The XOOPS Development Team is pleased to announce that a new version of the Top 5 Finalist of 2010 Packt Open Source CMS - XOOPS 2.5.0 RC is available for download.

(Don't forget to vote for XOOPS: read here)

The XOOPS 2.5.0 release is a major redesign of the System Module which has been AJAX-ed with jQuery done mainly by Nicolas Andricq (ForMusS), Cointin Maxime (kraven_30), and Grégory Mage (Mage). Other major contributors include Trabis, Voltan, Kris_fr, and Marco. Some of the new features are truly amazing, like the visual placement of blocks, and we're sure that the users will love them

Other major improvements/additions include:

• Help System for Admin and modules (see PM module)
• MySQL Dump in Maintenance
• New Redirect messaging
• Column sorting in tables
• Smarty plugin for icon pack
• Smarty plugin for breadcrumb navigation
• jQuery plugins for display popup or manage drag & drop
• File Manager (Plugin)

Umbraco, an open source CMS based on Microsoft's ASP.NET, has announced the availability of Umbraco 4.1RC. The Umbraco Core Team of developers calls this version of their CMS as "the biggest update to Umbraco" ever. This release candidate for Umbraco 4.1 is packed with a laundry list of improvements in performance and stability as well as some new features.

New and improved features:

• Enhanced preview. Browse your entire site as it looks in the future, including out-of-the-box support for all XSLT and NodeFactory based macros
• SpellChecker. With support for more than ten languages out of the box!
• LINQ 2 Umbraco. More a .NET Developer than an XSLT guru? You can access data via the all brand new .NET LINQ API
• Examine. Ultra performant and stable index-based search engine. With a fluent API that developers will love
• New XML Schema. Not only more performant, but makes it easier to understand your data and adds future support for Intellisense in Visual Studio!
• Improved DLR support. Faster than ever and with support for Ruby too!
• New Datatypes: Image Cropper for editor friendly image manipulation and Macro Container for easily handling of feature areas. (Needs to be manually created in the data type section in the RC)
• Improved Mediapicker: Preview and advanced dialog with upload is now a part of the default MediaPicker (needs to be activated on the datatype in the RC)
  

During the final days of May, the first release candidate for WordPress 3.0 was released to the public. In the world of WordPress, when a version of the popular blogging application becomes a release candidates it means that the official version of WordPress isn't too far behind.

What’s an RC? An RC comes after beta and before the final launch. It means we think we’ve got everything done: all features finished, all bugs squashed, and all potential issues addressed. But, then, with over 20 million people using WordPress with a wide variety of configurations and hosting setups, it’s entirely possible that we’ve missed something.

So what are the new features that will be included in WordPress 3.0. Personally, I'm excited about improvements in custom taxonomy and the merging of standalone WordPress with WordPress Multi-User code which WordPress is calling Multisite. Some of the highlights of WordPress 3.0 include:

• New menu management feature
• New theme "Twenty Ten" is the only theme in the WordPress distribution.
• Improved child theme support; child theme use is highly encouraged and as described in the Child Themes article, very simple to accomplish
• New comment_form() that outputs a complete commenting form for use within a theme template
• Expanded contextual help
• All importers moved to the plugin repository (e.g. WordPress Importer)
• Custom backgrounds for themes
• The Default (Kubrick), and Classic themes, are no longer included in the WordPress distribution, but are available in the Theme repository
• Bulk theme update ability
• Improved custom post types (try the Custom Post Type UI or GD Custom Posts And Taxonomies Tools plugins to see the possibilities)
• Improved custom taxonomies including hierarchical (category-style) support (again, try the Custom Post Type UI or GD Custom Posts And Taxonomies Tools plugins)
• Standalone WordPress and WPMU code merged and is called Multisite (Note: extra domain stuff remains plugin territory for this version)
• Multisite requires wp-config.php file changes to institute

Below the fold I've also included a video from WordPress.TV on WordPress 3.0 multisite.

MODx CMS, a open source Web content management system, has announced it has published the first release candidate for its upcoming flagship product, MODx Revolution. Over three years in the making, this release candidate moves MODx CMS Revolution 2.0 out of beta and brings it one step closer to the final General Release.

In addition to maintaining MODx's reputation of offering absolute freedom over design and content structure, and the ability to build sites quickly and easily that perform well with Search Engines, MODx Revolution 2.0 Release Candidate 1 comes tightly packed with more than 240 bugfixes and enhancements since its last beta release. This release offers a faster Manager, easier installation, better Rich Text Editing (RTE) for content managers, a robust Package Manager for installing Add-ons directly within the Manager, and a new native file browser for direct access of files and other website assets.

"We're excited to see Revo moving out of beta, as it takes everything great about our classic code base, and re-envisions it in a modern architecture with Enterprise-level scalability," said Ryan Thrash, MODx's co-founder. "When developers start working with Revo and experience first-hand what we've talked about for so long—let's just say I think there's going to be a lot of happy developers and site owners. Revo really is a platform on which you can build a robust, mission-critical website. Our upcoming user conference, Partner Program and Commercial Support offerings will further enhance the MODx ecosystem and demonstrate our level of commitment to the MODx platform."

With a release candidate out for ocPortal 4.3, you can expect a number of improvements in the upcoming official release of ocPortal. This version is a feature release that introduces a number of bug fixes since the last release as well as performance improvements and new features.

The new features expected to be included in ocPortal 4.3:

• The "What's new" newsletter feature now allows you to easily re-order categories, change what categories are used, is better presented, and allows you to choose the reference date
• Added link to ocPortal's bookmarks feature on the screen-actions block (commented out by default though)
• Added Guest forum searching to OCF
  

A new version of Radiant, a Ruby on Rails content management systems, is coming soon. Radiant 0.9.0 has just been released as a release candidate.

In this release the interface for the CMS has been updated to make Radiant more stylish and compact. Apart from the stylistic changes, there are a few other significant changes to the user interface worth mentioning:

• There are now two levels of tabs. The intent here is to provide more organization for folks that have a lot of extensions installed. The primary top level tabs are now “Content”, “Design”, and “Settings”.
• Hot-keys have been added for saving. You can now press Ctrl+S to save a page and continue editing, or Ctrl+Shift+S to save a page and return to the index page.
• The number of flash messages have been reduced in favor of status messages that pop up when you submit a form.
• Support has been added for the tab key to text areas. On Safari and Firefox there is also support for multi-line indent and unindent.

There are a number of changes that did not make it into this release candidate that still may make it into the final version in one form or another. Additional features that may be added by the developers in the final version include internationalization, asset management, password reset, filter toolbar, and a revamped settings interface.

The original announcement for this release candidate has additional information and can be found at RadiantCMS.org.

Curently as a release candidate, dotCMS 1.6.5 is shaping up to be feature packed.  While you may want to wait for the official release, there is no reason to wait on finding out what's new with dotCMS.

The new 1.6.5 version includes almost 200 improvements and fixes.  Highlights include:

• Widgets
• Major Performance Improvements
  • Now uses enterprise ready JBoss Cache.
  • Velocity Files cached in memory across cluster for speedier parsing.
• Simplified Configuration, Maintenance, Installation and Upgrades
• webDAV file access
• User Interface Improvements / Simplified Inline Editing
  • Less user confusion:  new user interface cleanly distinguishes content from widgets/dynamic pulls.
• PDF export
• Web Form Improvements
  • Online webform builder allows end users to create forms without knowledge of HTML.
• Other Improvements:
  • Google Maps Macro.
  • TinyMCE WYSIWYG upgraded to 3.1.
• Over 120 bugs squashed.