GoPHP5 - WebsiteBaker 3 will be PHP5 only

[pcwacht]

- As a sysadmin playing with computers since 1981 (26 years !!) I know for sure you need to use the tools wich does the job the best.
PHP5 is such a tool, no doubt about it, it has truely more power and is better written for today's machines and lacks heaps of problems php4 has.

- Allso knowing wb2 will keep on living (at least till the first stable release of wb3 wich will happen somewhere at the beginning of 2008) and be supported afterwards untill it becomes obsolete

I am supporting your ideas because of the two things mentioned,
and since I can't predict what the hosts will offer medio 2008 I can't really be worried.


So I vote go for php5 (not necessaraly 5.2)

John

[kmillar]

Will you continue to offer a version  of WB that works with PHP 4? My hosts all only have php4 and I would really like to use WB if possible.

Karene

[Ryan]

Michael,

You made some very good points and I don't plan to fight an endless battle and I definitely don't expect other forum members to either.
I simply wanted to raise awareness of the "campaign", and let the community know the direction we are heading with development.

With regards to ease of use - although this is the main goal for WebsiteBaker, I don't think it is the number one factor in this issue. Also, I don't believe that after a year of WB3 being released the majority of hosts won't support PHP5 (it isn't too hard to make PHP 4 and 5 run side-by-side).

As I understand, Open Source is about choice and community... I want to give the community a chance to voice their opinions, and I am also letting them choose to still run the WB2 (I will be happy to support the ongoing maintenance if there is sufficient demand) for as long as their hosts won't support them.

Unfortunately at the end of the day, somebody has to make these decisions and with all the research I have done into this particular issue, all I can see is long-term gain for possibly a little short-term pain.

BTW, Drupal and Typo3 may be the big names you have read about, but phpMyAdmin is another extremely big name in the list (used by many CMS people, regardless of which CMS).
Also, I believe Joomla is going to be on the list soon to:
http://lists.drupal.org/pipermail/development/2007-May/024073.html

Ryan

[Waldschwein]

Hello!
One word before: Don't trust the poll here- only the active members are voting here, and they are the small part of the WB community that are skilled in web developement. The very big part of the community (that aren't present in the forum) won't take part here.

Well, I don't like that idea at all. Many, many hosters only have php4.x (if they have), and WB is a CMS that should be only one thing: Easy.
When it is only supporting php5 it is not easy to use, because many not-so-friendly-with-technique users don't know that, and then that would be an own goal.
The security, the ability of the software has nothing or not very much to do with the php version that is used. Seeing the very unflexible structure at WB today, seeing that know security issues and bugs are fixed half an year or even longer after they are known- that should be imporved very quickly, not the php version. And one fix that was made was so hiden somewhere in the deeps of that forum, that very, very few people have seen it. There should be a news-ticker, -letter or something every websoftware has.

And the gophp5.org is supported by only two CMS: Drupal and Typo3. And both aren't at all the ones WB should ever be compared with. Drupal lacks extremely security, and both are made for programmers, not at all the target group WB has. So taking part at this gophp5.org supported by some geeks- nothing WB should take part in.

Last of all: You and the WB developer group could do that- but then do it. Do it- we see it- we will believe it.
But don't ask whether, if or should and could the community would like that. You will only achieve one thing: To answer endless questions, and also the support team here. It would safe endless time for Matthias, Klaus and other very active and skilled supporters to stop that could-be-news in drips and drabs, then they would have more time to improve the "is" WB and not to anser something about the "will-be" WB.
And in the end you will be as clever as before because there are always two grupos- supporters of your ides and opponents.

Greets Michael
 

[Ryan]

Hi all,

Some of you may have seen www.gophp5.org recently.
If you haven't, I encourage you to take a brief moment to look at the website.

Today I would like to announce that WebsiteBaker 3 will only support PHP 5.2 and up.
The timing is excellent: the goal for GoPHP5 is to only support PHP5.2 (and higher) by February 5, 2008, and WebsiteBaker 3 will be starting full-time development mid-January 2008 (with the first RC expected in March).

Besides "jumping on the GoPHP5 bandwagon", the main reason for announcing this is a technical one: PHP5 simply has better XML support, and since WB3 will make such extensive use of XML, this is critical to offering the most stable CMS possible.

Aside from better XML support being the most obvious benefit, PHP5.2 also offers many other features that WB3 will be able to take advantage of, including:

• Improved performance and a more accurate memory usage.
• Better security through the filter extension.
• ZIP extension for creating and editing zip files.
• Hooks for tracking file upload progress were introduced (will let us write an accurate progress tracker for file uploads.)
• DateTime and DateTimeZone objects with methods to manipulate date/time information
• Real opportunities for object oriented programming.

(Note: the above overview list was taken from the Drupal GoPHP5 page).

I know many people are currently using web hosts that might not support PHP5, however I believe that following the GoPHP5 effort, many hosts will begin to support it.
And for those of you that cannot do anything about your host, at least you will still have WB2 on your side (which will still be supported for bug and security fixes)

By making the decision to only support PHP 5.2 and up for WB3, we can guarantee a high quality system.

Please provide feedback as I would like to hear your opinions about this issue.

Ryan