Dear friends,

The main stage of version 17.0 development has been completed. While the new version is undergoing testing and pre-release preparation, we would like to tell you about what will be available in the new version.

The following new features have been implemented:

1. Added the ability for site users to delete their own account on the site, if they so wish. This permission is enabled in the settings of user groups. And it can be selected from several options. You can allow users to make a completely independent decision to delete an account, or you can only allow sending a request to the site administration to delete an account, or even prohibit self-deletion. The admin group is always protected from self-deletion for security purposes against account theft. An administrator can only be removed by another administrator. If the user is allowed to delete himself, then he can delete his account and all his data from the site in his profile by confirming this decision with an additional input of his account password. If sending a request to the administration is enabled, then the user management section for site administrators will show a list of users who have requested the deletion of data and account from the site, and the administrator will need to decide whether to delete this account or reject this request. After the account is deleted by the administrator, the user will receive a corresponding notification that his deletion request has been completed.

2. For the user profile output template (userinfo.tpl), support for new tags has been added: [delete] Text [/delete] that display the text enclosed in them as a link to delete the user's own profile on the site, if he is allowed to do so by the settings of user groups.

3. Added a new “Storage” section in the DataLife Engine control panel. In this section, you can add various external storage systems to which files will be uploaded using the DataLife Engine in the future. Thus, the site can use not one specific external storage for files, but different ones. Moreover, different storages can be used for different needs. In this section, you can add repositories, disable them, assign any storage, default storage, etc.

4. In the script settings in the admin panel, the ability to specify which repositories to upload certain files has been added. You can set up different repositories for images for posts, comments, static pages, user avatars, etc. For all cases, you can set either the default repository or any other repository created in the storage management section.

5. The ability to allow or prohibit users to select storage immediately before uploading files and images has been added to the user group settings. If this feature is allowed to the user, that he will be able to choose before uploading files to which storage they need to be placed. Thus, different files can optionally be placed in different repositories. And if this is prohibited, then the download will be according to all default settings.

6. For additional fields with the types “Uploaded image”, “Uploaded image Gallery”, “Uploaded audio playlist”, “Uploaded video playlist”, and “Uploaded file”, the ability to specify in the settings of these fields to which storage files need to be uploaded has been added. Thus, you can upload different additional fields to different repositories, which are specified in the storage management section.

7. For additional fields of user profiles, the possibility of assigning the “safe field mode” option has been added, with this type of field, the possibility of using BB tags or HTML tags is completely disabled. And also these fields can be safely used when displaying them in the HTML attributes of template tags.

8. When displaying a list of recent comments on the site, an automatic transition to the selected comment has been added when clicking on the headline of the news to which it refers. At the same time, the page on which he is located is automatically searched, if, for example, a comment is on the second page of the news, then the user will automatically get to the second page, and the browser will automatically scroll to this comment. Thus, the user will see it immediately visually. In order to add automatic search when generating custom links in the template, you need to add the attribute to the links: onclick="findCommentsPage(this, '{id}', '{news-id}'); return false;"

9. Added automatic marking of avatars uploaded by the user with a unique value of the avatar file name. Thus, each time a user uploads an avatar for his account, his name will automatically change, and the new avatar will be visible immediately after downloading, without using the cache from the browser. Thus, it is no longer necessary to clear the browser cache when the user changes the avatar on the site.

10. Added the ability to quickly attach images to comments, while quickly editing comments on the site. If the template for adding a comment uses tags to display a quick upload form and attach images to the comment, then when editing, a quick upload image form will also be automatically added to the comment.

11. Added the ability to quickly attach images to comments when responding to comments. If the template for adding a comment uses tags to display a quick upload form and attach images to the comment, then when responding to comments, a quick upload image form will also be automatically added to the comment. Thus, the possibilities when adding a new comment and when adding a response to a comment will be identical.

12. For custom output of publications using the {custom ...} tag, the possibility of custom assignment of the period for which the block should be cached in the cache parameter has been added. You can specify the period in minutes, hours, or days. Values with the suffixes “m”, “h” and “d” are used to specify the caching time. For example, if you specify {custom cache="30m"....}, the block will be forcibly cached for 30 minutes if you specify {custom cache="2h"....}, then the block will be cached for 2 hours, if you specify {custom cache="1d" ....} then the block will be cached for one day. If you simply specify {custom cache="yes"....}, then as before, automatic cache control will be enabled and it will be updated as the information is updated. Specifying the time of forced caching will save server resources if the block does not need to be updated immediately, for example, when adding new publications or comments.

