What happened during 2017?
Vaadin Framework 8.0 was released on February 2017. It brought more than 21 Improvements to Vaadin Framework. One of the major features was full Java 8 support. Java 8 allowed us to dramatically improve the Data API.
We released Vaadin Framework 8.1 in July. It took a bit longer time than anticipated. We used the extra time to ensure the quality of important new features such as TreeGrid. With 8.1 it is safe to say it's the gr8est release of Vaadin Framework ever.
What's still in store for 2017?
After we got Framework 8.1 out of the door, the development team took a well deserved vacation. Once back at office the team made some adjustments to working practises. This means that reported defects and pull requests get handled faster. It also means that those fixes and code contributions get released faster. Now the team releases bug fix releases every two weeks. Latest bug fix release, 8.1.5, was just released on September 27th.
Between Framework 8.1 and 8.2.alpha1 the team merged 52 commits by 16 different contributors. Thank you very much! Keep them coming!
Starting with Framework 8.2 we focus on community contributions. We also release feature enhancements and small new features in each minor release.
Here are couple of highlights we plan to release with Framework 8.2:
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Grid: independent row height support for header, body and footer,
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Grid: easy drag & drop reordering of grid rows
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Navigator: ability to use real URLs using HTML History API (a.k.a. get rid of the #!)
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Runs on Java 8 and on Java 9
2018-2022
When we released Vaadin Framework 8.0 we said that Vaadin supports Framework 8 for at least five years. This means that we will put out new releases until February 2022.
In the beginning of 2018 we will change the pace of the Framework 8 releases. Instead of big feature development being the release driver. We release what is ready once a quarter. Starting January 2018 the Vaadin 8 release date will be last Wednesday of first month of a quarter.
This means that:
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Framework 8.3 will be released on January 31st 2018,
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Framework 8.4 will be released on April 25th 2018,
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Framework 8.5 will be released on July 25th 2018 and
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Framework 8.6 will be released on October 24th 2018.
Fast forward to 2022 – in 2022 we will release Framework 8.19 on January 26th 2022.
That is our commitment for Vaadin Framework 8 – Eight is gr8 and getting gr8er every three months.
P.S. Framework 8.2.alpha2 was released last week, check it out!