The time is drawing near where we'll be locking down the hatches, taking the suggestions we've been receiving and brewing over, and hacking away at the JoomlaSEF package to rebuild it into a real SEO workhorse. We've setup a new forum that will be much easier for us to manage as we move forward with the project. Several things we can use your suggestions on:

1) What kinds of SEO Tools do you need with your projects? We've had several ideas, and we already started the Plugin system with the release of JoomlaSEF.

2) Extensions Galore! We want to make sure this release has as many extensions already included as possible. Hunting for them has always been frustrating.

Checkout our initial list of SEO Upgrade Ideas and share your your ideas with us on our new forum. http://forum.webuddha.com/

This new version is going to rock ;-)

The JoomlaSEF Development Team

These are areas of attention that have been identified during the development of v2.1.0. The JoomlaSEF development team will be adding all known issues and upgrade intentions to the SourceForge Tracking system to be reviewed by the community. Major areas for attention are provided below. If you are reading this and have suggestions, please consider taking the time to add them here -or- add specific items to the Tracker system. 

The new Joomla SEF and SEO component has undergone several upgrades providing noticeably FASTER Run-Time execution and ENHANCED SEO Page Title and Meta Tag manipulation. Joomla SEF v2.1.0 includes several Bug Fixes and has undergone the first phases of development towards having a full Plug-in system for future collaboration efforts in the SEO arena.

• Faster Processing, Improved MySQL and Memory Usage for Incoming URL Resolution
  This was one of the biggest oversights found. The entire ALIAS database was being loaded into global memory space on each Joomla instance. This was a simple issue to correct and should be one of the largest contributors to a speed increase for this version. i.e.: Large Sites where loading hundreds of data objects into memory which was unecessary.

• Enhanced SEO Page Title and Meta Tag Integration with WebuddhaSEO Plug-in
  This integration allows for a fine tuning of the Page Title and Meta Tags present on a per-page basis. The data is all tied to the Alias records, allowing for extreme flexibility since a page can have limitless alias records. The plug-in allows for multiple titles and Meta tags to be rotated - currently in a random fashion - specific for each alias. Requires installation of the Open Source WebuddhaSEO Mambot which can be found here.

• Plug-in System Review and Initial Development
  This release has taken some initial steps toward a structured plug-in system for 3rd Party SEF / SEO plug-ins and extension management.  The plug-in system needs you or support to determine the best methodology to employ. The OpenSEF application uses a hybrid of Savant and a custom XCL templating system to create the interface and manage the form data. The goal will be to review and simplify the current platform.

May 13th, 2008 - Today we launch the JoomlaSEF.org website to carry on a new phase of the OpenSEF development project.  This inaugural JoomlaSEF release v2.1.0, built off the OpenSEF platform release v2.0.0_RC5_SP2, has been reviewed and enhanced to address many of the issues we had been witnessing in the forums and with our projects.  Joomla SEF v2.1.0 will be the first of many upgrades to the wonderful OpenSEF component. Our goal is to organize support within the Joomla community and finally bring this application to the level it deserves.

Joomla SEF is a powerful component, built off the OpenSEF platform v2.0.0_RC5_SP2, that provides Search Engine Friendly (SEF) URL management for the Joomla CMS system.  The Joomla SEF component also boasts Multiple Site management, and a suite of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) tools for evaluating and managing your website search rankings.

The JoomlaSEF project has been started by the Holodyn Corporations Atlanta Web Site Development team Webuddha.com, who has opened a SourceForge repository found here where all discussion, tracking, and collaboration will be hosted.  We hope that the Joomla user community will take part in our efforts by providing bug reports, code enhancement suggestions, and development support through the SourceForge platform.

If you want to learn more about the JoomlaSEF component and available plug-ins, please review the JoomlaSEF documentation category.  The JoomlaSEF Component and Webuddha SEO Mambot can be downloaded here.