This Sunday, March 21, 2010 was held on JoomlaDay in Bordeaux. We were there and we attended different conferences:

- FLEXIcontent with Emmanuel Danan (developer and architect of the component)
- Virtuemart with Valérie Isaksen (specialist in Joomla and Virtuemart)
- Community Builder with Beat (Component Developer)
- Joomla 1.6 Framework with Marc STUDER (consultant and developer specializing Joomla) and Christophe Demko (contributor to Joomla 1.6 and lecturer in computer science from La Rochelle)

A very rewarding day which can shed light on the future of Joomla and its main components. What reassure us about our strategic development and implementation of our web applications, Joomla has yet very bright future.

I will make you a little summary of key information that we have learned.

FLEXIcontent

Emmanuel Danan presents its component which is a CCK (Content Construction Kit) - read here the article about the features of the component -
The latest additions to FLEXIcontent:
- Advanced control of versioning content
- Submission of content via the frontend
- Enter the simplified tags
- Function "Save As" to create new content from a model
- Copy function fields
- Changed the interface for selecting categories of content
- SEO individualized for each content
Detailed features of CCK, click here.

Thereafter Emmanuel Danan presented its management ACL (Access Control List) integrated FLEXIcontent: FLEXIaccess. For my part I had not yet taken the time to test this addon and presentation I was totally seduced. Already at first no need to ask, but when is that Joomla 1.6 will come out, FLEXIaccess replies to almost all the management rights of which 95% of users may need.
That allows you to FLEXIaccess?
- Manage user groups, a user can be member of multiple groups
- Manage the law of custom external components based on the url
- Manage the set of permissions for features FLEXIcontent
- Seamless integration in FLEXIcontent when entering content
- Customize the interface backend FLEXIcontent (to simplify the interface and make it as easy as possible for the end user)
For more information, click here.

Finally, we already knew FLEXIcontent now gets sublimated by FLEXIaccess, a component (addon) that allows you to present end users with an interface accomplished, simple and professional. FLEXIaccess is available through a subscription which starts from € 19.90, and at that price it would be unthinkable not to enjoy it. (Cheaper than a entry for the JoomlaDay. I emphasize the fact that € 29 it was way too expensive if you wanted to educate the larger community)

Virtuemart

By itself this component explained our visit to JoomlaDay, we really want to explore a little deeper into the possibilities of this component.
Unfortunately we have not learned much more during the conference Valérie Isaksen. However, I recommend you go to his site to find valuable resources such as gateways for Virtuemart bank or even the French translation ( http://www.alatak.net/telechargements/ ).
To summarize the most important information concerning the evolution of Virtuemart, I will refer you to an article authored by Kalenga in November last: http://www.kalenga.fr/joomla/nouvelle-version-composant-joomla -virtuemart/2009/11 / informing us that the next major revolution in Virtuemart does not reside in the development of new features but for its complete overhaul to pass under the structure MVC (model view controller).

Community Builder

Fighting began by introducing the principle of a community site and the importance it took the social network on the internet, it is a movement that can not be ignored in the design of our websites.
Community Builder has the advantage of being completely open source and free, a community of over 300,000 members, a development with a team of professional and it is also the single most downloaded of all extensions of Joomla.
It is also a very secure component, during the last 3 years only two security holes have been found (and corrected immediately). This is due to an implementation of layered security.
May 5, 2010, the latest release 1.2.2 Community Builder was released, here are the updates:
- Support for PHP 5.3
- Updated language files
- Support RTL (Right to left) - Management of the alphabets from right to left
- Last day of templates with rounded DIV
- Management of the update for installation
- Updated the jQuery library
Download it here.
Community builder also offers new templates: myCommunity and Coolness that make the component a little more sexy ;). They also have the advantage of loading times really optimized.
Community Builder can now be connected directly to Facebook and Twitter (that is to say that the user can connect via his account of one of these two social networks)
The development team of Community Builder is really looking to the future with a 2.0 Beat that provide a real revolution. He associates a trend towards Web 3.0.

Beat this also CBSubs (accessible via a subscription but will be fully integrated into CB 2.0). This plugin (almost one component) is used to manage a very advanced subscriptions (even free) to your members. The rate of this plugin depends on how many members you serve.

Joomla Framework 1.6

It expects all the famous Joomla 1.6. I'll start by removing the suspense, we do of course still no official date of release. However Christophe Demko thinks that a Beta version should be released in June 2010. The beta will be delivered should be the final version, only bug fixes will be made before delivery of the final version. To borrow the quote: "Joomla 1.6 will be delivered when ready", the development team is desperate to avoid the same mistakes as with version 1.5. They prefer to take their time and offer a version completely successful. But the fact that is what will change with Joomla 1.6? What are the migration issues with previous versions?

