WHMCS Feature Requests - PHP 8.0 support

Alternative Hosting commented 2 weeks ago

Ioncube is not taking this seriously at all. Rather than deliver support for a PHP version that is already over a year old, they chose to focus on a PHP version that they KNEW was going to be out of general support by the time they released version 11. All you need to do is ask your own Product Management team if that was a smart move. Rather than focus on support for the PHP 8.x stream, which people NEEDED, they chose to focus on adding new features, so they could make a few more sales (I work for a major software company in my other hat, so I know about the pressure from Sales to deliver new features. I also know PM and PO set the roadmap, and it is their job to balance new features intake, product maintenance and bug fixes, in order to retain current customers, while providing new features to bring in new sales). In this case, the Ioncube PM team failed the job, epically. They delivered a new release that nobody, except their sales team, wanted. This failure on their part is going to have the opposite effect than what their sales team desired, as many of their customers are going to drop them in favour of competitors who offer PHP 8.x support. WHMCS is also going to see a similar effect on net sales and Monthly Recurring Revenue if you don’t find and implement an alternative solution soon. I know I am already evaluation other solutions, even though I hope WHMCS will provide a solution very soon.

ramf commented 1 month ago

Hi @WHMCS Dev Team - are you talking about inside messaging?
As far as I know the official response from them is Maybe: 2 June 2022 and For sure: 2 December 2022.
This is not soon in my opinion...

sol2010 commented 1 month ago

Time to go open source for 90% of the files...

WHMCS Team Member

WHMCS Dev Team commented 1 month ago

Greetings,

We are still monitoring for an ionCube Loader update that will bring support for the PHP 8 runtime environment. As soon as a compatible loader is available, we will shift priorities to testing it and, if necessary, delivering a WHMCS update.

The fact that ionCube Loader environment support is not tracking with PHP's faster development and support cycles is problematic for the larger PHP community. However, the recent release of the 11 series, which includes encoding for PHP 7.4, is encouraging. Based on their messaging, we can expect an ionCube Loader release to provide PHP 8 environment support soon.

WHMCS is perpetually reevaluating its technologies and system requirements for continuity as a part of your business strategy.

Michael Foland commented 2 weeks ago

I should upgrade to Ioncube Version 11! I'm actually shocked IonCube hasn't rolled out with loaders for php 8 yet. It would be nice indeed.

Michael Foland commented 2 weeks ago

I've heard of Source Guardian! I thought about using them in the past. I know you guys use IonCube, just like me, but something to consider could be Source Guardian, especially with the fact that they already have loaders out for PHP 8.

ramf commented 1 month ago

So now there is an error in the System Health Status:

PHP Version
Your PHP version 7.4.26 is supported by WHMCS.

The PHP 7.4 branch no longer receives regular bug fixes and will only receive critical security updates until it reaches its end of life. Please see our documentation for more information.

Now as far as I know PHP version 7.4.26 is the Current Stable PHP version. Other than this version there is only PHP 8.1.0 that you don't support yet.

As far as I know you are waiting for ioncube to release a new PHP Encoder that will support PHP 8.1.0 - but as for their last release (25/11/2021) it's only supporting up to PHP 7.4.

According to ionCube Support it will take a year to support PHP 8.1 - you can see the answer from liaison from ionCube Support here:

https://forum.ioncube.com/viewtopic.php?t=4592&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=45&sid=73f25f47b85eae701ce63c66feb8d5b1

That is not good since php 7.4 is no longer receives regular bug fixes...
Maybe it's time to think on another solution instead of ionCube?

What do you think?

ramf commented 3 months ago

According to ionCube's website (https://forum.ioncube.com/viewtopic.php?t=4592&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=15&sid=9dc10d5f55841363dad4136f2560d53d) they are waiting for PHP 8.1 release and as far as I see PHP 8.1.0 RC 3 is available for testing (https://www.php.net/index.php#id2021-09-30-1) The next release will be the fourth release candidate (RC 4), planned for 14 October 2021 and 8.1 should be ready by 25 November 2021 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PHP#Release_history)

sol2010 commented 25th September

Hi what's the latest with PHP 8 ? All our servers will be dropping support for PHP 7.4 in one month (as PHP 7.4 is now End of Life).