Hi all,
I would like to keep you updated on some of the recent developments about Icy Phoenix.

Me and all developers are working on the whole package trying to improve some existing aspects but also implementing some new features.

Mainly we are focusing on performances and code optimization: trying to reduce the number of files and inclusions and creating classes for higher scalability and performances.

Regarding these aspects I would like you to know that I have decided to invest most part of donations received so far for a paid code audit by an external professional coder: this means that a specialized PHP coder will go through the code of the core files mainly trying to catch security holes and bugs, but also trying to improve the overall code by writing new code which helps with performance.

As you may imagine this kind of job is time consuming, and professional coders are not that cheap. This is why I'm also starting a new initiative here.

Starting from today, 90% of all the donations received until the end of February will be re-invested into code audit, while 10% will be donated to Haiti Cause.

Keep in mind that this project is open source, nobody has been charged for using it so far, and never will be. The amount you are willing to donate will be almost interely re-invested (apart of a small percentage that will go to charity) for improving the platform and your sites performances and security. I guess it is a great opportunity for us all to do something good for ourselves and the whole community.


How much should I donate?

Well that depends on how much you trust Open Source and how much your site is depending upon Icy Phoenix. Let me try to help you with some numbers / suggestions:

• Icy Phoenix is open source, you have never been charged for using it, and you will never be.
  
• Professional CMS platforms usually require a one time fee for the license plus an annual fee for supports and updates: on average pricing for the license is around 200 euros while about 100 euros are required for annual support fee (these amounts may also be really high for some kinds of products).
  
• If your site is based upon Icy Phoenix, you have a good ratio of visits per day, and you are generating some revenues from your site, then you should really consider donating at least 30 euros to this initiative.
  
• If you come regularly here (on this website) to get helped or styles or customization, and you think you found what you needed, maybe you should consider donating starting from 20 euros.
  
• If your site is based upon Icy Phoenix, your community is quite big, but you are not generating income from your site, then a donation of 10 euros will be highly appreciated.
  
• If your site is based upone Icy Phoenix, your site is amatorial and you don't mind about futures developments, well, then you don't need to donate unless you are feeling happy today!

Please keep in mind that I'm not forcing anyone to donate, feel free to donate or not, and please donate only if you trust this project and the open source world.


Also I would like to remind you that all donators who donate at least 10 euros will become part of a Special Group which have access to a special section where special content and informations are provided.


I will keep you updated about the total amount received and how those money will be used to improve Icy Phoenix.

Thank you for reading, and thank you in advance to all those who will donate.

Also a big thank you to all users that donated so far and allowed me to upgrade to a new server with higher performances.



Link to donation pages: Donations - Donate

PATCH REPLACED BY PATCH FOR 1.3.0.53b
______________

Hi all,
here is the first patch of Icy Phoenix 1.3.0.53 which will upgrade your version to 1.3.0.53a.

How to install this patch:

1. Make a full backup, both files and DB
   
2. Download the patch from the link below
   
3. Extract the package on your hard disk
   
4. Copy the install folder in the root of your website
   
5. Launch install/database_update.php
   
6. Upload all files into your website by replacing old ones (please note that you may have customized some files like constants.php or lang_main_settings.php, and you may want to update them before uploading)
   
7. Enjoy your updated website!

Should you have any kind of error, please use the support forum to report it..

Thanks.

Hi all,
I have just updated this site to the latest SVN release.

This version is still unstable, but I needed to test some things on live environment, and I have decided to take the risk on Icy Phoenix main site.

I hope everything is working in a decent way, otherwise... I'll try to fix bugs as soon as possible.

Please use the General Support forum to report all the bugs you will find here.

Here are some of the new Icy Phoenix features:

• Cache Functions ported from phpBB 3
  
• DB Class ported from phpBB 3
  
• Many Core Functions ported from phpBB 3
  
• Many SQL rewritten
  
• Optimized templates parsing
  
• Improved SEO functions all over the CMS
  
• Tags feature
  
• Custom BBCodes in ACP
  
• New Plugins system
  
• Some new AJAX functions in CMS
  
• Private AJAX Chat rooms
  
• Many smaller updates and features... install the SVN version to discover all of them!

phpBB 3 styles in Styles section have been updated to phpBB 3.0.6. I have also updated ColorizeIt to the brand new version which is more accurate and will allow many extra features and colorizations opportunites, go checking it!

