merge Master to develop

[kanjoe24]

merge Master to develop

[Copilot]

Pull request overview

This PR merges master into develop, bringing the generated changelog forward to include the next release entry.

Changes:

• Added a new 1.9.0 section with links to recent PRs/commits.
• Appended an additional changelog bullet under 1.8.2 for the bump commit.

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[jfreeda]

Approved

[srinivasgtl]

Approved

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