Looking at New Release of phpMyAdmin

Marc Delisle has sent an announcement on the availability of phpMyAdmin-4.3.0-rc1. This is the first RC release for the upcoming 4.3 release which will be another major release and as you can guess, it's loaded with TONS of new features:

* Smart sorting for int keys
* Confirmation message when dropping user(s)
* Confirm dialog on accidentally leaving a page
* Allow clicking an approximate row count to get a correct one
* Support for editing binary fields in hexadecimal
* MariaDB 10+ multi-master replication support
* Allow saving query charts as images
* Use aliases in SQL export for tables and columns
* Export with table/column name changes
* Dynamic process list
* Drag and Drop SQL import
* Preview SQL instead of executing it
* Run SQL query: Allow rollback for InnoDB tables
* Zeroconf PMA tables support
* Regexp replace
* Avoid session timeout when user is active
* MySQL 5.7.5 compatibility
* Avoid session timeout when user is active
* Multiple-column foreign key relation
* Charts for data in <x-axis, series,="" value=""> format
* Range Search Capability
* Improvements for the table editor (index creation)
* PHP OpenSSL support for cookie encryption/decryption

Other that above features, this release will also have other cool features, thanks to GSoC students:
Smita Kumari worked on two structure tools,
1) “a feature that enables a user to maintain a central list of columns
per database to avoid similar name for the same data element and bring
consistency of datatype for the same data element.”

2) Automated normalization is known as "Improve table structure" within
phpMyAdmin. It helps to bring the table structure upto Third Normal
Form. A wizard is presented to user which asks questions about the
elements during the various steps for normalization and a new structure
is proposed accordingly to bring the table optionally into the
First/Second/Third Normal form.

Edward Cheng implemented a component which provides easy access to a
console, including bookmarking and a history viewer.

Chirayu Chiripal and Ashutosh Dhundhara both worked on many feature
improvements. These improvements may not be glamorous but feature some
much needed maintenance and minor improvements.

Behind the scenes, Dhananjay Nakrani has improved the error reporting
server, an optional reporting feature allowing users to automatically
submit error reports directly to the phpMyAdmin developers. Now, PHP
errors can also be reported.

Additional behind the scenes work was done by Bimal Yashodha to refactor
the code behind the Designer interface. Most of these improvements are
transparent to users but help ease the maintenance required on this
portion of the code.

Cinnamon 2.4 and Future CSB Roadmap

Clem has announced the availability of Cinnamon 2.4 which should be premiered on LinuxMint 17.1 (Rebecca) by the end of this month. It has lots of improvements and bug fixes which is very pleasing for end-users.

Here are some of the highlights of this release:

Responsiveness and memory usage

• CJS was rebased on a newer version of GJS in an effort to reduce memory usage and provide faster execution times.
• All Cinnamon components were reviewed and their source code was checked with static analysis tools. Although most of them were small, about 30 memory leaks were fixed.
• Icons used in Cinnamon Settings were added to the Mint-X icon theme. This increased responsiveness (This is specific to Linux Mint so we encourage all artists and distributions to do the same).

More polish

• Credit to and similar to GNOME Shell, the Cinnamon desktop now starts with a zoom animation.
• The login sound is now handled directly by Cinnamon (as opposed to cinnamon-settings-daemon) and plays in sync with the login sequence.
• Modules in Cinnamon Settings and categories in the application menu are now sorted alphabetically.
• Similar to Windows, “Super+e” now opens up the home directory.
• Cinnamon 2.4 ships with many small refinements (multiple panel launchers, improvements in the sound applet, removal of the timeout in the logout dialog…etc) and a lot of bug fixes.

More settings and hardware support

• Single-button touchpads are now supported (like the one used on the Macbook) and actions for 2-finger and 3-finger clicks are configurable. By default they correspond to right-click and middle-click.
• Compositing in full-screen mode is now configurable and does not require to restart Cinnamon. This means less screen-tearing by default for most users and the option to undirect windows for gamers and users requiring an application to run at full speed without being impacted by the composition manager.
• The desktop font is now configurable.
• It is now possible to give the screensaver a custom date format, and custom fonts.

I'm targeting this version as my next milestone for my CSB project along with next Slackware release. I can't support Cinnamon 2.4 under Slackware 14.1 since it requires many new packages which aren't yet available under 14.1. Asking users to upgrade those libraries is not an option, since it may break many other applications and user experiences.

We will just have to wait for 2.4 to land in Slackware :)