What new features?

1 - ACL
Joomla 1.6 will manage all rights and access to a component. You can create groups of users. A user can belong to different groups. It will be possible to use human standards: create, edit, display and also create custom rights that you can leverage across your components. The rights will apply to categories and content. The policy: if a user belongs to a group that has a restriction in one place, it will automatically be blocked. Ie that the prohibitions take precedence over permissions.

2 - Categories multilevel
Finally, farewell to the good old sections that were a legacy of Mambo. Joomla 1.6 manages an unlimited category tree.

3 - Installation of advanced packages
Three new features are available:
Discover: Allows you to set up a system that will automatically update your packages
Update: A function that will detect new versions of the packages, the administrator can update a single click.
Warning: Will detect conflicts and problems with other libraries and packages installed.

4 - The Library of Joomla
Some libraries obsolete will be removed and new ones added. Mootools JS will be delivered in version 1.2 and XML-RPC is now integrated as a library rather than in Japplying.
More libraries can be updated easily, no need to wait for the next release of Joomla to exploit full functionality of a library. The only problem we may encounter will be a compatibility problem. Imagine you update a library for the last component that we just installed, however, another component installed can then no longer be compatible with this new version ... so nice feature but use with caution.

But also:
- Remove the management of polls
- Added standard of management comments
- Management of all the alphabets and characters specific for aliases (and thus the url)

And sides of the developers, what are the changes?

JControllerForm / JModelForm

JModelList
Object that allows you to simply create a list item in the back office by setting only one SQL query. Pagination will be handled automatically.

JModelItem
Object that allows you to create simply a display of an element in the back office.

JForms
Will automatically create an entry form from an XML file.

Objects and manipulation of ACL
- JAccess / JRules: Will know the rights of the logged in user
- JUser: Will allow to know the group affiliation
- Access.xml: This file will allow your component to create rights in Joomla customization

Component com_categorie
It will be possible to use the components for its own native component management category joomla, you can create and easily manage your own trees and more trees per component. It is also possible to add custom fields for each class.

Component com_comments
Management comments will now be integrated natively, you can operate it easily for your components.

New Package Database
JDatabaseQuery, JTable, JTableNested, JTableAsset, JTableCategory, JTableExtension, JTableUserGroup, JTableViweLevel.

New HTML Package
JHTML, JHtmlSliders / JHtmlTabs, JHtmlAccess, JHtmlBehavior, JHtmlRules, JHtmlCategory, JPagination.

Language files
The language files have been significantly modified for performance issues. The language file can be stored directly into the template in a language directory. The presence of a file manage.ini will take over all language files of the site. So you can edit all your keys inside this file.
The key must be unique and it is recommended to use the following nomenclature: "component name" _ "key name"
Key values ​​must be enclosed in double quotes.

Extensions
A feature update will be available via the Internet, simply set up a extension.xml file in the package with the correct parameters.
It will be possible to install packages (components, modules, plugins) but also a single file or even a bookstore.
5 methods available to manage the entire installation / uninstall a package:
- Preflight / Postflight: method that will handle events before and after installation
- Install / update / uninstall: method that handles the type of action that you want to run.

T will be easy to move from version 1.5 to 1.6?
In theory yes, because all the code in a package 1.5 will be compatible with version 1.6. However it will be essential to rewrite the language files that are no longer compatible (and therefore it will also review the templates of components). It will also be necessary to modify the xml files installation. Please note there will be no legacy mode (ie direct compatibility with packages 1.5), it will be mandatory to do some modification to migrate ... A migration script is also provided for standard components (but development of the latter has not yet started).
Joomla 1.6 requires at minimumPHP 5.2 and MySQL 5.0.4.

Conclusion

With this latest version of Joomla is much further than just a CMS, it is a real framework that is about to be built. Creating code is even more streamlined and efficient. When making a choice for a future solution, this day could reassure us in our strategic choices. Joomla seems to represent a stable, reliable, secure, powerful, scalable and sustainable. In addition the community has a very important force majeure.
The latest developments come as Joomla 1.6 offers gaps from the previous version. However Joomla can not yet be a unique tool, it will of course essential to develop components that will allow you to build your website. It will probably take several months to find all your favorite components fully compatible and optimized for Joomla 1.6 ...