Welcome to CKAN Monthly Newsletter (December edition)

Hello fellow CKANers,

We’ve got some exciting stuff to share this month! From new features in the works to fresh ideas and ways you can get involved, it’s all happening in the CKAN community. Let’s jump right in and catch up on the latest!

News & Updates

Core Dev Team updates

Another busy month in CKAN land:

• A new release was made available for the CKAN Docker images, that includes changes in user permissions to make the images more secure. We also deprecated the Alpine based images. Both these two might imply changes on your GitHub Actions workflow files. Check the release notes for all details.
• A new release for ckanext-spatial: v2.2.0 fixes various bugs and expands support for CKAN 2.11 and SQLAlchemy 2. We also reviewed and updated all the documentation.
• We have started preparing a new patch release for CKAN 2.11 that includes various fixes. This gives us an opportunity to review the release processes and deploy automations to make the process simpler and more secure (e.g. automatic publishing to PyPI and Docker Hub).

• New default datastore settings were added to save approximately 50% database storage space and significantly improve loading time at a small potential performance cost for FTS search on specific fields. See #8530 for more details. This setting will also be available on CKAN 2.11.1.
• Work on the new theme is humming along, and well as the usual management of incoming PRs and issues.

User interface revamp updates

• Creation of a page for organization and group functionality completed.
• Header implementation PR merged.

Decisions made

• Ideal completion timeline set within 1 month, with fallback deadline of end of year.
• Prioritized work to unblock Alex and Stephen.
• Decided on using Primary Brand Color Darken - #193164.
• Considering design system refactoring after New Year.
• Testing phase to be done after implementation is complete.

Issues faced (solving them now)

• Blockers present for some UI components.
• Waiting for dataset UI review and PR review for organization and groups work.
• The current PNG logo appears low quality and cut off on preview.
• Inconsistent button placement across the interface in the default layout.
• Need to unify backgrounds, layout, and components across pages.

You can check the progress by seeing the current state of implementation on the public CKAN dev instance: https://ckan-design-preview.galv1.links.com.au/

• Login: ckan
• Password: preview

We'd love to hear your feedback! Let us know what you think by writing us a message on LinkedIn or joining the discussion on Gitter.

?? Sustainability Matters

Did you know that CKAN contributes to sustainability by enabling better data sharing and transparency, which is crucial for environmental initiatives? Together, we're making a positive impact!

GitHub Updates

The latest stats show numerous commits, pull requests, and issues resolved. This momentum highlights CKAN’s progress and its role in driving open data solutions forward.

Connect with the community!

?? Have something to share?

As we prepare for the upcoming issue, we would like to encourage everyone to share any relevant information or updates with our team. To facilitate this process, we kindly request that you send your contributions to either [email protected], [email protected] or [email protected]. Thanks for being part of this!

?? Want to get involved?

We're a diverse and distributed community of 240 contributors from all over the world and diverse backgrounds, united by our mission to create the best data management system on the internet.

If you love data and python then join one of the weekly Dev Meetings. These are open to anyone so feel free to drop by and ask questions or just listen in. Maybe you can even help with issues marked as Good for Contribution or tackle some of the project's Rockstar Tickets listed here.

• Chat with us on Gitter
• Join Dev Meetings

?? Need help with CKAN?

If you’re stuck on anything, chances are the answers await you on Stackoverflow or in the docs. GitHub Discussions is the place to connect with the community, share your projects and ask questions or support requests about CKAN.

If you want to report a bug or an actual issue with the CKAN software or documentation, please post it on the issue tracker. For security-related issues please email [email protected].

• GitHub Discussions
• Check Stackoverflow
• Create an issue on GitHub
• Chat with us on Gitter

?? Share Your Experience

Join the conversation on @CKANproject and share your experience using #CKAN! Don’t forget to subscribe to the CKAN Association YouTube Channel to receive updates!

?? Stay Connected

Follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube and join our LinkedIn Group to get notified and be able to sign up for future sessions. You can also visit our website and blog to learn more! Our LinkedIn Page is brand new; follow us there and spread the word!

More information here:

?? Thank You!

We appreciate your continued support and involvement in the CKAN community. Your contributions make a difference.

Best regards,

The CKAN team

P.S. Feel free to share this newsletter with colleagues who might find it valuable!