10.5 release notes
10.5 introduces improvements to the CMS in the following areas:
- Post groups, listing and redesign
- Log in configuration and protection
- Improved channel emailer, more responsive with less limitations.
- Speed improvements – navigation tree, asset class rights, internal links blocks, data islands caching.
- Sub site improvements – 404 and improved search indexing.
- More eXSLT support in form fields and in XML page consumers.
As usual we've received a lot of ideas from our users. We're now extending indexing searches to include sub sites (Steve Howard, NE London CSU) and have added a useful generic header override function with many applications including supporting Facebook OpenGraph meta tagging of content. The idea for the ability to embed variable reserved words into data islands came from Martin at the North West CSU. Tom at Alps Accommodation took us to task about poor performance on some of his pages resulting in some significant optimisation work on thispageinfo reserved word. The bad link checker was extended to encompass news article thanks to Ruth at Ipswich Hospital. Lhasa Limited prompted work improving related information in restricted date ranges. There's examples of that in use on their site along with their post based faceted searches. Finally, there's always bugs so kudos to Dave at Wigan Leisure for spotting two relating to RSS events feeds and auto-saving on editing, both now much improved.
Post grouping and re-organisation
We've been promoting post as a flexible solution for structured data for some time. It's now in use by a lot of our customers. In this release we've re-organised where it appears in the admin interface removing it from the top bar and adding it to a new left hand tab called content. We've added groupings to allow the data to be collated and sorted in a more useful and scalable way. We've also added auto completing searches to help you find your data more easily.
Better log-in configuration and protection
This release sees us improving the security of intranet and extranet log-in areas while at the same time making those entry point easier to configure and customise. We've hardened the security around the 'remember me' functionality and also added more communication and auditing to device specific login. All these are in line with OWASP and CESG best practice and guidelines. Configuration of extranet log-in has been improved by allowing them to be edited as Sitekit forms. Security got better, configuration got easier.
Improved channel emailer
The channel emailer has been completely rewritten for this release with the following changes
- No more size limits for pages, you can mail out pages as large as you like (though we'd advise you not to)
- No more delays - mailouts start sending as soon as you click.
- Faster creation - Reply to and name fields are auto filled from your log in details.
- No more doubling of email - plain text and HTML are combined in multipart and sent. You no longer have to think what type of mail your users' mail client supports.
Speed improvements
We did a lot of work on this release making specific areas faster. The main focus was on the navigation tree. It's common on all sites but it's dynamic so it can't realistically be cached. We reworked the code from the ground up to make it faster. Similar work was done on other frequently used parts of pages such as asset class rights and internal links blocks. The final piece of optimisation in this release was adding caching to post searches to improve their performance.
Security improvements
The improvements in 10.5 encompass several security enhancements relating to improved cookie management and further hardening against brute force attacks and cookie hacking. We strongly encourage our deployed customers to upgrade to 10.5 to improve their site's security.
Documentation changes - New help pages
Most additional and new content is labelled as ‘10.5’ so a search of help for ‘10.5’ will present most if not all of the following:
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/v10/documentation/help/asset-folder-properties.htm - Asset folder properties addition of 404 handling for subsites
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/v10/documentation/help/content-tab.htm - new post content tab
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/help/security.htm - Information on logic
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/syntax/login-customisation-via-forms.htm - reserved forms for customising logins
Documentation changes - Updated pages
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/help/domains.htm - link to folders, update subsite
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/faq/whats-the-difference-between-a-site-and-a-subsite/752 - change to 404 support
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/help/Form-Fields.htm -eXSLT support
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/help/help-edit-xml-pages.htm - eXSLT support
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/syntax/reserved-or-magic-words.htm - new word for sitename
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/help/help-edit-asset-add-folder.htm - hyphen in name
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/help/the-pop-up-editor.htm - new CMS content insertion under magic
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/help/add-preconfigured-posts.htm - addition of ordering
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/help/data-islands-configuration.htm - relative addressing and embedding on variable magic words
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/help/User-Preferences.htm - user preferences autosave
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/help/create-or-configure-posts.htm - post groups
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/help/configuring-posts.htm - adding types to pre created groups
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/syntax/functional-place-markers.htm Header over ride tagging
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/syntax/xsl-placeholders.htm - link to above
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/syntax/syntax-comment-based.htm - Admin commenting
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/help/creating-a-page-for-posts.htm - post page caching
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/extending-posts.htm - post page caching
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/faq/how-do-i-format-and-send-a-newsletter/437 - mailer changes
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/help/help-manage-send-mailshot.htm - mailer changes
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/authentication/ addition of admin based information
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/help/create-or-configure-a-form.htm - addition of reserved forms
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/help/help-configure-password.htm - remember me checkbox
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/faq/what-kind-of-actions-does-the-cms-audit/3 addition of auditable items
Deprecated
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/syntax/login-customisation-old.htm - extranet login
http://helpcms.sitekit.net/documentation/syntax/login-customisation.htm - in favour of form based items