We realise it can be confusing sometimes... we release 1.5 beta1, then we continue with 1.9, and today we release the second beta for 2.0.
This all has to do with the new approach we are working out, the change from 1.1.x to 2.x is major and has influence on our team structure as well.

But most important: VirtueMart 2.0 beta2 is now available for download!

Changes in this release

Here is a list of changes compared with the (1.5) beta 1 release. When 2.0 Final comes to you, we will publish a full list of changes.

• Compatible with Joomla 1.6
• Review system implemented
• Currency system implemented
• Coupons are now supported
• New plugin system for Shipping and Payments (fully documented)
• Updated the All-In-One module, including a few plugins

Furthermore, a lot of changes have been made that improve performance dramatically, SEF improvents have been made and a lot of bugs, reported in the 1st beta, have been fixed.

What's next?

First, we want to thank you all for your patience and your feedback on our first beta.
There are still a few open issues to be solved, but our main focus now is to get the currently supported functionality as bugfree as possible. Remember this is complete rewrite from scratch!

Known issues in this release include:

• Downloads not yet supported
• Media does not work yet as we would like it (multiple pictures not supported, resizing not userfriendly)
• Not all emails use the layout system yet
• Some issues in the currency system with fixed rates

Some of the open issues will (like Downloads) will probably not be solved in 2.0 but postponed for the 2.2 release (2.1 will be our next development release).

Download

You can download the new release as a Joomla component install kit. The All-In-One module is available as a Joomla Module install kit:

• com_virtuemart_2.0-beta2.zip (1.8 MB)
• mod_virtuemart_allinone_2.0-beta2.zip (35.3 KB)

Once again, a big Thank You to all of you for your continuous support!

Some days ago the VirtueMart Team was informed of another security problem, found by Steven Seely of Stratsec. That's why we have made available a patch for VirtueMart 1.1.7 to fix this security issue. All VirtueMart users are urged to apply this patch as soon as possible. How to do that: Follow the instructions in our Security Bulletin 2011-02-18.

About this patch
VirtueMart 1.1.7a is a patch that fixes an SQL injection problem that was revealed after VirtueMart 1.1.7 had been released. Read more about it in our Security Bulletin 2011-02-18.

Thanks to Francesco for developing and creating this patch package so quickly!

The VirtueMart Developer Team has published VirtueMart 1.1.7 to fix a security issue. All VirtueMart users are urged to upgrade to this new version as soon as possible. If you don't want to update, you can simply apply a patch to fix the security issue in your installation.

• Download complete or update package at http://virtuemart.net/downloads
• Check other packages at http://dev.virtuemart.net/redmine/projects/virtuemart/files

Important: please read on before upgrading or installing!

While the beta phase, people very often mixed up the different versions, the name of the file for installation for vm1.1 is com_virtuemart_1.1.5.j15.zip. So people often saw just the 15 and got confused. As we started with vm1.5 it was planned only to port the backend to MVC, fast as possible. But then we decided also to port the frontend and changed a lot core behaviours (Templating, Calculation, Plugins). We were asked why we do not call it virtuemart 2. The core is completly rewritten, the tables differently organized and so on.

So from now on the branch virtuemart 1.5 is renamed to virtuemart 2, to reflect the progress better and to avoid confusion.
We will change all names and projects (redmine, forum) to the new name during the weekend.

In future will use the odd number system, so we could call vm1.5 also vm1.9 or so, but this would lead in the situation now to more confusion. The roadmap for the this year is to complete virtuemart 2 and to enhance it during the year with a wide ranging plugin structure, security, speed and more multi-x features (multistore, multivendor, multidomain). The generall philosophy is now to use the pluginsystem as best as possible and to provide a small stable core.

The next beta (now just vm2beta2 in future versioning system it would have been vm1.9.3) will contain joomla 1.6 compability. It will also contain a coupon system, the review system is on the way. We will provide more layouts and a new template. We are just adding a browse category view (at the moment there is only a browse products of a category view). It will contain more hooks for plugins. When beta2 is released, all 3thd party developers are invited to give ideas to the plugin system (lacking hooks) and to write payment plugins shipped with the payment plugin all in one installer.

Then we freeze implementing features and will take a special look on the security, fix uprising bugs and make a Release Candidate (vm2 RC, in future versioning system vm1.9.4) which should be already ready for operative environment. The deadline for the RC is end of march.
The next subversion vm2.2 maybe end of the year.