I will try to show you the benefit of some of the new features in the following days... stay tuned!

In the meantime, you should notice a performance increase in pages loading in this website.

Enjoy Icy Phoenix!

Luca Libralato

Hi all,
I would like you to know that we are going to move to a brand new server soon.

Hopefully some day during next week... I still don't know the final schedule, but we will make our best to be online ASAP.

The new server has a better and newer hardware configuration, so I'm expecting that this site will benefit that.

Stay tuned!

Hi all,
I have created two new sections to keep releases diversified from discussions and developments topics about MODs and Styles.

The new sections are Customizations And MODs Discussions and Templates And Styles Discussions.

These new sections are open for all and can be used for any kind of discussions about those topics. Customizations and Styles releases will be moved to the main Styles and Customizations sections (where only Staff can post new topics).

This new setup should help to keep discussions apart from releases.

For any query do not hesitate to ask in this topic.

Soul Eater Italia has been chosen as the first winner in our monthly Show Off Of The Month contest! HaoAsakura's style was chosen based on several factors, but mainly the overall graphical genius exhibited.



HaoAsakura will receive a special graphic to display on his website, special guest access, and his website featured in our links section!

If you are interested in submitting your Icy Phoenix website in our next Show Off Of The Month contest, please visit the following link to get more details:

Show Off Of The Month Contest

Please be sure to congratulate HaoAsakura for his hard work!

Hi all,
here is the third stable release of Icy Phoenix.

What's New Respect To Latest Stable Release

• CMS Administration recoded with new features (some AJAX) and restyled
  
• CMS Blocks and Layouts recoded from scratch to increase flexibility and performance (now block style is in a single file to help designing new styles)
  
• CMS Standard Pages now is more flexible... can also handle new pages (even if a little code should be added to those pages to work correctly)
  
• Removed the old CMS Pages Permissions section in CMS which has been replaced by the new Standard Pages section
  
• New template structure: it is now possible to create brand new templates by just creating a CSS and a CFG file, this will reduce the number of files needed for each template, reducing also the job in case of updates or customizations; not only, you will be able to easily create combinations between different templates without having to duplicate directory structure
  
• Common CMS and ACP templates now fully independent from all other templates
  
• Common JS and CSS in common folder and possibility to include extra CSS and JS via PHP without editing TPL
  
• Some Functions and other common includes splitted among several files to reduce memory charge and increase performance
  
• Created new overall vars and switches to increase flexibility and performances (old switches were based upon loops, new ones are based on conditions, which are faster to be processed)
  
• English language files grammatically reviewed (thanks Lopalong!) and in some cases updated to the new phpBB 3 format
  
• New Junior Admin permission which gives full admin power while in the forum but restricted in ACP and CMS (ACP modules can be assigned via Junior Admin management and CMS permission for CMS management)
  
• Brand new Statistics system which integrates new features and replace also old Site History page
  
• Bots Parsing now is DB dependent and bots can now have REG access... also you can now add a switch for bots in TPL files to avoid bots spidering something you don't want them to
  
• URL Rewrite modified to be more efficient
  
• Print Page improved
  
• Added Google Search page to be used alternatively the standard search system, this will reduce the charge on your server
  
• Colorize username function recoded to reduce looping and cache issues with a large userbase
  
• Recoded caching system which in older Icy Phoenix version was proved to fail for high traffic sites: this new way to cache should be more efficient and should reduce CPU charge under stressing condition
  
• Birthdays and Calendar should now use less resources than before, again big sites will benefit from this
  
• New CRON system which should be easier to be customized and improved... basic functions already added, new features to come with future versions...
  
