Posts From July, 2006

It won't be long till the 2.1.1 release

Significant progress was made this week in converting to the new 2.0 .NET localization model in svn branches/2.1.1 so we will probably be able to make a new release in about 2 weeks. I still have some tweaking and testing to do and also still need to implement the keyboard shortcuts feature that is targeted for the 2.1.1 release.

The Culture*.config files will go away with this release and culture specific strings will come from App_GloabalResources/Resource*.resx files where the default english will be just Resource.resx, Russian will be Resource-ru.resx, and Mexican spanish will be Resource-es-MX.resx for example.

In the new model, the culture of the browser is detected and if there is a resource file for that culture it will be used, otherwise it will fall back to the default cutlure specified in the web.config. We will still use the /Data/MessageTemplate/*.config files which also have fallback to the default culture.

The new .resx file format is in a very readable xml format and can be edited with a text editor, though VS 2005 has a nicer built in editor. Going forward, anyone contributing translations should contribute them in .resx format plus message tamplate files.

Since the 2.1 release shipped last weekend, the new development branch in svn is branches/2.1.1 and changes will only be made in branches/2.1 if we have to make important bug fixes before the next planned release.

Of course content from the database is always in the language that it was entered in but labels, buttons, date formats etc will adapt to the user's browser. Hopefully I will update this site later this week from svn.

Release 1.0.3 and 2.1 Now Available

I'm happy to announce the latest releases available from the download page:

1.0.3 for the 1.1 .NET Framework or mono a maintenance release with bug fixes and the newest version of FCKeditor. The coolest new feature in the FCKeditor is the full screen mode. Try the bottom right toolbar icon in the editor to see how it works.

and

2.1 for the 2.0 .NET Framework (currently Windows only) is a major new release featuring:
Personalization using the new 2.0 .NET WebParts framework
XHTML Compliance, table-less layouts, and table-less menus
New streamlined Content Manager module
New 2.0 .NET provider implementations for all supported databases including:
SiteMapProvider
MembershipProvider
RolesProvider
PersonalizationProvider

Most of the above is really improvements in the infrastructure to take advantage of the new 2.0 .NET. The new features that actual users will notice include the MyPage feature which allows registered users to create personalized pages by selecting content from a Catalog of content. Administrators can make any site content available in the Catalog. Very easy to use RSS feeds to bring in external content and make it available, but all of the modules can be used there. Also the new Contant Manager will make things easy for Administrators. Content can now be published on any number of pages in the site not just one as before. The new FCKeditor with full screen mode is very cool. It is now easy to use icons in the menu as you can see on this site.

There are no table changes in the 1.0.3 release but new stored procedures if you are using MS SQL or PostgreSQL.
2.1 has quite a few db schema changes, there are upgrade scripts to help you upgrade. As always, be sure and completely backup your site and your database before attempting an upgrade in case things go wrong. If you do run into any problems, post in the forums and I will try to help.

There is a separate download for the 2.1 version called the Atlas pak. If you want to use Atlas to make the WebParts drag and drop work in Firefox and maybe Safari, download this and read the readme file. You will also need the Atlas dll from Microsoft.

There is one known bug if you use SQLite, the MyPage feature is broken due to a bug in the driver for SQLite. It is not handling the blob/binary data type parameter. I am looking into this issue to see if we can get it fixed.