Overview:
- What’s in Umbraco 8.11?
- Breaking changes
- How to test
- How to get your hands on Umbraco 8.11RC
- When is the public release?
To help you provide us with feedback, I’ve gathered an overview of some of the items that you can help test for this RC. We have run internal testing and are very happy with the current state of the build - but extra polishing and testing is always helpful. So if you have time to help - or just find yourself super curious, feel free to dive into the 8.11. RC today.
What’s in Umbraco 8.11?
Unattended Installs
Adds the ability to install Umbraco without having to click through the step-by-step installer. This can now be done by adding a bit of configuration and booting up a fresh install.
To enable unattended installs you need to:
- Set the correct umbraco version in web.config
- You need to have an Umbraco database connection string configured
- Umbraco.Core.RuntimeState.InstallUnattended in app settings set to true.
When you boot the site we'll check if the database is empty (has no tables) and if it is, the database schema and default data will be created.
You will not be able to login to Umbraco since no password has been set for the default user, you either need to have an external login provider configured or set the password programmatically.
This currently only affects fresh installs but support for unattended upgrades will be added in an upcoming version.
Remove all items for Multinode Treepicker (MNTP)
A new property action has been added for the MNTP property editor. This allows editors to remove all picked items in one go.
We look to get this added for other pickers in a future release.
Updated NPoco version
NPoco, which is a dependency in Umbraco CMS, has been updated from version 3.9.4 to 4.0.2. There shouldn’t be any breaking changes with this upgrade but if you are using NPoco we’d appreciate feedback if you encounter any issues.
… And much more
The release candidate is chock full of great fixes and improvements. Many of them from this year's Hackotoberfest. Along with the features described above you’ll also find another round of awesome accessibility improvements from the A11Y Accessibility Team (if you don’t know them check out this blog post).
Massive HIGH FIVE YOU ROCK to all contributors and the Core Collaborators team for keeping track of it all.
You can find the full list of features and fixes on the 8.11 download page.
Breaking Changes
The breaking change in 8.11 relates to Unattended Installs. The app setting Umbraco.Core.RuntimeState.InstallEmptyDatabase that used to default to false is now obsolete and no longer used at all. Since this was a non-documented configuration we don't think this will affect anyone.
How to test
First, you need to make a new Umbraco installation from 8.11RC (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 8.11 release or submit new bug reports (click New Issue and select Bug Report), please prefix the issue with 8.11RC:.
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 Umbraco 8.11RC
As always, installation and release notes can be found on Our: https://our.umbraco.com/contribute/releases/8110
This release candidate is also available from Nuget: https://www.nuget.org/packages/UmbracoCms/8.11.0-rc
When is the public release?
We’re aiming for a full public release on January 28th, 2020. This means Umbraco 8.11 will be available for upgrade on Umbraco Cloud and via Nuget or the download page. 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 Umbraco 8.11 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 on product@umbraco.com