Cloudscraper Software - Magento 2 development

How to use and develop the Cloudscraper system

Release 2.4.6-p9-15.19

TAG: R2.4.6-p9-15.19

branch: main

Release date: February 2025

This release upgrades version R2.4.5-p1-13.9

Introduction

As you note from the update numbering, this version skips one Cloudscraper version. This is correct, and intentional. The 14th release of the software system was an update to Magento 2.4.5-p5. Since there is a major version upgrade from Magento available (2.4.6) we chose to upgrade to the newer Magento version.

One of the major issues we came across switching to version 2.4.6 was the removal of the Zend framework. A number of the extensions we use were not upgraded for this yet. Therefore, we have created a number of small Cloudscraper modules that fix these discrepancies.

The fix is actually simple, as the Zend framework is replaced by the Laminas framework.

The modules are:

You find the information on Magento 2.4.6 here.

Updates

Page not found 404

On mobile devices the layout was incorrect. The font size was too big to have the layout fit on the smaller screens of phones. This has been corrected.

Customer lock out

We’ve developed a module that enables assigning a customer to the ‘locked’ customer group. Upon assignment, these users are prohibited from logging into the system. While this may seem like an odd feature, it was necessary to implement due to certain users exhibiting improper behavior, and thus needed a mechanism to prevent system contamination.

In order to utilize this feature, an administrator is required to establish the ‘locked’ customer group within the Magento back-end. Following this setup, users, denoted as customers, can then be designated to this group.

Translations

Testing revealed that in case of an error during the payment process, the message always comes back in English, even when the site was in Dutch. This is corrected. The Dutch translation is added.

CSP preparations

The CSP (Content Security Policy) implementation is becoming stricter and essential with the Magento 2.4.7 release. As a result, we have activated the CSP module in this version and established a unique whitelist for components necessary to ensure the platform operates correctly.

Captcha on blog comments

In the past, we allowed guests to comment in our blog section. But recently, too many malicious entries have been attempted in our comment section. As a counter measure, we stopped allowing guests to comment. But, as we are in a free world, we think this is too strict. So, in this version we have added a captcha on the comment section of our blog to keep out the unwanted comments.

Shoppingfeeder observer

With the move to 2.4.6-p7 and the newer version of the Shoppingfeeder extension, the compiler yielded an error in the observer code that we had created to resolve the Zend references in Shoppingfeeder. The compiler complains about an argument type that is expected but used differently.

We rewrote the observer code such that it completely replaces the original observer code. Our version uses dependency injection to avoid the use of creation of objects, and it has been refactored to be more efficient. On top of that, all variables used in the observer code have been set to private variables rather than protected.

The copyright notice had the year semi hard-coded in the template source. We have changed this by using a simple system PHP command to retrieve the current year. Now the copyright year notice is always up to date.

Responsive YouTube videos

When you add a YouTube video in a blog post, by default the HTML and CSS do not result in a responsive rendering of the video. We added additional CSS to solve this.

A video should be included as follows:

<div class="video-container">
    <iframe src="https://url-to-the-video" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe>
</div>

Note that width and height are not required. You should not use fixed definitions for these parameters, otherwise they overrule the CSS rules from the system as they are applied as a style to the element.

Bugfixes

Shipments in customer account not visible

When a customer is logged in and retrieves the details of an order from the order history, it appeared the shipments for the order were not visible anymore. We corrected this, and you can also view the shipment details on past orders.

Release notes

We fixed the incorrect links that lead to a “Page not found - 404” error in the release notes site.

Payment test system

The database we use in the development version has been changed. Therefore, the payment test system is now instructed to use the new development database.

New

GLS carrier tracking

We added another carrier as a module to the system. With this module, you can choose GLS as a carrier, fill in the tracking code, and the correct link with all data necessary is created and used in transactional mails, but also in the backend of the system for both the user and admins.

Opensearch

With Magento version 2.4.6 we move to Opensearch for our internal search engine. This requires to setup Opensearch on the server. Setup is easy, you can find the details below with a link to the Hypernode release information where the developers explain what to do on the Hypernode.

We continue to use ElasticSuite on top of Opensearch to offer a richer search experience.

Updated backorder summary in backend

Partly shipped backorders are now accounted for in the impact on cash flow. This means an order becomes a backorder once the order is taken and invoiced, but not yet shipped. In the new version, partially shipped orders are, like before still backorders, but they shipped value is taken into account for the impact on the cash flow.

Essentials for release

  1. Activate maintenance pages.
  2. Activate maintenance mode.
  3. Temporarily switch off cron.
  4. With Magento 2.4.6 we moved to Opensearch.
  5. See: Hypernode information
  6. Activate Opensearch
  7. Verify the search engine settings in the backend
  8. Verify the indexes have been cleared and re-instated.
  9. Verify the search engine yields results.
  10. Switch on cron.
  11. Create new sitemaps in pub/sitemaps.
  12. Check the backorder screen for the new table columns.
  13. Remove the obsolete style from the videos in the Liebermann posts.
  14. Deactivate maintenance mode.
  15. Deactivate maintenance pages.
  16. Warm cache after the software is released.

Goto the webstore release notes site

Home