There are many fine achievements to reflect on as we look back on 2017. Most importantly the Joomla Project wants to say a massive "thank you" to all our volunteers. As an open source project, Joomla can only achieve what it does with the valuable contributions of our extensive global community of hard-working volunteers. On behalf of the Joomla Project, Thank You!

In 2017 we stepped forward, and it is you, the volunteers, who played a compelling role in our quest. The year was filled with inspiring, compelling, awesome, challenging, and simply great stories every single day. These stories are the fabric and core of our project and they continually remind us of how vital the commitment of our volunteers is to the Joomla Project. 

The Joomla Project would also be unable to function without the amazing support from our our sponsors and partners who keep the project running on a day to day basis by providing financial support and/or access to products and services which help us to keep Joomla running.

Thank you all for your involvement and engagement!

An eye on 2017 ...

A new breath

The new structure, which came into existence at the beginning of 2017, was designed to provide substance to the values, vision, and mission of the Joomla Project. You can see the structure here: https://www.joomla.org/images/joomla-organisation-structure.png

A community driven project

There are more than 1 200  volunteers from around the world and this number keeps growing on a daily basis. You can see the map where our “Joomlers” are based in our Volunteers Portal. (https://volunteers.joomla.org/)

A new milestone

In March 2017, Joomla reached a new milestone, as the CMS passed the 80 million downloads mark. There are now 74 different accredited language packs, and more than 10,000 extensions and templates to enhance the capabilities of Joomla. More than 2 million active websites are using Joomla today!

Joomla! World Conference

For the first time, the Joomla! World Conference (JWC) was held in Europe; Rome was chosen for this honour. Excellent speakers covered a wide range of topics relevant to our Joomla attendees who totalled over 375 over the 3 days. The old adage, "when in Rome do as the Romans do", so a great time was had by all in the Eternal City.  New connections were made, old ones rekindled and the "Joomla Love" was everywhere.

New look for joomla.org

A new and fresh home page for Joomla.org was created and launched during 2017. The new home page focuses on the important elements and features of the CMS, and extends an invitation to new users to try the software. The fact that Joomla is the only major CMS built, developed and maintained solely by volunteers is also highlighted.

Releases, releases, releases

2017 saw 10 stable releases of the 3-series, and Alpha releases of the much anticipated Joomla 4. These Alpha releases have a single focused goal - to allow extension developers to test their extensions well before the final Joomla 4 release sometime in mid 2018.

Go professional, get certified!

Professional certification is a powerful asset to have when applying for any corporate position or when pitching for work as an freelancer or agency. Holding a Joomla Certification provides a prospective customer or employer with proof of an established standard of knowledge and competency. During 2017, fifteen countries held 32 exams and 108 people were awarded the coveted certificate, congratulations to them all!

Worldwide Events

Joomla Days are held around the world to provide regional and local Joomla! User Groups (JUG) to meet, learn, and exchange knowledge pertinent to them. There were 25 JoomlaDays held during the year, covering all the continents.

10th Anniversary of Google Summer of Code

Google Summer of Code (GSoC) is a major initiative by Google empowering students to complete 3-month open source projects with mentors (Google Summer of Code). The Joomla Project applied to be part of this project, and for the 10th time, was accepted as a mentoring organisation. Some fortunate students were invited to the Joomla World Conference. Five successful students and their mentors addressed the conference via a panel hosted by Nick Burch of the Apache Foundation and Quanticate.

Happy Birthday!

Started in 2005, Joomla has grown to a world-wide organisation operated by volunteers, who is led by a Board, and is guided by the values, vision, and the code of conduct. (The name is a phonetic spelling of the Swahili word jumla meaning "all together" or "as a whole". It was chosen to reflect the commitment of the development team and community to the project.)

Joomla’s Awards

November 6th saw Joomla awarded the best free Content Management System in the world. Significantly, this was the 4th consecutive year Joomla has won the coveted CMS Critic Award. This came after sterling work from the core team of developers supported by testers and the Joomla community as always. (https://community.joomla.org/blogs/community/joomla-is-the-best-free-cms-by-2017-cms-critic-awards.html)
Another feather in our Joomla cap was ranking in the top 3 in an major SEO conference competition.This win was achieved against stiff competition from all SEO experts in Germany. (https://community.joomla.org/blogs/community/joomla-achieved-position-3-in-the-german-seo-contest.html)

2018, what’s in store ...

Many great things and significant milestones were achieved in 2017. Solid foundations were laid on which we can launch ourselves into 2018.

2018  promises to be an exciting year. The highlight will undoubtedly be the launch of  the next major version of Joomla - Joomla 4.
This will be complemented by the upcoming Template Directory, and a redesigned Joomla! Resource Directory (JRD).

We look forward to building on the momentum we created in 2017, expect many great new improvements and features during 2018.

We are determined to start the new year with strength and energy. We are committed to investing in  all in our community - from the aspiring to the most accomplished serial volunteer.

The Joomla Project’s plans for the future are exciting, and we welcome all who are able to join this incredible journey with us.

Visit our Volunteers Portal (VP) https://volunteers.joomla.org, and explore the many opportunities that exist, choose a few, then  register yourself, apply, and see the magic happen.  You can work as little - or as much - as you like, or are able to. The Joomla Project is grateful to our global community that we are all a part of. We can all testify to the difference that your wonderful support has made to the project.

The Joomla Project wishes all of you the best year ever in 2018,  “Together as one”!