13. For custom output of comments using the {custom comments ...} tag, the possibility of custom specifying the period for which the block should be cached in the cache parameter has been added. You can specify the period in minutes, hours, or days. Values with the suffixes “m”, “h” and “d” are used to specify the caching time. For example, if you specify {customcomments cache="30m"....}, the comment block will be forcibly cached for 30 minutes if you specify {customcomments cache="2h" ....}, then the block with comments will be cached for 2 hours, if you specify {customcomments cache="1d" ....} then the block with comments will be cached for one day. If you simply specify {customcomments cache="yes"....}, then as before, automatic cache control will be enabled and it will be updated as the information is updated. Specifying the time of forced caching will save server resources if the block does not need to be updated immediately if the information on the site changes.

14. For the DataLife Engine control panel, full support for languages using the right-to-left text writing method has been added. To do this, the “direction” directive has been added to the language packs, which specifies the type of writing text for this language ‘ltr’ or ‘rtl’. At the same time, if the right-to-left writing type is used, then DataLife Engine will connect a specially prepared and adapted CSS file with control panel styles for the control panel, which will correctly mirror the entire control panel. Thus, users can use the panel design necessary for this language.

15. For WYSIWYG visual editors, support for languages using right-to-left text writing has been added. To do this, the value of the “direction” directive is also used, which is set in language packs when creating a translation into the desired language. By specifying the right-to-left spelling of “rtl” in the directive, editors will automatically use this text writing mode.

16. For all the usual text fields that DataLife Engine generates in the control panel and on the site, automatic support for languages using right-to-left spelling has been added. Switching occurs automatically as soon as the user starts writing text in this language. Thus, the integration and creation of websites in these languages has been improved and facilitated.

17. In the user group management section, the ability to enable or disable permission to use the “Headers, descriptions, meta tags” module has been added. Thus, you can allow other user groups to use this section, and not only for administrator groups.

18. In the user group management section, the ability to enable or disable permission to use the “Cross-references” module has been added. Thus, you can allow other user groups to use this section, and not only for administrator groups.

19. In the user group management section, the ability to enable or disable permission to use the Redirects module has been added. Thus, you can allow other user groups to use this section, and not only for administrator groups.

20. For the Redirects module in the control panel, the ability to disable or enable redirects has been added. Thus, if necessary, you can temporarily disable or enable the redirect you need without having to delete and re-add them.

21. For the “Cross-references” module in the control panel, the ability to disable or enable keywords has been added, thus, if necessary, you can temporarily disable or enable the replacement of the words you need without having to delete and re-add them.

22. For the module “Headers, descriptions, meta tags” in the control panel, the ability to disable or enable the specified rules has been added. Thus, if necessary, you can temporarily disable or enable the specified rules for these pages without having to delete and re-add them.

23. In the admin panel in the publication editing section, a visual display of the number of publications found has been added when using advanced search by various parameters.

24. In the script settings, the ability to specify how many found publications to show in the results of a quick search on the site has been added. Previously, only five found results were always displayed, now you can specify your desired value in the settings.

25. Changes have been made to the logic of the quick search. Now the search results, if they do not enter the window in height, do not directly block the search field itself.

26. For the total rating of the user's publications, the use of a new {ratingscore} tag has been added in the output templates of the user profile and the user's quick card (userinfo.tpl and profile_popup.tpl). This tag displays the number of the average rating of all the user's publications, from one to five, while maintaining a fractional value. For example, depending on the rating, it can be 1.6 or 4.2, etc. This tag allows you to set, for example, your own design of rating stars with partial filling, and not just 2 or 4 filled stars.

27. For the total rating of user comments, the use of a new {commentsratingscore} tag has been added in the output templates of the user profile and the user's quick card (userinfo.tpl and profile_popup.tpl). This tag displays the number of the average rating of all user comments, from one to five, while maintaining a fractional value. For example, depending on the rating, it can be 1.6 or 4.2, etc. This tag allows you to set, for example, your own design of rating stars with partial filling, and not just 2 or 4 filled stars.