• Created new user related functions to simplify Icy Phoenix integration and coding: user_get_avatar, build_im_link, PM Class, generate_user_info
  
• AJAX Sorting in some ACP and CMS pages to speed up things in administrating things
  
• New Recent Topics page allowing admins to track latest users activity
  
• Forums Sorting capabilities both by adding alphabetical sorts and columns headers links
  
• Higher Lang Encoding compatibility
  
• Mass PM feature integrated in Mass Email section
  
• Brand new Ads and Banners system
  
• Mass Email supports now full HTML format for nicely formatted newsletters
  
• Smileys Categories section... it is hardcoded to improve performances even with thousands of smileys
  
• Step by step DB Backup System similar to MySQLDumper... to avoid nasty timeouts when backing up the site
  
• HighSlide JS (http://highslide.com/) integration
  
• Event Registration feature has been added
  
• Fixed a lot of bugs in IE
  
• Many smaller updates and features... install the new version to discover all of them!

Older templates: Please note that the template system has been totally revamped, so templates designed for 1.2.0.27 or below won't work at all with this version. Check the new styles section for templates which already work with this version: Styles.


Translations: Please note that lang packs for 1.2.0.27 won't work with this version. Lang packs need to be updated before you can use them on your site. I will update all lang files in download section as soon as translators will send me their latest release. Currently lang files for Icy Phoenix 1.3 RC 2 should work fine even if not fully up to date. You can find latest development translations here: http://code.assembla.com/icyphoenix_langs/subversion/nodes/trunk


Customizations And Mods: Please note that this version has many core difference from the previous one, so it is really unlikely that old customizations and mods will work with this brand new release. If you have some mods installed and you cannot update them on your own, please be patient until the author or the person who have ported them to Icy Phoenix will find some free time to update them.

• Requirements
  
  Spoiler: [ Show ]

  Spoiler: [ Hide ]

  Readme
  
  
• Fresh Installation
  
  Spoiler: [ Show ]

  Spoiler: [ Hide ]

  Readme
  
  
• How To Upgrade From phpBB 2
  
  Spoiler: [ Show ]

  Spoiler: [ Hide ]

  Readme
  
  
• How To Upgrade From Old Icy Phoenix Versions
  
  Spoiler: [ Show ]

  Spoiler: [ Hide ]

  Readme
  
  
• How To Upgrade From Icy Phoenix Beta OR RC Versions
  
  Spoiler: [ Show ]

  Spoiler: [ Hide ]

  Upgrading from Beta versions is really easy... just upload all new files and run install/database_update.php.
  Pay attention to customized files, CHMOD permissions and config.php when overwriting.

Available Packages



GIT Links
https://github.com/MightyGorgon/icy_phoenix


SVN Links
Using a client:


Using a browser:


SourceForge Page
Icy Phoenix @ SourceForge

Ohloh Page
Icy Phoenix @ Ohloh

Support

All older versions of Icy Phoenix will not be supported any more, you are invited to upgrade to the latest stable release which adds many improvements to the system and it is more secure.

Please note that if you decide to upgrade your existing site with this version, you may face some problems and you may not be able to recover your datas in case something goes wrong. Make sure you have a full backup before proceeding.

Should you ask for support, please remember that this is an open source community and me and all the Staff are doing all for free and in their spare time... be kind, be patient and respect other users efforts and hard work.



Enjoy Icy Phoenix!
Luca Libralato

We're ready to begin taking nominations for our first Show Off Of The Month contest!

If you know of a website using Icy Phoenix that features outstanding graphical design, nominate that website to be considered for our Show Off Of The Month! The staff will be taking nominations for websites that have a certain graphical genius to them. We will then select the best three nominated websites and vote anonymously on the absolute best!

The winning website will:

• Receive a special graphic from Icy Phoenix to display on their website showing their website was voted the best!
  
• Gain access to the Special Guests group!
  
• Have their website featured in our Links section!

As with any contest, there are special rules:



TheSteffen created a small graphic for the winner of each contest:

---

The contest is now officially open, so start nominating! We will allow two full weeks of nothing but nominations. Post your nominations in a separate post in THIS TOPIC. After two weeks, the Staff will review all nominated websites and submit their votes for best graphical design. The winner will be announced after voting!