Web Design and Web Development Blog from Webilicious in Tasmania

There will be no more security updates for PHP 7.4 after 28th November 2022.

Recommended Version of PHP for Joomla 3.x Websites

Joomla websites running on Joomla 3.x should update to Joomla 3.10.12 and PHP 7.4 or PHP 8.0 if all third party extensions support PHP 8.0.

Recommended Version of PHP for Joomla 4.x Websites

Joomla websites running on Joomla 4.x should update to the latest version of Joomla 4.x and PHP 8 if all third party extensions support PHP 8.

PHP 7.4 End of Life Options for Joomla 3.x Websites

Some Joomla 3.x websites may run successfully on PHP 8.0. As hosting providers drop support for PHP 7, Joomla 3.x may cease to function. It's not clear exactly when this will happen and it might depend on the timing and severity of security vulnerabilities discovered after security support for PHP 7.4 ends in November 2022.

When your hosting company announces they are dropping support for PHP 7.4, a short term solution may be to move to another host that still supports PHP 7.4 but ideally you should be aiming to migrate any remaining Joomla 3.x websites to Joomla 4.x or some other secure platform as soon as possible.

Another option for a simple Joomla 3.x website with few ongoing updates is to recreate the website as a static HTML website or similar. A static HTML website can still have all the basic essential features such as a responsive template, SSL, search engine friendly URLs, Google Analytics and search engine optimisation. Additional benefits of static HTML websites are faster performance and little or no ongoing cost (apart from the domain name and hosting renewals).

PHP 7.4 End of Life Options for Joomla 4.x Websites

Joomla 4.x websites running on PHP 7 should upgrade to a supported version of PHP 8 as soon as possible. It is usually best to upgrade third party extensions to the latest versions first.

What Version of PHP is My Website Running On?

There are a few ways for you to check what version of PHP your website is running on. For example:

• use a free online tool such as the HTTP / HTTPS Header Check at http://www.webconfs.com/http-header-check.php
• on Joomla 3.x websites, log in to the back-end of the website and go to Site -> System Information
• log in to your cPanel (or similar) hosting control panel and click on "Select PHP Version" or similar

What if My Hosting Company Does Not Offer Support For PHP 8?

Your hosting company should be running at least one supported version of PHP. If not, you should ask them why not and when they propose to fix the security issue. If there is no satisfactory answer then you probably have no other option but to move to a better quality hosting company.

See https://webhostingdownunder.com.au for help in choosing a new hosting company.

I have been looking since 2014 for a content management system that is search engine friendly, user friendly and simpler than Joomla or WordPress and I think I have finally found it!

Bludit Open Source Content Management System

The Bludit content management system is a free and open source flat file content management system which is easy to install and use and suitable for simpler websites.

Bludit includes all the basic features you would expect in a content management system such as pages and posts, categories, tags, comments, a WYSIWYG editor, hit counter, navigation, social networking links, search and sitemap.

More advanced features such as contact forms, galleries, popups, basic e-commerce, WordPress importer, RSS feed, embedding a Google Map and embedding a YouTube video are available via the Bludit official plugin repository which currently lists over 100 plugins. Most plugins are free and paid plugins are very affordable.

There are over 50 free themes in the Bludit official theme repository with more free and paid themes available from third parties.

Performance will depend on which theme is used but Bludit websites have low overheads and load very quickly.

The first website I built for a client uses the free "Easy Blog" theme which loads Bootstrap, jQuery, Font Awesome and 2 Google fonts. It still scores an "A" on GTMetrix with 100% on performance and 99% on structure and loads in about half a second (see below). This is out of the box on a budget web hosting plan with no tinkering required!

The disk space footprint for a default install of Bludit is only 7.1 MB which is tiny compared to a default install of Joomla 4.2.5 which uses 87.2 MB or a default install of WordPress 6.1.1 which uses 66.5 MB.

Support is available on the Bludit support forums.

Joomla 4.x was released on 17th August 2021 followed by a security update and several bug fixes.

New Joomla 4.x Features

Some of the new features included in Joomla 4.x are:

• improved install process
• new accessible backend and frontend templates
• Bootstrap 5 integration
• new media manager
• new publishing workflow
• new web services
• improved security features
• new HTML email templates
• improved and expanded Command Line Interface (CLI)
• cleaner and more powerful codebase

It's Safe to Migrate or Upgrade to Joomla 4.x Now

Assuming all your favourite extensions are Joomla 4.x ready, now is a good time to upgrade from Joomla 3.x.

I have already updated my business website to Joomla 4.x and have completed some Joomla 3.x to Joomla 4.x updates for clients.

Using a template with Joomla 3.x and Joomla 4.x versions (such as JoomShaper Helix Ultimate) simplifies the update process considerably.

Goodbye Gantry 4

Many of the websites I developed until 2018 were built with or were upgraded to the Gantry 4 Framework by RocketTheme. Gantry 4 was a great choice for Joomla 2.5 website owners as Gantry 4 made the transition from Joomla 2.5 to Joomla 3.x easy.

Unfortunately, there will be no Gantry 4 version for Joomla 4 and website owners currently on Gantry 4 will need to upgrade to Gantry 5 or choose a new template.

Gantry 5 is quite different to Gantry 4 and my current preference is to build websites with and to migrate websites to the JoomShaper Helix Ultimate template and framework. Helix Ultimate has all the great features that Gantry 4 has plus much more, such as multiple Google Fonts, more control over styling and layout and more control over inserting custom code. The default Helix Ultimate template is free. JoomShaper have a large user base which hopefully means that Helix Ultimate will continue to be developed and supported for a long time into the future.

Joomla 4.x Performance

As per, "The new metrics for web performance" article by Patrick Jackson, Joomla 4 performs phenominally well. Joomla 4 has been optimised for performance and it scores well in various test tools including Google Lighthouse and GTMetrix.

Joomla 3.x Support

Joomla 3.x will be supported for two years after the Joomla 4.x release so Joomla 3.x website owners should plan to update to Joomla 4.x by August 2023. This gives Joomla website owners plenty of time to migrate to Joomla 4.x. Joomla 3.x websites will, of course, still operate after August 2023 but may be more vulnerable to hackers.

Extension and Template Support for Joomla 4.x

Joomla extension and template developers are now starting to focus on the Joomla 4 versions of their extensions and templates. The Joomla 3 versions will still be supported for a while but new functionality might only be implemented in the Joomla 4 versions of their extensions and templates. This is already happening with at least one extension, Regular Labs Articles Anywhere, where the developer has taken the opportunity to rewrite the Joomla 4 versions of his extensions with many new features which will not be added to the Joomla 3 versions.

Happy updating / migrating!