Hello! It's been a little while since we updated you in all things CMSMS, so we wanted to send you a round-up of the latest news along with some exciting announcements!
We hope you enjoy reading this. If you want to respond to us on anything, we'll be delighted to see you in the forums or in Slack. You'll find links to all channels here.
Release of CMSMS 2.2.15
Earlier this month, we were delighted to release CMSMS 2.2.15, 'Bonaventure'. Bonaventure is an incremental bug fix and security release.
This version improves some minor security concerns, specifically addressing users with access to the admin area. Although not critical vulnerabilities, they are best-practice changes we are working on improving over the next few releases.
You can find out more info in the blog post here and the file release itself here.
Server Upgrade
After many years, we have moved away from the old servers we held the CMSMS sites and systems on. This background move was an important part of the ongoing mission to redemocratise the Dev Team. We have been able, through our new sponsors, Linode (see below for more information) and DirectAdmin, to move to a cloud server with more modern management tools. This allows everyone on the Dev Team to manage the basic server administration tasks, rather than relying on those with more advanced server management skills to do everything. Not only does that mean we can make the changes we want to the user experiences such as forums and forge, but it means we can do so in a timely fashion.
PHP BB upgrade to the Forum
And with the background server move as mentioned, we've already been able to make changes to the website experience. The forum has been in need of an overhaul for a little while now. We are delighted that due to the excellent work of Dev Team members [[blah]] we now have a shiny new forum running on PHPBB's latest version, and the ability to keep it secure and up to date.
The next major web experience change we are looking forward to implementing asap is an improvement to the forge on the same server structure.
CMSMS 2.3 Roadmap
After a number of dev meetings, we are now very close to publishing the roadmap for CMSMS 2.3 and beyond. This will be published before the end of December. We are mindful that there is considerable interest in where the next generation of CMSMS is going and still some confusion among certain parts of the community as to why the last version of 2.3 has been paused.
Again, as a part of the redemocratisation of the Dev Team, we knew that certain unilateral decisions taken on the first version of 2.3 would have caused many users long and hard hours changing sites. Of course, we will always move the software forward, but as many of us are small businesses ourselves, we are firmly of the belief that a new release should not have our users tearing their hair out, worried about all the work they will need to do to maintain existing client sites where it is very hard to justify to the clients why there is a cost.
The new 2.3 roadmap, we believe, will allow for next-generation software that all users will want to upgrade to and most importantly, leaves no-one behind. We are very excited about showing it to the world.
Virtual GeekMoot
And finally, we wanted to add a teaser about our Virtual Geekmoot. As you will know, GeekMoot is our live meeting of devs and users, full of discussion and tutorials, presentations and socialising., It's taken place a number of times in Europe over the past decade. One thing we have always wished is that more of our large, worldwide, community- particularly those from the US and Canada - could make the trip. Of course, we have understood that distance and cost make that difficult.
With our current world situation, it is of course not possible to have a physical meeting anytime soon. However, we see this as a tremendous opportunity. With everyone so comfortable with video networking, we see that now is the time to plan a virtual Geekmoot that can be attended by many more of our users. We will make an official announcement with more information before the end of the year, but you can expect to join us at Virtual Geekmoot within the first quarter of 2021!
Sponsors Highlight
Linode
We are delighted to welcome Linode as a new sponsor for CMS Made Simple. Linode is the largest independent open cloud provider in the world with 11 global data centers serving over 800,000 customers and businesses around the globe. Linode’s mission remains unchanged since the day it began: to accelerate innovation by making cloud computing simple, affordable, and accessible to all. Throughout its history, the bootstrapped company has deliberately rebuffed the temptation of outside investment, creating a company that reflects the higher social calling of the open source movement and freeing it to always put its customers first in every decision it makes.
Click here to find out more
DirectAdmin
We're also very pleased to thanks DirectAdmin for their sponsorship as well. DirectAdmin is a graphical web-based web hosting control panel developed by JBMC Software that makes managing websites a dream!
DirectAdmin is designed to function either as a dedicated server or virtual private server. DirectAdmin supports Database servers, WWW servers, PHP (5.x/7.x) modes, Web applications, IMAP/POP3 Server, Mail Transfer Agent/SMTP server, Mailing list, anti-SPAM solutions, Antivirus software, FTP server, Web Application Firewall, WWW Usage Statistics and more. Without DirectAdmin, our plans for the future of our websites would be a headache. Their system has made our lives immeasurably easier.
Click here to find out more
Does your business utilize CMS Made Simple, or just want to support open source in general? Consider becoming a partner.
Patreon Donations
Did you know you can donate to the CMS Made Simple project and help contribute to its costs? If you use Patreon to donate you can give from as llittle as US$3 per month. Please consider supporting your favourite CMS if you can!
Find out more: CMS Made Simple donation options.
Until next time!
Your CMS Made Simple Development Team
https://www.cmsmadesimple.org/about/team/
