[opencms-dev] OpenCms version 5.0 final (5.0.0) available

[Alexander Kandzior]

Hi all,

I am happy to report that the OpenCms 5.0 "final" release is now
available. The exact version number of this release version is OpenCms
5.0.0.

This release features numerous enhancements and fixes over the last
published "release candidate" (5.0 rc 2). The 5.0 release is a major
step for OpenCms in general. It is far superior to OpenCms 4.x and we
recommend everyone who uses OpenCms to upgrade to the 5.0.0 version.

You can download the OpenCms 5.0.0 release from the OpenCms homepage
at http://www.opencms.org. You will notice that the OpenCms homepage
has been rebuild and offers new features.

OpenCms 5.0 comes with a new template mechanism based on JSP and
taglibs. JSP is a well documented standard, easy to learn for Java
programmers, the created templates are extremely fast and development
of interactive functionality like web forms or database connections
with JSP in OpenCms is straightforward. Therefore the JSP template
mechanism makes the 4.x style proprietary "XMLTemplate" mechanism
pretty much obsolete, even though it is still supported in the 5.0
release. For new projects, we strongly recommend using only JSP
templates in OpenCms. Full documentation and examples for OpenCms JSP
templates developed by Alkacon Software has been made available
together with the 5.0.0 version. Experience shows that using JSP in
OpenCms can reduce development time up to 50%, with a much easier to
manage learning curve for beginners when compared to XMLTemplates.

Upgrading to OpenCms 5.0 is easy. Please check the upgrade information
provided as part of the org.opencms.welcome module to learn how to
upgrade your existing OpenCms system to the 5.0 release.

OpenCms 5.0 is Open Source software published under the LGPL license.

OpenCms 5.0 supports Java 1.4. and 1.4.1. Because of required features
related to file encoding and JDBC, Java 1.3 is not longer supported.
If you run Java 1.3 on your OpenCms server, please upgrade to 1.4.1.
for OpenCms 5.0.

The almost complete list of changes and improvements in OpenCms 5.0.0
final over the last release candidate (5.0 rc 2):

* Added "import.immutable.resources" setting to opencms.properties,
  all resources listed there will be ignored during an import if they
  already exist
* The size of the file upload can now be limited with the
  opencms.properties setting "workplace.file.maxuploadsize"
* Added method getContent() to com.opencms.jsp.CmsJspActionElement
* Export and import for module data now use a report output instead of
  writing to the console
* OpenCms now sets a "Server" http response header
  "OpenCms/{version_number}"
* The file last modified date is now saved when exporting and
  importing data from the VFS
* Added links management for VFS links, it's now possible to find all
  VFS links that point to a specific file
* Added feature to convert content from old export format (4.x) to 5.0
  version, set "compatibility.support.import.4.x.contents=true" in
  opencms.properties
* Updated the TeX sources of the PDF documentation for the 5.0 release
* Implemented "module replacement", if a module is uploaded that
  already exists in the system, the existing module is updated (simple
  type modules only)
* Default user preferences can now be set in opencms.properties
* Improved "new module" options, it's now possible to select if
  exportable "classes/" and/or "lib/" folders should be created for
  the module
* Updated and improved English workplace online help is now available
  as a separate module "org.opencms.help.en"
* Database field sizes for user, group and project names have been
  increased to 64 characters
* Fixed issue #71: CronScheduler does not longer re-open the DB
  connections if OpenCms is shut down
* Fixed issue with JSP static export not always restoring the previous
  URI context
* Fixed compatibility issues with MySQL 4.0.x, OpenCms now supports
  MySQL 4.0.x
* Fixed issue #56: Links in "Text" pages edited with the WYSIWYG "Edit
  as HTML"
* Fixed issue with hard coded servlet context path in <edittemplate>,
  it's now possible to rename the servlet context and the images still
  work in the editor
* Fixed issue #55 from Bugzilla (compatibility.support.oldlocales not
  working if no new modules installed)
* Fixed issue where an absolute link to the local machine with an URI
  outside of OpenCms was incorrectly treated as an OpenCms internal
  link by the link replacement engine
* Improved handling of cached properties in the CmsResourceBroker
* Deleted CmsCache and CmsResourceCache and replaced them with
  CmsLruHashMap, also replaced a lot of Hashtable uses with Map
* Added automatic forced exclusion of system folders for module import
* Improved source code quality by removing unused method parameters in
  most (but not all) packages
* Streamlined module administration options, now a module can be
  uploaded or created only when "offline"
* Improved JavaDocs in package com.opencms.flex.jsp.*
* Improved the API for the building of dynamic navigations on a JSP
* Module version numbers are of type float instead of int now, so that
  values like "0.9" are possible
* Workplace now adopts to the systems default encoding if possible
  instead of using only the encoding set in the localization file
* Removed unused private methods and member variables in all classes
* JSP are now stored with real path names in the jsp/ subdirectory
* When exporting a module the modules "uploadeddate" and "uploadedby"
  registry information is discarded
* Added global method getOpenCmsContext() in
  com.opencms.core.A_OpenCms for universal access to the servlet
  context and servlet name
* Some final touches were added to the JSP / XMLTemplate integration
  for easier inclusion of sub - elements or multiple body pages in JSP
  templates
* Updated OpenCms TLD for modified options of the <cms:include> tag
* The "bodyloader" for the JSP / XMLTemplate integration is now a
  default part of the installation, located in the new /system/shared/
  directory
* Improved logging output if OpenCms is initialized

The team at Alkacon Software wants to thank everyone who has 
contributed to this release of OpenCms. 

Please use our Bugzilla to report bugs in this release:
http://www.opencms.org/bugzilla/

Thank you for using OpenCms and have fun with OpenCms 5.0 :-)


Best Regards,
Alex.

Alexander Kandzior
Alkacon Software - The OpenCms Experts
http://www.alkacon.com