Chapter 67. Last-Minute Changes

As promised, PHP-Nuke continues to evolve. As I was finishing the manuscript for this book, version 7.4 was just released, although you can continue to download earlier versions (remember, I covered v7.3 in this book).

Version 7.4 introduces some interesting changes:

• The Ephemerids module and block, which not many folks used, has been removed, although you can still download it separately and add it on as a "third-party" module and block.

• The Sections module, which I quite like, has been eliminated and merged into the Content module. I don't like that because the Sections module provided, in my opinion, a more attractive navigation interface. I do understand that the Content and Sections modules pretty much overlapped one another in terms of functionality, though.

• An IP addressbanning system was added, allowing you to ban specific IP addresses from accessing your site. This has been a popular add-in function for many sites, especially where the administrators take exception to a particular user or catch someone trying to hack their site.

By the time you read this bookit takes a long time to cut down the trees necessary to print itversion 7.5 will be out, introducing a score of new bug fixes, minor cosmetic changes, and probably a few major changes like the ones listed earlier. That's the beauty of PHP-Nuke: It continues to evolve and grow to meet the demands of its users.

Early word, for example, is that v7.5 will restructure the module administration so that each module's administration is self-contained. That's a major structural change in PHP-Nuke, which currently separates modules and their administrative functions into separate folder hierarchies. Does that mean this book is useless? Naw. Most of the administration will still work the same, it'll just be laid out differently in the folders of your site. Installing new modules will be a bit different, too. And you don't have to upgrade immediately. Lots of sites out there are still back on v6.9, which was very stable and offered a lot of great functionality. It's often easier to find add-on modules and blocks for older versions because they've been around longer. In fact, before upgrading PHP-Nuke, you must make sure that every add-in module and block that you have is compatible with the new version, and that can sometimes take the add-ins' authors a few months to figure out.