Improvements on Joomla 1.5 (in detail)

There was nothing that was explicitly mentioned in joomla.org about the features
presented in Joomla 1.5, only the main goals which was a bit too vague for me. So I googled on the web and came up with this page (which actually is selling a book about Joomla). I wasn't interested in buying anything so I'll just post what I is said on subject matter.

(View Source Link)

In Detail

Improvements include:

Internationalization: UTF-8 coding throughout, support of right-to-left text flow, and optional language files for all static text facilitate I18n of public front end and administrative back end alike.

User Plug-ins: Allow alternative login mechanisms etc.

Databases: An abstraction interface supports MySQL 4.x or 5.x and future use of other databases.

FTP: A new FTP interface avoids PHP safe mode access problems.

XML-RPC: Support for web service integration of external applications.

Joomla! Framework: Fundamental overhaul of the core functionality provides a better framework for component and extension developers.

Accessibility: Separation of front-end programming logic and presentation aids compliance with accessibility standards and future barrier-free websites.

SEF: Improved support for search-engine friendly URLs with extensions.
These changes mean that you cannot upgrade an existing Joomla! 1.0.x site to 1.5 by simply overwriting the files. Instead you must migrate the site, using a migrator component to dump the old site and an import facility in the Joomla! 1.5 installation, or manually. Since Joomla! 1.5 is on beta release, it should not yet be used in a production environment or if you have important data.

Joomla 1.5 is an improved version of the Joomla Content Management System, which is one of the leading Open-source CMSes. While still in its Beta 1 version, Joomla! 1.5 is still as easy to use as its earlier stable version, but with substantial improvements. Joomla! 1.5 implements the core requirements of a full-featured CMS. It has a powerful and extensible templating system with the ability to upload and manage many different data types. User access control, content approval, rich administrative control, and content display scheduling are all built-in. New features and extensions are constantly added to the core system, with many more being available and supported by the community.