Maintenance release, numerous fixes and improvements #118

Job	Run time
create .devN build date coordinated across all matrix jobs	4s
build-and-upload (3.8, manylinux_2_28)	53s
build-and-upload (3.8, macos-13)	46s
build-and-upload (3.8, macos-latest)	1m 1s
build-and-upload (3.8, windows-latest)	58s
build-and-upload (3.9, manylinux_2_28)	50s
build-and-upload (3.9, macos-13)	53s
build-and-upload (3.9, macos-latest)	35s
build-and-upload (3.9, windows-latest)	59s
build-and-upload (3.10, manylinux_2_28)	49s
build-and-upload (3.10, macos-13)	1m 13s
build-and-upload (3.10, macos-latest)	40s
build-and-upload (3.10, windows-latest)	1m 4s
build-and-upload (3.11, manylinux_2_28)	56s
build-and-upload (3.11, macos-13)	49s
build-and-upload (3.11, macos-latest)	43s
build-and-upload (3.12, manylinux_2_28)	49s
build-and-upload (3.12, macos-13)	1m 25s
build-and-upload (3.12, macos-latest)	58s
build-and-upload (3.12, windows-latest)	40s
	17m 5s

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