We are pleased to announce the release of cloudscribe v8.5, which includes important changes to licensing, plus some new features, enhancements and bug fixes.

Major Licensing Change

Commercial Components Now Free

  • Announcement: All cloudscribe commercial components are now available for free use
  • Components Included:
    • TalkAbout Commenting System
    • TalkAbout Forums
    • Membership Paywall
    • Newsletter Management
    • Forms and Surveys
    • Stripe Payment Integration
  • Impact: License key requirements have been completely removed for all commercial components
  • Source Code: Components remain proprietary (subject to potential future open-sourcing)
  • Benefit: Full cloudscribe ecosystem now accessible without licensing barriers

New Features

Admin Application Restart

  • Feature: Added capability for administrators to restart the application directly from the cloudscribe admin interface
  • Benefit: Eliminates need for direct server access when application restart is required
  • Configuration: Controlled via appsettings.json configuration boolean for security
  • Issue: #1102

Enhanced Summernote Editor - Element Path Display

  • Feature: New element path breadcrumb display showing current cursor position in DOM hierarchy (similar to CKEditor)
  • Functionality: Real-time updates with clickable breadcrumbs for easy navigation
  • Implementation: Custom Summernote plugin with comprehensive HTML5 tag support
  • Issue: #1208

Enhanced Summernote Editor - Improved Link Behavior

  • Change: Hyperlinks no longer open in new windows by default
  • Configuration: Controlled via linkTargetBlank: false in summernote-config.json
  • Issue: #1209

RSS Feed Styling Support

  • Feature: Added ability to style RSS feeds with custom CSS stylesheets
  • Implementation: Support for XML stylesheet meta tags in RSS feeds
  • Functionality: Automatic XSL and CSS file deployment with user override protection
  • Benefit: RSS feeds can now match site branding and provide better user experience
  • Documentation: New documentation available at https://www.cloudscribe.com/cloudscribesyndication
  • Issue: cloudscribe.Syndication #7

Enhancements

Enhanced Auto-Logout System

  • Improvement: Resolved session timeout issues for users actively using JavaScript API endpoints
  • Features:
    • Server-side middleware for intelligent session activity tracking
    • Client-side JavaScript for cross-tab session management
    • Configurable timeout thresholds
  • Benefit: Prevents unexpected logouts during active user workflows while maintaining security
  • Issue: #1204

System Information Improvements

  • Enhancement: Updated System Information page to include previously missing packages
  • Added: Compiled views, static files, integration packages, and Bootstrap components
  • Fixed: Removed duplicate "cloudscribe.Email.Templating.Web" entry
  • Benefit: Improved visibility for troubleshooting and support scenarios
  • Issue: #698

Bug Fixes

IdentityServer4 Support Resolution

  • Fixed: Resolved token creation issues caused by dependency version conflicts
  • Root Cause: System.IdentityModel.Tokens.Jwt version 8.2.* breaking changes
  • Solution: Updated dependency chain management and explicit package references
  • Impact: Restored proper JWT signature validation and metadata endpoint functionality
  • Issue: #1205

Email Queue Background Task Exception Handling

  • Fixed: Resolved cancellation exception thrown during app pool recycling
  • Error: "A task was canceled" in EmailQueueBackgroundTask.ExecuteAsync
  • Solution: Improved cancellation token handling in background services
  • Impact: Eliminates log noise during normal application lifecycle events
  • Issue: cloudscribe.Messaging #13

Upgrading to v8.5

To upgrade your cloudscribe installation to version 8.5:

  1. Update all cloudscribe package references in your .csproj files to version 8.5.*
  2. If you want to include the new Application Restart button in your administration interface, you need to add a new flag to your appsettings.json configuration file as documented
  3. If you want to include links in your Administration menu to cloudscribe's recently added tools for blocking access by IP address (see v8.3 release notes) - then you can add these to your navigation.xml file as documented.
  4. Run your application and verify all features are working as expected

Note: As always, we recommend testing the upgrade in a development environment before deploying to production.

