I had hoped to start this blog post with the news of the release of version2 of the Zen Grid Framework but alas that is not the case. Yesterday I released the Joomla 1.5 version of the Hub Joomla template (Joomla 1.6 version coming later today) which as you can see is a striking magazine styled template that comes with some beautiful large date formatting in the Joomla content as well as the k2 Joomla template that ships with the template.

Before I go on - you can check Hub's features, live preview, documentation or download options in the usual spots.

So why did we release the May template in June?

For those that don't know we follow a schedule of monthly Joomla template releases, that usually means we release a template within the month that the template is designed for. Hub is the first template that missed the targeted release month.

There are a few reasons why this happened but the main reason was that we were slightly over ambitious in what we wanted to do with the next incarnation of the Zen Grid Framework - our Joomla template framework. So it got to the point a few days ago, where we realised that while we had a killer Beta of version 2, it wasn't really stable enough  for production. This lead us to the big decision to keep working on v2 and release Hub on v1.1 of the framework.

This is just a quick note to let you know that the Joomla 1.6 template version of our April release - Pure is now available. Club members can download Pure from the Pure download page and if you haven't checked Pure out yet you can see it in action on the Joomlabamboo site showcase.

I've just published a small update to the Zen Grid Framework Joomla 1.5 template framework. The update fixes some small issues that crept in with the last update but also adds six new fonts to the Google font familiy list.

The new fonts are: Swanky and Moo Moo, Over the Rainbow, Wallpoet, Damion Aclonica, News Cycle. Google has yet again bundled some quality fonts into the font directory. Members can grab the new version of the framework from the Zen Grid Framework download page.

I'm very happy to announce the availability of the Joomla 1.6 version of our Joomla template framework - the Zen Grid Framework - and the Zen Default Starter Joomla template.

The Zen Default template is the starting point for our monthly template releases and is ideal for developers and designers who want to get a feel for how the framework operates and start working with a bare bones theme. A quickstart package will be available tomorrow and I will also put up the demo of the Zen Default once that has been finalised as well.

I'm hoping in the next few weeks to flesh out the starter theme catalogue some more with some blank-ish themes that are geared towards a blog, news portal, business, magazine and perhaps even a shop design - but I'll post some more on that later.

To download the framework or the starter theme club members can head on over to the Zen Grid Framework download page and start playing with the latest incarnation of the framework.

I've just rolled out the first of our Joomla 1.6 extension releases. First cab off the rank are the powerhouses behind our Joomla templates - JB Slideshow3 and Microblog - plus the popular and, might I say, very handy JB Library plugin.

The rest of the catalogue is also on the production line so it shouldn't be too long before we have the whole Joomlabamboo extension catalogue ported over to Joomla 1.6.  I'm hoping to have jFlickr and jTweet out in the next few days and the rest should follow shortly after.

Our Joomla template framework - the Zen Grid Framework - has just been updated to v1.1.15. This is a minor update but will probably quite useful to most people using the framework as we have now added all remaining fonts from the Google font library.

I was a little skeptical of how useful this service was going to be in the beginning, as the first fonts on offer were OK but really didn't warrant the extra work or overhead involved in implementing the font into your site. However the directory has of course grown and there are some quality fonts available now so I thought I would update all of the fonts for this release and also group the fonts into their respective categories.

I'm happy to announce the availability of our Joomla template release for April. Pure is a simple, clean cut web design that is ideal for business but is flexible enough to cater to a lot of different uses. It comes with a K2 Joomla template, a multitude of bold colour options and is of course built on our flexible Joomla template framework - the Zen Grid Framework.

To find out more about the Pure Joomla template you can view the feature overview, cut straight to the demo, read the docs or if you are already a member head straight to the download area, or if you want to become a member you can sign up here.

Another small update on Joomla 1.6 compatibility.

We will have a Joomla 1.6 version of Pure available early next week and hope to knock off quite a few more of the recent template releases by next Friday. It's certainly been an interesting journey (and certainly much longer than anticipated) for us in terms of porting the Zen Grid Framework and our extensions across to 1.6 but my hope is that most of the work will be behind us and we can start releasing parrallel releases for both Joomla 1.5 and Joomla 1.6 for the next template.

Don't forget that you can follow the JB Activity stream on twitter to keep up to date with releases, updates and anything else that relates to life at Joomlabamboo HQ.

We are currently putting together a list of features that will start getting added to our Joomla template framework in the next few weeks - that is once the Joomla 1.6 version and templates have been released. So I thought this would be a good time to canvas for some features, changes, improvements or whatever you would like to see incorporated into the zen grid framework.

Yann Tiersen is high on my list of music to design to - especially if I want something more organic and less electronic. I'm a huge fan of movie soundtracks and one of my favourites would have to be Goodbye Lenin. The film is beautiful but the soundtrack is sublime. A quote from the youtube page I referenced the clip from sums it up perfectly:

Listening to this song is like being dumped and having your first kiss at the same time.

Anyway ... see for yourself below.