28. Changes have been made to the operation of the [active] ... [/active] tag for the category menu template. Now this tag displays the text enclosed in them for the parent categories, if the category that the site visitor entered is a nested subcategory of these parent categories. Previously, this tag outputs text only for one category, directly in the one in which the visitor was. Thus, you can highlight, among other things, the active parent categories.

29. Added a correct system for calculating the hash of uploaded files directly by content, in case they are uploaded to external storage.

30. Added support for calculating the digital control signature of files uploaded to external storage, if the file arrives at external storage, bypassing the server where DataLife Engine is installed, for example, if the file is downloaded from an external site by URL, and not from a computer.

31. Changes have been made to the logic of the site search. Now data is transmitted to the server using GET requests, not POST. Thus, site visitors, when navigating through the search results pages, will be able to use the “Back” button in the browser, as well as overload the page without warnings from the browser.

32. For the TinyMCE visual editor, the ability has been added when writing comments to insert images from the clipboard and by transferring images to the editor and automatically upload them to the server, if a simplified form of uploading comments is enabled and used for uploading comments. That is, you can use both a simplified form and insert it into the editor text, or automatically upload it to the text field in the editor itself.

33. For the TinyMCE visual editor, the ability to insert drop-down lists (Accordion) has been added, as well as the ability to manage them. These lists are inserted using HTML5 tags “details” and “summary".

34. When viewing uploaded files online on the site, the ability to view files has been added, and when the file download blocking setting is enabled when accessing from other sites. Previously, viewing became unavailable because access to viewing sites occurred from external Google and Microsoft services.

35. Improved the system of uploading files to the server from external sites. Added the ability to upload files if the URL contains not simple direct links to the file, but using various parameters in the links.

36. Improved selection of parent categories when creating and editing categories. If there are a large number of categories, they can be found using a quick search through the list of categories.

37. The system of logging out and logging out of the user on the site has been improved. If the user leaves the site, then a complete cleaning of all data from the browser is performed, including those that were installed by third-party plugins and scripts on the site.

38. Changes have been made to the logic of processing tags [if field = "value"] text [/if], now they are executed before the connection and processing of tags {custom ....} and {include file=”....”}. Thus, you can use these tags inside these structures without creating an excessive load on the server and executing them only if the conditions of the structure in which they are located are met.

39. After uploading video or audio files to the server, the link to insert the player is now selected by default when selecting the insert. Thus, inserting media files is faster when writing publications.

40. Updated instructions for creating an application on the Google service for using authorization on the site using Google accounts.

41. The system of searching for similar news when editing publications in the control panel has been redesigned. Now the system of this search takes into account which search mode is enabled in the script settings: “Simple” or “Full-text".

42. The speed of the search for similar news in the publication editing section has been increased when using the full-text search mode on large databases with a large amount of content.

43. The work with the cache in the control panel has been optimized, which in some cases allows you to clear the cache of some data more rarely when performing a number of actions. This reduces the load on the server and increases the performance of the site.

44. Improved the performance of the site, in case of execution of any automatic programs on the crown. The cache is now cleared more accurately and only if necessary if any data in the database has been changed. This reduces the load on the server.

45. Improved the system for generating a control signature required to perform various actions for users who are not authorized on the site. This signature no longer depends on the IP of the users, thereby they will not be denied to perform an action on the site if the IP address has unexpectedly changed between the actions.

46. The TinyMCE visual editor has been updated to the current version. Various minor errors in the editor's work have been fixed.

47. Fixed an issue where the {THEME} tag was incorrectly processed when using it in the template for displaying the results of a quick site search.

48. Fixed an issue where information about the tag cloud and cross-references was not updated if the publication was automatically removed from the site by the crown, if the deadline for its publication on the site expired.

49. Fixed an issue where in some cases the name of the button for uploading video files for additional fields with the type “Downloadable video playlist” could be displayed incorrectly.

50. Fixed an issue with incorrect display of the section for editing additional fields of publications and users in the DataLife Engine control panel.

51. Fixed an issue where nested comments were displayed one level less than specified in the setting: “Maximum nesting level of comments" in the script control panel.

52. Fixed an issue where when disabling comments on the site, the user sorting of publications by views on the site stopped working correctly.

53. Minor errors in the script that were detected and stated earlier have been fixed.