer speed controls and compacted the toolbar to make room for more actions.
Added a toggleable multistate state bar with keyboard-based state selection.
Added persistent grey-mark and locked-overlay visibility controls.
Added tab reordering in the rule editor.
Added a startup title screen with New Rule, Load Rule, and Import Rule.
Reworked New Rule into an inline title-screen flow and removed the old modal new-rule and new-tab prompts.
Changed Ctrl+O to prompt for saving first, then route into the load or import flow.
Added low-memory safeguards for high-state rule creation, import, and session restore.
Raised the maximum supported state count to 16.
Tightened the top layout spacing and centered the Pattern Viewer and Rule Editor headers.
Updated the app version text to v0.1.2-alpha.

April 28, 2026

April 25, 2026

Published the first official Windows alpha installer for RuleEngineers.
Published GettingStarted.md as the user-facing quickstart document.
Added a Getting Started webpage and an interface-tour screenshots page for review.
Updated the desktop-app update feed to report 0.1.0-alpha.
Confirmed validation status: Release|x64 build succeeded and the internal test suite reported all tests passed.

Alpha notes

The installer is an IExpress self-extracting package.
It installs to %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\RuleEngineers and creates a Start Menu shortcut.
This alpha does not yet provide a formal uninstaller or Add/Remove Programs entry.
Users can remove the alpha by deleting the install folder manually.