Okay so the BETA search feature v3.1.11 has been released 🎉

The Joomla community will move from GLIP to Mattermost for our daily communication.

How to move:
- Go to joom.la/chat
- Login with your Joomla! Identity Account (or register one with any email address)
- Give your consent the first time you log in
- Start joining channels and chatting with others.

I just want to make this clear, JCB has not moved its official channel to Mattermost. We will still continue our conversation and communication here on Telegram.

Despite facing some challenges, we've made great strides in the JCB refactoring process. Manually transferring over 10,000 lines of code is a significant achievement and has resulted in a more organized and efficient design, with 100+ classes now in place.

But there's still work to be done. We've got 30,000 lines of code left to transfer and another 5,000 to add to make JCB fully compatible with Joomla 4. It may seem daunting, but I'm confident in my abilities to tackle these obstacles and reach our goal.

In the coming releases, JCB will also be able to incorporate composer packages with powers in a way that doesn't clash with Joomla. This is a big step forward and will greatly expand the possibilities of JCB in the long run.

To streamline our workflow, I've brought in the help of Rector and OpenAI. Rector will automate tedious tasks and make JCB PHP 8 compliant with ease, while OpenAI will provide valuable support and insights for more complex issues. Do note that Rector and OpenAI in JCB are not yet available to everyone, but will eventually become avaiable. But it's important to note that OpenAI integration will only be available to those who opt for it.

Now, moving 10,000 lines of code took us two months, so we can expect that transferring the remaining lines and making the necessary updates will take several more months. But I'm dedicated to this project and will continue pressing forward.

In conclusion, we're making steady progress towards our goal of making JCB fully compatible with Joomla 4. With the support of tools like Rector and OpenAI, I'll be able to overcome the challenges ahead and deliver the best possible results for our clients and stakeholders.

For those interested in beta testing, we have established a new channel at https://git.vdm.dev/joomla-beta/pkg-component-builder. Note that you must be logged in to access this channel. Any issues encountered during testing should still be recorded in the official issues area at https://git.vdm.dev/joomla/Component-Builder/issues. This arrangement is in place to allow for a comprehensive test of the entire system, including the plugins, with all the latest updates.

Yesterday, we released the next stable version of JCB, v3.1.17. We have further improved the codebase by refactoring an additional 4500 lines, primarily by moving structural-related functions into the container.

We would like to remind our users and those who benefit from JCB to show their appreciation for the project through financial support, whether it be a small or large contribution. With sufficient funding, we can accelerate the development process and bring even more value to the JCB community.

We extend a heartfelt thank you to Tom from TLWebdesign and Eric from Agerix, and many other for their generous contributions. Your support serves as an inspiration to others and will help secure the future of JCB. We hope that many others will follow in your footsteps and support this valuable project.

Please take note of the following offering by Tom van der Laan:

Thanks and it's the least we could do i feel. I can't speak for the others but i donated to J4 development, and the pro membership and a 100 USD per paid project i do. Unfortunately there are not so many projects yet.
Would love to see more people chip in and contribute financially. So don't hesistate and donate. It's not much considering what we pay for other extensions and what we get out of JCB.
Since it motivates me to see other people chip in. I'll double any donation done (up to 500 USD total) So let's get some money flowing 😊

I am planning to make a release later today, and I would like to ask those who offered to help to update the milestone issues that list all the functions to be moved in the compiler classes. In fact, I would like to request that this be done each time I push changes to the staging branch. One of you can go over the compiler functions and mark those that have been moved in the relevant issue.

Here are the issues as they form part of our milestones:
https://git.vdm.dev/joomla/Component-Builder/milestone/92

Another Stable JCB release JCB v3.1.19

We have fixed a number of bugs, and believe the is the most stable version since the refactoring started.

- We fixed #972 so that custom code (in the header) will be added after the power namespaces.
- We added a message to show when a server move failed.
- We fixed the BaseConfig to not use '_' as separator.
- We fixed the footable loading issue.
- We removed the need for passing placeholders by reference.
- We added the option to generate a CHANGELOG.
- We fixed the server class to load new client if server details changed.
- We fixed the readme placeholder issue #978.
- We fixed the empty server url issue #978.
- Fixed Package import to now use the phplibsec version 3 #979.

