v1.4.0

This is a minor release bringing several updates:

• Add support for Python 3.12, including removal of distutils use within the library and fixes for several deprecation warnings.
• Add renewed documentation, with fixes for the broken links and examples, an improved section on the installation process, and without the deprecation/sunsetting section.
• Upgrade bundled GEOS to 3.6.5.
• Adapt basemap source code to work with matplotlib 3.8.x (thanks to @qianwu2 and @rcomer).
• Precompiled PyPI wheels for MacOS (architectures x64 and arm64, Python 3.9+).
• Precompiled conda-forge packages for MacOS arm64, GNU/Linux aarch64 and GNU/Linux ppc64le.
• Optional argument encoding_errors for Basemap.readshapefile method (thanks to @guziy).
• Optional argument cachedir for Basemap.arcgisimage method to allow caching of ArcGIS image downloads (thanks to @JoepdeJong).

Maintenance bugfixes are also included, especially:

• Fix _geoslib.pyx compilation with Cython 3.0+ "legacy_implicit_noexcept" (thanks to @musicinmybrain).
• Fix _geoslib.pyx compilation with newer compilers Clang 16 and GCC 14 (thanks to @fweimer-rh).
• Upgrade the version pins for several runtime, lint, doc, setup and test requirements.

Please visit the CHANGELOG for a complete list of changes.