ZOO 2.4 BETA released
The ZOO is running on Joomla 1.5 and 1.6 now!
Today, with a bit of pride, we are happy to announce the release of our ZOO 2.4 BETA. As promised we worked hard the last weeks on making ZOO work with Joomla 1.6. And here it is running on both, Joomla 1.5 and 1.6! In this post will shed some light on the new Joomla 1.6 version and take a closer look at the new features.
Ready for Joomla 1.6
We had already plans to make a major overhaul to ZOOs underlying framework with the 2.4 release to increase its flexibility. So it was the perfect time to take it for a test drive with Joomla 1.6. To achieve compatible with both Joomla versions we added a new abstraction layer between Joomla and the ZOO. This makes it possible to have the same ZOO version running on Joomla 1.5 and 1.6. This means all functionalities of ZOO for Joomla 1.5 are also available in ZOO for Joomla 1.6. We have not yet fully embraced all of Joomla 1.6s new capabilities but this new framework will make it possible to take advantage of e.g. Joomlas ACL in a future update.
New Features
Of course we added some cool, new stuff through the framework overhaul. We are most excited about a new event system which allows other components to easily attach themselves to the ZOO. This is awesome for third party developers. It makes it possible to integrate with other third party extensions like e-commerce extensions.
We also make use of it and added one of the most demanded features for the ZOO: A notification system for both comments and submissions! You can now assign who will be notified on new comments and submissions. Users who post comments will also be notified of replies. They can also unsubscribe from those topics.
After each ZOO upgrade, there were still old files from previous ZOO installations lingering in your core ZOO directories. There is a new feature now, that tells you what files are modified or even unknown. It lets you remove those unknown files, to get a clean ZOO installation. But there is a bunch of other new stuff to explore like collapsible categories in the administration UI and a cool new ZOO Quickicon module.
Tools for ZOO
As you already know, our good'old YOOtools will not be converted for Joomla 1.6 as we have already started to work on something brand new here! Currently our YOOtools use Mootools as JavaScript library but as you know we have moved on to jQuery with our Joomla templates and the ZOO extension. This just leaves the tools out which are soon to be replaced by a completely rewritten version that uses the latest jQuery JavaScript library. We are really excited to give you a look at it soon! For the ZOO 2.4 Beta phase it means we will not include the tools as we have used to, because they are incompatible and will be replaced soon. However we expect the new tools to be ready before the ZOO 2.4 goes stable, so stay tuned!
What's next?
The ZOO 2.4 BETA is exclusively available for members only who purchased the ZOO app bundle. As soon as ZOO 2.4 goes STABLE, it will be released for the public. Members can go straight to the download section in the member area and take ZOO 2.4 BETA for a spin! Be aware that it is a BETA version. It is not intended to be used on a production web site just yet.
We have also updated the ZOO to the Stable 2.3.4 version. It includes quite a few bugfixes and the cool new ZOO Quickicon module.
Please give us your feedback and tell us what you think!

Comments (67)
Dick Groenhof
ivo.haarmann
Does the cleaner only works for files or also for old DB-entries (bak_ in particular)?
I am not moving too soon to 1.6 - but I will once it is stable - and it is great to know that YOO-Guys are ready with your tools and your framework already!
Thanks - Ivo
wouter
plugz0r
Dont forget to add a way to put a maximum length to the comments displayed in the zoo comment module and this is gonna be perfect, the notification system was missing, thanx for adding this
eri
Mike
Please make ZOO more compatible with joomfish if it possible
scott.lutes
joblow
kopacko
sascha
Pavel
mnemnoch
lucvg
Christopher Goins
claudio.prezzi
Best would be, that we could select the elements that should be searchable, and the search form ist built out of this...
mark.scott.10
John Walker
victorhtorres
pascal.magat.24
Benjamin
Andres
sameerdhingra
Greg
sascha
lukas.werner
surreal53
damian
Vierdimensional
James
carlos.devia.rojas
dominique.gatschet
Is it possible to use the multi-langauage tool of joomla also with zoo? Thanks for the answer :)
Daphne
kim
craigflick
delames
Martin
sascha
Marco
sascha
damian
john.gowie
sascha
Kristen
sascha
Mustafa
alec.thorne
Ravi Acharya
as this is very impressive and full of features so can i have a list of all the features ??
Markus
Mustafa
Justin
alec.thorne
Chris Gilroy
PLEASE MAKE ECOMMERCE WE HATE VIRTUEMART!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
paul.hutchins
AskingAgain
dave
sascha
carlos.devia.rojas
david.n.sparks
The I think will help improve the uptake of your component!
alain.badan
If I download Zoo 2.4.1 I get the file for Joomla 1.5
Where can I get Zoo 2.4.1 for Joomla 1.6 ?
Thanks.
adis
Blink
patricia.mendizabal
tatoo
chikkala
Also when can we expect the Yoo Tools / Zoo Tools be released for Zoo 2.4
olivier.moreau
That would be great to be able to publish it by email.
Machoman
Steve