v1.2.0

exovista 1.2.0

This release adds a PyVista import path (the inverse of write_exo), fixes
a number of real bugs, and stands up project infrastructure (CI, packaging).

✨ New feature: ExodusII → PyVista

• exovista.read_exo(filename, *files, ...) reconstructs an ExodusII file
  into a pyvista.UnstructuredGrid — the inverse of write_exo:
  • Node coordinates (2D meshes embedded in 3D with z = 0) and all element
    blocks, with exo_block_id / exo_block_name recorded as cell data.
  • Node variables → point_data, element variables → cell_data, sampled at a
    selectable time_step; time history exposed in field_data.
  • read_side_sets=True also returns a MultiBlock of PolyData side sets,
    rebuilt over the shared volume nodes (3D faces → polygons, 2D edges → lines),
    each carrying orig_elem_id / face_id. Round-trips are exact.
• Works for both serial files and globbed parallel decompositions.

🐛 Bug fixes

• Parallel join crash: get_node_set_dist_facts returned a np.ones
  fallback while caching None, so num_dist_facts disagreed with dist_facts
  and crashed the join. Now consistent with the serial reader.
• similar() compared a file against itself for element block IDs, so
  block-ID mismatches were never detected.
• Quad4.center averaged only x, divided by 4 a second time, and dropped y;
  now returns the true centroid like its sibling elements.
• numpy 2.x: replaced deprecated np.row_stack with np.vstack.
• Invalid block IDs now raise a clear ValueError instead of an opaque
  TypeError (five raise None sites).
• Fixed a latent NameError in copy_variable_histories.
• write_exo no longer mutates the caller's meshes (works on shallow copies,
  so helper arrays don't leak onto inputs).
• Fixed the broken exoread console-script entry point
  (exodusii:exoread → exovista:exoread).

🔧 Infrastructure & packaging

• GitHub Actions CI: flake8 + pytest across Python 3.10–3.12 (headless VTK);
  the package is now lint-clean.
• Filled out pyproject.toml metadata (readme, requires-python, license,
  classifiers, URLs, [dev] extras, explicit package discovery).
• Test suite expanded to cover read_exo, parallel join, elements, similar,
  and the exoread CLI. Tests depending on non-redistributed reference files
  now skip cleanly instead of failing.

Full changelog: v1.1.1...v1.2.0