MODX Cloud Goes to Eleven

Prepare for a major platform upgrade we’re launching with more security and speed.

By Jay Gilmore  |  Updated: February 10, 2022  |  4 min read
MODX Cloud Goes to Eleven

The Cloud team has been hard at work on a major platform upgrade, and also made a few tweaks to MODX Cloud grid. We want to share some details about that and to let you know how you can prepare.

Cloud goes to eleven

Benefits of the Upcoming Platforms

Security – Security is one of, if not the, biggest core principles for MODX. The new platforms are easier to maintain and we’ve locked them down even further. MODX in MODX Cloud is a great security pair and it’s also great for other software too: modx.com/go/security

Speed – The new platforms will be even faster thanks to the latest OS kernel and enterprise SSDs. Speed has always been important, but it will become an even bigger factor with Google’s Core Web Vitals SERP algorithm update in May: modx.com/go/speed

Reliability – Our current platform queues occasionally disconnect. This results in execution delays for important actions like creating a Cloud or deploying SSL. The new platforms are designed for resiliency and reliably with better visibility and recoverability of queued actions.

Modern PHP – PHP 7.4/8.0 will be supported on the new platforms—most sites should work fine on 7.4 if they currently run on 7.1 or above. Future updated PHP versions will be available as they’re released thanks to a streamlined build process.

New Cloud URLs – Cloud URLs will be portable across all platforms using an obscure random hash, and they’ll only run under HTTPS (example: f8r9m1kk.modx.dev). The current cXXXX.paasX.location_or_account URLs are being phased out.

Selective Staging – A dream for sites managed by a team, this allows you to collaborate on content, but only publish the pages, Chunks, Templates, etc. that are ready—even while you’re still working on content that isn’t approved for production just yet. It’s smart enough to find the images used on the pages you push, and collect those for you, too. Finally, anyone can run a proper content staging workflow without worrying about complex and fragile scripts or tedious manual migration methods. Contact us if you’re interested to learn more about this exciting product release.

Migrations – Sometimes you finish a demo or project only to realize it landed in the wrong location (hello Australia!). For sites using our DNS, we are working on a migration tool allow you to move a site to any public platform or your own private server with ease. For externally hosted DNS, we’ll still have helpers to make it smooth, but it will still require more work on your end.

Actions to Take

To prepare for the new platforms, review the following steps that will make it easier to migrate your production sites. Look for more recommendations and migration tips in the near future.

DNS

Moving your DNS management to MODX Cloud is a great first step. This will make platform-to-platform migrations seamless. Learn more about managing DNS in MODX Cloud. We realize this isn’t possible for everyone, and if that’s the case, lower the TTLs on your main apex record and any subdomains you host with us.

Prepare for New Cloud URLs

As mentioned previously, the current cXXXX.paasX.location_or_account URLs are being phased out in favor of hashed modx.dev URLs like f8r9m1kk.modx.dev. If you rely on those, please open a support ticket from the Cloud Dashboard so we can discuss it with you.

Help Us Get Launch-Ready

Are you an active MODX Cloud user with curiosity and a bit time to help us test our new platforms before we make them publicly available to everyone? Ideally, you would have several sites you could Snapshot or Backup and test new Clouds made from those on the new beta platform. If that’s you, we’d love to have you opt into our beta tester group. Please Note: this is truly a beta testing platform and absolutely no production sites should be deployed to it. (Seriously! This beta platform will not support issuing Let’s Encrypt SSL certificates on purpose for now—you can test SSL on the Cloud URLs.)