The Velocity Tools developers are pleased to announce the first beta release of Velocity Tools 1.3. You may download it here.

• Changed VelocityViewServlet to look for toolbox config at "/WEB-INF/toolbox.xml" and velocity init properties at "/WEB-INF/velocity.properties" when no other locations are specified (i.e. change the standard location into a convention to reduce configuration needs). (ndb)
• Upgraded VelocityStruts dependencies to those for Struts 1.3.x series and updated "struts" example app according to provided directions. (ndb)
• Replaced "layout" example with new "showcase" example to interactively demonstrate all tools and the VelocityLayoutServlet. (ndb)
• Added auto() and manual() methods to AlternatorTool and deprecated the make() methods that took a boolean parameter. (ndb)
• Added getAll() method to ParameterParser to retrieve map of all params via $params.all. (ndb)
• Added configurable getSelf() function to LinkTool to make self-referencing links easier. (ndb)
• Added create() methods to CookieTool to support more complex Cookie creation. (ndb)
• Added ContextTool for convenient access to context data and meta-data. (ndb)
• VELTOOLS-71: Overhauled ant build process: dependencies are now automatically download, jars have manifests, checksums are auto-generated, and more. Also, building with JDK 1.3 is no longer supported. (ndb)
• Updated license headers and notices to comply with new ASF policy. (henning)
• Made auto-alternate default of AlternatorTool configurable via toolbox config. (ndb)
• Add addQueryData(Map) and params(Map) method to LinkTool. Thanks to Mark Brunkhart for this. (ndb)
• VELTOOLS-56: Fixed a number of problems with ImportSupport. Thanks to Christopher Schultz for this. (ndb)
• VELTOOLS-67: Add ability to restrict availability of request-scoped tools according to a request path value set in the tool configuration. Thanks to Claude Brisson for this. (ndb)
• VELTOOLS-68: Change VelocityViewServlet to read logger and resource loader config from velocity.properties file instead of hard-coding it. (henning)
• Added setAbsolute() and absolute() methods to LinkTool. (ndb)
• Made default format of DateTool configurable via toolbox definition. (ndb)
• Deprecated ViewTool and Configurable interfaces. ViewToolInfo has been enhanced to automatically recognize such tools by checking for init(Object) and/or configure(Map) methods. (ndb)
• Enhanced TextKey trick in MessageTool to make using args and bundles easier. (ndb)
• Add getInteger() and getDouble() convenience methods to ValueParser. (ndb)
• Added get() method to StrutsLinkTool to allow syntax like $link.action.saveFoo. (ndb)
• Added param(), relative(), anchor(), and uri() convenience methods to LinkTool. (ndb)
• Added currency(), number(), integer(), and percent() convenience methods to NumberTool. (ndb)
• Changed auto-alternate default in AlternatorTool to match Alternator default.