b2evolution version 3.3.1-stable “Los Angeles” has been released!

Download here »

As they say, it’s the most advanced b2evolution… yet! But it’s even better than that, this version has gone though an extensive beta and release-candidate process in order to ensure that upgrades from versions 2.x will run flawlessly! (Can be done in less than a minute! – Just make sure your web host is up to date and your account runs at least MySQL 4.1, if not 5.x; if not ask them how to upgrade.)

Note that it’s also possible to upgrade from versions 1.x but you will need to use a new evoskin v2/3 and recustomize it to your site design. Either way, just follow the upgrade instructions in infex.html in the downloadable ZIP file.

Skins and Plugins from version 2.x will work on 3.x. Skins developed specifically for 3.x offer additional features (such as intro & featured posts).

Language packs from 2.x will work on 3.x if you add a locale definition file. Have a peek into the /locales folder or download a 3.x language pack here.

This stable 3.x release meets the standards and functionality I took out of my insanely long todo list end of 2008, while still living in Los Angeles (hence, the name of the relase). For upcoming versions, please send feature requests via twitter starting like this ” @b2evolution wish: ” – one request per user in 140 chars or less! That’s the rule of the game :)

Tons of new features!

Below you will find a recap of all the new features that have been added in versions 3.x:

3.3.1-stable

• Improved Archive plugin ( @tblue )
• Improved Auto Links plugin ( @francoisplanque )
• Improved Auto-P plugin ( @blueyed )
• Fixed display of new plugin widgets ( @tblue )
• Fixed canonical URLs for multipage posts ( @tblue )
• Fixed multiblogs.php & a_noskin.php ( @francoisplanque )
• Updated master language file (POT)
• Cleaned up skins/CSS
• Additional bug fixes

3.3.0-rc1

• Skins:

  • Skins can now have skin-specific translations ("locales” folder in the skin’s folder, directory structure is the same as for plugin translations). ( @tblue )
  • All skins now support setting RSS feeds to ‘none’ ( @leeturner )

• SEO:

  • <meta> desc and <meta> keywords per blog post ( @leeturner )
  • Category descriptions can be used as meta description on category pages ( @waltercruz )

• Admin:

  • Remember whether or not the TinyMCE editor was last used on a per post and per blog basis. ( @fplanque )
  • Prevent clicking on “Publish NOW!’ when a post is set to protected or private ( @tblue )

• Installer:

  • B2evolution no longer ships with _basic_config.php . It ships with _basic_config.template.php instead. That way, uploading a new release never overwrites the previous base config. The installer now creates _basic_config.php based on _basic_config.template.php + entered form values. ( @fplanque )
  • Language/locale selection moved to a place where it’s visible! ( @fplanque )
  • Only one locale is now activated by default (the one selected during install). ( @fplanque )
  • Simplified main screen ( @fplanque ).

• Plugins:

  • Twitter plugin no longer requires curl ( @yabs )
  • New plugin hook: BeforeSessionsDelete ( @yabs, @blueyed )

• Other:

  • i18n/charset handling improvements ( @sam2kb )
  • Bug fixes! ( @blueyed, @tblue, @sam2kb, @yabs, @leeturner, @fplanque )

3.2.0-beta

• Skins:

  • Post attachments. Non image files that are linked to a post will be listed and linked below the post. (sam2kb)
  • All default skins now support featured posts and intro posts. (fplanque).
  • Category, tag, archive and search pages now only display post excerpts by default. (Requires a 3.x skin; otherwise the skin will display full posts as before). This can be controlled in the Blog settings > SEO. (fplanque)
  • Skins can now have a _skin.class.php file to override default Skin behaviour and provide skin specific settings. Demo: the custom skin has configurable header colors. The settings can be changed through Blog Settings > Skin Settings (fplanque) – Anyone is welcome to extend those settings for any skin you like.
  • Skins can now have an item.css file to specify content formats. This will be reused in WYSIWYG editors. (fplanque)

• URLs & SEO:

  • Homepage: option to 301 redirect to canonical homepage. (fplanque)
  • Date archives: option to 301 redirect to canonical urls. (fplanque)
  • Option to support rel="canonical” instead of or when 301 redirect cannot be used. (fplanque)
  • Options to select how much content to display (excerpt|teaser|normal) on different types of pages. (fplanque)
  • Tag pages: Prefix only mode allows urls like http ://…/tag/tag-name with no trailing character (blueyed)
  • Optional rel="tag” attribute (blueyed)
  • Return to a clean url after posting a comment (fplanque)
  • Posts excerpts can be used as meta description for posts and pages

• Logging & stats:

  • Detect new Google “ajax search” urls as search referers. (fplanque)
  • Log “serprank” (start= or dc=) param if given in search url. (fplanque)
  • Added goal tracker: /htsrv/track.php (fplanque)

• UI:

  • User Interface cleanup (fplanque)
  • The blog is now always displayed after publishing a post. If anyone doesn’t actually want this, we can make it an option. (fplanque)
  • TinyMCE upgraded to 3.2.4.1 — missing buttons are fixed. (fplanque)

• Plugins:

