Changelog

All notable changes to this project will be documented in this file.

The format is based on Keep a Changelog, and this project adheres to Semantic Versioning.

0.1.0a12 - 2026-04-30

Just some minor improvements …

Changed

  • further refinements to documentation.

  • cleaned up rendering of Graphviz graphs.

Removed

  • removed unused misc.DocstringInheritanceMixin

0.1.0a11 - 2026-04-24

Added

  • ExtendedSerial.read_struct_iter and ExtendedSerial.stream_struct methods.

  • misc.SuggestionDict for key lookup with typo suggestions.

  • added optional trial_number parameter to Bpod.run method.

Changed

  • replaced NamedTuples with misc.SuggestionDict for Bpod.inputs and Bpod.outputs

  • refactored Sphinx documentation and API reference.

0.1.0a10 - 2026-04-16

Added

  • Bpod.address property — exposes the ZeroMQ address of the running instance.

  • Bpod.peek_data - read trial data before trial end.

  • misc.ByteEnum - an extended IntEnum that caches its values as bytes.

  • Timer fields in StateMachine now accept timedelta values in addition to floats.

  • bpod CLI entry point for launching a Bpod instance that can be connected to via TCP Unix Sockets.

  • state machine column added to trial data output (hash of the FSM)

Changed

  • renamed Bpod.send_state_machine to Bpod.run.

  • removed Bpod.run_state_machine.

  • switched to Polars LazyFrame for storing trial data.

  • replaced use of Queue with SimpleQueue.

  • switched Bpod.module field from NamedTuple to dict.

  • replaced hashlib.blake2b with xxhash for state machine hashing.

  • cache validation and compilation of state machines.

  • StateMachine.hash now returns bytes instead of str.

0.1.0a9 - 2026-04-02

Added

  • bpod.is_ready property indicating whether a compiled FSM is loaded and ready to run

  • bpod.is_queued property indicating whether an FSM is queued to run after the current one

  • bpod.get_data for returning trial data after a state machine run.

Changed

  • renamed BNC input events and output actions to TTLIn and TTLOut.

  • replaced MD5 hashing of fsm.StateMachine with blake2b.

  • improved readability of ValidationError messages in fsm.StateMachine.

  • state machine runs are now handled by three separate threads:

    • ReadThread for serial communication with the Bpod,

    • EventThread for handling and structuring the incoming data, and

    • SoftcodeThread for executing soft-codes.

Fixed

  • reorganization of finalizers for better garbage collection.

0.1.0a8 - 2026-03-04

Just a quick bugfix release …

Changed

  • ipc.ServiceHost: set Zeroconf to listen on all interfaces, reorder WelcomeData fields, and improve type hints.

  • event handler callback type hint to return None instead of Any.

  • refactor CI workflows.

0.1.0a7 - 2026-03-01

Added

  • com.find_ports for finding serial ports that match given filter criteria.

  • com.verify_serial_discovery for checking if a serial device sends an expected discovery message.

  • convenience functions for reading and writing integers in com.ExtendedSerial.

  • misc.extend_packed for extending a bytearray by multiple values of the same format.

  • misc.DocstringInheritanceMixin for inheriting docstrings from base classes.

  • ipc.LocalServiceAdvertisement: local service advertisement and discovery

  • ipc.iter_services and ipc.ServiceIterator for discovering services.

  • bpod.discover_remote_bpod for discovering remote Bpod instances.

  • more examples.

Changed

  • more verbose debug logging during state machine runs.

  • replace unmaintained appdirs dependency with platformdirs.

  • switch to zero-based indexing for global counters, timers, conditions and soft-codes.

  • added file locking to misc.SettingsDict.

  • switch to using ZMQ multipart messages for communication.

  • renamed ipc.DualChannelHost / ipc.DualChannelClient to ipc.ServiceHost / ipc.ServiceClient.

  • restructured bpod module into several submodules.

  • zero-copy behavior on send path of ipc.ServiceClient and receive path of ipc.ServiceHost.

Fixed

  • decoupled finalizers and event loops from instance references.

0.1.0a6 - 2025-10-29

Added

  • Initial work on cached state machine validation: fsm.StateMachine.check

Changed

  • com.ExtendedSerial no longer supports NumPy types, integers, strings and iterables.

  • refactoring of com.ChunkedSerialReader

Removed

  • com.to_bytes

  • dependency on Pandas

0.1.0a5 - 2025-09-03

Added

  • fsm.to_file and fsm.from_file for export/import of state machines.

  • YAML import/export for state machines

  • Work on documentation: Finite-State Machines

Changed

  • moved state machine structure from msgspec Struct back to Pydantic Model

  • merged fsm_types module back into fsm

  • renamed parameters for add_state method: state_change_conditions -> transitions and output_actions -> actions

0.1.0a4 - 2025-08-25

Added

  • ipc.DualChannelHost and ipc.DualChannelClient

  • JSON import/export for state machines

  • example state machines

Changed

  • improved export of state machines to graphviz

  • improved settings management

  • moved state machine structure from Pydantic Model to msgspec Struct

0.1.0a3 - 2025-08-04

Added

  • state machine assembly

  • state machine thread

  • ZMQ communication module

  • basic settings management

Changed

  • switched package management from PDM to uv.

0.1.0a2 - 2025-05-07

Added

  • pydantic model for state machine

Changed

  • further refactoring of the code

  • renamed serial module to com to avoid confusion with PySerial.

0.1.0a1 - 2025-04-22

Changed

  • major reorganization of the existing codebase.

  • renamed serial_extensions module to serial.

Removed

  • removed SerialSingleton class.

0.1.0a0 - 2025-04-17

First alpha release. Nothing works.