XF announces surprise 2.4 (and potential 2.5!)

[joelr]

https://xenforo.com/community/threads/coming-soon-xenforo-2-4.225302/

XF dropped a surprise message on Fri morning about an unexpected and surprise 2.4 release. This pushes up their timetable for releasing the new TipTap editor, which will be exciting.

Up until this point, there was no mention of any other intermediate releases after 2.3, with the next release to be 3.0 to be theme related.

This prolongs the 2.x life cycle and gives XF clients more runway on their 2.x site. XF clients can also look forward to more front end feature, not just a theme update.

 

[Tracy]

Sounds like the heat finally got high enough that they realized that they really needed to concentrate on bringing some improvements for the users (members) of the sites that run XenForo.
But it remains to be seen what those improvements are, and if they are just stubbed out functions that beg for 3rd party developers to make really useful, which is frequently been the path taken, or if they will have some meat on their bones.
Hopefully they will decide to color outside the very narrow lines that they have in the past.

I do like the fact that the new editor will be included in the 2.4 version... but it's just one more thing to slow down the updating of those 3rd party add-ons that many sites consider important.
We are 3 months into the 2.3 version and there are still many add-ons (several that are paid ones) that have not been updated. I have to wonder if now those developers will even be working on their 2.3 versions now since it does sound like 2.4 may have some additional core changes?

EDIT:
From reading in the discussion thread (something I rarely do over there other than for bug reports and resources I use) it appears that they are going to try to keep 2.4 so that it should not negatively impact the 2.3 add-ons. So that's a good thing.

 

[Tracy]

But.. this is CLASSIC example of issues with some of the XF staff... when your software is SO dependent upon 3rd party developers... it is ultimately a YOU problem and not a 3rd party developer issue.

and then you have

I think some people with XF miss the fact that the very DEPENDENCE on 3rd party developers for XenForo makes it a YOU problem and not a THEM problem.
That's why I've been such a bastich about riding them about it. And yes, they got their feelers hurt for being called out about it and I paid the price I was willing to for pointing out much of their hypocrisy, specifically apparently pissing Chris off by directly calling him out.

Hopefully they may finally are seeing the light that their dependence on 3rd parties to make their software work as many others do natively is negatively impacting them. And maybe they are being pushed to FINALLY looking forward and not through their limited view rose glasses.
It's not them that generate their paychecks... it is the customers that use their script. And yes, they ARE dependent upon the needs of those customers and sometimes their (the developers) egos need to take a seat in the back of the bus. They really need to pay more attention to what their license holders are asking for and less on what strokes their egos.
And yes, I have high hopes that maybe the XF developers are starting to wake up to reality. Doesn't do me a lot of good, but it may help others.
I still say that XF has a LOT of potential it is missing out on because of the limited view of the developers. It has the potential to be SO much better than almost any script out there if they would push the envelope.
Yes, IPS has more developers and offers a more fully functional offering for their license holders... but XF could easily engage some of those very 3rd party developers to pursue those offerings into 1st party ones, the very way they did with XFMG.

 

[Retro]

Tracy, if they can convince a cynic like you that they're turned a corner, then they've really turned things around there. We need another 6 months to a year to really be able to say how much things have improved. Personally, I'm feeling optimistic given the updates I'm seeing recently.

 

[Tracy]

I would not classify myself as a cynic... but a skeptic.
I look at past behavior as an indicator for future behavior.

 

[Retro]

Ok, skeptic is a better description, really.

 

[Carlos]

But.. this is CLASSIC example of issues with some of the XF staff... when your software is SO dependent upon 3rd party developers... it is ultimately a YOU problem and not a 3rd party developer issue..

I said this in another thread. They're gaslighting their customer base. This is gonna piss off a lot of coders, who THEY do need to rely on. Like, for example, the 2.3 skin thing... here...

In fact here's a designer who pointed it out to me:

They're aware and seem to have no intention of changing it. They don't want to force a design onto someone. If someone has dark mode set, they want dark mode loading.

I get where they're coming from, but I don't agree with it and am glad Kirby made the plugin he did.

https://xenforo.com/community/threads/set-light-variation-as-default-for-guests.221745/

Ongoing discussion here with quite a few staff responses in it.

I agree with that comment. I run gaming websites, when people come to the site, they expect dark mode. Here's my 2.3 launch thread:
https://www.codforums.com/threads/welcome-to-xenforo-2-3.22135/

 

[Tracy]

I said this in another thread. They're gaslighting their customer base. This is gonna piss off a lot of coders, who THEY do need to rely on. Like, for example, the 2.3 skin thing... here...

Errr... of late I have not been a defender of XF... but in this case, I have to step up to the plate for them.
If you (or your user) wants to use day/night system preferences for their system, that is EXACTLY what their light/dark style does. YOUR wants don't mean crap for that user if you elect to offer the OS system preference choice.

If you wan to FORCE a light style as a default, you ALREADY have that ability in that you can have either two different styles or a base light style and a child dark style as selectable options with the light being set as the system default in either case.

Ultimately this is already handled well and is simply someone wanting to add a complication in. I can somewhat see what they reference as they want the benefits of a forced base color (light/dark) preference to be forced on everyone and then those that want to use system be able to do so. That allows them to only maintain one style... but with child styles, it's not really THAT hard to do now. In fact, in many cases you may want your dark to have some different settings that the native system does not control. I don't run 2.3 (because several needed add-ons are not supported for it yet)... so I don't know if you have options to set up a default style as one option and then the native dark version of it as a child or not. I could see the benefit of that in a few cases for those that don't want to have to maintain extra styles.

I agree with that comment. I run gaming websites, when people come to the site, they expect dark mode. Here's my 2.3 launch thread:

And that's easy enough to control now...
Alternative dark style

Base dark style (system default)

Base light style

Night vision style

 

[joelr]

Night vision style

That's pretty clever to do a "night vision" in shades of red on a black vase.