XELOS PRO 11 - Changelog

Note: The availability of the functions mentioned depends on the respective license and the modules contained therein.

 

Highlights in XELOS PRO 11

 

NEW: Mediapool

• New function for the central management of image and video assets
  • Simple structuring of media in folders
  • Fast upload via drag & drop
  • Incl. versioning and storage of your own metadata

Pages

• New components
  • Videos
    • For more movement and dynamics, exciting and engaging content pages can be created in XELOS
    • Allows the embedding of videos on the content pages
    • It is also possible to use videos without control elements and with / without autoplay
    • An individual cover image (selection or upload) can be selected
    • Access to media pool
  • Tabs
    • Similar to the accordion, this allows content to be placed in "tabs" through which the user can switch. These are also containers that can be filled with text, images and other components.
  • Activity stream / microblog
    • Enables the display of microblogs / activities directly within a Pages page, e.g. for the start page
  • Lists
    • Allows the display of content from the list module
  • Documents
    • New dynamic portlet for displaying documents from the document repository
    • The editor only needs to select the desired folder - all documents including future changes are then automatically displayed on the page
    • Content can be displayed in both a gallery and a list view
    • The user can also be allowed to navigate to deeper folders
    • Ideal for providing templates, menus or similar content, for example
• New context menu
  • The editor offers quick access to essential actions by "right-clicking" on the respective element, which further simplifies operation
• New features in components
  • Text fields
    • Placeholders are now available, which can be used, for example, to dynamically display the name or a greeting for the current user, such as "Good morning Hans"
  • News, events, groups
    • Data filters allow an even greater variety of options for displaying certain content to users. For example, content can be displayed with a specific tag/keyword, a search term, in the vicinity of a location (GeoLocation) or according to user-specific content subscriptions
  • Images
    • With the new image editor, images can be cropped, rotated or mirrored directly
    • New options for accessibility
    • Upload of images is now also possible via clipboard
    • Access to media pool
  • layouts
    • The new option "No outer spacing" in combination with "Total width" allows greater flexibility for borderless designs, depending on whether, for example, a flat image or multi-column content is to be placed
  • Page templates
    • In addition to the standard templates that are delivered with XELOS, you can now also create your own page templates. This makes it easier to maintain a uniform look across your intranet and enables faster page creation
    • The selection window for page templates has been optimized and now shows a preview of the template directly upon selection
  • Element templates
    • It is now possible to save configured elements (e.g. images, HTML styles or entire blocks) as a template for all editors so that they can simply add the elements to a new page using drag & drop
  • Further changes
    • It is now possible to display the preview in tablet size in addition to desktop and smartphone, making it easier to optimize content for this format

News section

New media component

• Allows even easier uploading of large media formats, which were previously often restricted by technical limitations
• Upload can be carried out conveniently via manual selection, drag & drop or the clipboard
• Images can be cropped and rotated directly
• A title image can now be defined for videos by selecting an automatically generated image from the video or by manual upload. In this way, unfavorable video cuts can be avoided
• Access to media pool

 

NEW: Activity stream / microblog

• New UI / UX for microblogs
  • New design with a stronger focus on visual elements such as images and videos
  • It is now possible to filter between posts and activities to get a better overview of many activities
  • Sorting can be selected between "Last modified" or "Creation time" by the user
  • Filtering for posts in which you yourself have been mentioned
  • The archive is no longer a separate view, but you can now jump directly to a specific year / date in the history
  • New views for posts display content even better and support the integration of interactive content
• Share posts
  • New "Share" function both in other groups and as a private message in the chat
  • Posts now have a permalink
• Votes / trend votes
  • Easy creation of votes directly when creating posts
    • Supports single and multiple answers
  • Direct display of questions and results in the stream
• Performance
  • Numerous improvements for better performance for the user

Social features

• In addition to "Likes", users now have five other reactions to be able to react more specifically to the respective content

Comments

• Clicking on comments, e.g. via the search, now opens the relevant comment directly
• You can now retrieve a "permalink" for each comment, e.g. to bookmark or share the post

 

Employee directory (Lookbook)

• New component for microblog posts of the respective user within their profile
• Revision of "Contacts" portlet
• Revision of "My groups" portlet
• Configuration: Show only contacts on card view
• Configuration: Show vCard details in directory
• Performance contact calculation, limit on 3 levels (FOAF)
• On birthdays, the profile is marked and "decorated" accordingly
• The absence and vacation status from HRM is now directly visible in the profile

NEW: Privacy Center

• In the user profile, the Privacy Center now provides a convenient way for the respective user to access the data they have stored in terms of GDPR information
• Download profile data, likes, posts, etc.
• Information on the storage periods

