We are pleased to announce that the second Beta of IP.Tracker 1.2.0 is now available for immediate download! To see what has changed in this release, please visit this topic. To download Beta 2, please visit this link.

As always, if you believe you have found a bug in the software, please report it in our Tracker, available here.

We are pleased to reveal the next Featured Resource, this month we are featuring a elegant skin, be sure to check it out!

Click here to see the featured resource!

We are also pleased to announce the second beta is now available for IP.Shoutbox. Please visit this topic to see what has changed!

We are pleased to announce that the beta releases of IP.Shoutbox 1.0.0 and IP.Tracker 1.2.0 are now available for immediate download!

IP.Tracker
IP.Tracker is a bug/issue tracking system, it allows members and staff to track certain issues, for examples, bugs within a project you are working on, or even building a house! IP.Tracker supports statuses, severities, and much much more to bring you an extensible Tracker to use however you wish to.

IP.Tracker 1.2.0 builds upon what was available in previous releases, whilst adding vital features such as sub-projects, custom fields, an advanced search library, and better database recognition of when an issue has been read.

IP.Tracker 1.2.0 has been developed by the Tracker team (krocheck, Jaggi, and Alex) but as stated in a previous blog entry, we will be introducing ways so that you, the community, can assist coding features, and fixing bugs.

Here is a list of the main changes in IP.Tracker 1.2.0

• Subprojects - We have added functionality allowing you to add subprojects to an existing project
• Custom Fields - Custom fields have now been implemented, and are very advanced, you can choose to only show a custom field in a certain project, and in the project edit screen, you can edit how custom fields are display in that particular project. Custom fields now also support permissions
• Advanced Search - We have now added advanced search to IP.Tracker, and you can also search within a particular issue
• Database recognition - We have changed how the database records if an issue is read, and there are no longer issues with it, as cookies are no longer used. We have also changed how issue changes are recorded to allow better recognition (statuses, severities etc.)
• Last post information on project overview - A rather simple, but informative feature. Projects will now display last posts on the right hand column, just like IP.Board

As said, these are the main features in 1.2.0, however when we are nearer a stable release, we will post a full changelog.

We hope you like the changes in IP.Tracker, we certainly do! To discuss IP.Tracker 1.2.0, please use this topic.

IP.Shoutbox
IP.Shoutbox is our feature-rich chat room for your IP.Board without the need for Java, Flash or any other browser dependency!

One of the main concerns people had about the base we chose for IP.Shoutbox was server load, and query counts. We are pleased to inform you that the two developers, myself, and Brandon have been going through the code to try and reduce this as much as possible, and we think you will be impressed. Wherever possible, the majority of the content is cached, and this has rapidly shown in the query count. The original base code has 16 queries per page load, IP.Shoutbox has as little as 8, 5 of those being IPB queries themselves. We have got IP.Shoutbox down to three queries per page load, we said you'd be impressed!

1.0 is mainly a code rewrite, however more features will be added in future releases once the new code base is complete. There are a few changes from the base modification, outlined below:

• No file edits - We promised we would do this, and we have, all that is needed is a simple skin edit, which also gives you the power of limiting the global shoutbox to certain skins!
• Moderators - IP.Shoutbox now supports both groups and individual members, whilst the base only supported individual members

To discuss IP.Shoutbox, please use this topic.

Lastly we would like to express huge thanks to the developers for these two, amazing products: krocheck, Jaggi, Alex, vadim88, and terabyte!
As we said, this blog entry is a bit vague, but we will be posting more details over at the Community Projects page at IPS Resources when the time comes!

Since our recent updates to the resources site the feedback received has been great. We have managed to address a lot of the feedback, and we hope you like the changes we have made.

One of the changes was the new Featured Resource. We have now revealed the featured resource for July, as usual, this page will go into a lot of detail about the resource, the author, and will also feature screenshots. We have also implemented the archive section which allows you to go back in time and view all previous featured resources we have had at IPS Resources. Now that is out of the way, we go onto the main part of this blog post, information regarding our two community projects: IP.Tracker, and IP.Shoutbox.

IP.Tracker
IP.Tracker 1.1.0 has been received brilliantly, and we recently released an update to address issues found in 1.1.0, we would like to thank everyone that took their time to help test the release and make it as good as possible! IP.Tracker is now splitting into two stages: 1.2.0 will be available for IP.Board 2.3.x as 1.1.0 was and will also be ported for IP.Board3. Shortly after that time, a new release will be out for IP.Board3 with new features (2.0.0), however it will only work on IP.Board3.

Development has been rolling onto a stage where, in the next few weeks, we will be able to open up the beta testing process once again. IP.Tracker 1.2 builds and improves upon what was there in 1.1. Vital features such as sub-projects and custom fields are included with this release and we have finally rewrote the 'issue read' code. IP.Tracker can now tell whether you have read an issue or not, with no cookies!

