With the increasing number of users, we have to focus on the stability of our website and ecosystem for updating our software. This will mean that, although we will have improvements, bug fixes, and some enhancements, we will introduce new features that will enable us to improve our update process.

What does it mean for you?

It became clear that we needed a mirror location to host our software. Although untouched, our website has been under attack and could have taken down our environment. Thinking about that possibility, we have decided to set up a new mirror site that is only accessible from within the PHsPeed IDE. If the connection to our leading site is lost, you will still be able to maintain your development environment with updates, etc.

Another thing that was on our list for quite some time was that we were not completely satisfied with updating Xampp. To implement new PHP releases, MySql / MariaDB, etc., we had to deploy a full Xampp release. The disadvantage was that updating this way would overwrite the sample databases, which could contain your databases. Although there was a procedure in the software to overcome this disadvantage, it would still be necessary to perform a backup and restore procedure just in case.

In the upcoming release, you will get an additional module that enables us to release Xampp en PHsPeed modules separately. It will allow us to update the PHP releases without the need for a full Xampp install, and it also means that you will be able to keep up with the latest versions of the PHsPeed modules without a complete installation procedure. All these updates will lead to an incremental update of PHsPeed from time to time, the regular releases.
Setting ports for XDebug, MySQL/MariaDB, and Apache is now done from one place, used by the installer and IDE. The process of deleting duplicate functions continues, and the IDE gets smoother at every new release. We will also move some of the preferences into the new configuration module.

As a Dutch company, we comply with the EU privacy regulations. We have received questions about why we don't update fully automated like some other products. Sometimes, we are unsure if that aligns with the EU regulations. We have decided that our end-users should initiate the update procedure to avoid discussions and procedures around this regulation. The software informs you when a new release is available, you decide if and when you upgrade. It also avoids issues with virus scanners that detect automatic updates and marks the software as a potential threat. Especially Symantec is a well-known problem, as they do not look to the digital signature of our software and don't respond to our questions. But most other virus companies have white-listed PHsPeed, Microsoft, and Google have accepted it so that you can install the MSI directly from our website. But if you run into issues, then white-list the folder you are installing PHsPeed into and let us know so that we can contact the anti-virus company that is giving you trouble.

In the near future, we will open up a new customer portal. The access to the website, service desk, and bug tracker will be centralized and bound to a valid PHsPeed license. We see a lot of registrations on our website without an underlying use of PHsPeed. We consider that a 'threat' as we have no idea why those users registered. To our current customer pool, we ask you to change your account and that you enable 2-factor authentication. If you want to use the new customer portal later this year, it will be required.

Besides the upgrade of our ecosystem, we will also make some internal upgrades. Initially, the new release will be as we always do. We will deploy a new Xampp release containing the latest Apache, MySQL/MariaDB, and PHP versions (7.4, 8.0, and 8.1). This time you will have to upgrade the regular way. As of that date, you will be able to keep up the Xampp environment separately.

The Chromium version in PHsPeed will be upgraded and will support downloading files. We have had reports that some videos do not play. However, that is a known issue. Due to license issues, the Chrome package lacks particular codecs available in the 'full' browsers. So if you need to create software with videos and run into this issue, set the IDE preference to use an external browser for debugging. The webform will be displayed in the external browser while the IDE keeps working. It is also an excellent way for developers with two monitors, they can split the output: a monitor for the ide and a monitor for the output.

Happy coding!

Today (24th of June), we released version 2.2. In addition to the documentation we have sent to our customers, here is a summary of solutions if you run into issues:

1. Make a backup of your project folders
   It is not mandatory, as PHsPeed maintains all kinds of backup files, but once loaded into the new IDE and saved, the file will not be loadable in older versions.
   
   
2. Project corrupt error
   This error message is usually caused when an older project is migrated. But easily fixed, at least in 99% of the cases. Go to the project source tab, and locate for double quotes: "You will see something like ^somekeyword=" this is some text", ^someotherkeyword... The solution is to replace the double quotes with a single one and/or remove the text. Save the project file and then reload the project.
3. RegisterOwner not found
   This error is generated when the deployed runtime is not refreshed. The first step is to go to deployment and purge deployed files. If you are using private libraries, redeploy the libraries. Then regenerate the code.

