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Joomla is a popular open-source content management system (CMS) that has been around for almost two decades. It is used by millions of websites, from small blogs to large enterprise sites. In this blog post, we'll take a look at the history of Joomla, from its origins as a fork of Mambo to its current state.

Origins of Joomla

The story of Joomla begins with Mambo, another open-source CMS that was created in 2001. Mambo quickly gained popularity and was used by many websites, including some high-profile ones like MTV and Harvard University. However, there were disagreements within the Mambo development team, which led to a split in 2005. A group of developers who were unhappy with the direction of Mambo decided to create their own fork of the project, which they called Joomla.

The name Joomla comes from the Swahili word "jumla", which means "all together". This reflects the community-driven nature of the project, which has always relied on volunteers to develop and maintain the software.

Key people in Joomla's history

Some of the key people in Joomla's history include:

  • Andrew Eddie: one of the original developers of Joomla, who helped create the first version of the software in 2005.
  • Johan Janssens: another early contributor to Joomla who helped develop many of the key features of the software.
  • Louis Landry: a core developer of Joomla who helped lead the development of version 1.5, which was a major milestone for the project.
  • Sarah Watz: a former president of the Joomla project who helped build relationships with the community and promote the software.

Major releases and features

Joomla has gone through several major releases over the years, each with its own set of features and improvements. Here are some of the key releases and their features:

  • Joomla 1.0: the first version of Joomla, released in 2005. It was based on the Mambo codebase but included many new features, such as a more flexible template system and improved user management.
  • Joomla 1.5: released in 2008, this was a major update that introduced a new architecture for the software. It included many new features, such as an improved installer, a new user interface, and support for multiple languages.
  • Joomla 2.5: released in 2012, this version included many performance improvements and updated the software to use the latest web technologies.
  • Joomla 3.x: the current version of Joomla, which was released in 2013. It includes many new features, such as a mobile-friendly design, improved search functionality, and support for more advanced content types.

One of the key features of Joomla is its extensibility. There are thousands of third-party extensions available for the software, including plugins, modules, and templates. This makes it easy to add new functionality to a Joomla site without having to write code from scratch.

Conclusion

Joomla has come a long way since its origins as a fork of Mambo. It has grown into a powerful and flexible content management system that is used by millions of websites around the world. Its community-driven nature and emphasis on extensibility have made it a popular choice for developers and site owners alike. With each new release, Joomla continues to evolve and improve, and it will be interesting to see where the project goes in the years to come.

Author Note

The entire blog post above was written by ChatGPT-3 AI in response to the following request and is posted in its complete form with no corrections or amendments.

Write a blog post for me describing the history of Joomla, how it was created from mambo, who the key people were and what have been the major releases and their features.

The typing steampunk robot image was also created using text-to-image AI using canva.

J o o m l a !

Brian Teeman

Brian Teeman

Who is Brian?

As a co-founder of Joomla! and OpenSourceMatters Inc I've never been known to be lacking an opinion or being too afraid to express it.

Despite what some people might think I'm a shy and modest man who doesn't like to blow his own trumpet or boast about achievements.

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