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2013 Mar 16

Dotclear 2.5

By Franck - News

As stated in our Dotclear 2.5 Release Candidate announcement, this one mainly sees the thightening of bolts and screws everywhere, and dozens of tickets (say : a lot) closed (don't worry, we kept a few, thus there's still work to be done), some of them long overdue, whatever the reasons.

Among the differences beetween our RC and this release: a couple of bugs have been fixed, and more importantly, we had to fix two security issue comming from the multiple files upload system we're using. We are now planning to replace this (Flash) component by a new one, in Ajax. Expect a 2.5.1 one of these days. :)

The new version is, as usual, available there : http://download.dotclear.org/latest.zip

Let me use my very first annoucement as the new skipper to talk you about a few things I would like to see being worked on in the near future[1]:

  • The revamping of the back-office should benefit from the work currently under progress on the sexy branch, which now includes Twig, in order to make administration of your blog even more friendly and powerful.
  • Still in the back-office, it would be nice to replace the "wysiwyg" editor by something like CKEditor. It is a big job, and we've had so far some unsuccessful trials... well, it is a bit of a holy grail but it would be cool to have that.
  • Make some room for Dotclear 2 by moving Dotclear 1 closer to the attic on Dotclear and DotAddict websites, and harmonise a bit their designs.
  • Progressively abandon PHP versions lower than 5.2[2]

The main idea is to streamline Dotclear to the essential stuff and to externalise everything else in plugins (this is what the sexy branch is all about), to use whatever libraries others do better than we do (a template system, a wysiwyg editor, ...) in order to ease future developments. That being said, such deep changes might have a cost in terms of compatibility, but those questions will be dealt with at the right place, in the right time, we're not there yet.

If ever you're reading this English version of the announcement, it surely means you're a bit too far away for that, but if you have the occasion, feel free to follow the French blog, where we plan to give details about a meet-up in Paris somewhere next month.

Notes

[1] It will mostly depend on everybody's availability and abilities, of course.

[2] This might break compatibility with some shared hosting companies who still run versions of PHP that has been deprecated for seven years. In IT, dinosaurs have been known to disappear in a shorter time.

2 comments

2013 Feb 24

Upcoming 2.5 (and a bit of news)

By xave - News

Today nearly sees the release of Dotclear 2.5: what we release today is a Release Candidate, meaning that we hope it's the real deal, but we'd like it to be tested by a few madmen before releasing it in the wild in a few days.

Why this waryness? We've had a big crash on Dotclear sister server: Dotaddict.org, and we had to stop everything to reinstall it from scratch, and I mean nearly really from scratch, as we discovered in the process that our backup plan hasn't been working for several months (and let that be a warning: automation is good, as long as you automatize some checks in the process.)

And because we had to stop working on that nearly finished 2.5, we prefer now to introduce it slowly, just to be on the safe side.

Users won't find any big changes in it: webfonts can now be used in Ductile and the daInstaller plugin is included in the main release. Other than that, there have been a whole bunch of small changes, both functional and cosmetic. Changes two are to be found for themes and plugins builders, and we can't even count all the small bugs that were fixed. As important for sysadmins: we are confident that Dotclear is now PHP5.4 compatible, for people using top-notch hosting.

Another important bit of news: having got a new job for the last 18 months, I finally had to admit that my schedule doesn't allow me to manage the project any more. It was really becoming a burden and a problem for the project, as I had often had no time to dwell into things. As nobody wants things to stall, waiting for my decisions or approvals, it became important to allow someone else to make those decisions, even if I stay in the team.

That's why we now welcome Franck Paul as the new project manager. It was an easy choice, as Franck not only is an historic member of the Dotclear Team, but is also the guy behind that new release, fixing most of the bugs single-handedly and driving the team for changes. Dotclear won't change: albeit with a role re-distribution, that's still the same team working on it.

And working we are, we're already working on several projects, stay tuned.