XELOS PRO add-on: Human Resource Management (HRM)

• New views for employees provide greater clarity
  • New dashboard provides a direct overview of e.g:
    • Current time recording
    • Upcoming and planned absences
    • Sickness notifications
  • Vacation request view directly displays important key figures and shows upcoming vacations directly
    • In addition, each vacation request can now be given a title that is only visible to the employee to provide a better overview of their own vacation planning
  • The vacation overview offers a clearer display of colleagues who are currently on vacation or sick
• The short profile of each employee and the profile in the employee directory automatically show "Availability" if the employee is "Sick" or "On vacation", so that it is easy for colleagues to see when it is possible to contact them again

X11 framework

• New versions of the backend systems for more security and performance
  • PHP 8.2, mySQL 8, REDIS 7, ElasticSearch 8.13.4
• security
  • New authentication method: OpenID Connect
  • Selective multi-factor authentication
  • GeoIP blocking now allows white and blacklists
• API
  • In addition to the previous WebServices + JSON RPC API, a REST - style based interface variant is also available
  • The API documentation now contains more details for easier use of the endpoints
• Container
  • Video conversion is now mapped via a separate worker container to enable optimized load balancing and security
  • New Libreoffice Worker
• Theme
  • Individual font files can now be stored via the theme set settings
  • Improved handling of expired sessions: A modal window is displayed to the user in tabs that are still open, with the option of logging in again without closing the current view. This prevents errors caused by expired sessions (e.g. entering and sending data in a form that is still open)
  • The loading logic of the content has been modified to enable better compatibility even with higher browser security settings

Miscellaneous

• A new user export in the user admin allows the export including the lookbook fields
• In the group configuration, it can now be set that all created groups must always be listed

BITV certification of the application

• The application has been further optimized in hundreds of places for the best possible accessibility
• With the release of XELOS 11, the basic application navigation, forms and the content and news that can be created with Pages will be independently tested in accordance with BITV 2.0 / EN 301 549
• In the coming months, this certification will be extended to other areas of the views commonly used by regular users, making XELOS the first choice for all companies and authorities that want to provide an accessible communication platform for their employees / members

Accessibility in Pages

• The integrated check helps authors to create content that is as accessible as possible for users. For this purpose, the editor shows places where additional information is required for the best possible accessibility (e.g. image descriptions etc.)

Accessibility mode integrated in the theme

• Can be activated globally or by each user as desired
  • Deactivated: The system provides normal accessibility without restricting the appearance / design of the interface
  • Activated: Increases the contrast and legibility of the content and ensures the best possible accessibility. The visual appearance is treated as secondary in this mode

Optimized functions for accessibility

• Optimization of navigation, forms and content pages created in Pages
• Improved compatibility with screen readers
• Alternative texts for control elements - Alternative texts for graphics and objects
• User-specific activation
• Text can be enlarged to 200
• Contrasts for texts, graphics and graphic control elements
• Playback of subtitles - Recorded videos with subtitles
• Labeling of form elements can be determined programmatically
• Improved readability of data tables with screen readers
• Automatic notification of missing accessible elements to authors and editors

XELOS PRO 11 Notes and Breaking Changes

 

Known Issues - as of 06.06.2024

The following functions are part of XELOS 11, but are only available to a limited extent or deactivated at launch to prevent the possible occurrence of errors. These functions will be made available again as soon as possible with one of the next updates.

• XELOS PRO Add-on Translation: Automatic translation in the activity stream is currently not possible
• XELOS PRO Add-on HRM: The old view is currently still available for the overview of absences as a list view. The new one still needs to be optimized
• It is currently not possible to reply to or comment on forum posts directly in the activity stream. This is currently only possible in the forum itself
• It is currently not possible to send a read confirmation directly in the activity stream. This is currently only possible directly in the news
• The trend vote function for votes is currently not yet available directly in content pages (Pages), but can only be inserted directly in the activity stream
• The new list widget in the Pages page editor is currently already available in the first version, but will be further adapted with the next updates

End of Life Module

The following modules will no longer be provided with updates in XELOS 11 and should be removed before the update.

• Personal Workspace
• MS Exchange EWS Connector

Deprecated modules in XELOS 11

The following modules should no longer be installed in XELOS 11 as they are no longer supported with updates in XELOS 12.

• Invite + Share o These functionalities will be adapted as part of the revision of the groups in XELOS. The old module will then no longer be available

For further information on other breaking changes and end-of-life modules, please refer to this PDF document.