We are excited to announce that 3.3.0 BETA 1 has been released! If you purchased Blesta direct, you may download blesta-3.3.0-b1.zip from the client area now (Login Required). During installation, choose to start a free trial unless you have a dev license you can use. Then, head over to our 3.3 beta forums to report any bugs and let us know what you think.

We don’t recommend using beta releases in production.

New order forms “Wizard List” and “AJAX List”.

So what else is new in 3.3?

In Blesta 3.3, we focused primarily on your feature requests, adding many new and highly requested features, including:

• Pro Forma Invoices
• Pro Rata / Proration
• Client Upgrades & Downgrades
• Pay with an existing credit
• Price Overrides
• Wizard List and AJAX List order forms
• Copy Packages
• Multicraft Module

There’s a lot more in this release, see the release notes for details.

When is the final release?

Version 3.3 will be officially released after the beta phase is completed. Generally the beta for a minor release lasts around 2-3 weeks, but it can vary. An official release is only made once we deem it to be stable.

What are you waiting for? Download the beta and let us know what you think!

Blesta 3.3 is in active development and is coming along nicely. One of the new highly requested features is Pro Forma Invoices. Let’s take a look!

In this video I’ll walk you through the process of enabling pro forma invoices. This is the process you’ll follow after we release version 3.3, if you need to issue pro forma invoices to your clients.

That was easy!

I know what you’re thinking. It’s too simple right? You should have to tweak settings and hone your coding skills modifying files that you’ll have to change again after you upgrade. Right? Not with Blesta.

So, how does it work?

After enabling pro forma, invoices will be created as pro forma invoices. Once paid, the pro forma invoice will be converted to a standard invoice with new invoice numbering. Invoices and Pro Forma Invoices have unique numbering and formats. By default, Pro Forma Invoices will start with PROFORMA-, followed by a number, but this can be changed under “Pro Forma Invoice Format”.

If you’re not an EU company, chances are good you don’t need pro forma invoices. Blesta will continue to use the standard invoice format out of the box.

We are excited to announce that the beta has begun for Blesta 3.2! If you purchased Blesta direct, you may download blesta-3.2.0-b1 from the client area now (Login required). During installation choose to start a free trial unless you have a dev license you can use. Then, head over to our 3.2 beta forums to report any bugs and let us know what you think.

So what’s in 3.2?

The focus of 3.2 is the client area. The entire client area has been rebuilt on top of Bootstrap 3 and is responsive. Additionally, 4 new responsive order templates have been created, including:

• Ajax Slider (A one page ajax order form with a slider package selector)
• Ajax Boxes (A one page ajax order form with a boxes package selector)
• Wizard Slider (A multi-step wizard order form with a slider package selector)
• Wizard Boxes (A multi-step wizard order form with a boxes package selector)

We really like these new order forms and we hope you do too.

There’s a lot more in this release, see the release notes for details.

When is the final release?

Version 3.2 will be officially released after the beta phase is completed. Generally the beta for a minor release lasts around 2-3 weeks, but it can vary. An official release is only made once we deem it to be stable.

If you have any custom plugins or modules or website integrations, we suggest installing the beta and getting a head start integrating. Anything custom that renders views in the client area will need to be updated.

Blesta 3.1 is loaded with great new features, but we didn’t forget about developers either. Here are a few new items developers can take advantage of in 3.1.

Improved CLI Installer

The command line installer gets non-interactive mode support in 3.1. This allows integration services to automate installation of Blesta. Read more about CLI installation.

Extensions Simplified

Plugins, Modules, and Gateways now support a config.json file that defines basic details such as author, name, version, and more. This greatly reduces the redundancy and maintenance across extensions, simplifying the development process. See configuration for Plugins, configuration for Modules, and configuration for Gateways for more details.

New Events

Almost a dozen new events have been added in 3.1. Of course, every event added opens up endless possibilities for new Plugins. See all events here.

Updated API

New features equals new and updated API commands (including Plugins). Check out the source code documentation.

Version 3.1 is currently in beta with a final release due out this week.

We’re excited to announce that Blesta 3.1 beta 1 has been released. If you didn’t receive the announcement email, you can view it online here. The release notes are also available here.

We’ve been working on 3.1 for a while now, and it’s time for a beta! Betas are open to direct customers, and the download is available now within the client area. Login at https://account.blesta.com/client/login/, click “Downloads”, then “Betas”, then 3.1.0-b1 download.

During installation, select to start a 30-day free trial unless you have another license available, such as a development license. If you need help, please open a ticket.

If you don’t have a Blesta license yet, you can still get into the Beta. Now’s a good time to buy!

Once you get the beta installed, head on over to the forums and let us know what you think. Your feedback is very important to us, and will help us get to a final release as quickly as possible.