Do I forget something? Yep, the 2.5RC: it's now available in the nightlies at http://download.dotclear.org/nightl..., or by defining DC_UPDATE_VERSION to "testing" in your configuration file, if you want to take advantage of the autoupdate feature. The final version should be available within two weeks.

one comment

2012 Aug 13

Dotclear 2.4.4

By xave - News

Today, Dotclear is 9 years old, and we can't help but be emotional, thinking that it will leave the house one day. But it calls for a small celebration, so here are three things:

We're starting with a new release. Dotclear 2.4.4 is mostly a bugfix release and you shouldn't notice any difference. Except if you're using the "Program post" feature that was broken in the last release: it's back. Grab the 2.4.4. here: http://download.dotclear.org/latest.zip

In order to clear the backlog of things we'd like not to think about any more: the DC Loader, the script that allows you to install Dotclear in three clicks, has been updated, is now prettier, and is localization ready (only English and French are available, for now, though.) Grab it there: http://download.dotclear.net/loader/dotclear-loader.php

Last but not least, a small pre-announcement: the team has started to work on a Dotclear version nicknamed "Sexy". It should coexist for a while with the good old official one and aims to rewrite a good part of its internals in order to be lighter, quicker, sexier! Watch this space for a future announcement, explaining what it's all about.

3 comments

2012 May 19

Dotclear 2.4.3

By xave - News

Hi all! Here comes a new Dotclear version. This one has been made necessary by ... well, nothing, really. Just a couple under the hood enhancements, small bugfixes here and there and a new option to hide the shortcuts menu should you wish to do so. As usual, it can be downloaded there : http://download.dotclear.org/latest... or by launching the automatic update from you admin.

4 comments

2012 Feb 26

Dotclear partners

By xave

We recently received a nice message from an hosting company that was basically saying 'hey guys, we like what you do and we'd like to provide Dotclear free of charge to our users!' The company is Liveblot, and guys, we like what you do, so we finally activated on this English site the partners feature we've been using for years on our French site.

Launching this feature, and because we wouldn't want liveblot to feel alone, we also provide a link to Softaculous, an auto-installer used by many hosting companies, who provide Dotclear among dozens of other scripts for more than two years now. It's in no small part thanks to them that you can find readily made Dotclear hosting at several places on the Web (and some of those places will be incorporated here in the future. If you provide Dotclear in a way or another, let us now.)

You may now head to Liveblot to pre-order your free[1]Dotclear hosting. :)

Note

[1] Sic. Well, you can pre-order a free Dotclear hosting and pay for a domain name at the same time, but if you already have a domain name of your own, you can indeed pre-order the free Dotclear service, including 5000MB diskspace, 50GB Bandwidth, unlimited mail boxes, MySQL databases, subdomains, etc.

one comment

2012 Feb 11

Dotclear 2.4.2

By xave - News

Hi all!

Here comes a new Dotclear version. This one has been made necessary because four XSS vulnerabilities have been found this week[1]. No time to lose: we corrected them and here comes Dotclear 2.4.2.

As usual, it can be found there: http://download.dotclear.org/latest.zip

As always, have fun.

Note

[1] By the High-Tech Bridge Security Research Lab.

one comment

2011 Dec 24

I'm dreaming of a white Dotclear

By xave - News

Here is our Christmas surprise: Dotclear 2.4.1.2... We did not skip a version, we just decided to numerate this one specially for Christmas (for the more Americans among you, "24/12" means the 24th day of the 12th month, you date-order-challenged! :)

You won't find many new features in this one, but some small tweaks here and there and the patching of a an SQL injection vulnerability that hid itself so well no one found it until now, except for our forum member Adjaya.

That's all. Enjoy yourself, happy Holidays, have fun!

19 comments

2011 Nov 13

Dotclear 2.4

By xave - News

You can now download our new version:Dotclear 2.4.

In this version, you'll find an new iconset, specilly designed for us by Thomas Daveluy. This allow us to go back to a full GPL distribution, as the version for the icons introduced in Dotclear 2.3 was limited.

You'll also find a new theme, named Ductile, designed to be both easy to adpat to your needs and to fit wathever screen size your readers may use. Along with this theme comes a new plugin, named SimpleMenu, whose purpose is -you guessed it- to allow you to manage a menu of links in a simple way.

This version includes, as is now usual, incremental ergonomic and accessibility modifications. It can be found, as always, at the following URL: http://download.dotclear.org/latest.zip

You may have noticed that two files are attached to this post. once unzipped in the /admin/images/iconset/ folder of your blog[1], they'll allow you to find a new setting in your user preferences, where you will now be able to chose your iconset. Don't let the new icons prevent you from installing the 2.4 if you just loved the 2.3 ones, you can install them if you want.

EDIT: Please note the if you did not apply the changes needed for Dotclear 2.3.1, you will now see a warning in the admin interface.

