Introduction
Nitro Beta 1, Craft CMS conference updates, news, plugins, tips and more.
Hello Craft friends. Now that you've finished your Zoom meeting, it's time for some Craft links.
The big news in this issue is the release of the Nitro Beta 1, the official local development tool from the Craft team. We've also got the cancelation of Dot All 2020, a possible replacement Craft conference, EOL extensions for Craft 2 and Commerce 1, and news on the 3.5 release date.
Thank you to the sponsors of this issue.
Fortrabbit is a preferred hosting provider for Craft CMS, offering a modern PHP application platform tailored for Craft, with Git deployments and Composer support. Try fortrabbit today.
Freeform is the feature-filled form plugin for Craft CMS that includes ready-to-use templates to get you up and running quickly. Learn about the power of Freeform.
Let's hit the links.
-John Morton
Top Stories
Craft Nitro - Beta 1 released
Nitro, the official local development tool by the Craft team mentioned in the previous issue, has hit 1.x in the latest beta.
The change from 0.x to 1.x means you should feel a little more confident to install it, kick the tires, and think about kicking MAMP, XAMP, or Valet to the curb. You'll want to keep an eye on the changelog as Nitro develops.
Dot All Amsterdam Postponed
The Craft team has announced that Dot All 2020 is not happening. đ Blame the virus. The plans for Dot All 2021 are already set though. đŽ As mentioned in the link above, âDot All Amsterdam will be held from September 22-24, 2021. Same venue. Same price.â đ
extendsConf
As you read in the link above, Dot All will not be happening this year, but @jalendport and @michaelrog are itching for a Craft conference and want to make it happen. đ They're looking for your feedback on what will make it great. Head over to the site and send them suggestions for talks and other ideas.
Extended Craft CMS 2 and Craft Commerce 1 security support
If youâve still got sites on Craft 2 and Commerce 1, there is good news. The new EOL date for both has been extended to January 31, 2022.
News
Craft 3.4.18
As of 3.4.17, Craft now fully logs migration exceptions. 3.4.18 added a âDelete assetâ option to the Save menu on Edit Asset pages and "improved reliability on multi-threaded environments." Be sure to read the full changelog.
Craft 3.5 release date hints
Brandon said Craft 3.5 would be released "before the end of summer." To view that link, youâll need to be part of the Craft Discord group.
Craft the Planet newsletter launched
Ben Parizek has started a new Craft CMS focused newsletter slated to publish "several times per week with Craft snippets, examples, and discussion." You can sign up in the footer of his website at the link above. Subscribing to Benâs newsletter doesn't mean you should unsubscribe from CLL; I can't stop you, but I will miss you. đ
Featured Sponsor

Craft CMS Hosting Partner
We like to automate ALL THE THINGS â except customer support.
Get started with a free trial today! And ask whenever you have any questions.
Tools, tips, and fundamentals
devMode.fm // Boost Your Local Development with Craft Nitro
Jason McCalÂlisÂter and Brad Bell from PixÂel & TonÂic join the devMode cres to talk about their new Craft Nitro prodÂuct for local PHP development.
Craft Nitro: Localhosting Countdown on CraftQuest
CraftQuest already has a video showing you the ropes when it comes to Nitro as well. As I write this, it's not clear to me if this a free video or requires a subscription. A subscription is worth it though. (Note: that's not a paid endorsement, just a personal one.)
How to install Craft CMS on Windows using XAMPP
This post is a rather sparse but if you're struggling with XAMPP, it might help you get Craft installed on your local machine. (You saw the link to Nitro, right?)
Perfecting your technique
Export Sheet Data: Add-on for Google Sheets that allows sheets to be exported as JSON or XML.
@Ransom in Discord mentioned this add-on for Google Sheets is "a little complex to use, but ridiculously useful for Feed Me imports."
Extending Craft CMS with Validation Rules and Behaviors
Craft CMS is a web appliÂcaÂtion that is amazÂingÂly flexÂiÂble & cusÂtomizÂable using the built-in funcÂtionÂalÂiÂty that the platÂform offers. Use the platform!
Andrew also mentioned in Discord that the AttributeTypecastBehavior is his "most useful behavior ever."
Namespacing forms in Craft CMS | Craft Snippets
Piotr Pogorzelski is back with another helpful post on dealing with potentially complex forms in Twig. For example, the responsive design of your page may require you to embed the same form multiple times in the same cause causing conflicts. Piotr will demonstrate how to namespace the form to avoid problems.
Managing static message translations with Crowdin | Craft CMS
This page from the docs discusses using Crowdin for static translations in Craft.
GraphQL: Prevent users from seeing entries authored by other users
In this StackExchange post, Brandon shows how to use a custom module to add an authorId
condition for graphql/api
requests.
devMode.fm // Bro, Do You Even Test?
JenÂnifer BlumÂberg hosts this episode with Giel TetÂteÂlaar, Tech Lead @ GlobÂal NetÂwork Group & the author of the Craft CMS testÂing enviÂronÂment to talk all about testing!
Sponsor

Effortlessly build beautiful forms in minutes with Freeform!
Freeform is the most reliable, intuitive and powerful form building plugin for Craft. Everything is at your fingertips in our elegant form builder. It gives you full control to create simple or complex multi-page forms, as well as connect your forms to many popular API integrations. Templating is easy and highly customizable. Our ready-to-go templates and features like built-in AJAX and Conditional Rules Logic will have you ready in minutes! No other form plugin even comes close to comparing! You can trust Freeform (and the team behind it) to deliver the quality and support you expect and deserve.
Plugged In
Starfield
This plugin adds a new âStarfieldâ field type to Craft, which offers a simple star rating entry.
Craft 3 Instagram: An Instagram plugin for CraftCMS v3
Leevi Graham has released a new Instagram plugin for Craft.
The Craft Advantage
Yii, Twig, PHP & More
Twig Primer
Trivia time: How many types of tags exist in Twig, and what are they? Check the Twig Primer in the Craft docs to find out.
How to find the presence of a substring within a string in TWIG
The in
operator also works with Arrays, as you can see here in the documentation.
Itâs not Craft, but itâs interesting.
Email spam tools
For some readers, the previous issue of this newsletter ended up in their SPAM inboxes.
Based on anecdotal reports, it seems Google mail flagged that issue based on the subject line which contained a potentially-lethal combination of the word that means something does not cost money plus the name of the virus causing the current state global lockdown. I promise the issue meant you no harm.
It turns out there are tools to help your email avoid the SPAM black hole. Here are a few of them.
Forget NodeJS! Build native TypeScript applications with Deno
Deno does not use NPM for dependency management, and hence there is nonode_modules
hell to deal with, which is a huge selling point.
What's Deno? Check out the Deno homepage to read more about this new secure runtime for JavaScript and TypeScript.
Creating a Global Store in Vue without Vuex | Good Work
Jake Dohm has been digging into Vue and shared thoughts on how to manage data globally-ish without using Vuex.
Convert a simple Vue 2 application to Vue 3 in about 10m
Jake also shared his Vue 2 to Vue 3 experience in a seven-tweet thread.
Tailwind Accessibility Config
Tailwind Accessibility Config Project replaces the colors in Tailwind, in Tailwind style, by the USG standards for accessibility colors.
Easily switch PHP versions in Laravel Valet
Switching versions of PHP when using Valet has been previously mentioned in the newsletter. Here's another option in case you're building a collection. (Did I mention the link to Nitro earlier?)