A new stable version of the symfony framework has just been released. In addition to a lot of little improvements and bug fixes, here are the three major features that may decide you to upgrade right away:

  • New exception page: When an exception occurs in the development environment, the page displayed is much more user-friendly to speed up your search for the incorrect code. The line causing the error in each call in the execution stack is clearly indicated, and can be clicked to reveal the PHP code and the related parameters.
  • Better form repopulation: In the past, you may have experienced problems with form repopulation in the case of a failed validation. Conflicts between the default value, the value of the current object and the value from the request (i.e. the value entered by the user before the validation) were resolved in a way that satisfied nobody, each web application having its own rules to deal with this case. Now, the repopulation is optional but easy to activate (one additional line in the YAML validation file) and behaves just like you expect it to - without interfering with default or object values when you're not in a validation context. The repopulation chapter of the symfony book will tell you all you need to know about this feature.
  • Output escaping: There's been quite a fuss recently about cross-site scripting (XSS) attack risks in websites, due to the absence of control on the data entered by users in web forms. Taking care of these risks requires two measures: input filtering and output escaping. Symfony now implements the latter in an innovative way, and is the first framework to offer such a level of security when displaying data from an unsafe database. You will find more information in the online documentation of this feature - a book chapter is in preparation.

The changelog gives a little more details about the update. To upgrade, use the usual PEAR command:

$ pear upgrade symfony/symfony

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