Jahia 5.0 Service Pack 4 (5.0.4) README

Release date: 2008/06/13

Please read this README carefully to learn about the new features present in this release.

In this section

Jahia Quickstart

New features, bug fixes and deprecations in Jahia 5.0.4

This 4th Service Pack for the Jahia 5.0 release is mainly a performance and stability pack. (Please read carefully the Performance Guide). Refer to the change log for an exhaustive list of the stability fixes.

Jahia 5.0 SP4 includes the following new features :

New Container Query Tag Library
The new container query tags replace the scriptlet based container filter/searcher/sorter. The forward-looking design is based on the QueryObjectModel specification (JSR-283) and eases template development. Now most of the queries can also be done against the Lucene index, which is often the most efficient solution. By simply changing a single property the query could be run against the Jahia database instead, or you could base the query on the Jahia audit log to display the last modified or last published items. More information on the usage can be found in the documentation: Container query tags documentation
The old scriptlet based filters/searchers/sorters are still supported. Most of them have been refactored to improve performance. To be able to use the Lucene based container searcher in edit mode, we also added a new indexation rule policy, which on configuration can synchronously index new or updated content immediately after editing.
New WebDAV Files Cache
Until now, each time a webdav file was requested by a browser on a jahia server, it was streamed from the slide content store. When using database storage, this could be quite long and took a connection to the database. We have so introduced a WebDAV Files Cache. The goal of this cache is to keep small binaries that are often served, in order to reduce the database load due to blob streaming. See the how to configure the WebDAV Files Cache document for more information.
HTML container cache
Up to now Jahia could either cache entire HTML pages or when using ESI also fragments. As these two technologies are aimed either for small or for very large sites, we now added a technology for the middle: caching of HTML fragments at Jahia container level. See the container cache guide for more information.
SelectPage-Filter
Like already indicated in the Template Developer Guide, we have added a possibility to set SelectPage-filters to page field definitions. This way you could control that the editor can choose the pages to move or to link to only from a limited set. As you could already limit the list of templates, from which an editor can choose from, when creating new pages, the default filter now is the LimitedTemplatesFilter, which on page move or page link, will only allow to select the pages, which are based on the given list of templates.
Quick access to rights management panel
The icons displayed near action menus when ACLs differences display is activated in Advanced Editing Options are now a link that opens the edition engine for concerned container directly on rights management panel. This should let handle permissions quicker for administrators.
Supported libraries
While with this release Java 1.4 is not supported anymore, we have on default enabled the usage of Servlet 2.4 and JSP 2.0 and are delivering Jahia with JSTL 1.1.2. Template developer can now write nicer looking and less complex code.
User friendly URLs
This release now offers more flexible options in terms of URL rewriting. First of all we have moved the page URL key input to the page field engine, which allows users to enter an URL key at the same time they are initially creating a new page. Also, we have integrated an URL rewriting filter. This feature is young and should be considered still in beta, which is why it is not activated by default. You can find the documentation for this filter here.
File usage detection in large text boxes (bigtext fields)
Jahia now detects links to files inserted in the large text boxes and will automatically update them if the file is moved, for example through the WebDAV interface.

The following bug fixes and improvements are part of Jahia 5.0 SP4 :

Search improvements
The search engine did undergo a major refactoring to improve performance and reduce memory consumption and can now much better handle multiple concurrent search requests. We upgraded to Lucene 2.2.0, but already backported some performance improvements from Lucene 2.3.x. We also implemented an Apache Solr inspired sharing of IndexReader/-Searcher, which are re-opened only when the index changes and which first warm the caches and filters, before being exposed to the user requests. Analyzers and highlighters can now be configured on a per field basis (via Compass configuration). Internally added search constraints are now using cached Lucene filters. Template developers may now also use cached Lucene filters for often used queries.
Performance
(Please read carefully the Performance Guide)
Dozens of performance optimizations are included in this SP4 release. We have improved evaluation and modification of ACLs, locks, time based publishing rules; display of trees like in page deletion engine, in versioning engine; and performance improvement in search. We have paid a particular attention to mass operations on huge sections. Please check the change log file for more details.
Templates developer toolbox
We have introduced news tags and API elements for templates development. There's now a new filter for retrieving only unpublished container IDs in the site by the container definition name (StagedContainerFilterByContainerDefinition) We have added tags <jahia-html:memberOf/> and <jahia-html:notMemberOf/> to check for current user membership. We have added the possibility to retrieve absolute container list by a page URL key (taglib and API version). The "sortBy" tag is now locale sensitive, and supports fields aliasNames. We added tag in order to include the topBar in a single line.
Workflow improvements
We have performed the following improvements in the workflow sub-system :
  • We have added an indicator that the workflow will be partially performed meaning that ,on a given page, some content objects will be validated while others will not. This is actually what was happening behind the scenes in previous versions, but the users will now be informed of what will happen when the workflow UI is displayed.
  • We added the possibility for users to choose a preferred language, which will be used for e-mail notifications. Users have also now the possibility to deactivate e-mail notifications for their e-mail address.
Content replication improvements
We have improved the support for content replication by adding support for ACL, time-based publishing and properties modifications when performing content picking and automated content remote or local publication.

The following parts of Jahia have been deprecated as of version 5.0 SP4 :

Non-container fields
It is no longer allowed to use fields directly on a page (outside of a container definition). As this is no longer necessary and identical functionality can be achieved by using single entry containers. This functionality also caused issues with the validation process, making it harder to understand and harder to debug. Warnings will be output in the console log if these fields are declared, so watch for them ! This feature will be removed in the next major release of Jahia.
Undefined field type
The rarely used undefined field type has been deprecated. If you are looking for something similar in functionality, simply using the same design as the box-pattern (boxType with a sub container list) will let you achieve something similar. Also the undefined field didn't allow to specify with sub-types were allowed and didn't allow to change to any field type. This also caused issues with versioning. Warnings will be output in the console log if this field type is used. This feature will be removed in the next major release of Jahia.
... and of course a lot of other bug fixes have also been committed. (see change log)

How to migrate from Jahia 5.0.x to Jahia 5.0 SP4

Please follow this how-to to migrate your existing Jahia 5.0.x server to Jahia 5.0 SP4

New templates organization (since Jahia 5.0 SP3)

From this release, the number of templates included in Corporate Portal Templates v1 and v2 has been reduced to the strict minimum when installing Jahia. In previous versions, many templates where given for demonstration purpose only, or to help developers understand Jahia templating mechanisms and capabilities. Those templates weren't designed for an immediate use in production on heavy loaded web sites, or weren't stable enough.
Nevertheless, in too many Jahia "live" web sites we've discovered those templates used without any optimization or change.

To avoid that kind of temptation, we've decided to put most templates available on our web site on the Template Repository with notes and warnings.

From now, this Template Download Center will centralize all extra templates, which will evolve independently from Jahia releases. Pay attention to template notes and compatibility before downloading and using them.

Standard templates available in corporate portal templates

Extra templates available on-line

Please note that you can also install additional portlets which are available in our Portlet Repository .