--- title: 3.7 Release Notes description: "## Overview Elements 3.7 is the biggest release yet. Elements can now be packaged, distributed, and hot-loaded at runtime — no server restart required. The new `.elm` archive format gives developers a single self-contained artifact to ship, and the new Deployments UI makes managing the full lifecycle a first-class…" url: "https://namazustudios.com/docs/releases/3-7-release-notes/" updated: "2026-08-13" category: Releases --- # 3.7 Release Notes ## Overview Elements 3.7 is the biggest release yet. Elements can now be packaged, distributed, and hot-loaded at runtime — no server restart required. The new `.elm` archive format gives developers a single self-contained artifact to ship, and the new Deployments UI makes managing the full lifecycle a first-class experience in the admin console. Highlights ## Highlights - **Hot-deploy Elements at runtime** — load, update, and unload Elements dynamically via the new deployment API and runtime/container services. - **ELM package format** — distribute Elements as self-contained `.elm` archives, loadable from the filesystem or MongoDB GridFS, with nested JAR and SPI support. - **Deployments UI** — brand-new admin UI with a guided wizard for creating and managing deployments, runtimes, and containers. - **Maven archetypes** — new standard Java and Kotlin archetypes (`sdk-Element-standard`, `sdk-Element-kotlin`) to scaffold a production-ready [Element](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/element/) in seconds. - **SDK Bill of Materials** — `sdk-bom` makes dependency management across [Element](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/element/) projects consistent and effortless. - **Security hardening** — fixed [OAuth2](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/oauth2/) account linking vulnerabilities, anonymous [User](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/user/) collision bugs, and tightened classloader isolation. - **Windows support** — full build and test compatibility on Windows, including path-length mitigations. ## Coming Soon The deployment and packaging work in 3.7 is laying the foundation for something bigger. Namazu Cloud will be a fully managed hosting solution for Namazu Elements; spin up and manage your own instances with one-click deploys, automated backups, and self-[Service](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/service/) scaling, all without touching infrastructure. Stay tuned. ## New Features ### Dynamic Deployment Introduced a full hot-deploy system for Elements, enabling Elements to be loaded, updated, and unloaded at runtime without restarting the server. - New `sdk-deployment` module extracts deployment services as a first-class SDK concern. - `ElementDeployment` model supports multiple Elements per deployment, full CRUD, status tracking, and lifecycle events. - New [REST](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/rest/) API endpoints for managing deployments (`/api/Element/deployment`). - `ElementRuntimeService` and `ElementContainerService` now support lifecycle events and handler cleanup on unmount. - `LoadConfiguration` with `AttributesLoader` for customizable [Element](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/element/) initialization. - `ElementDeployment` can now inject the hosting `Application` into the [Element](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/element/)'s `Attributes`. - SPI directory support and flat [Element](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/element/) loading architecture. - New `AttributesLoader` and `SpiLoader` interfaces for external configuration. ### ELM Package Format and Local SDK Full support for distributing and loading Elements as self-contained `.elm` archive files. - Load Elements from `.elm` packages stored in MongoDB GridFS or from the local filesystem. - Nested JAR classloading within `.elm` packages. - New `sdk-Element-standard` Maven archetype for scaffolding standard Elements. - New `sdk-bom` Bill of Materials for consistent SDK dependency management across [Element](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/element/) projects. - ELM Inspector: new [REST](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/rest/) endpoint and UI for introspecting a deployed `.elm` package. - `PermittedTypesClassLoader` with `TypeRequest`/`PackageRequest` (literal, regex, wildcard) for fine-grained classloader isolation. - `ElementDependencyMetadata` DTO for reporting deployed [Element](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/element/) dependencies. - OpenAPI spec integration test suite. - Local SDK improvements: simplified `ElementsLocal` API, Maven-based local builder, abstract base class for local tests. - `sdk-bom` fleshed out as a proper BOM encompassing all SDK modules. - Features endpoint added to expose server capabilities. ### Signup Creates [Session](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/session/) The signup API now creates an authenticated [Session](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/session/) immediately after account creation, matching the behavior users expect from a signup flow. - New endpoint path added to avoid breaking existing login integrations. - Legacy endpoint preserved and deprecated. ### Deployments UI New web UI for managing [Element](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/element/) deployments. - Deployment wizard with Runtimes and Containers pages. - Features dialog on the Deployments page. - File upload support to pre-fill deployment fields. - Edit [Element](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/element/) flow aligned with the create wizard. - Search filter presets to hide large `.elm` objects from general object lists. - Updated Container and Runtime detail views for better screen fit. ### Kotlin Archetype Added a Kotlin Maven archetype (`sdk-Element-kotlin`) for developers who prefer Kotlin when building Elements. ## Bug Fixes ### Obsolete Fields Removed obsolete [Application](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/application/) fields from the admin UI. Updated tests to reflect that [Metadata](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/metadata/) [name](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/name/) changes are now permitted. ### Codegen Creating Duplicate Methods Fixed code generation producing duplicate method names in OpenAPI-generated clients. Resources without an explicit tag are now automatically tagged with `ElementsCore`. ### Elements API Cleanup Normalized [REST](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/rest/) API path conventions across applications, leaderboards, progress, and mission endpoints. Added `@Deprecated` annotations to all renamed methods. Renamed methods referencing "active" or "inactive" applications for consistency. ### ShrinkWrap Module Loader Added a ShrinkWrap-based module loader for test harnesses, enabling more reliable module assembly in integration tests. ### Windows Build and Path Length Issues Fixed failures building and running tests on Windows caused by path lengths exceeding the Windows filesystem limit. Added cleanup on exception to avoid leaving temporary state behind. ### ClassLoader Memory Leak Fixed a resource leak in `ElementImplementationClassLoader` where native resources were not released when a deployment was unloaded. ### Error Hiding in DirectoryElementPathLoader Improved error handling in `DirectoryElementPathLoader` so that load failures are surfaced rather than silently swallowed. ### Elements Not Loading After Deployment (Regression) Fixed a regression where Elements failed to load after deployment due to incorrect attribute loading hierarchy. Reworked `PropertiesAttributes` to fix a `NullPointerException` and corrected the attribute merge order so system attributes take proper precedence. ### [OAuth2](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/oauth2/) Account Linking Fixed a bug where the JWK cache was considered out of date on the first authentication attempt, causing the first [OIDC](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/oidc/) login to fail. Fixed related issues in the account linking flow. ### Anonymous [User](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/user/) Collision and [OAuth2](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/oauth2/) Security - Fixed a soft-deleted anonymous [User](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/user/) being returned as a live [User](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/user/) under certain conditions. - Fixed a security issue where an [OAuth2](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/oauth2/) identity could be linked to a second account under the same scheme. - Prevented duplicate linking when the same identity provider scheme is used more than once. - Added additional guard rails and expanded test coverage. ### Missing SLF4J Dependency on Container B Added a missing `slf4j` dependency that caused startup failures in certain deployment configurations. ### Codegen / OAS3 Integration Tests Added integration tests validating OpenAPI 3 code generation output. Hardened related codegen logic to prevent regressions. ## Other Changes - **[Application](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/application/) configuration hotfix**: Fixed an error when creating an [Application](https://namazustudios.com/glossary/application/) configuration with no product bundles; `description` field is no longer required to be non-null. - **Dependency updates**: Updated Jackson and Swagger to their latest versions. Migrated Jetty, Jersey, and Swagger to BOM-managed versions. - **Branding cleanup**: Replaced outdated references to "Elemental-Computing" with current project naming. - **CI improvements**: Reduced double-builds in Bitbucket Pipelines; added Maven version as a Surefire system property; fixed Makefile syntax. - **Javadoc**: Added Javadoc generation to all builds; fixed misplaced Javadoc tags across multiple modules.