Joomla 3.2 is coming soon. A beta release of 3.2 is due this week and so it's time for developers to start testing.
The Joomla team says that,
"the amount of contributions for this release is amazingly high and we are most likely looking at the largest release of the CMS ever."
To make testing the change much easier, the Joomla team have released a component called "Patch Tester".
Patch Tester allows you to easily apply any potential Joomla patches to your test site.
Here's how Patch Tester works ...
- Go to https://github.com/mbabker/patchtester/releases/tag/2.0.beta
- Click one of the green buttons to downoad the Patch Tester component.
- Install the component into your test site.
- Go to Components > Patch Tester.
You'll see a list of all pending patches to the Joomla core. You can search for any topics you're particularly interested in.
For example, you can search for "version". Versioning is one of the major new features in Joomla 3.2.
- To apply any patch, click "Apply Patch".
- If instalation was successful, the patch will be marked in green as below.
- You can click "Revert Patch" to undo the patch.
Joomla has also made it very easy to test whole Alpha and Beta releases, not just single patches.
Remember that testing is one of the easiest and most productive contributions you can make to your favorite project. Even if you normally break things, this is the task for you!