Smoother Canvas & Multi-Magnifier Workflow! A major release focused on smoother canvas interaction, sharper rendering, and a richer multi-magnifier workflow.

Highlights

• Smoother Canvas Interactions: Smoother zoom and panning in the main comparison canvas, with more responsive feedback during interactive movement. Separators, splits, and magnifier dividers move without lag and stay in sync with the cursor.
• Sharper Image Rendering: Cleaner image rendering with corrected alpha handling, so anti-aliased edges, magnifier circles, and overlays look crisp both on screen and in exported screenshots.
• Reworked Multi-Magnifier Workflow: Easier to add, hide, delete, and manage multiple magnifiers, each with its own color and settings. Optional automatic color assignment and intersection highlighting while dragging capture areas.
• Consistent Mode Behavior: More consistent behavior across comparison modes, guide lines, capture rings, filename overlays, and exported images.
• Improved Flatpak Compatibility: Removed the direct DBus notification path that caused integration issues, plus an updated in-app help covering the expanded magnifier behavior and new canvas controls.

Compatibility Patch & Stability Fixes A focused bugfix release addressing rendering stability, backend compatibility, and packaging after the major 8.1.0 refactor.

Highlights

• Split-Line & Zoom Fixes: Resolved edge cases with split-line behavior during zoom and pan, including incorrect jumps at image borders.
• Magnifier Geometry Fixes: Fixed magnifier bounds, clamping, and interaction geometry under zoom.
• Quick Backend Migration: Continued migration away from hardcoded pure-OpenGL paths toward the Qt Quick backend for improved compatibility.
• Video Editor Trim Fix: Fixed a bug where trimming without a selection could erase the entire clip.
• Windows CI Pipeline: Added the first Windows GitHub Actions pipeline with release metadata validation.

GPU Acceleration & Canvas Revolution! A major release consolidating months of deep architectural work, introducing hybrid CPU-GPU rendering, a fully rewritten canvas, native Qt widgets, canvas zoom/pan, video editor improvements, and a plugin-based architecture.

Highlights

• Hybrid CPU-GPU Rendering: A new rendering engine offloads work to the GPU via OpenGL shaders for dramatically improved performance on large images.
• Canvas Architecture Overhaul: The comparison canvas was fully rewritten for correctness and performance across all operating modes and edge cases.
• Native Qt Widgets: All pop-up and overlay windows are now native Qt widgets, greatly improving Wayland compatibility.
• Canvas Zooming & Panning: The main comparison view can now be zoomed and panned interactively.
• Video Editor Overhaul: The timeline was rewritten with a keyframe-based model, aspect-ratio-correct thumbnails, and dynamic spacing.
• Plugin-Based Architecture: A plugin system was introduced for extensibility and a cleaner internal structure.

Unification & Analysis - The Collaborative Evolution! Complete integration with shared_toolkit library enabling code reuse, revolutionary clipboard support (Ctrl+V), comprehensive image analysis tools (diffs, metrics, edge detection, channel analysis), and enhanced UX customization.

Highlights

• Unified Architecture with Shared Toolkit: Complete integration with shared component library enabling code reuse across projects.
• Clipboard Integration: Paste images directly from clipboard (Ctrl+V) with intuitive direction selection overlay.
• Professional Image Analysis Suite: Pixel difference highlighting, structural similarity mapping, edge detection, channel analysis, and metrics calculation (PSNR/SSIM).
• Premium Magnifier Rendering: Subpixel precision controls for smooth, accurate comparisons even with different resolutions.

The MVP Revolution - A Monumental Refactor! This is the most extensive architectural refactoring in the project's history, transitioning the entire application to a robust and modern Model-View-Presenter (MVP) pattern and introducing a completely custom-built UI.

Highlights

• Robust MVP Architecture: Re-engineered into a Model-View-Presenter pattern for vastly improved stability and maintainability.
• Custom Fluent UI: The dependency on PyQt-Fluent-Widgets has been removed in favor of custom, lightweight "fluent-style" components.
• Three-Level Caching System: Enhanced caching architecture for improved performance.
• Reimagined Core Features: New dedicated Export Dialog, a structured Help Window, and a powerful two-panel Image List manager with Drag & Drop.

The Definitive Experience Update! A major quality-of-life and rendering engine update focusing on control, quality, and stability.

Highlights

• Reactive State-Driven Architecture: Re-engineered core logic to eliminate race conditions and improve stability.
• Power-User Launcher: The launcher.sh script is now a full-fledged command-line utility.
• Unleashed Magnifier: The magnifier now renders on a dynamic canvas, can be positioned outside image boundaries, and correctly supports horizontal split view.
• Streamlined UI Interaction: Added long-press actions and scrollable image selection lists to speed up workflow.

The Phoenix Rises, Powered by AI! A massive update featuring significant architectural changes, performance enhancements, and a fresh look using qfluentwidgets.

Highlights

• Revolutionary Performance: A new multi-layered architecture and advanced caching service make the application 2-3 times smoother.
• Modern UI with Fluent Widgets: A complete visual overhaul for a sleek, modern aesthetic.
• AI-Driven Development: Major portions of this update were made possible through rapid prototyping with AI agents.
• Enhanced Magnifier Tool: More controls, smoother operation, and better visual feedback.

Stable Windows Release. A significant update that provided the first stable, modern Windows installer. This release also included bug fixes, design improvements, a full-fledged settings panel, and added a setting for JPEG quality.

Cross-Platform Milestone. Introduced the first official Windows version alongside updates for the Flatpak build, marking a major step towards cross-platform availability for the application.

The First Public Release. The initial version of Improve-ImgSLI was released, providing the core feature set including side-by-side comparison, a draggable splitter, and the first iteration of the magnifier tool.