TYPO3 CMS 8 LTS now available

TYPO3 now includes a mature and flexible form builder, enabling editors to create complex forms. The user friendly interface makes it possible to create multi-column field groups and multi-page forms.The form builder provides full control over where form data is stored and sent. The builder must be configured only once per installation, using the popular YAML markup language.

Modern websites must be optimized for mobile devices, such as mobile phones and tablets. An important requirement is the possibility to present different image versions depending on the screen size (i.e. responsive images). In the new TYPO3 8 LTS, editors can interactively select and configure responsive image versions. Each image version can be individually cropped. Editors can even define focus areas, specifying what part of the image is most important.

One of TYPO3’s greatest strengths is the flexible support for multilingual web applications, including content inheritance between languages. TYPO3 8 LTS extends the multi-language features further: Editors are now able to define which content element fields will be inherited or overwritten when translating. While this could previously only be configured once, for the entire installation, it can now be defined for individual elements. The decision is up to the editor creating the content.

The rich text editor, the component that allows the editor to enter and format text, is one of the most important parts of a content management system. In the TYPO3 8 LTS release the legacy editor technology has been replaced with the state-of-the-art CKEditor. The effort involved in configuring the editor has been greatly reduced.

Other features improving the editors’ workflow include search engine and user-friendly links in the core. Page titles, files, and extension records are now displayed instead of cryptic numbers. 

Most content management systems use a database to store their data. In many parts of the PHP world, the database abstraction layer “Doctrine” is used to connect with databases of almost any type. Both easy to learn and popular, Doctrine is a framework known to most PHP developers. With Doctrine, TYPO3 CMS now supports a long list of database engines, such as MySQL as well as software popular with enterprise solutions, such as PostgreSQL (aka. Postgres) and Microsoft SQL.

The number of cloud-hosted websites has increased rapidly over the last few years. TYPO3 8 LTS is cloud-ready and can be installed on a variety of cloud solutions, such as Microsoft Azure and Amazon Web Services (AWS).

Many features have been implemented in the TYPO3 core over the last 18 months. In order to further improve the experience for developers, popular PHP standards and technologies, such as PSR-1 to PSR-7, Guzzle and Symfony, are being used.

Thanks to a modernized core, developers and integrators can now make the user interface even easier for editors. It is possible to add information about how to use a field on the current web site or generate a live preview based on the data entered.

When debugging complex HTML templates, integrators now have one-click access to the template files used when rendering individual areas of the web page. This simplifies and speeds up troubleshooting and template enhancements.

TYPO3 CMS 8 LTS is a Long-Term Support release, and will be supported with maintenance until October 2018 regular security and important bug fix releases until April 2020. Existing installations can be upgraded directly from TYPO3 7 LTS. Any installation running a previous version must first be upgraded to this version.

More information about TYPO3 CMS is available at <link https: typo3.org>typo3.org.

The TYPO3 Association has been promoting the development of free software projects that have arisen from the Community regarding the original TYPO3 Content Management Solution for ten years now. It is a not-for-profit organization that provides software developments from third parties that it has funded to the public free of charge. The TYPO3 Association is an association according to Swiss Law that was founded by the members of the TYPO3 Community, including Kasper Skårhøj, in November 2004. It has its headquarters in Baar ZG (Switzerland). The TYPO3 Association is non-partisan and denominationally neutral. More information on its members, objectives and funding opportunities can be found on its website: <link https: typo3.org association>typo3.org/association. Additionally, the TYPO3 Association has established an independent service company that provides its members with support services and attends to the technological development of the CMS system. More about TYPO3 Inc. can be found at <link https: typo3.com>typo3.com.