Umbraco

Umbraco 11.1 and 10.4 Release Candidates are now available!

See and try out the new features in the upcoming releases

Bjarke Berg
Written by Bjarke Berg

It’s only been a few weeks since Umbraco 11 was released and we’ve already got the next round of features ready for testing - just in time for the holidays 🎄New maintenance page for upgrades, features for Block List and Block Grid Editors, improved drag and drop support for the Media Picker, and a whole lot more is waiting for you. And for those of you on Umbraco 10, there’s great news as well, all these features are coming with Umbraco 10.4 also available as RC. Let’s take a look at the exciting release candidates(s) 👀

Overview:

Why two releases at the same time? 

Release candidates have been made available for both Umbraco 11 and 10 today. The main purpose of this is to make the Block Grid editor available for Umbraco 10 as it is an LTS release. While we were at it, including all the latest features in Umbraco 10 just made sense. As of this writing, there are no further minor releases scheduled for Umbraco 10, and all new feature development will be targeted at Umbraco 11.

What’s in Umbraco 11.1 and 10.4?

Below I’ve listed a number of features that would be valuable to get feedback on. Both releases contain numerous additional improvements and fixes all listed in the release notes: 

Maintenance Page

We have introduced a new page that is shown to website users, while Umbraco is in Upgrade runtime mode. This replaces the old behavior that just redirected the website request to login/upgrader which is not usually something you want to show to website visitors.

This new page can be replaced in the same way as it is possible for the 404/Not found page.
Furthermore, we have introduced a new configuration that lets you continue showing your website while Umbraco is in Upgrade mode. It is not recommended to let Umbraco be in Upgrade mode for longer periods, but most migrations can be executed while the website continues to work. Consider this a feature to use, if you know what you are doing, and you remember to go to the backoffice and finalize the upgrade.


To test out this new feature, try upgrading from Umbraco 10.3 or below, as Umbraco 11.1RC does not contain any migrations. To see the maintenance page, you can also make a simple endpoint force returning the maintenance page, which can be requested at /test/maintenancepage/:

Drag & Drop support in for Media Picker

This release introduces a new feature for the media picker. Now it is possible to drag and drop media directly on the Media Picker when using it inside the content section. The media is automatically uploaded to the user's start node in the media section.

To test this, add a Media Picker (version 3) on a document type. Go to the content section and create a new node of this type. Try to drag & drop media directly on the + icon.

Tags Editor Support in Block List, Block Grid, and Nested Content Editors

The Tags Editor is now supported in Data Types that rely on Element Types, such as Block Grid Editor and Block List Editor. Nested Content also supports the Tags Editor now, but it is recommended to migrate to use Block List Editor as Nested Content is now deprecated.

To test this, add the Tags Editor to an Element Type. Add this Element Type to a Property using either a Block Grid, Block List, or Nested Content.  Go to the Content section and create a new piece of content based on this type. The Tags Editor should now be fully usable in your Block or Nested content.

Single Block Mode in Block List Editor

The Block List Editor now supports a single block mode. This has been a much-requested feature and can help make the migration from Nested Content to Block List Editor even easier. When enabled, the Block List Editor also returns a single item instead of an enumerable.

This new feature can be enabled on the Data Type, so to test this, you will need to enable it on a Block List Editor that only has a single block available. Then go to the content section and create some content of this type. When adding items to the Block List Editor, it will automatically open the configuration of the single available block.

Administrators can now disable 2FA for members

Administrators can now disable the 2FA for members. To be able to do it you need to be part of the Administrator User Group. Obviously, only the member itself can enable 2FA.

To test this feature, you need to have members that have activated 2FA. Be aware administrators cannot enable 2FA again, this needs to be done by the member itself.

HTTP Strict Transport Security Health Check Updated

The Health Check that ensures the HSTS (HTTP Strict Transport Security) header is present is now updated to exclude localhost, as this header is not recommended to have, while the host is  localhost.

To test this, go to the health checks and execute the security health checks.

Low-level Performance Improvements

This release contains a series of small low-level performance improvements, that either optimize for CPU or memory. Areas that are improved are rebuilding the media cache when removing file extensions from files, GUID/UDI generation, and batch upload files in the Media section.

Block Grid Editor for Umbraco 10

The Block Grid Editor was launched along with Umbraco 11, and now makes its debut for Umbraco 10 as well, including the above-mentioned addition of support for the Tag Editor as well as numerous smaller updates and improvements.

If you haven’t tried it in Umbraco 11 and want to test out the new Property Editor we just published a Deep Dive blog post that takes you through all the basics. You can also dig into the extensive documentation for the Block Grid Editor.

Known issues

There are currently no known issues in Umbraco 11.1 or 10.4.

How to test

First, you need to make a new Umbraco installation from 11.1RC or 10.4RC (links below) or upgrade an existing project, both scenarios can provide valuable feedback.

If you find things in the RC that are not working, we’d be grateful for feedback on the Github issue tracker:


 You’re welcome to add comments to the features and fixes listed under 11.1 release or submit new bug reports (click New Issue and select Bug Report), please prefix the issue with 11.1RC:.

As mentioned previously, the RC is feature complete, so we’re not going to add additional features but will, of course, fix bugs that prevent a stable release.

How to get your hands on the release candidates for Umbraco 11.1 and 10.4

As always, installation and release notes can be found on Our:

This release candidates are also available from NuGet:

When is the public release?

We’re aiming for a full public release on January 12, 2023. This means Umbraco 11.1 and Umbraco 10.4 will be available for upgrade on Umbraco Cloud and via NuGet. We need a couple of days to wrap up the release so the sooner we get your feedback the better 🙂

Big H5YR 🙌 to everyone who has contributed to both releases and thanks to everyone willing to lend a hand in testing it out. It means the world to get it validated by the users.

Bug reports are best handled on the issue tracker and as always, we welcome you to submit product feedback and questions to product@umbraco.com