In the course of removing ionCube, Shopware 5.5 compatible plugins are always open source. What this means for you, we clarify in this section.
Before you update, make sure that your plugins are as fully compatible as possible with Shopware 5.5. Only if all plugins are 5.5 compatible you don't need the license manager in Shopware 5.5 anymore and you can uninstall it after the update.
Since not all plugins may be made directly compatible, the license manager remains functional even after the update, so that you can continue to use your plugins first. The license manager is only marked as compatible in case of an update, so that you don't have to remove the plugin before the update.
The license manager is no longer developed for Shopware 5.5!
So make sure that you update your plugins to the open source versions as soon as possible to avoid problems! With ionCube you can only use PHP 7.0, to update to newer PHP versions you have to update all encrypted plugins and remove the license manager.
Internationalisation is quite important for us at Shopware and in this recent update we have again implemented several features that contribute to our continuing efforts to improve internationalization. We will explain and briefly introduce these in the following sections.
Categories can now be translated - just as it is possible elsewhere in Shopware - by clicking the blue/green globe symbol. Your language shops are now based on the same category tree your main shop is. Yet it still delivers translated content! Find further information on this in the corresponding wiki article Categories.
Shop pages now can be translated.
For new installations: The previous technical separation caused by the language prefix for the keys "gLeft", "eLeft" etc. no longer exists! Shopware now only utilizes these keys: "Left", "Bottom" and "Bottom2".
For updates: Aready present keys retain their previous assignment, but are mapped to the new key "Left", "Bottom" and "Bottom2" automatically in the background. If you wish, it is possible to change the keys yourself, but it will certainly not just be necessary.
Find further information on this in in the wiki article shop pages.
Forms are translateable and can therefore be used multilingually now. Edit the translations and other relevant information by clicking the globe symbol.
Find further information on this in the corresponding wiki article Forms.
If you are making use of language shops, you can activate hreflang support after the update. The pages' corresponding translations are put forward as part of the source code. This way search engines will recognize a shop's language, what pages are to be considered translations and therefore should be treated accordingly.
Look up the wiki article SEO / router settings for further information.
During the checkout taxes can now be calculated and displayed proportionally for rebates and surcharges, taking into consideration multiple different tax rates. This funtion can be activated in the basic settings > shopping cart / item details.
Further information can be found in in the wiki article Shopping cart / item details.
The Shopware cart's calculation precision was increased, so that now calculations are made with up to two decimals resulting in more accureate tax calculation.
Time-controlled content, such as shopping worlds or landing pages that are activated at certain times, now support http caching. As a result, the cache is appropriately invalidated and an active shopping world / landing page is stored in the cache after the initial visit.
The cache warm-up has been fundamentally revised, it is now possible to warm up variant URLs and URLs with category parameters to significantly increase the speed of the shop after the initial warmup.
Read a detailed description in the corresponding wiki article Cache (performance module).
Sitemaps are now structured differently in Shopware 5.5.0. There is no longer a single "sitemap", but instead an index, that can contains several sitemaps. The amount depends on the shops' set-up. Sitemaps are compressed immidiately.
The old sitemap.xml call will be forwarded to the new index, so that you will not suffer any disadvantages during the update.
Interestingly, for shops accumulating many orders, customers or articles, Shopware can now also index modules via the backend, by using ElasticSearch. This should considerably increase performance of modules in the backend.
Shopware 5.5.0 is compatible with ElasticSearch 6. This is a change that requires a mandatory re-indexing after the update, as indexing is performed differently from Shopware 5.5.0.
If you made use of a trial licenses or rentals, you have expired and the plugin is still installed, you will be notified and prompted to uninstall the plugin.
Forms sent through Shopware can now serve several recipients. That way, forms can be processed by several employees.
Further information can be found in in the wiki article Forms.
The links to the forms have changed and may therefore have to be adapted accordingly. Links are now generated according to the pattern shopware.php?sViewport=forms&sFid=5 (before: shopware.php?sViewport=ticket&sFid=5).
Shopware is now compatible with MySQL 8, which is likely to perform better in larger environments or environments with many concurrent accesses.
Deprecations announced in older versions have actually been removed! Better check if one of your plugins or extensions still uses these, as they won't work any longer! It would be wise to check fpr this, before updating.
If you use external file systems like Amazon S3 or similar, we recommend a GDPR notice for your customers.
