Our spree of behind-the-scenes improvements continues with a whole host of gem- and test-related updates. We also have some exciting user-facing changes, too, like a major overhaul of our Skin Wizard and the ability for gift exchange moderators to search sign-ups.

We made the Archive homepage more useful for guests by listing available fandom categories to browse, highlighting recent news posts, and pointing out the benefits of creating an account. For logged-in users, we added a random selection of their marked-for-later works, the latest unread comments from the inbox, and a list of favorite tags.

With the new Favorite Tags feature, you can now pin up to 20 canonical tags (fandom, character, relationship, etc.) to the homepage, so you can always access your most frequently visited tags when logged in. To add a Favorite Tag, simply go to the tag’s work listing (e.g. Polyamory) and select the “Favorite Tag” button. A link back to the tag’s work listing will immediately be added to your homepage.

Which tags have you favorited so far? Reblog and let us know!

This batch of code includes several new features and enhancements aimed at assisting the Abuse team in their work, as well as some changes under the hood to protect us against attacks from download bots while keeping disruptions for our users to a minimum.

When we announced that we’d be suspending our automated invitation queue at the beginning of the month, we didn’t plan for it to be closed quite this long! Writing, testing, and improving the new code, while also working with Abuse and taking care of our servers through planned and unplanned downtimes, took considerably longer than we expected.

While the queue was closed, we continued to provide invitation codes to existing users upon request. According to our records, we handed out over 5000 such invitations this month, which is more than three times our usual number. To everyone who reached out to friends and strangers to share invitations, we thank you!

If you wanted to create an account in January and couldn’t - we’re very sorry for making you wait! The queue is now back in business: request an invitation today and receive a code in 48 hours or less!