What's new with Drupal 8?

Since the last Drupal 8 Core Update, Drupal 8 got a UI for responsive image mapping, a proposal for a new Drupal.org content model was put forward and a bunch of improvements were made to Drupal.org, notably: the first comment to an issue is now automatically generated to make it easier to see the original issue summary, test result output was improved, and it's now possible to test patches on PHP 5.4, 5.5, 5.6, and 7 simultaneously.

Some other highlights of the month were:

• To improve usability, h2-h6 headings were added to the CKEditor paragraph format drop-down by default and the password strength evaluator became much more accessible.
• Jonathan Westman at ActiveLAMP wrote about his first experiences with Drupal 8, Nikhil Sukul at Faichi Solutions Pvt Ltd described the advantages that Symfony brings to Drupal 8, and Jingsheng Wang at INsReady Inc. (引锐信息科技有限公司) demonstrated how to test Drupal 8 with 2 Docker commands.
• On the front-end, system.module.css and system.theme.css were split into SMACSS-style components; theme functions for the maintenance page were converted to Twig; and CSS and HTML for the toolbar, views, and the admin, buttons, "featured bottom", table, and user components in Bartik were cleaned up.
• Daniel Sipos gave an overview of why theming Drupal 8 will rock.
• To make Drupal more compatible and easier to use with other PHP projects, you can now use your own exception handler, and support for PSR-7 RequestInterface was added to Drupal's ControllerResolver.
• Fabian Bircher at Nuvole explained how to use D8's CMI without running into pitfalls, Mike Potter talked about the role of the Features module in Drupal 8 on the Modules Unraveled Podcast, and Aidan Foster at Foster Interactive Inc. explained how he built the first multilingual conference site in Drupal 8.
• Larry Garfield at Palantir.net discussed how Drupal 8 distinguishes different types of data, Daniel Sipos walked through how an HTTP request gets turned into rendered HTML in Drupal 8, Brian Altenhofel at VMdoh wrote about how to build a Drupal 8 website with Composer, and Shitiz Garg finished his series of blog posts about his adventures writing the Hawk Authentication module for Drupal 8.
• SafeMarkup::checkAdminXss(), \Drupal\system\FileAjaxForm, node_page_title(), and Bartik's tips.css were all removed.
• Migrations for files, locale settings, and D7 text formatters and filters were committed.
• For security, Drupal's JavaScript settings are now loaded rather than embedded directly in the page.
• Moving blocks to new regions now work again, failed behaviors no longer halt Drupal, datelist fields now validate that all fields are filled in, and you can install modules from the UI again.

How can I help get Drupal 8 finished?

See Help get Drupal 8 released! for updated information on the current state of the software and more information on how you can help.

We're also looking for more contributors to help compile these posts. Contact mparker17 if you'd like to help!

Drupal 8 In Real Life

• Drupal Meetup in Islamabad, Pakistan by Ikonami Technologies on August 19, 2015. They present an overview of Drupal 8 features along with discussions around common problems faced in Drupal 7.
• CADUG General Drupal Meetup held on August 20th, 2015 in Chicago, IL, USA covering Drupal 8 Views. Check it out!
• Drupal Global Training Days in Wrocław, Poland will be conducting trainings on Drupal 8. Join the learning hub!
• Learn Drupal 8 custom module and theme development by joining Drupal Meetup Delhi, India on 21st August from 18:00 to 20:00 IST.
• Join the 2 day DrupalCamp Pune, Maharashtra, India and explore more about Drupal 8 on 22nd and 23rd August.
• The 6th annual DrupalCamp Baltics returns to Tallinn, Estonia on 28th and 29th August with huge coverage of Drupal 8 via their interesting sessions. Join them!
• DrupalCamp LA, held at University of California, in Irvine, CA, USA is coming on 29th and 30th August with coverage of Drupal 8. Come, join them, learn and have fun!

Whew! That's a wrap!

Do you follow Drupal Planet with devotion, or keep a close eye on the Drupal event calendar, or git pull origin 8.0.x every morning without fail before your coffee? We're looking for more contributors to help compile these posts. You could either take a few hours once every six weeks or so to put together a whole post, or help with one section more regularly. If you'd like to volunteer for helping to draft these posts, please follow the steps here!