Community and Support

We appreciate the continued support and feedback from the cloudscribe community. For questions or issues related to this release, please visit our GitHub repository or join the discussion in our community forums.

Thank you for using cloudscribe!

We are pleased to announce a new release of cloudscribe at version 8.1. This minor version release addresses a number of issues, bugs and feature enhancements (see the release notes below).

We've released a new version of the cloudscribe Visual Studio template. Reviews are always appreciated!

We recommend that the VSIX template should be installed into Visual Studio 2022 (version 17.8 onwards).

Older versions of the VSIX template remain available here: https://github.com/cloudscribe/cloudscribe.templates/tree/master/Archive.

As always, feedback is welcome in the forums or on GitHub.

Release Notes

version 8.1 - 6 May 2025

@cloudscribe/cloudscribe.Web.Navigation

  • #135: Fixed an issue causing incorrect child page sub-menus when the URL ends with a trailing slash. This ensures consistent navigation tree behavior across routes with or without trailing slashes.

@cloudscribe/cloudscribe

  • #1073: Introduced a reserved word list for tenant site names to prevent conflicts. For example, "development" is now restricted to avoid issues with accessing developer sections.
  • #1063: Added a feature to export user data from the User Manager, including basic attributes such as First Name, Surname, Display Name, Email Address, and Created Date.
  • #798: Enhanced the file manager with the ability to move files between folders, eliminating the need to delete and re-upload files.
  • #762: Updated the main heading on /privacy and other cloudscribe core pages to use <h1> tags or allow configurability, replacing the previous <h2> implementation.
  • #942: Extended reCAPTCHA protection to the "Forgot Your Password?" page to mitigate risks associated with automated email spam and enhance security.
  • #935: Resolved an issue where the returnurl parameter was ignored on the login page if the user was already logged in. Now, the intended return behavior is consistently applied.
  • #929: Improved the user experience for sites with social sign-in by hiding password management options (/manage/setpassword and /manage/changepassword) when database authentication is disabled.
  • #924: Fixed a UI issue in the Page Manager tree where togglers were inheriting an underline style and made them larger and easier to click.
  • #959: Fixed a crash when saving user details with a date of birth in PostgreSQL. Ensured compatibility with timestamp with time zone by enforcing UTC for DateTime values.
  • #1056: Corrected the behavior of the "Clear Image" button to ensure it functions as expected after dragging and dropping an image.
  • #1034: Added a "View Activity" link on the Manage User page to improve navigation to the User Activity page.

@cloudscribe/cloudscribe.SimpleContent

  • #487: Added options in CMS settings to display created and last edited information (author and timestamps) below content. These settings include configurable defaults.
  • #549: Updated the LinksRenderPartial to align with Bootstrap 5 standards. Replaced <h2> and float-based styling with semantic markup and modern flex layouts.

Upgrading an existing cloudscribe site

We recommend manually editing the .csproj file of your solution (or each of them, if you have multiple projects). to upgrade the package references:

<PackageReference Include="cloudscribe.Core.SimpleContent" Version="8.1.*" />
<PackageReference Include="cloudscribe.SimpleContent.Web" Version="8.1.*" />
<PackageReference Include="cloudscribe.Core.SimpleContent.CompiledViews.Bootstrap5" Version="8.1.*" />

(and so on for all cloudscribe packages)

There should be no breaking changes from our previous v8.0 release.

I am very happy to announce the availability of project templates that make it much easier to start new projects using cloudscribe components. Specifically, we have a new VSIX extension that provides a project template for Visual Studio 2017 and a NuGet package the provides a project template for the dotnet new command.

Previously, copying a project from the cloudscribe Starter Kits was the best way to get started with a new cloudscribe project, but now with the new project templates you can create projects with configurations that correspond to the different starter kit project configurations simply by using the available project template parameters. See the document "Introduction to cloudscribe" for more details.

