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New Features

All the new features that have been added to this version. Any changes in best practice.

Media: New Folder for Documents and Other Non-Image Files​

Until now by default Joomla had only /images folder in Media manager for upload. Starting from 5.3 version Joomla have additional /files folder for non image files, for new installations.

Existing installations will not be affected. To add it to existing installation, need to:

  • Configure Media component and set Path to Files Folder option to files;
  • Configure FileSystem - Local plugin and add files to list of directories, additionally to existing images;

PR: https://github.com/joomla/joomla-cms/pull/43532

Form Control Fields​

New methods to manage form control fields. More detail at Form Control fields

PR: https://github.com/joomla/joomla-cms/pull/43857

Example

Before:

<input type="hidden" name="task" value="">
<input type="hidden" name="foo" value="bar">
<input type="hidden" name="return" value="<?php echo $input->getBase64('return'); ?>">
<?php echo HTMLHelper::_('form.token'); ?>

After:

// Code in Controller/View
$this->form
  ->addControlField('task', '')
  ->addControlField('foo', 'bar')
  ->addControlField('return', $input->getBase64('return', ''));

// Code in the form layout
echo $this->form->renderControlFields();

New BeforeUpdateSiteDownloadEvent​

A new event is available where an installer plugin can hook in before an update site url is fetched. Similar to what we have for package download of an extension.

PR: https://github.com/joomla/joomla-cms/pull/44516

The event can be used like:

public function onInstallerBeforeUpdateSiteDownload(\Joomla\CMS\Event\Installer\BeforeUpdateSiteDownloadEvent $event): void
{
    $event->updateUrl($event->getUrl() . '?auth=foo');
}

Media: Allow Thumbnails for Any File Type​

The changes allow to add thumbnail for any file type: video, pdf, audio etc. Previously it was worked only for images.

PR: https://github.com/joomla/joomla-cms/pull/44847

com_ajax: Support for Stringable Result​

Allows to customise the response for com_ajax, with help of Joomla\CMS\String\StringableInterface.

PR: https://github.com/joomla/joomla-cms/pull/43530

Example of Module helper getAjax() method, with &format=json request. Before:

function getAjax() {
    echo json_encode(['title' => 'Foo', 'text' => 'Bar']);
    exit;
}

After:

function getAjax() {
    $result = new class() implements \Joomla\CMS\String\StringableInterface {
        public $title = '';
        public $text = '';
        
        public function __toString(): string
        {
          return json_encode($this);
        }
    };
    
    $result->title = 'Foo';
    $result->text = 'Bar';
    
    return $result;
}

Example of customised Joomla\CMS\Response\JsonResponse response:

function getAjax() {
    $data   = $this->getData(); //... code to load your data
    $result = new class($data, null, false, false) extends \Joomla\CMS\Response\JsonResponse implements \Joomla\CMS\String\StringableInterface {};
   
    return $result;
}