matrix.org/content/blog/2022/04/2022-04-05-synapse-1-56-rel...

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title = "Synapse 1.56 released"
path = "/blog/2022/04/05/synapse-1-56-released"
[taxonomies]
author = ["Brendan Abolivier"]
category = ["Releases"]
+++
Happy release day everyone! [Synapse
1.56](https://github.com/matrix-org/synapse/releases/tag/v1.56.0) is out! Let's
have a look at what's new in this release.
## Additional restrictions around registration
One common abuse scenario we have seen on Matrix over the years is attackers
making use of public homeservers with open registration to automatically create
multiple accounts in order to evade sanctions. Sometimes, this can lead to these
public homeservers being banned across multiple public rooms despite their
administrator(s) not being directly at fault.
In order to mitigate this, starting from this release, Synapse will refuse to
start by default if it is configured with open registration with no additional
verification. This means users wishing to register on these homeservers will
need to authenticate themselves, either via
[email](https://github.com/matrix-org/synapse/blob/8a519f8abc6de772167c2cca101d22ee2052fafc/docs/sample_config.yaml#L1285),
[recaptcha](https://matrix-org.github.io/synapse/v1.56/CAPTCHA_SETUP.html) or
[registration
tokens](https://matrix-org.github.io/synapse/v1.56/usage/administration/admin_api/registration_tokens.html).
Please see the [upgrade
notes](https://matrix-org.github.io/synapse/v1.56/upgrade.html#open-registration-without-verification-is-now-disabled-by-default)
for more information.
## So long groups, and thanks for all the fish
Long-time users of Matrix might remember when, [way back in
2017](https://matrix.org/blog/2017/10/24/synapse-0-24-is-here), we introduced
groups (also known as communities in some clients). Groups would let users
define a curated set of users and rooms to represent a given community that
others could refer to. We even used to have `+matrix:matrix.org` which was
the official group for the Matrix team and community.
If this sounds a bit familiar to you (and remind you of a certain other feature
of Matrix), that's no coincidence. Some time ago, we had already identified a
good amount of shortcomings with groups, and decided to redesign the feature
entirely and release it under the name "spaces". If you're curious about this,
then you may wish to read the [spaces announcement
blogpost](https://matrix.org/blog/2021/05/17/the-matrix-space-beta) we released
at the time.
Now that spaces have been out of beta for some time, and have shown to be a very
useful feature to the ecosystem, we decided it was time to retire support for
groups from Synapse, after more than 4 years of good and loyal service. This
release of Synapse deprecates the feature, with a plan to disable it by default
in Synapse 1.58 (which is expected to be released next month).
## Everything else
As of this version, Synapse will also refuse to start the if the Postgres
database it is running against has a non-`C` locale, in order to prevent
accidental database corruption. See the [upgrade
notes](https://matrix-org.github.io/synapse/v1.56/upgrade.html#change-in-behaviour-for-postgresql-databases-with-unsafe-locale)
for more information.
This release also includes the ability for modules to register server
administrators through the `register_user` method, as well as a [new
method](https://github.com/matrix-org/synapse/blob/v1.56.0/synapse/module_api/__init__.py#L1290-L1312)
to allow modules to store external 3PID associations into Synapse's database.
See the [full
changelog](https://github.com/matrix-org/synapse/releases/tag/v1.56.0) for a
complete list of changes in this release. Also please have a look at the
[upgrade
notes](https://matrix-org.github.io/synapse/v1.56/upgrade#upgrading-to-v1560)
for this version.
Synapse is a Free and Open Source Software project, and we'd like to extend our
thanks to everyone who contributed to this release, including (in no particular
order) [Dirk Klimpel](https://github.com/dklimpel),
[Beeper](https://www.beeper.com/), [Famedly](https://famedly.com/),
[IronTooch](https://github.com/IronTooch) and
[villepeh](https://github.com/villepeh).