Release notes

Bugfixes: see bug tracker.
Full release notes: see this post

IDE

• Much cleaner interface, removed duplicate functions
• Upgraded XDebug client for higher performance and fixed a bug that could cause crashes
• New (context-sensitive) help function based upon HelpNDoc, removed Wiki
• Displays changed modules in the project tree
• Upgraded Chromium and homepage
• Setup for easy PWA applications
• Additional options in the application wizards

Components

• Grid component enhanced.
• More features like fixed header, events, recordable headers, etc.
• Modal forms enhanced, allows suppression of refresh events. Improved 'free use' outside Crud functionality
• New components for PayPal, YouTube, Vimeo, MP3, MP4, Database Export, Vertical menu
• Improved and upgraded components for Charts, DBTable, DB(Simple)Query, and DataSource

Note about PWA

All visual applications built in PHsPeed can be migrated into a PWA, using the PWA setup module found under projects. There are some misunderstandings about what a PWA is and how you can use them.

First of all, Apple is not fully compliant with the PWA standards. If you want to 'install' a PWA configured application on IOS, you must manually add the application to the homepage. That has nothing to do with PHsPeed.

If you create your application with a desktop in mind, you might need to redesign your forms so that they will look good on a mobile phone. For instance, a mobile is not quite capable of showing massive data grids. This doesn't mean that you cannot use PWA for these types of applications, but for the best usability, you must design your forms so that Bootstrap can resize them properly to display them right on smaller mobile screens.

PWA applications build in PHsPeed are still web-based applications that will only run when there is an active internet connection. If there is no connection, the home screen will notify and the application will continue to run once the connection is established.

Hi, and great to see you here! We are proud of our new website, and in the upcoming weeks, we will reveal a lot of new features that will be in our release 2.2. If you haven't already, we would advise you to subscribe to our newsletter to be informed when new releases come out or when there is something to announce. And no, we do not share your email with others, nor will we spam you with useless 'offers'. As you might know, we like to simplify things. No difficult license models, no 'special' promotions. Just a great product for a very fair price. No sudden 'huge' increase in pricing or other unpleasant surprises!

Talking about the pricing is not a nice subject, but we will increase our license price for new licenses as of July 2022. As every company, we too suffer from increased costs. We kept our pricing low for early adaptors, but currently, PHsPeed is competing with all the products out there, which means that we will drop our early-bird discount.

If you are already a customer, then you will not be touched by the new pricing. We keep our promises! But if you are new and want to save a few bucks, then this might be the right time to step in. But if you can't, PHsPeed will still be very affordable.

Then some good news. I will give you detailed information about the new features in the following blogs. But to mention a few:

• Improved user interface
  We started to work with a front-end designer, and the first improvements to the user interface already have been implemented. Our Wiki will be removed and replaced by a new help system powered by HelpNDoc. This allows us to concentrate all our documentation in one place and implement a help function within the IDE. A first implementation is already in place!
  
  
• PayPal
  We have added a new component to connect to the PayPal gateway.
  
  
• Charts
  We improved our implementation of ChartJS.
  
  
• XML/JSon/CSV output
  We have added a new component to export your dataset result in several formats. Just bind the component to the data source, and you're done.
  
  
• Vimeo, Youtube, MP3, Mp4
  We added new components to embed these formats into your PHspeed applications.
  
  
• PWA
  Yes, you read it well. Last but not least. As of PHsPeed version 2.2, you can create a fully qualified PWA application. For those who do not know what this means, you can have your web application look like an App. Users can install this app without needing an app store, and in fact, it is still a web application. But you will have an icon on your mobile that responds directly to the web app, without the url line. It's installable and to convert your application into a PWA is as you might expect from a low-code tool... NO CODING IS REQUIRED!