Starting New Projects in Visual Studio

You can download the Visual Studio 2017 extension for free from the Visual Studio Marketplace, or from directly within Visual Studio, under Tools > Extensions and Updates > Online

If you download it from the marketplace you need to double click the .vsix file to install it. In both cases you have to restart Visual Studio for it to become available, then you will see a new cloudscribe project template under C# > Web in the new project dialog.

When you create a new cloudscribe project, another small dialog window will appear to let you choose which data storage platform and which cloudscribe features you want.

Starting New Projects with the .NET CLI (Command Line Interface)

The .NET CLI can be used on Windows, Linux, or macOS. You can install the cloudscribe project template NuGet package with this command:

dotnet new -i "cloudscribe.templates::*"

If you later wish to uninstall it, you can use this command:

dotnet new -u cloudscribe

Once you have the cloudscribe project template installed you should enter the following command to see the available parameters that you can pass to the template in order to choose which data storage platform to use and which features to install:

PS C:\_c\scratch> dotnet new cloudscribe --help
Usage: new [options]

Options:
  -h, --help          Displays help for this command.
  -l, --list          Lists templates containing the specified name. If no name is specified, lists all templates.
  -n, --name          The name for the output being created. If no name is specified, the name of the current directory is used.
  -o, --output        Location to place the generated output.
  -i, --install       Installs a source or a template pack.
  -u, --uninstall     Uninstalls a source or a template pack.
  --type              Filters templates based on available types. Predefined values are "project", "item" or "other".
  --force             Forces content to be generated even if it would change existing files.
  -lang, --language   Specifies the language of the template to create.


cloudscribe web project template (C#)
Author: Joe Audette
Options:
  -T|--Title                  The name of the project which determines the assembly product name.
                              string - Optional
                              Default: Project Title

  -S|--SimpleContent          Include cloudscribe SimpleContent blog and content engine.
                              bool - Optional
                              Default: true

  -C|--ContactForm            Include cloudscribe SimpleContactForm.
                              bool - Optional
                              Default: false

  -K|--KvpCustomRegistration  Include cloudscribe key/value pair custom registration.
                              bool - Optional
                              Default: false

  -I|--IdentityServer         Include IdentityServer4 (fork) integration.
                              bool - Optional
                              Default: false

  -L|--Logging                Include cloudscribe logging and log viewer UI.
                              bool - Optional
                              Default: true

  -D|--DataStorage            The data storage platform you wish to use.
                                  NoDb     - A no-database file system storage
                                  MSSQL    - Microsoft SqlServer storage using Entity Framework Core
                                  pgsql    - PostgreSql storage using Entity Framework Core
                                  MySql    - MySql storage using Entity Framework Core
                              Default: MSSQL

  -H|--HttpsPort              Port number to use to configure SSL in launchSettings.json.
                              integer - Optional

  -Ke|--KestrelPort           Port number to use to configure Kestrel in launchSettings.json.
                              integer - Optional

  -II|--IISExpressPort        Port number to use to configure IIS Express in launchSettings.json.
                              integer - Optional


PS C:\_c\scratch>

As you can see this is much easier than cloning the starter kits repo and copying an existing project. You have full control over the project name and even more configurable options than what the starter kits provide.

I hope you will give the new project templates a try and provide feedback. It would be great if you could provide a review or rating of the Visual Studio extension on the marketplace site.

One thing cool that I have noticed is that the marketplace shows the number of installs, not the number of downloads, so the number goes down if people uninstall it. That gives us a real honest metric for how the extension is doing in terms of popularity over time.  The NuGet package for dotnet new shows download statistics. Note that the Visual Studio extension has the template embedded inside the vsix file so it doesn't affect the downloads from nuget, only installations from the CLI affect the nuget download numbers.

UPDATE 2017-09-26

Feedback on the project templates has been great and I have continued to improve it. Yesterday I released a new version (1.8) with even more configurable options for SimpleContent and also added an option to set the multi-tenant mode to either use folders, host names or just use a single tenant.

cloudscribe project template options