## July 2024
- **Behavior change:** `target_schema` is no longer a required configuration for [snapshots](/docs/build/snapshots). You can now target different schemas for snapshots across development and deployment environments using the [schema config](/reference/resource-configs/schema).
- **New:** [Connections](/docs/cloud/connect-data-platform/about-connections#connection-management) are now available under **Account settings** as a global setting. Previously, they were found under **Project settings**.  This is being rolled out in phases over the coming weeks.
- **New:** Admins can now assign [environment-level permissions](/docs/cloud/manage-access/environment-permissions) to groups for specific roles.
- **New:** [Merge jobs](/docs/deploy/merge-jobs) for implementing [continuous deployment (CD)](/docs/deploy/continuous-deployment) workflows are now GA in <Constant name="dbt" />. Previously, you had to either set up a custom GitHub action or manually build the changes every time a pull request is merged.
- **New**: The ability to lint your SQL files from the <Constant name="dbt" /> CLI is now available. To learn more, refer to [Lint SQL files](/docs/cloud/configure-cloud-cli#lint-sql-files).
- **Behavior change:** dbt Cloud IDE automatically adds a `--limit 100` to preview queries to avoid slow and expensive queries during development. Recently, dbt Core changed how the `limit` is applied to ensure that `order by` clauses are consistently respected. Because of this, queries that already contain a limit clause might now cause errors in the IDE previews. To address this, dbt Labs plans to provide an option soon to disable the limit from being applied. Until then, dbt Labs recommends removing the (duplicate) limit clause from your queries during previews to avoid these IDE errors.

- **Enhancement**: Introducing a revamped overview page for dbt Explorer, available in beta. It includes a new design and layout for the dbt Explorer homepage. The new layout provides a more intuitive experience for users to navigate their dbt projects, as well as a new **Latest updates** section to view the latest changes or issues related to project resources. To learn more, refer to [Overview page](/docs/explore/explore-projects#overview-page).

#### dbt Semantic Layer
- **New**: Introduced the [`dbt-sl-sdk` Python software development kit (SDK)](https://github.com/dbt-labs/semantic-layer-sdk-python) Python library, which provides you with easy access to the dbt Semantic Layer with Python. It allows developers to interact with the dbt Semantic Layer APIs and query metrics and dimensions in downstream tools. Refer to the [dbt Semantic Layer Python SDK](/docs/dbt-cloud-apis/sl-python) for more information.
- **New**: Introduced Semantic validations in CI pipelines. Automatically test your semantic nodes (metrics, semantic models, and saved queries) during code reviews by adding warehouse validation checks in your CI job using the `dbt sl validate` command. You can also validate modified semantic nodes to guarantee code changes made to dbt models don't break these metrics. Refer to [Semantic validations in CI](/docs/deploy/ci-jobs#semantic-validations-in-ci) to learn about the additional commands and use cases.
- **New**: We now expose the `meta` field within the [config property](/reference/resource-configs/meta) for dbt Semantic Layer metrics in the [JDBC and GraphQL APIs](/docs/dbt-cloud-apis/sl-api-overview) under the `meta` field.
- **New**: Added a new command in the dbt CLI called `export-all`, which allows you to export multiple or all of your saved queries. Previously, you had to explicitly specify the [list of saved queries](/docs/build/metricflow-commands#list-saved-queries).
- **Enhancement**: The <Constant name="semantic_layer" /> now offers more granular control by supporting multiple data platform credentials, which can represent different roles or service accounts. Available for <Constant name="dbt" /> Enterprise plans, you can map credentials to service tokens for secure authentication. Refer to [Set up <Constant name="semantic_layer" />](/docs/use-dbt-semantic-layer/setup-sl#set-up-dbt-semantic-layer) for more details.
- **Fix**: Addressed a bug where unicode query filters (such as Chinese characters) were not working correctly in the <Constant name="semantic_layer" /> Tableau integration.
- **Fix**: Resolved a bug with parsing certain private keys for BigQuery when running an export.
- **Fix**: Addressed a bug that caused a "closed connection" error to be returned when querying or running an Export.
- **Fix**: Resolved an issue in <Constant name="core" /> where, during partial parsing, all generated metrics in a file were incorrectly deleted instead of just those related to the changed semantic model. Now, only the metrics associated with the modified model are affected.