We are very pleased to present you X3, the new Xoops Engine for the next generation of XOOPS powered web application development.
This new Xoops Engine was long time in coming. During that time, we went through different phases of trials and errors, but we believe that we finally have the best combination of features and technologies to strategically position XOOPS as one of the top Web Application Platform solutions.
The new Xoops Engine has been re-designed from the ground up to take advantages of third-party frameworks like Zend Framework and Smarty 3.
Why did we rewrite XOOPS?
XOOPS is one of the most successful Open Source CMS and portal solutions, constantly placing in top places in various competitions, and receiving various awards. But it is showing signs of aging, that would require major rewrites of the Core.
In order to keep us focused on creating a flexible and extensible development engine for developers and a high performance application platform for end users, the development team has decided to use industry-standard frameworks. By doing so, we can focus our limited resources on aspects that make XOOPS unique and special, while leaving standard functionality to be addressed by off-the-shelf frameworks. This way we can take advantage of latest internet developments already included in those frameworks - it's like getting suddenly a whole new team of some of the best and brightest PHP and RIA programmers joining XOOPS!
After much research, we've selected a couple of frameworks at this stage:
PHP: Zend Framework
Template: Smarty 3
JavaScript: jQuery
Meanwhile the multi-engine mechanism of the Xoops Engine will ensure the possibility of adopting other excellent frameworks in the future, like Yii Framework, Dojo Toolkit, etc.
Why did we choose Zend Framework for PHP
- The design and coding is professional and state-of-the-art
- Fully Object-oriented and strictly PHP 5
- The documentation is exhaustive, with countless third-party resources available on internet
- The development is very active and sustainable, and its team is backed by PHP development team (Zend)
- Strong support from major corporations (Technology partners include IBM, Google, Microsoft, Adobe Systems, and StrikeIron).
- Use-at-will architecture with loosely coupled components and minimal interdependencies
- Extensible MVC implementation supporting layouts and PHP-based templates by default
- The components are vast and loosely coupled and potentially compatible with other libraries: on-demand pickup
- Proven PHPunit integration for unit tests
What goes forward:
The Xoops Engine architecture is designed to build on features that made XOOPS so popular:
- Modularization
- Themes
- Template
What do we expect to improve with the new Xoops Engine:
- Flexible architecture and elegant code and implementation
- Modern MVC architecture: faster development, state-of-the-art technology
- Distributed deployment respecting virtual hosts
- Contributor friendly skeleton: easy to manage third-party modules and plugins
- SEO capable URL routing
- Solid and rich libraries and frameworks
- Ready to implement unit test
System requirements:
Apache mod_rewrite
PHP 5.3+
More information about this release, as well as download information, is on the XOOPS Website
About XOOPS: Founded in 2002 by group of international software developers, XOOPS quickly become one of world’s leading Open Source Content Management Systems (CMS). Known and loved for its ease of use and countless powerful modules, XOOPS received numerous International Awards and Recognitions, among them: the First Runner-Up in the SourceForge 2006 Community Choice Awards in the Development category, 5 Stars from Germany's Chip Magazine, Top 3 content management system from Adobe Edge Magazine, one of top Open Source CMS for Medical Professionals by ONDD. It was also the finalist of 2008 Source Forge Community Awards, and 2008, 2009, and 2010 CMS Awards by Packt Publishing. In January 2009 it received the 2008 China Open Source Software Contest Award and in Oct. 2010 the "Best Technology Award" from NEA OSS Forum. XOOPS is the most active and downloaded CMS project on www.SourceForge.net More info at: http://www.xoops.org