Other features included in this release include latest post information (the same as on the main board index). We are also implementing a few new changes to the system to better record when a status, severity, etc. has been changed, however, there is nothing new on your end for it at this present stage. We have implemented the changes to the system now to prepare us for 2.x.x. A couple of features which will be introduced need the code implementing now so the features have a lot of information to work off when they arrive.

As it stands, IP.Tracker 1.2 is featured locked, and is again being worked on by the developers: Alex, krocheck, and Jaggi. However, we invite you to help us code the 2.x.x series, please read below to find out more!

IP.Shoutbox
Our community-driven shoutbox, IP.Shoutbox, is moving along nicely. We do not know of a release date for the first beta, and therefore we cannot give you much information about it. We'd like to make one thing clear, we have had a few users asking about the security of this modification because of the base we chose, please note, that said modification is a base for the project, and the end result will not resemble it at all in terms of code. The two developers, myself, and bfarber will be going through the code to make sure its safe, secure, and doesn't have high server loads. That's as much as we can really say on Shoutbox at this stage, but stay tuned for more updates!

Community Projects - Redefining what 'community' means
When we first announced the community-driven project scheme, we wanted it to be just that: community-driven. Many developers have told us that the main reason they cannot contribute to the projects is due to lack of up-to-date code. Over the past few weeks, we have been adding functionality to allow license holders to view the SVN code allowing you to code as we code. You will not be able to commit to our code, but upon release of IP.Tracker 1.2.0, there will be a subcategory setup for you to submit code changes, and bug fixes. This process is not yet complete and is still in development and will only start when IP.Tracker 1.2.0 is installed here at the company forums. We will keep you updated with news about this process and we hope this may encourage more of you to contribute to the community projects.


Hopefully this blog entry has been of interest to you and we can't wait to be able to show you the previews of IP.Tracker, and IP.Shoutbox. They are shaping up to be brilliant products!

Thank you for your patience while we made our improvements to the resource site! There are some exciting changes we would like to point out to help you navigate through the new features.

Homepage Updates

We've made a few improvements to the homepage, with more to come. Immediately, you will notice we have separated the left column to show 'Top' listings and the right column to show 'Latest' listings. We've also separated out modifications and skins to help you more quickly find the latest updates you are interested in.

Featured Resources

Once a month we will be posting a resource spotlight in the new 'Featured Resources' section. In each spotlight we will give you an overview of the resource with some basic statistics and a link to view or download it, a list of features or highlights for the resource, some screenshots, and a short interview with the author. The resources will include anything submitted to the Downloads or Articles areas. Please be sure to check out the featured resource for June!

Community Projects

IP.Tracker has been out for some time and has been a huge success. As a result, we will slowly be introducing more community projects to our customers. Next up will be IP.Shoutbox - a fully functional and comprehensive shoutbox system for your forum. The project is based on Dean's "D22-Shoutbox" and he is working closely with us on updating and preparing it for release. More information to follow soon...

In the mean time, please check out our new Community Projects page for more information on our community projects.

Paid Resources

There are hundreds of resources available for sale from many authors who contribute to this site, and many of our users are interested in these resources. There are some drawbacks here

• The user may have a hard time vouching for the trustworthiness of a paid resource
• The user may not know a specific resource they are interested in exists
• Paid resources are often not welcome on sites that host free resources for download, so authors have a hard time getting the word out about their work
• A user may not be sure which paid resource they are interested in if more than one solution fits their needs

The resources site will now allow mod and skin authors to list paid resources in our download manager. The authors have to agree to certain guidelines, and if the guidelines are not met or maintained their work will be de-listed and not allowed back on the site. This helps users to verify that a solution is being properly maintained, fixed, updated and supported.

Paid resources will show up with a small symbol in our downloads database so you will more quickly know if a file is for sale or not. Filters have been added to the bottom of the download pages so you can easily filter out (or in!) paid resources in the event you don't want to see them (or only want to see paid solutions). Payment for a third-party solution is handled by the third party directly, and the download link will take you to their site to complete the transaction and download the work. Consider our database a helpful listing so you can better realize what kind of options are available to you. Authors can consider our database a useful tool to help them advertise the work they've put so much time and effort into.

Miscellaneous

Our company forums have undergone a slight re-organization in the resource sections to help you better identify where topics should be posted and found.

We've also added a "Most Recent Resources" feed at the top of the resource forums so you can stay up to date on new works submitted to the resource site.

Additionally, at long last, the resources site is now linked from the main company website at http://invisionpower.com - we hope this helps everyone discover all of the resources we have available to them that they may never even have known existed.


We look forward to your feedback and hope you enjoy the updates!