We're giving a short outlook on the upcoming changes of the TYPO3 extension repository which will be separated from typo3.org.
As announced in earlier news, a relaunch for the typo3.org website has is currently in the works. One of the steps needed for that is to extract the TYPO3 extension repository (TER) away from typo3.org, and move it to a separate website. In light of this task, we like to take the opportunity and add some changes to the platform:
Remove SOAP support
As you may remember, there was a possibility to upload an own TYPO3 extension to TER in the Extension Manager via SOAP. This way could be used until TYPO3 v4.5 and is not supported any more. We will remove the SOAP interface and get rid of the very old code. The only official possibility to upload an extension will be the form to send a ZIP file on typo3.org.
Reduce complexity
During the last relaunch of typo3.org in 2012 we introduced a new TER frontend, which you currently can see on the website. It was build in Extbase/Fluid with the challenge of using TYPO3 v4.5. We used new database tables for the data and established a possibility to salvage your extension keys from the "old" tables to the fancy "Extbase" tables, so we have all data twice in the database. Due to the removal of the SOAP support we will remove the old tables and the doubled persistence as well.
Start the long-term plan
Maybe you get frightened of losing the SOAP interface and stuck to a form on a website to publish your extension? No need to worry about! We will start to implement different drivers step by step to let you publish an extension by tagging it in your Git repository. All you need is to connect it to TER.
You want to help?
The responsible person of this extraction / movement / long-term plan is Thomas Löffler. Of course we will need more people for the implementation and planning. If you want to contribute by coding, planning, designing and giving ideas, feel free to get in contact by mail (<link>thomas.loeffler@typo3.org) or in <link https: typo3.slack.com>Slack (#t3o-relaunch-sprints)
Update (14.10.2016): After a constructive discussion we will not shut down SOAP before we have a good alternative which can handle TER uploads by an API, the connection to the Extension Manager and the internal handling of extensions.
