Drupal 5.0 Beta-1

Drupal released their first beta of the next version of Drupal called 5.0
Some significant changes including a new core theme and a web installer for making it easier to install Drupal. Lots of performance updates too!

http://www.drupal.org

completely retooled the administration page
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[*] /admin now contains an administration page which may be themed
[*] reorganised administration menu items by task and by module
[*] added a status report page with detailed PHP/MySQL information
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added web-based installer which can:
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[*] check installation requirements
[*] automatically generate the database configuration file
[*] install pre-made 'install profiles' or distributions
[*] import the database structure with automatic table prefixing
be localized
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System
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[*]added new default Garland theme
[*] added color module to change some themes' color schemes
[*] included the jQuery JavaScript library 1.0.2 and converted all core
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JavaScript to use it
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[*] introduced the ability to alter mail sent from system
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module system:
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[*] added .info files for module meta-data
[*] added support for module dependencies
[*] improved module installation screen
[*] moved core modules to their own directories
[*] added support for module uninstalling
[*] added support for different cache backends
[*] added support for a generic "sites/all" directory.
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usability:
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[*] added support for auto-complete forms (AJAX) to user profiles.
[*] made it possible to instantly assign roles to newly created user accounts.
[*] improved configurability of the contact forms.
[*] reorganized the settings pages.
[*] made it easy to investigate popular search terms
[*] integrated urlfilter.module in filter.module
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block system:
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[*] extended the block visibility settings with a role specific settings.
[*] made it possible to customize all block titles
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poll module:
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[*] optionally allow people to inspect all votes.
[*] optionally allow people to cancel their vote.
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distributed authentication:
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[*] added default server option.
[*] added default robots.txt to control crawlers.
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database API:
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[*] added db_table_exists().
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blogapi module:
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[*] 'blogapi new' and 'blogapi edit' nodeapi operations.
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user module:
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[*] added hook_profile_alter().
[*] e-mail verification is made optional.
[*] added mass editing and filtering on admin/user/user.
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PHP Template engine:
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[*] add the ability to look for a series of suggested templates.
[*] look for page templates based upon the path.
[*] look for block templates based upon the region, module, and delta.
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content system:
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[*] made it easier for node access modules to work well with each other.
[*] added configurable content types.
[*] changed node rendering to work with structured arrays.
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performance:
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[*] improved session handling: reduces database overhead.
[*] improved access checking: reduces database overhead.
[*] made it possible to do memcached based session management.
[*] omit sidebars when serving a '404
[*] Page not found': saves CPU cycles and bandwidth.
[*] added an 'aggressive' caching policy.
[*] removed the archive module.
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upgrade system:
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[*] created space for update branches.
forms API:
[*] made it possible to programmatically submit forms.
improved api for multistep forms.
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theme system:
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[*] split up and removed drupal.css.
[*] added nested lists generation.
[*] added a self-clearing block class.
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