What's Changed
* Remove cached `plates` from `AutoGuide`. by tillahoffmann in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1976
* Fix typo and tweak wording in `get_dependencies()` docs by dylanhmorris in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1975
* Navigate to our forum for discussions by fehiepsi in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1978
* Unify `sample_posterior()` signatures by tare in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1979
* Add guidelines for bug report and feature request by fehiepsi in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1980
* Make seed handler stateless by default by fehiepsi in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1983
* Update paths to data files by fehiepsi in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1996
* Add `sum_sites` option to sum loss over sites or return as dict. by tillahoffmann in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1995
* Improve rng default in the `contrib/model.py` module by juanitorduz in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1992
* Fix padding calculation by tare in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1993
* Apply `init_to_median` in unconstrained space. by tillahoffmann in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1994
* Fix tracer leak in hmc by fehiepsi in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1985
* Fix trace leakage in SL-DAIS by fehiepsi in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1984
* Mark xfail for leaked tracer tests by fehiepsi in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1997
* Fix tracer leak in svi with mutable state by fehiepsi in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/2001
* Fix Memleak in ASVGD by OlaRonning in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/2003
* Flax NNX integration by juanitorduz in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1990
* Pass value arg to optax, allowing use of reduce_on_plateau by zmbc in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1974
* Add `CirculantNormal` distribution. by tillahoffmann in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1988
* circulant gp notebook: minor improvements by juanitorduz in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/2004
* Fix behavior of `logdiffexp(jnp.inf, jnp.inf)`, add test that would have caught it. by dylanhmorris in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/2007
* Port hierarchical multivariate forecasting model from Pyro to NumPyro by juanitorduz in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/2006
* Bump to 0.18.0 by fehiepsi in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/2009
New Contributors
* zmbc made their first contribution in https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/pull/1974
**Full Changelog**: https://github.com/pyro-ppl/numpyro/compare/0.17.0...0.18.0