[fleXive] was originally started back in 1999 as a closed source project by UCS – unique computing solutions gmbh. Its aim was to provide a sophisticated J2EE framework to allow for the rapid development of webbased applications like CMS systems, while automatically ensuring high standards of security and flexibility (hence its name) in a way that was not available at the time. This eventually led to the release of [fleXive] 2.0 in 2003, the last official release of [fleXive] up to this point.

During this period as well as the following years many successful projects were implemented using this framework, but no new versions were release and further developments has not been driven forward. One reason for this was, that the existing release suited the needs at that time very well. Another reason was the fact, that a complete reimplementation of [fleXive] would have been necessary for a new release.

The discussion about the future of [fleXive] ended in 2005 when the decision was finally taken in favour of creating a new [fleXive] with state of the art architecture and technologies. But this time as an open-source project, mainly sponsored and developed by UCS in its starting phase. The main reason that led to this decision was the belief, that the great work already existing - both in terms of functionality and technologically - should not be lost but rather given to the community, so that as many people as possible could benefit from it.

The "Release Candidate 1" strives to be feature complete and we focus on ironing out the last remaining issues for the final 3.0 release.

Features include:

• Dynamic-OR mapping of hierarchical XML-like data to relational database tables for numerous data types (definition of types and relations, multi-language support, versioning, workflows)
• Content handling
• Internationalization
• Security using access control lists (ACLs) ruling mandators, roles/groups/users and data-security (type, instance and property permissions)
• Complete SQL-like search engine (support of string and numbers, search in content tree, define query via UI, etc.)
• Manage your data in a tree-like virtual filesystem (2-step workflow support, etc.)
• User management (groups, roles)
• Mandator support
• Event triggered scripting (certain events can trigger scripts, startup/runonce scripts, manage the scripts via UI, scripting-console)
• Caching
• Loads of ready to use JSF components
• Intuitive and comprehensive backend (visual editors for structure definition, content handling and query definition, extendable administration interface)

New and improved features in this release:

• Import / Export of content instances
  
• Scripting support for the content tree
• UI for status of runonce/startup scripts
• UI to access and compare instance versions
• Improved UI for multi-language support
• Preferred languages for editors
• History-tracking of instances
• Complete German localization
• Improved search engine (query support for date/time/ranges, selectlists, binaries and booleans)
• Improved content tree UI

The development of [fleXive] will not stop at version 3.0. Instead we already have numerous additional features planned to be included in future releases.  While the order in which they will be implemented has not been 100% decided yet, we nonetheless want to already give you an idea of what can be expected for upcoming versions of [fleXive]:

• External (JAAS, etc.) authentication and synchronization
• Schedule workflow changes
• Relations: UI for definition and editing
• Templating support
• Storage of binaries on the file-system
• Splitscreen UI for multi-language contents
• Explicit locking of instances
• Batch-processing
• Integration (webservices, XML RPC, JSON RPC, WebDAV)

We expect to publish a more concrete version of the roadmap including a timeplan for upcoming releases once the RC1 of Version 3.0 has been released. If you think we should prioritize or add features we would be happy to receive your feedback.

There are always a lot of new features on our list of open points. A lot of them are derived from the constant planning of additional functionality as well as the natural evolution of [fleXive] as it is used in various projects and we receive valuable feedback from the community.

Unfortunately we can’t implement all of them at once though, as the number of developers for this project - as for all projects - is limited. Therefore we need to choose a set of features that we plan to implement for each upcoming release. This selection process usually involves ordering the currently planned features into logical groups based on their functionality and priority as seen by us and the community and then choosing as many of them as feasible.

On one hand this means, that you should let us know if you are missing a certain feature on our roadmap or think we don’t prioritize an existing one sufficiently. In most cases we will then do our best to include this feature as soon as possible.

On the other hand however, there are also those situations where you need a specific feature for the implementation of a project based on [fleXive], and you also need it within a given timeframe to meet a certain deadline. For these cases there is always the possibility to sponsor that feature. By doing this, you allow us to add additional programming resources to the project dedicated to implementing your specific feature in the way and timeframe you need it. For more details or a sponsoring request be sure to contact us directly.