The Kunena team has now released Kunena 2.0.4 for J! 1.5 and J! 2.5. K 2.0.4 is a security and maintenance release for Kunena that addresses over 30 issues that were reported since the last version release. The Kunena team recommends this updated version as a replacement for any earlier version of Kunena.
Details about K 2.0.4 are contained in the Kunena 2.0.4 release notes. Although K 2.0.4 is only a minor/dot-point release, there are changes in behaviour between this version and the previous release (K 2.0.3); it essential that people read the release notes before upgrading to better prepare for changes to the way that Kunena now works.
As a security response against possible XSS attacks, K 2.0.4 makes all previous versions of Kunena obsolete and no longer supported by the team. We encourage all users to upgrade to this new version as soon as possible to avoid the possibility that your forum's operations may be compromised as a result of this issue. Questions regarding older versions of Kunena will not be answered on the forum.
With the release of K 2.0.4 out of the way, the Kunena team will now be able to focus attention on the development of K 3.0. The essential differences between K 3.0 and K 2.0 are
- K 3.0 will not support J! 1.5
- K 3.0 will support J! 2.5 and J! 3.0
K 2.0.4 Highlights
- Two potential XSS vulnerabilities have been detected and changes have been made to address these.
- Changes that affect forum announcements
- General improvements to forum administration (backend) features
- Fixes to many reported problems with Kunena menu types that failed to work since the introduction of K 2.0
- Resolution of problems using the Trash Manager
- Changed behaviour: Changed behaviour: Guests are able to view results of polls (although they are not permitted to vote); logged-in users (who have not yet voted) will not be able to see the results of the poll until after they have voted. The team is aware that this changed behaviour may influence voting patterns; the changed behaviour is an unfortunate side-effect of correcting other poll-related problems.
- Remediation of "message preview" issues
- Remediation of K 2.0.3 known issues
Kunena 2.0.4 is available for download at http://www.kunena.org/download.
The future of K 2.0
With the release of K 2.0.4 completed, and with the team now focusing on K 3.0, we would expect that this version will be the last in the K 2.0 series. This means that K 2.0.4 will be the only version supported (by the team) as far as J! 1.5 is concerned, but only to the extent of providing essential hotfixes. It is unlikely that a new version of K 2.0 will be released after this time.
What this means for those who have J! 1.5 websites is that they will be stuck with K 2.0 and people will not be able to take advantage of enhancements, features or bugfixes that may occur in future. What this means for those who have J! 1.5 is that, at some stage after the release of K 3.0, K 2.0 will no longer be supported by the team. This should signal J! 1.5 site operators to consider their strategic position as to how they will proceed from now. While there is no urgency at this time for people to upgrade from a website that they currently have no problems with, this does not mean that people should necessarily become complacent either. These are matters for each J! 1.5 site owner to consider for themselves.
The future of Kunena is tied to the future of Joomla. With J! 3.0 soon to be used more widely, the team is making efforts to respond to the ongoing challenges of ensuring that Kunena meets the growing demand for the "latest and greatest".
