Database upgrade
We've just updated our backend applications to use Steam's new information requesting system "PICS".
We don't know what PICS means either, but it sure has a lot more information than the previous system did.
With this update, we've ran a app database-wide upgrade to PICS.
Steam Hub / Achievement titles / Updates
This upgrade means some of the apps with "Steam Hub" or achievements, will most likely have had this information removed since something changed about them.
This does not mean anything new happened to these apps, just that we've updated to a different system.
Addendum May 5, 2013 (no really this is pretty important)
It seems this needs additional clarification, since some news sites have "picked up" on some "new" things appearing in the database.
Any history entries from around 21:00 UTC on May 4th are entries relating to our database upgrade and switch to PICS. Apps that have been inactive for months (mostly Steam Hub titles) are still as inactive as they were then.
The "Last Updated" time was updated because our (SteamDB, not Valve's) database entry for these apps changed. A new value named "changenumber" was also added, which is part of the new information system. This indicates the last time the app changed on Valve's side.
Depots
With PICS, "Depot" apps will no longer be updated. This isn't a shame at all since they're pretty much useless anyways. Actual depots are listed on the app pages they belong to under the "Depots" tab.
Frontend changes
- Search has been rewritten, code makes more sense now, and less bugs
Backend changes
- Updater rebuilt to only use PICS. Just like packages, apps will now use PICS instead (#4)
- Fixed issue where hidden package would not be shown in changelists
- Hopefully fixed issue where the updater would receive duplicate changelists
- Various optimizations to backend, things should update slightly faster now