With the upcoming release of IP.Board 3, we will of course be updating our components to be compatible with the new architecture. Releases of IP.Blog, IP.Gallery and IP.Downloads will be available alongside IP.Board 3.0 so that we can update everything at the same time and not have to worry about when our other components will be ready.

IPS who sell our software have determined that initially for the big release, they will only be working for application compatibility between our components. They want to spend all of their time focusing on IP.Board itself to ensure maximum stability, especially given the fact that they are working on an entirely new platform. This means that you won't really notice any new features to speak of with the Blog, Gallery and Downloads updates. You will, however, notice much better integration between the applications and the board itself, and an updated look and feel for all applications.

Some examples of this include:

• Integrated searching - one search form will search everything
  
• Ability to show gallery or blog data on board index through hooks
  
  
  IP.Blog
  
  • Proper user-customizable headers
    
  • RSS blogs - allows members to import their remote blog or news into their blogs
    
  • "Blog this post" support
    
    
    IP.Gallery
    

    • Ability to crop, rotate, dynamically resize images. Use Javascript for front end, then re-generate image using GD on backend when user saves.
      
    • Fancy slideshow feature. Something like Flickr, but done completely in Javascript (no flash needed), little simpler probably.
      
    • Better album control based on friendships - only allow friends to view album, allow friends to submit to your album, etc.
      
    • Sub-albums
      
    • Image tagging
      
    • Correct category/album markers (ala IPB)
      
    • Allow users to choose album covers from images in an album
      

    IP.Downloads

    [*]Better and more abstracted support for file records. Ultimately the goal would be to allow you to submit multiple files to a single file record. Uses would include "contributed files", breaking single files into "parts" (i.e. for large movies), and multiple screenshots per record, for instance.

    [*]Support for mirrors

    [*]More reliable upload progress meter

    [*]File tagging

    These are just some ideas are floating around. Final feature lists will be determined after the release of IP.Board 3.0.