It's been almost a year and a half since Jamroom 5.2 was released , and today we're kicking off the Beta release of Jamroom 5.3!

Jamroom 5.3 builds on Jamroom 5.2 and adds some really cool new features.  Our plan is to run Jamroom 5.3 as a beta release for a little bit so we can get feedback and input from the Jamroom community on how things are working.  It should be much more stable than a "normal" beta, as it is improvements and enhancements that continue Jamroom 5.2, but this way we can be sure that those users running 5.3 know that things could change based on feedback.

So what's new in Jamroom 5.3?  We've been working hard for the last 4-5 weeks on some ideas we have had for a while to make Jamroom easier to use.  Most of the Jamroom 5.3 features are on the "ACP" (admin control panel) side of things, so updating to the new Jamroom 5.3 Core should be pretty easy - there's no template changes that are going to need to be integrated in to your custom skin (if you have created one).  Our goal with Jamroom 5.3 was to focus on usability - making things easier to use on a day to day basis for Jamroom admins.

New System Wide Recycle Bin

Jamroom 5.3 has a new system "Recycle Bin" that can help you recover if items (profile, users, blog posts, etc.) are accidentally deleted on your system.  You can configure the length of time items will remain in the Recycle Bin before being permanently deleted, and you'll find the new "Recycle Bin" tab in the Dashboard.

Updated ACP

We've updated the Admin Control panel with better search, new module categories that are designed to make it easier to find what you're looking for, as well as a new "Dashboard" tab that makes it easy to switch back and forth between the ACP and the Dashboard.  Module jumpers have also been updated with module categories to make it easier to quickly move to the module you're looking for.

Updated Dashboard

We've updated the Dashboard layout to now include the new Recycle Bin, as well as the core Queue Viewer.  We've also updated the Activity Log section to have the Debug and Error logs available, and have generally gone through all the Dashboard screens and tweaked and updated things to make it easier to get around.  There is a new "ACP" tab as well for Master Admins to easily switch between the ACP and Dashboard.

Improved HTML formatting and clean-up

Jamroom 5.3 will do a much better job of "cleaning up" malformed HTML that might be entered on the site - this can prevent a page from appearing "broken" because some embedded HTML did not have the proper closing tags (which can happen if you are truncating user input to include in lists on your site).  HTML is now scanned and all tags are "closed" that have been left open, which should prevent anything from spilling over.

CSS Sprite Icons updated for HiRes displays

The Core provided icons that are used throughout the site have been updated to serve "hi-res" versions to users on high density display devices (i.e. iPad and "retina" screens, etc.) - this should make things look crisper on these new devices.

New "Birthday Date" form designer form field

A new Form Designer form field has been added that allows you to capture dates before 1970 - this is something many Jamroom sites have wanted to allow them to have a "birthday" custom form field.

LOTS of small updates and Tweaks

There are dozens of other small updates and tweaks throughout the Core including an updated Queue Viewer with new Queue tools, updated Performance Check, streamlined ACP search, better layout of Config options and more.

Module updates too!

A lot of work has gone into the new Jamroom Core 5.3, but we also have A LOT of module updates that we're excited about too:

 - All new "Overlay" media players for the Audio, Video and Playlist modules - these new players are more modern and streamlined and look AWESOME on the page.

- Timeline updates to bring the "style" of the Timeline home index page in line with the other pages in the profile.

- All new Spam Blocker module that provides you with new tools to help fight Spam on your site - including user probation, detection of offsite URLs and HTML stripping.  This is a "rename" of the old Akismet module, and it still features integration with the Akismet Blog Spam detection service.

- Updated Aparna module (now in the Developer category) that makes it even easier to create custom modules - includes new Module Description and Icon fields that make your custom modules truly unique in the ACP.

- Updated Developer Tools including new "Reset Categories" tool that will reset your ACP to the new Jamroom 5.3 module category structure, as well as updates to module and skin packaging.

- Updated Search module with new keyword weighting and Rebuild Search Index tool.

We're really excited about Jamroom 5.3 and hope you find the new updates to be helpful and as awesome as we think they are.  If you are the admin of a busy Jamroom site, the new updates - the streamlined Dashboard and new Spam Blocker module - should really help your ongoing support work.

If you would like to participate in the Jamroom 5.3 beta, make sure you subscribe to the "BETA" channel in your Jamroom Marketplace Module:

ACP -> Core -> Marketplace -> Tools -> Release Channels - Click on "Make Active" to the right of the "BETA" channel

This will enable you to browse and install Beta items in the Marketplace.  After the change, going to the System Updates tab will show you the new Jamroom 5.3 release you can update too.

Make sure and join us in the Jamroom User Support forum with any Jamroom 5.3 questions and we can help.

We hope you enjoy Jamroom 5.3!

- The Jamroom Team

We’ve been hard at work for the past month working on a bunch of exciting updates and changes to Jamroom Hosting - new features and options that will help you get the most out of your Jamroom Hosting Server:

New Server Plans and Prices

We’re excited to roll out 3 new server plans (4G, 8G and 12G) that offer a smaller server for those that have been looking to use Jamroom Hosting, but couldn’t afford the $49 per month for our entry level server, or didn’t have the need for the larger amount of disk space.

