Coming up next: JoomlaPack 2.1

It's almost a week since 2.0.1 was released, but we haven't been lying dormant. On the contrary, this has been a very productive week with major work having been carried out towards the next beta release of our component, JoomlaPack 2.1 Beta 1. The major highlights of this upcoming release are:

• Off-site directory inclusion. You can now backup directories above your site's root, provided that your server's open_basedir restrictions allow it. Many webmasters use directories above the site's root to store download repositories and such, therefore it's a handy feature to them :) The off-site directories are stored inside a new folder in the archive, one which does not already physically exist on your site.
• Extension filters. I've been planning this ever since 1.0, but the code base wasn't mature enough. With this filter you can completely exclude any installed component, module, plug-in, template or even language! This is the absolute step in creating customized sites by performing nothing more than a backup! Note: components' database tables are not automatically excluded because there is no technically sound way to determine which table is owned by which component.
• Front-end "Light Mode". With an increasing number of ultra-portable Internet-connected devices, ranging from Netbooks to PDA's to cellphones, it's desirable to be able to perform a site backup right from your palm, while on the move. In order to ensure this possibility, the "Light Mode" was invented. Using very plain pages (so users priced on data volume won't suffer) and front-end access, authenticating by means of the "secret word", the light mode enables you to backup your site anywhere, anytime, even while commuting to work or attending that boring meeting!
• Tar and tar.gz support. The popular uncompressed tar format is based on a modified version of PEAR's Archive_Tar library. The optional gzip compression is realized using your operating system's gzip binary; doing this inside PHP has proved to be an awfully bad idea in the past (remember memory outages on JoomlaPack 1.0.x?)
• Integrated news reader. We know we release a new version every now and then and that makes it hard for you to keep up. Since the "old" system of updates querying had the potential to cause insane amounts of traffic to our website (therefore it was eradicated in 2.0), we decided to implement a different idea. The new version fetches, caches and displays JoomlaPack's latest headlines through RSS, using the trusted Joomla! newsfeed syndication technology. So, no more remembering to visit JoomlaPack.net, the component's Control Panel does it for you ;)
• Tons of bug fixes. It's bug hunting season and we came back from our "bug safari" with quite a few trophies! Fallen pray to our hunting skills: a dozen or so sources of PHP notices, JPI3 displaying odd behaviour with multiple database restoration pages, a broken email feature, undesired behaviour of quotas, erratic handling of cache and temporary directories and some few other minor bugs.

Now it's minor tweaking and QA time, so expect a formal beta 1 release somewhere around New Year. It'll be our present to you for the holiday season ;)

Of course, we're still working on other stuff as well, including our Native Tools. But that's the topic of another post, in due time!

It's the final countdown!

After 6 months in development, countless hours of testing by JoomlaPack Developers, JATS and regular users, fixing a pile of bugs, one alpha and one beta release, we are finally ready to release JoomlaPack 2.0 Stable. So, spread the word around...

JoomlaPack 2.0 Stable
Global Launch
Sunday, December 7th, 2008 - Noon, UTC

Our site will be down for 2-3 days for maintenance and a necessary face-lift. It will be back on-line at the official launch date and time. Meanwhile, let me give you the highlights of this release...

Coded around the Joomla! 1.5 API, the JoomlaPack 2.0 component delivers a high-profile backup solution for your site, while remaining Free, both as in "freedom" and as in "zero price". More powerfull than ever before and compatible with a wide assortment of server setups, it's designed to protect your valuable site. With exciting new features, like live full site or database only restoration and multiple database-only backup, it makes backing up your site a child's play. Our thorough documentation will guide you through and - should the need arise - our stellar support team is always willing to lend a hand, right now and for free!

We wanted to push the PHP site backup technology to its limits ever since the first release, more than two years ago. So, as you readers of this blog already know, we decided to take site backup... to your desktop! AFAIK, nobody attempted this before, but we did. Full fledged multiple site backups running in parallel, right from your desktop, thanks to JoomlaPack and a hefty XML-RPC plugin. The whole thing is called JoomlaPack Remote and will be shipped with this release.

As far as the backup archive extraction is concerned, we've got the traditional command-line suite of utilities called the JPA Utilities (JPAUtils) or, a new addition to the webmaster's arsenal, the vastly improved JoomlaPack eXtract graphical wizard for Windows and all x86 systems running WINE. It's click, click, backup archive is now extracted, thank you very much ;)

Our versatile web-based ZIP and JPA archive extraction tool, Kickstart, is even more powerful and smart. It can write files to your site using the traditional PHP direct file access mode, or the new FTP mode for maximum compatibility with common shared hosts setups. Using the FTP mode, it can automatically work around permission and ownership problems ("ownership hell") which would otherwise give you, the webmaster, a tough challenge trying to restore or upgrade your site.

The default embedded installer is now the JoomlaPack Installer 3 (JPI3), based on the Joomla! 1.5 installer, improved under the hood. It even supports the "auto mode" which - in conjunction with Kickstart - allows for fast two-click site restoration/migration for advanced web professionals.

Welcome to the future of Joomla! site backup.