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Support for Joomla 1.0 is slated to end on July 22, 2009, 18 months after the release of Joomla 1.5.

 This leads to many Frequently Asked Questions.

 1. Should I be building my new Joomla sites in Joomla 1.0 or Joomla 1.5?

We at 4Web strongly believe you should be building your sites in Joomla 1.5, unless there is a compelling reason to do otherwise. We have not found a compelling reason to build a site in Joomla 1.0 since Joomla 1.5 Release Candidate 1 was released in July 2007.

Most of the major extensions are now running in Joomla 1.5: Fireboard, Community Builder, VirtueMart, etc.

There aren't many excuses anymore to build in Joomla 1.0, except you haven't bothered to come up to speed on Joomla 1.5 yet.  So bite the bullet and get it done!

2. Should I upgrade my site from Joomla 1.0 to 1.5?

Without question. 

3. Should I panic and upgrade it right now?

That's not required, but you had better start budgeting some money for an upgrade.  Ideally, that upgrade will happen by July 22, 2009.

When Joomla 1.0 is no longer supported, upgrades will no longer be produced. This means that any security vulnerabilities will not be addressed long-term.

Think about running Windows 95 on a PC these days. Not only is it slow, clunky, and feels completely out of date, there are all kinds of ways a hacker could get into your computer.  The same could be said for Joomla 1.0.

If you have clients running Joomla 1.0 sites, now is the time to make sure they know that there is an upgrade, and that they should be budgeting for it.

4. What happens if I don't upgrade?

Potentially nothing at all. Or you could be hacked and have your whole site wiped out. Who knows?

Adding new extensions/functionality will become more difficult long-term, as effort is being put into Joomla 1.5 extensions at this time.  

Don't be cheap -- not upgrading is false economy. Pay the money to upgrade your site. Think of it as an insurance policy.

5. How do I upgrade?

 You can find directions out on the internet. MAKE SURE YOU BACK UP EVERYTHING. It would really suck for you to blow your whole site up as you're trying to upgrade it.