BlogEngine 2.5 - quick overview

27. June 2011 11:52 by rtur.net in BlogEngine  //  Tags:   //   Comments (11)

BlogEngine 2.5 final release is ready for download, and most anticipated new feature is obviously ability to run multiple blogs on single code base. It's been a top request for a while, so hopefully it'll make lots of people happy. You can read in-depth about it on Ben's blog, I'm not going to repeat it here. Just want to say - don't dismiss it if you only going to run one blog, it can be helpful in many ways. I for one planning on little family "members only" site working as sub-blog and another used as private Wiki. All on the same code base, with single update cycle - can be a time saver.

Another big feature is integration with online gallery that currently will let you install themes from web store to your blog with a button click. This feature is largely experimental and might be responsible for future direction that project will take. We definitely going to see extensions/widgets from online gallery in admin panel in the next version, but potential is so much bigger. I really hope this works out well. If you customizing BlogEngine, consider doing it by creating reusable code so it can be NuGet-packaged and shared with community - sharing is fun :)

BlogEngine also updated to .net 4.0 and made a move to utilize web pages (Razor). Decision was definitely not driven by "cool" factor - after quick evaluation team came to conclusion that Razor is great template engine with clean output and should save time in the long run. Plus there is possibility to take advantage of growing number of HTML helpers that can be used as extensions, sometimes with no modification needed. Sure as with any new technology it requires investment up front, but you have to give some to get some, right? Only new functionality and parts of the site that needed complete refactoring to support new features were coded in Razor, and move in that direction will probably be slow but steady. Don't see web forms support dropped any time soon.

There were few changes to generated HTML output in attempt to address some of the pain-points in building custom themes, specifically in form/comment view. This should give more control and make design tasks a little easier, admittedly more needs to be done. Not much changes to spam protection this time around, which is a good sign - 2.0 got strong tools to fight spam. One small change is turning simple captcha on by default and including it as a another field in the form, so it looks more natural.

Comments (11) -

blogenginewall
blogenginewall
6/29/2011 2:44:47 PM #

Hello Ruslan,

Thanks for the Gallery integration and a detailed information here.

Regards, http://www.blogenginewall.com/

Rene
Rene
7/2/2011 7:43:04 PM #

Great job! Some nice new features. I installed it on the live server today, ran some tests, and found the whole is about 20 percent faster. I posted the test results here, if you're interested: http://blog.re-net.nl/post/2011/07/02/BlogEngineNet-25-20-percent-faster.aspx

Alfonso
Alfonso
7/11/2011 7:42:17 PM #

Hello,

I am unable to save comments using Boldy them and BlogEngine.Net 2.5, any advice is appreciated.

Thanks

rtur.net
rtur.net
7/12/2011 9:02:23 AM #

Saving comment is ajax/js driven. Check with FireBug or alike to see if it shows any errors. Most common in my experience - conflicting javascript libraries.

xiamenhenre
xiamenhenre
7/30/2011 3:49:16 AM #

I like it

Zuo Modern
Zuo Modern
8/2/2011 3:53:38 AM #

cool blog

Fatboy
Fatboy
8/8/2011 5:44:57 AM #

nice posts

Soan
Soan
9/1/2011 6:56:54 AM #

Hi Rtur,

I am currently running my blog on BE 1.6 version and was trying to integrate BE 2.5.
My website's structure is like this (http://am22tech.com):

1. Root     ->Contains my custom code and some pages.
2. Root\Blogs\ -> Contains all BE specific code. Some common folders like app_FOLDERS are in Root.
3. Root\Forum1 -> This folder contains code for YAF (Yet Another Forum).

Now, when i run my site, system is able to run my custom pages from root, BE when I link to Root\Blogs\Default.aspx and Forum when i link to Root\Forum1\Default.aspx.

But this scenario does not work with BE 2.5. When i try to fit-in BE in the above structure, it always shows up the BE home page i.e. does not matter if i am at Root\Default.aspx or Root\Forum1\Default.aspx or Root\Blogs\Default.aspx. All three links show the home page of BE 2.5.

This behavior is really different than BE 1.6 oe BE 2.0. I tested the same scenario in BE2.0 and it works fine but breaks in BE 2.5.

Do you have any idea about what could be causing this issue. Also, I would appreciate if you can throw some light on how to integrate BE 2.5 wth existing website.

rtur.net
rtur.net
9/2/2011 9:21:34 AM #

Hi Soan, I usually set BE as sub-application to avoid any conflicts. So unless you need deep integration with shared security etc., I'd set BE, blogs and forums as 3 separate applications in IIS, each with it's own global.asax and web.config (can even be on separate app pools). Root usually serves as static front page, or .aspx if you need it dynamic.
Most changes with BE 2.5 due to multi-blogging feature, so you might be facing issues related to URL rewriting that changed to support multiple instances.  

Aman Thakral
Aman Thakral
9/14/2011 10:49:52 AM #

Can we have some documentation? How to write themes using Razor Engine. I think that will help a lot.

Regards
Aman

Venu Yankarla
Venu Yankarla
10/26/2011 1:26:41 PM #

Alfonso,  were you able to fix your issue of "saving comments".  I do have the same issue .

Thanks
Venu

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