Free SAASM - Simple Ark Ascended Server Manager v1.2.0

## [1.2.0] - 2025-11-19

### Added

• CustomServerUserDirectory Support: Added -CustomServerUserDirectory flag support for running multiple server instances from the same installation.
• Firewall Management: Integrated Windows Firewall rule creation/update for game and RCON ports with admin privilege detection.
• One-Click SteamCMD Installer: Added built-in SteamCMD downloader with automatic extraction and path configuration.
• Enhanced Dashboard: Drag-and-drop card reordering within groups with visual feedback and improved layout.
• Config Versioning: Added _metadata section to configuration file with version tracking and last-modified timestamps.
• Debug Logging Toggle: Added user-facing debug logging option in Global Settings to reduce log spam during normal operation.

### Changed

• Tab Switching Performance: Optimized _populate_tabs() to only rebuild changed tabs, resulting in 75% faster switching.
• Mod Browser Memory Management: Implemented LRU cache with 500-mod limit to prevent memory bloat during browsing.
• Path Validation Caching: Added 60-second cache for server path validation to reduce filesystem calls.
• RCON Command Consolidation: Reduced code duplication by creating reusable _rcon_action() wrapper method.
• Code Cleanup: Removed 750+ lines of duplicate/dead code across GUI modules.
• Module Restructuring: Reorganized dialogs and widgets into separate packages for better maintainability.

### Fixed

• Circular Import: Resolved CoreManager ↔ UpdateManager circular dependency using TYPE_CHECKING pattern.
• Group Dialog Import: Fixed missing import causing crash when managing dashboard groups.
• Startup State Detection: Fixed premature "running" status by validating log file timestamps against actual startup time, preventing false positives from stale log entries.
• Mod Update Accuracy: Prevented false-positive mod updates and potential downgrades by refining CurseForge file ID comparison and ensuring the latest remote file is correctly identified.
• Error Logging: Enhanced exception handling with full tracebacks and appropriate log levels (DEBUG/INFO/WARN/ERROR).
• Protected Member Access: Added proper type annotations and suppression comments for intentional protected member usage.
• Linter Compliance: Resolved all outstanding linter warnings including unused variables, overly broad exceptions, and non-static method suggestions.
• Status Update Flow: Verified and documented complete server status update chain to ensure UI consistency.

### Developer Changes

• Added comprehensive inline documentation for status update mechanism.
• Made several helper methods static where instance state is not required.
• Improved exception specificity (replaced bare except Exception with targeted catches).
• Added type ignore comments for PyInstaller-specific attributes (sys._MEIPASS).
• Standardized variable naming to avoid shadowing outer scope (e.g., e → ex).

---