EE 2.0 Beta, 30 days in
Happy New Years!
I’m writing this update from an undisclosed warm weather location where Rick Ellis, Derek Jones, and I are convening to plan out the next year. Yes, its our annual World Domination Summit. There is energy and excitement in the air (along with the promise of good Brazilian BBQ). We think 2010 is going to be special, but let’s start by reviewing what’s happened in the last 30 days.
Let’s start this update by welcoming Jamie Rumbelow to the EllisLab Team. If you spend any time over at CodeIgniter you probably already know Jamie. Since EE is now on CI I want to formally introduce Jamie to the ExpressionEngine community. Jamie is our new CodeIgniter Chieftain. If you’ve ever had the pleasure of meeting Jamie in person you know that its a title that fits him well and will be a great win for the community due to his passion and commitment to code and people.
I was extremely pleased to discover that Ryan Irelan’s ExpressionEngine 2.0 Quick Start Guide was Pragmatic’s top selling direct online sales book for December. A big thank you to every one who bought it and a big congrats to Ryan!
During the first week of EE 2.0 Beta’s release our dev team performed as promised. There were four build updates within 7 days as our team diligently responded to community feedback. The blog has been quiet but anybody in the beta knows that we’ve been very active on the forums working closely with the community.
We are now 30+ days into the EE 2.0 Public Beta and the dev team is putting the finishing touches on ExpressionEngine v2.0.1. This will be the first significant update to the Public Beta as it includes the implementation of the Custom Field API and its documentation for third party developers. This will open up a more focused conversion path for 3rd party developers that need their add-ons to integrate with the Publish/Edit pages.
There are also additional bug fixes along with a few highly requested UI tweaks.
After EE 2.0.1 our focus will shift from primarily responding to issues to focusing on a few of the larger goals for the beta.
Let me also give a big, heartfelt thank you to the EE Community. The high quality feedback that started way back in the Developer preview, and then in both phases of the private beta, has continued in the Public Beta.
Your ability to ferret out issues, file good bug reports, tell your use case stories, and work closely with our staff and team to resolve issues is a testament to how communities should work together. We’re very proud to be working for you and we’re blown away that sales have exceeded expectations.
What I want to emphasize to the community is that this is a beta and that means you have the opportunity to influence the final result. That’s the entire purpose of the beta and part of what made EE 1.X so special. This opportunity is now yours for EE 2.X. Many of you are already taking advantage of this opportunity and I encourage you to continue that with your feedback and the conversations we’re seeing on the forums and elsewhere.
This also includes the chance to influence your favorite 3rd party developer. Make sure you talk to them about what you want them to do with EE 2.X. The EE dev community is awesome. If you’ve never checked it out before start by heading over to EE Insider and Devot-ee.
Together we can make 2010 the year of ExpressionEngine.
I need to close this update with a public thank you to our tireless support staff. On December 2nd they were handed a very big challenge, and have been doing a fantastic job. They put in overtime, worked extra shifts, and went beyond the call of duty to support the release. In the space of 7 days our community grew at an accelerated pace and our support team handled it like artisians.
Ingmar, Sue, John, Greg, Adam, and Lisa, thank you!
See you on the forums, next update in two weeks.