These 3 new servers sizes feature smaller size SSD disks (4 Gig, 8 Gig and 12 Gig) - and you can get started with Jamroom Hosting from only $19 per month!  These 3 new servers have the same level of features that all other Jamroom Hosting servers enjoy - namely FREE modules and skins, daily backups and ticket support.  The only difference is the lower price and small disk space.

We know there’s quite a few of you who have contacted us since we rolled out Jamroom Hosting looking for a lower priced plan - we’re excited to finally roll that out.

All Jamroom plans have been updated with a new plan name as well (i.e. the “old” 2G server is now the 48G server, etc.)

To get started with one of these new servers click on the big orange "Hosting" link on your Profile.

New 7 Day Free Trial for new Jamroom Hosting users

Have you wanted to check out Jamroom hosting but weren’t sure if it would work for you?  We’re now offering a 7 day free trial of the new Jamroom 4G server so you can check it out.  You can test out all the Jamroom features “for real” for 7 days.

All Server bandwidth is now UNLIMITED

We purchase bandwidth from our provider in bulk, and by far the majority of our hosting servers are under their bandwidth allocation in any given month.  So we’ve decided to remove this “cap” all together - all servers now have unlimited bandwidth - within reason of course   Our goal here is to make it be one less thing you have to think about or worry about.  We will let you know if you’re using an INSANE amount of traffic and will work with you to make sure you’re accommodated.

One Click Server Upgrades - and Downgrades

Previously you had to contact us via Ticket to get your server “downsized” - our Hosting tools can now downsize your server for you as well - as long as your used disk space amount fits into the smaller plan.  Our goal is to make sure you feel like you’re getting a great value for your Hosting - if you’re not using the power of your current plan, downgrading is easy.  If you’re not sure - let us know - we can recommend the proper server size for your existing Jamroom work load.

New Email Delivery Log

One of the most frequent tickets that is opened for hosting is that a Jamroom site owner will have one of their users contact them and tell them they are not receiving email notifications from the Jamroom site.  We now have an easy to browse Email Delivery Log (located in the Domain settings for the site you want to check out) - this lets you easily see any email errors or issues that might be happening when delivering email to your users.

Updated “Change Jamroom Admin Info” tool

You can now change the user name and/or password for ANY Jamroom Master Admin account in your Jamroom.  Did you forget your master admin account password?  You can easily set it now from within the Domain Settings section for the Domain you want to set the password for.

We’ve also spent time tweaking and updating a lot of functions to make them more robust and easier to use, so we hope that new AND existing Hosting customers will find the new updates as awesome as we do

If you have any questions about Jamroom Hosting, make sure and join us in our Jamroom User Forum:

https://www.jamroom.net/the-jamroom-network/forum/jamroom-hosting

and let us know how we can help.

Thanks!

The Jamroom Team

I've just uploaded a new module to the Jamroom Marketplace - User Photo Albums.

User Photo Albums is an advanced module that allows your users to easily create and manage photo albums based on the images in your system. Supports both the Gallery and Flickr modules. Users who are not logged in can also create photo albums, and they will be saved to their account once they signup.

This module was generously sponsored by @roy-simmons and @artemis who run the site http://pmp-art.com

User Photo Albums is based on, and works the same as the User Playlists module. When hovering over a gallery or flickr image, an 'add to album' button shows and when clicked, the user gets a popup prompting for a new album name, or to optionally add this image to an existing album.

All user photo albums are 'Jamroom Items' and are then accessible in the normal way via their profile pages.

https://www.jamroom.net/the-jamroom-network/networkmarket/261/user-photo-albums

We've been hard at work here "behind the scenes" improving Jamroom Hosting, and while many of our recent changes are small, there's been a lot of work put into making the system faster, more stable and easier to use.

Today we have just taken the wraps off a big piece of our hosting puzzle - Server Backups.  Previously when you wanted to restore a backup of your server, you would have to open a ticket with us and we would handle the restoral for you.  However, it was a FULL server restoral - in other words, the entire server was wiped out and restored.  While this worked just fine, it was often "overkill" if you happened to be working on a new domain and just needed a few things restored.

With our new Backups we are rolling out today, all backups are handled at the Domain level - just like everything else in Jamroom Hosting.  This lets you restore a single Domain on your server without impacting (or even shutting down) your server.  This way any other domains on your server will be unaffected.  We've found that often the users that need a site restored are those that are doing active development on a NEW site - so this makes things A LOT more flexible as you can simply restore the domain you are working on to the previous backup.

Currently we are maintaining one FULL backup, and then a weeks worth of Incremental backups , and you can restore to any of them in your Domain Settings section.  Note that if your site is really large, it can take several hours for the restoral to be completed.

You will find the new "Restore from Backup" option in your Domain Settings section.  We have also reorganized the Domain Settings section to hopefully make things a bit cleaner and simpler to understand.

Some other updates:

• You can now change the Master Admin user name (as well as the password) from your Domain Settings -> Change Jamroom Admin Info section.  Note that this requires the Master Admin be user_id #1 - if you have deleted and re-created the Master Admin account, then this will not work (you can contact us if you are locked out of your Jamroom for any reason).

• The "Import a Jamroom 5 Site" tool has been updated to be a bit more robust and can now work with FTP servers that are running on a different IP Address than the web server.

Hopefully these new changes make it even easier for you when you're working in the Hosting control panel.  If anyone has any questions or spots any issues, please let us know

Thanks!