- Fixes to the ORM and to the postgresql JSON type regarding the
``None`` constant in conjunction with the Postgresql :class:`.JSON` type.  When
the :paramref:`.JSON.none_as_null` flag is left at its default
value of ``False``, the ORM will now correctly insert the Json
"'null'" string into the column whenever the value on the ORM
object is set to the value ``None`` or when the value ``None``
is used with :meth:`.Session.bulk_insert_mappings`,
**including** if the column has a default or server default on it.  This
makes use of a new type-level flag "evaluates_none" which is implemented
by the JSON type based on the none_as_null flag. fixes #3514
- Added a new constant :attr:`.postgresql.JSON.NULL`, indicating
that the JSON NULL value should be used for a value
regardless of other settings. part of fixes #3514

- The "hashable" flag on special datatypes such as :class:`.postgresql.ARRAY`,
:class:`.postgresql.JSON` and :class:`.postgresql.HSTORE` is now
set to False, which allows these types to be fetchable in ORM
queries that include entities within the row.  fixes #3499
- The Postgresql :class:`.postgresql.ARRAY` type now supports multidimensional
indexed access, e.g. expressions such as ``somecol[5][6]`` without
any need for explicit casts or type coercions, provided
that the :paramref:`.postgresql.ARRAY.dimensions` parameter is set to the
desired number of dimensions. fixes #3487
- The return type for the :class:`.postgresql.JSON` and :class:`.postgresql.JSONB`
when using indexed access has been fixed to work like Postgresql itself,
and returns an expression that itself is of type :class:`.postgresql.JSON`
or :class:`.postgresql.JSONB`.  Previously, the accessor would return
:class:`.NullType` which disallowed subsequent JSON-like operators to be
used. part of fixes #3503
- The :class:`.postgresql.JSON`, :class:`.postgresql.JSONB` and
:class:`.postgresql.HSTORE` datatypes now allow full control over the
return type from an indexed textual access operation, either ``column[someindex].astext``
for a JSON type or ``column[someindex]`` for an HSTORE type,
via the :paramref:`.postgresql.JSON.astext_type` and
:paramref:`.postgresql.HSTORE.text_type` parameters. also part of fixes #3503
- The :attr:`.postgresql.JSON.Comparator.astext` modifier no longer
calls upon :meth:`.ColumnElement.cast` implicitly, as PG's JSON/JSONB
types allow cross-casting between each other as well.  Code that
makes use of :meth:`.ColumnElement.cast` on JSON indexed access,
e.g. ``col[someindex].cast(Integer)``, will need to be changed
to call :attr:`.postgresql.JSON.Comparator.astext` explicitly.  This is
part of the refactor in references #3503 for consistency in operator
use.

Would be nice to fix Oracle here

such as :meth:`.Query.union` now handle the case where the embedded
SELECT statements need to be parenthesized due to the fact that they
include LIMIT, OFFSET and/or ORDER BY.   These queries **do not work
on SQLite**, and will fail on that backend as they did before, but
should now work on all other backends.
fixes #2528

to function for a many-to-one relationship.  The loader used an
API to place "None" into the dictionary which no longer actually
writes a value; this is a side effect of :ticket:`3061`.
- remove InstanceState._initialize() totally, it's used nowhere
else and no longer does what it says it does
- fill in fowards-port version ids throughout the changes for 1.0.9

without primary keys to be reflected as well as ensured that
a SQL statement involved in foreign key detection is pre-fetched up
front to avoid driver issues upon nested queries.  Fixes here
courtesy Eugene Zapolsky; note that we cannot currently test
Sybase to locally verify these changes.
fixes #3508  fixes #3509

or other variable-length column type with unbounded length
by assigning the token ``"max"`` to the
length attribute of the string.   While using the ``"max"`` token
explicitly is supported by the SQL Server dialect, it isn't part
of the normal contract of the base string types, and instead the
length should just be left as None.   The dialect now assigns the
length to None on reflection of the type so that the type behaves
normally in other contexts.
fixes #3504

up SQLAlchemy's version detection under Python 3 and inadvertently
not using the correct unicode mode for Python 3.  This would cause
issues such as bound variables mis-interpreted as NULL and rows
silently not being returned.
fixes #3491