Notes

[1] That folder has to be created, and each file has to be uncompressed in a specific sub-folder of it. We plan to create a GUI for that feature.

4 comments 3 trackbacks 2 attachments

2011 Sep 13

Dotclear 2.4 beta

By xave - News

The new version promised a month ago is not yet ready (holidays in the team spread from june to this week, I switched jobs and one of us is even getting maried!) but the curious and the bolds can as of now try the new Dotclear 2.4 beta. It includes new icons, a new theme, and other tweaks and functionnalities that will be detailed once we'll get out of beta.

You can download it here.

4 comments

2011 Aug 13

Eight years

By xave

That's Dotclear's birthday: we've been running for eight years!

There were some thoughts about celebrating by releasing a new version, but going on holidays seemed more fun. So we shelved things like a new theme or new refinements to the backend for a while. Holidays are not forever, though, and we plan to release a beta in a few days, leading to a new full release when it's ready™, but we'd like to have it ready by a month or so.

Meanwhile, enjoy the summer (if you have one) and have fun!

one comment

2011 Jun 14

Dotclear 2.3.1

By xave - News

Here comes another maintenance release for Dotclear. in this one, you'll find:

  • Some internal clean-up for development files that were preventing a clean upgrade under unusual circumstances.
  • Localisation problems have been corrected for our new dashboard system.
  • Cleaning and refining for some CSS & JS files.
  • There were a problem with the user preferences in the import/export module. This has been corrected.
  • You can now configure the email address used to send password reminders.
  • A potential security flaw has been fixed + some others security tightening.

About the last two points:

Starting with this version, the email address for reminders is set up in the config file. On new installations, a default one will be defined. For security reasons, it will not be the case with upgrades. Please add the following line to your inc.config.php file:

define('DC_ADMIN_MAILFROM','dotclear@theaddressyouwant.com');

If you don't do so, Dotclear will work as usual. You'll just raise the password reminders mails' score in antispam system.

About the security fix and tightening: you don't have to worry about the tightening, we just enhanced the security for the software's future life. There is a true security flaw, though, that could have been used under certain rare circumstances to gain access to a administrator account. You are still encouraged to update, better safe than sorry.

Those security enhancements were indicated by Jérémie Boutoille, while he was participating in Pirate-Moi, a monthly hacking contest that chose Dotclear for its last edition.

Dotclear was not hacked during this contest. :)

one comment

2011 May 16

Dotclear 2.3

By xave - News

Bonjour everybody !

Here comes the brand new Dotclear 2.3. Whereas our last version was targeted towards internal changes that were not obvious to the user, you will notice changes at once with this one, as it includes the first results of the ergonomics and accessibility study we launched several months ago (and that is just a first step, as it is a work in progress.)

favicon

Please allow me to introduce:

  • An admin backend refresh, harmonization and new icons;
  • More accessible forms;
  • A new handling of user preferences;
  • A new safe mode, for those cases where a plugin locks you out;
  • A new configurable side menu.

While we were working, we squashed quite a log of bugs, not all though, to be sure we'll release other versions in the future. New versions where we will also implements ergonomics and accessibility enhancements.

This new version was well received by our beta testers, I do hope you will like it! Have fun!

7 comments

2011 Apr 1

Dotclear 2.2.3

By xave - News

We publish tonight a fresh new Dotclear version. Nothing fancy in this one but two changes in the Media Manager: a bugfix for the manual thumbnail regeneration and a security fix.

As usual, the auto-update procedure should notify you of this new version in the next few hours. If you dont want to wait:

one comment

2011 Jan 17

Release early, release often: Dotclear 2.2.2

By xave - News

Twenty four hours after Dotclear 2.2.1, here comes Dotclear 2.2.2. This quick update has been made necessary because of a bug blocking new installations. We also corrected a small bunch of smaller bugs and more importantly, we made changes to the autoupdate procedure: it should now have a better handling of problems created by a bad FTP client configuration.

You can now go back to your blogs.

2 comments

2011 Jan 16

Dotclear 2.2.1

By xave - News

You can now download Dotclear 2.2.1. This maintenance release includes several fixes for bugs discovered since the 2.2 release. Upgrading is recommended as it also includes a security fix.

I would like to thank the Team for the work here, as I have mostly been just a conductor on this version, and it is only a small part of the work there are doing in the shadow for the next couple of big features.

So, please find:

no comment

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