Update VERSION to 2.18.0 and generate release notes

Author: flyingsilverfin

RELEASE_NOTES_LATEST.md

@@ -0,0 +1,65 @@
+PyPI package: https://pypi.org/project/typedb-client
+Documentation: https://docs.vaticle.com/docs/client-api/python
+
+## Distribution
+
+Available through https://pypi.org
+
+```
+pip install typedb-client=={version}
+```
+
+
+## New Features
+- **Protocol versioning**
+  
+  We use a new protocol API to perform a "connection open". This API does server-side protocol version compatibility checks, and replaces also our previous need to an any RPC call to check that the network is available.
+  
+  This API is called transparently during the construction of both the Core and Cluster clients, so the user does not have to do anything.
+  
+  
+- **Introduce Values to support expressions**
+  
+  Introduce the 'Value' type, which is returned as the result of an expression's computation. This change follows from https://github.com/vaticle/typeql/pull/260, which outlines the capabilities of the new expression syntax.
+  
+  Values (representing any of Long, Double, Boolean, String, or DateTime) are returned as part of `ConceptMap` answers and are subtypes of `Concept` for the time being. Their main API is made of the `.get_value()` method and `.get_value_vype()` method, along with all the standard safe downcasting methods to convert a `Concept` into a `Value`, using `Concept.is_value()` and `Concept.as_value()`.
+  
+  We also move the import location of `ValueType` from `attribute_type.py` to `concept.py`. We remove APIs like `isKeyable` from `ValueType`s.
+  
+  
+- **Support generalised annotations and uniqueness**
+  
+  We update the Typedb Protocol and TypeQL to the latest versions, which support the uniqueness annotation and generalised `Type` APIs. These generalised APIs allow querying by a set of annotations, rather than just boolean = `true|false`.
+  
+  For example, the API: `AttributeType.get_owners(onlyKey: boolean)`, has become: `AttributeType.get_owners(annotations: Set["Annotation"])`
+  
+  All usages of boolean flags to indicate key-ness should be replaced by a set of `ThingType.Annotations.KEY`. The new `@unique` annotation is available as `ThingType.Annotations.KEY`, and also usable within the APIs that accept annotations.
+  
+  
+  
+- **Add method to Cluster client to retrieve current user**
+  
+  Add an API to be able to retrieve the currently authenticated user.
+  
+  
+
+## Bugs Fixed
+- **Fix Factory Badge**
+  
+  We've updated the Factory badge from the old 'Grabl' badge that is no longer active.
+  
+  
+
+## Code Refactors
+
+
+## Other Improvements
+- **Update release notes workflow**
+  
+  We integrate the new release notes tooling. The release notes are now to be written by a person and committed to the repo.
+  
+  
+- **Split connection test jobs**
+
+
+

VERSION

@@ -1 +1 @@
-2.17.0
+2.18.0