  • Plugins can now have Settings that are specific to each blog. (fplanque)
  • Included twitter plugin based on twitterlution and extended to handle blog specific twitter accounts.(Lee Turner, fplanque)

• Other:

  • Combined CSS files in order to reduce number of CSS files loaded. (Yes I combined more than I splitted ;) Stubs are left in place for backward compatibility and to prevent 404 errors. (fplanque)
  • Bug fixes (tblue, blueyed, waltercruz, fplanque, sam2kb, yabs)
  • CSS fixes (tblue, blueyed, fplanque)
  • Internationalization fixes (tblue)

3.1.0-beta

• UI:

  • Integrated WYSIWYG editor (TinyMCE) (blueyed,fplanque)
  • New evobar menu: extended, extensible by plugins and a little animation too (fplanque)
  • Integrated jQuery UI datepicker (Afwas)

• Blog features:

  • Intro posts: added typecolumn in browse screen and made more silent regarding noindex, sitemaps & notifications.
  • The default category for new posts can now be chosen explicitely for each blog.
  • Categories can now be reordered manually (instead of alphabetical display). This is a system wide general setting.
  • Automatic generation of excepts (fplanque)
  • Basic version history of post edits (click on the little clock icon in the post lists) (fplanque)

• Widgets:

  • Cleaned up AJAX drag & drop interface (fplanque)
  • Universal Item List widget now combines the functionality of Post List, Page List, Link List, Link Blog… + combinations. Pretty powerful :) (fplanque)
  • Related posts widget (fplanque)
  • Extended widget possibilities (fplanque,yabba,tblue)
  • Widgets can be enabled/disabled. (Tblue)
  • Sidebar Links item type + widget now allow to display a linkroll without using a separate blog. (walter,fplanque

• Other:

  • Optimized speed/reduced # of queries (blueyed)
  • Cleaner URLs when browsing through multiple pages. (fplanque)
  • Fixed locale selection during install.
  • Do not display locale selector on edit screen if only one locale is available.
• Bugfixes. Many! (Tblue,blueyed,walter)

3.0.0-alpha

• General features

  • User avatar support
  • User fields support: MSN/Live IM, Yahoo IM, AOL AIM, ICQ ID, Skype, Main phone, Cell phone, Office phone’ Home phone, Office FAX, Home FAX, Website, Blog, Linkedin, Twitter, Facebook, Myspace, Flickr, YouTube, Digg, StumbleUpon, Role, Organization, Division, VAT ID, Main address, Home address… (what else? ;)
  • Featured posts let you have the latest featured post on top of others with special formatting. (requires a skin that implements get_featured_Item() )
  • Intro posts let you content specific have intros on top of your category and tag pages. Same for the home page. (requires a skin that implements get_featured_Item() )

• Photoblogging

  • It is now possible to select multiple images in the file manager and either

    • create multiple posts (1 per image)
    • or create 1 post with all images attached
  • Photo posts will be in draft status by default, allowing you to add titles and comments before publishing.
  • Photo index widget to show your latest photos in a blog sidebar.
  • Support of “cropped” thumbnails (the image will always fill the whole thumbnail area)
  • Thumbnail sizes can be configured in /conf/_advanced.php

• Enhanced stats & analytics

  • Complete hit log view
  • Faster queries
  • Goal tracking (TODO finish)
  • Keyphrase analytics

• Performance

  • Page level caching. Can be enabled for each blog indivually (Advanced blog settings

• Admin interface

  • Yabbarriffic drag & drop widget reordering (you can even move a widget from one container to another)
  • File manager now supports a shared directory (/media/shared/global/)
  • Enhanced dashboard.
  • Added usability shortcuts.
  • Improved iPhone compatibility.

• Post editing

  • Added “Save & edit” button
  • Added 1 click “Publish NOW !” button
  • Enhanced handling of attached images & files.
  • Posts can be explicitely ordered by the use of the order field. This can be set on each post in expert edit mode (in the right column).
  • Post can now have custom fields. Custom fields can be defined for each blog under “Blog Settings > Features".
  • The issue date can now be set to an explicit date or just to “now” in which case it will be updated without the need to explicitely type in the current date/time.
  • Urltitles (slugs) can now be up to 200 chars long.
  • You can now specify a different title to be displayed in the <title> tag than the regular title of your post

• Logging and stats

  • Session and Hit logging as well as debug info display are now done systematically at PHP shutdown. Therefore calls to $Hit->log() and debug_info() are no longer needed within skins. (It doesn’t hurt to let them there either.)
  • Keyphrase logging

• More SEO settings:

  • Customizable 404 pages
  • Customizable 404 responses (200, 301, 302, 303, 404 and 410 !)
  • Description and keywords META tags are inserted into the main page only to avoid duplicate content
• Enhanced blog by email (tilman)
• Reworked demo blog created at install

• Blog properties

  • Longer blog name (up to 255 chars)
  • Autogeneration of category/chapter slugs(url names)

• Comments

  • Whoever has permission to *edit* comments will now have extended permissions on *new* comments too, including posting <a> tags.
• Bug fixes