OLD Page Builder deprecation

Unfortunately, OLD Page Builder needed to be deprecated (removed). It has been set for deprecation from August 2022, and we tried to maintain it as long as possible.

So, if you have Zero One version older than v4.5.2, and you want to update to Zero One version 5 you must first migrate all your OLD Page Builder pages to Layout Builder.

Keep in mind that you can stay on Zero One 4.5.2 version (Kirby 3) as long as you want, and use OLD Page Builder forever if you like. You don't need to update to Zero One version 5 ever, if you don't want to. As long as your server support PHP 8.2 (which can be even 10 years, and more) your Zero One website will be okay.

Why did we remove it?

We can't maintain two page builders any more, it is too much additional work. And Layout Builder is much better, much flexible, and has much better performance.

We know it will be a pain for older Zero One users, but we had a choice:

1. Discontinue Zero One development, and create a new theme

2. Discontinue only OLD Page Builder, but continue Zero One development

We chose the second, in our opinion, better option. It meant more work for us, but it seemed a best thing to do.

How to migrate OLD Page Builder pages?

Unfortunately, there is no automatic solution for that, OLD Page Builder and NEW Layout Builder are too different.

You must recreate pages manually.

What that means? It means, you just create new page using Layout Builder and recreate the same page as the OLD Page Builder page you are recreating. After you create new Layout Builder page you can delete the old page.

Make sure you new Layout Builder page have the same slug (page URL) as your OLD Page Builder page, so your SEO rank stays intact.

OLD Page Builder history

When we first started development of Zero One (2019/2020) the Kirby Layout field was not invented yet, and for Page Builder we used Kirby Builder plugin. In the months that followed Kirby team decided to integrate Kirby Builder plugin into core, and then Kirby Blocks field is born.

So, in Zero One version 3 (February 2021) we migrated Kirby Builder plugin to new Kirby Blocks.

But soon after that Kirby introduced its Layout field, so we started working on a new Layout Builder and released it in Zero One version 4 (August, 2022). From that moment OLD Page Builder was set for deprecation.

Although OLD Page Builder had some good points, it was doomed from the moment Kirby Layout field is invented. It was not logical to develop it further, Layout field was the new path.