ENJOY! We are moving forward!

Adding super powers to Joomla Component Builder (JCB) is a critical and necessary step for any developer looking to build robust and customized components with ease. Super powers will form the foundation of everything built within JCB, and without them, JCB will not be able to build anything. By enabling developers to easily share their powers with others, collaboration and teamwork will become more efficient and effective. Additionally, super powers will allow for the customization and extension of JCB's core powers, providing developers with full control and flexibility over their projects. The use of super powers will also enable the overriding of any power in any way you like, which is essential in developing complex and customized Joomla components. The explanation of this new feature is available for feedback on this page: https://git.vdm.dev/joomla/Component-Builder/issues/984. We welcome your input and suggestions as we continue to improve JCB for developers. And take the very great and necessary next step toward Joomla 4.

Just finished the complete Gitea PHP API back-end that is also fully container https://git.vdm.dev/joomla/gitea#vdm-joomla-gitea-service ready. Here its packaged https://git.vdm.dev/joomla/gitea as a "super-power" which is one of the formats JCB exports and imports (will soon roll this out to you all). These classes are automatically exported from JCB with their own UML for each class. Thanks to GPT-4 yes it only took two days to build this Gitea API with GPT-4 and JCB

The new super-powers area is going to empower all of you to use PHP in a complete liberating way in Joomla, the boundaries has been removed....

We will be rolling out this new feature of JCB in a few days, it is yet another step towards Joomla 4, as it forms a critical part of the new architecture needed.

A major slowdown in development is currently the lack of testing. Those who want things to move faster should join the releases/update channel and when beta releases are made, to test them and open issues where needed making use of the Beta tag. No testing means no way for me to see bugs lurking in the release, and that makes for unstable releases. Since I am trying to move forward I push out the next release and then bugs come out that we did not catch. Here is the real challenge, when I push out a beta, and three days pass, with no feedback, no "it seems stable" or any other response from anyone... I move on, and after doing this many times we accumulate un-resolved issues, and fixing them becomes very complicated. We currently have an encryption issue which is going to seriously effect the project, and due to little testing support we are past the point where an easy solution could be made. This one issue has set the project back weeks. At the end of the day, if there are more loyal testers, who are like me actively working on JCB everyday we will be able to more effectively move forward. Our next major step forward with the new "Super Powers" area is the collaborative work with "ro-ot" so we have been able to get so much done. Yet we need people to test the things we do, since we are working on a shared JCB system, all changes are being committed via a bot into the beta channel. So as you will notice we have added another 125k lines of code to the project (some of that is the new super powers, which is duplicates). Most of this has been to create the new area that will allow for powers to be used instead of the old template system. So it will empower you to be able to adapt JCB into any architecture you want. Yes, we are trying to decouple the hard coded parts of JCB that targets Joomla 3. Okay, so that is a some feedback from my side. Let's do this!!! I will push out a new beta version this week we are already on v3.1.22-beta

I need feedback on this issue: https://git.vdm.dev/joomla/Component-Builder/issues/992

Please give your feedback of git.vdm.dev, thanks!

We are scheduling a meeting for the 23rd of May at 7pm CAT (UTC+2). Please ensure your calendars are clear for this event. This gathering is not tied to the release of Joomla 4; however, it remains a critical discussion where we'll explore various strategies for preparing your components for the transition to Joomla 4.

We'll delve into the new 'Super Powers' feature introduced in JCB 3.1.24, elaborating on its implications and utilities. Moreover, I will offer insights into the integration of Chat GPT-4 into our workflow, demonstrating how it complements the 'Super Powers' feature.

Lastly, we'll examine our successful endeavor of constructing the entire GITEA API in PHP, following this dynamic workflow. Your participation is highly anticipated as we continue to innovate and advance our collective knowledge.

In preparation for our meeting on the 23rd I have made a few tutorials so that we can get more focused conversations. Please review and give feedback as needed. Enjoy!!! (Don’t forget to like my tutorials)

Giving more detail to the flow of the new super power search... for those interested. https://youtu.be/y8vjGW1vpJw