VirtueMart and Joomla 4

[ClaudioRomeo]

Last week-end I was involved in the Joomla! World Conference in Rome.
There, they talked about Joomla 4, that will introduce important difference at programming-level. So, extensions will have to be updated to remain compliant to Joomla.
My fear is that, if VirtueMart will be not so ready to be compliant with Joomla 4, my best liked ecommerce software will loose market share (again, after the delays due to Joomla 3).
Can someone of the core developers guys tell us if the VirtueMart project will be ready for J4 after it is realised?

[balai]

Interested as well.

[balai]

Is there any roadmap about Joomla 4 compatibility?

[Studio 42]

Does as someone tested Joomla 4 and Virtuemart 3.2.6 ?

I checked the changes here https://docs.joomla.org/Potential_backward_compatibility_issues_in_Joomla_4
I dont really see big changes for extentions(perhaps Jsession)
Old fancybox can have problem, but i think that in all case, this have to be removed from Virtuemart and use a better one.

[sandomatyas]

Yep
Joomla 4 alpha 1 + VM 3.2.8.9695

Fatal error: Interface 'JObservableInterface' not found in .../administrator/components/com_virtuemart/helpers/vmtable.php on line 48

[Studio 42]

Hum nothing about JObservableInterface in the list, but when you check, most are classname changes.

[caesarsk]

are there new information about this topic?

[Studio 42]

The question is, do have someone do a test with Joomla 4 ? I dont tested for now.
Official roadmap :
Joomla! 4.0
Joomla! 4.0 will be the first release of the next Joomla! major release series.

Schedule
4.0.0 Alpha 3   12 May 2018
Beta   3rd Quarter 2018
RC   End of 3rd Quarter 2018
Stable   4th Quarter 2018

So you should wait september or october, before trying to use it in a website, for now Joomla 4 is only a toy for developpers

[ivankamart]

So, I'm working to set up a new website for a company in the next few weeks. I am looking forward to the answer!

[jenkinhill]

There is no answer. J4 is still in alpha and it looks like the release schedule is slipping as effort is being put into getting 3.9 suitable for release. This version will contain the GDPR privacy tools although it was supposed to be the transition version between J3&J4, now the bridge version will be J3.10 and will contain contain backports of API changes from the Joomla 4.0 development branch nto make the transition to J4 easier.

Current VM has been trialed with J4 alpha but until the code is more stable valuable development time is being spent on other VM matters.  Anyone developing a new site now should use current versions (or versions current at that time).

[balai]

 jenkinhill let me disagree.
There will be no serious changes in Joomla's 4 code between the alpha and the stable release. Just bug fixes.
The joomla framework/libraries of 3.8  are already using namespaces and autoloader which are supposed to be the core features of J4.

An extension with such a big codebase like VM better start moving into that direction, if it wants to have a smooth and in time transition.

[caesarsk]

I see J!4 as an opportunity to move forward.
VM is an excellent component whose properties we all know well. But... For years of use I see a few shortcomings (no hate, only opinion).
- bothers me as VM "sold" - old site (VM.net), old templates (VM standard template), old admin template. maybe these things are insignificant, but the packaging sell product.
- a terrible management of custom fields (variants) compared to competitive platforms (hika, presta, magento). this thing would deserve to be combed, clarify and simplified
- media management. again, clarify and simplified + multiupload

to these things I would like to hear the opinion. @milbo?

[Studio 42]

I see J!4 as an opportunity to move forward.
VM is an excellent component whose properties we all know well. But... For years of use I see a few shortcomings (no hate, only opinion).
- bothers me as VM "sold" - old site (VM.net), old templates (VM standard template), old admin template. maybe these things are insignificant, but the packaging sell product.
- a terrible management of custom fields (variants) compared to competitive platforms (hika, presta, magento). this thing would deserve to be combed, clarify and simplified
- media management. again, clarify and simplified + multiupload

I fighted for some years already for this when i was on the Dev team
For media management, i wrote this plugin https://shop.st42.fr/en/products/multi-upload-images.htm
For some years i wrote this fork https://github.com/studio42/Virtuemart-2-Joomla-3-Bootstrap it's able to multi upload, simplified the customfields management and better admin template(responsive, font icons ...), but i had no time to continue dev, because Virtuemart changed each time internal codes.

[julash]

hello, joomla 3.9 is 96% complete. I was wondering if one of you tested VM with joomla 3.9 and what is your feedback? I will do it myself too. Also, will there be any VM update soon?

One of the VM website I maintain have some core changes. Because of that, I did not update VM on that website for some time now. Looking forward to do that when a major joomla and VM get released. So thinking if I should start working on migration to joomla 3.9 and latest VM 3.2.15 now.

I see J!4 as an opportunity to move forward.
VM is an excellent component whose properties we all know well. But... For years of use I see a few shortcomings (no hate, only opinion).
- bothers me as VM "sold" - old site (VM.net), old templates (VM standard template), old admin template. maybe these things are insignificant, but the packaging sell product.
- a terrible management of custom fields (variants) compared to competitive platforms (hika, presta, magento). this thing would deserve to be combed, clarify and simplified
- media management. again, clarify and simplified + multiupload

to these things I would like to hear the opinion. @milbo?

I am also worried about this. One of my client who has been with VM for several years recently... let's think happy thought. The idea of using bootstrap, simplified custom fields management etc will be great help for VM users.

[ssnobben]

jenkinhill let me disagree.
There will be no serious changes in Joomla's 4 code between the alpha and the stable release. Just bug fixes.
The joomla framework/libraries of 3.8  are already using namespaces and autoloader which are supposed to be the core features of J4.

An extension with such a big codebase like VM better start moving into that direction, if it wants to have a smooth and in time transition.

And let me also disagree bcs there will be numerous versions of alpha, beta and release candidates (rc) before stable release are for the public live sites to use. And you can have serious changes until the rc is released.

I dont know where you got this info ( "There will be no serious changes in Joomla's 4 code between the alpha and the stable release. Just bug fixes.") about Joomla development precedures and naming conventions & strategy. That is not true.