osCommerce Blog

.. is to finish off the big entries on your to-do list!

The biggest change to hit MS3 has been completed! The template structure implementation is in!

It was a joy seeing the amount of root files shrink and shrink and shrink from the odd 40 that MS2 had to a maximum of 11 that MS3 will have. That will be cut down to 8 to have:

account.php
checkout.php
download.php
index.php
info.php
products.php
redirect.php
search.php

Maybe it can be cut down further - that is the joy of it. Simply copy a page module to another group directory, update the links to call the new group file, and thats it! The functionality has been moved to another group with minimal source code changes required.

It could also be moved down to one index.php file, however why mangle the URL up? It certainly doesn’t look nice to call something like

/index.php?module=product_info&products_id=45

it looks much nicer to have

/products.php/45

which can easily be cut down to

/products/45

and even

/products/product_keyword_here

all without using apache rewrite urls, and as explained in earlier blogging entries

Now that this mammoth task is finalized it is easy to merge in the other stuff that have been worked on. To provide an early preview release for testing and preparation purposes (for contribution authors, not for store owners) work on the online installation routine will be done to also get that tested at the same time.

By then the phpDoc API documentation will also be ready, and some KB articles to address the new framework.

So when will MS3 be released? My political answer is (still) aiming to get 2.2 ready in January

An update to the 2.2 MS2 release is also going to be available in the coming days, and will contain all reported security vulnerabilities and some minor bug fixes. Nothing more as development milestone releases are not maintained. The feedback from the Community Sponsors were positive regarding this update, and further internal testings found some additional minor issues to fix which will be taken care of first.

How can you help in general? Motivate us! We’ve been going through some bad times with some criticism (with some being rightly so) and are in need of TLC to feel loved again

Thanks!