SynaptikCMS 1.2 — Template Editor, Built-in Translations, and Four New Themes

26 June 2026

Version 1.2 is out today. This release focuses on giving you more control directly inside the admin panel — editing theme files, managing translations, and handling language configurations — without ever touching the file system manually.

Here is what changed.

Template Editor

The CSS-only editor introduced in earlier versions is replaced by a full Template Editor. You can now browse and edit every file belonging to the active theme — PHP, CSS, JavaScript, and JSON — from a single grouped file dropdown in the admin panel.

Each file type shows contextual stats: line count, CSS rules and variables for stylesheets, function and comment counts for PHP and JS files. Every save creates a timestamped backup, so you can roll back any change.

This is the fastest way to customise a theme without leaving the browser.

Built-in Translation Editor

You no longer need to edit JSON files manually to manage translations. Version 1.2 ships a dedicated Translation Editor accessible from Tools → Translations and from the language selector in Settings.

From there you can edit any string in any locale directly in the admin panel. If you want to add a new language, duplicate en.json with one click and translate inline — no FTP, no terminal.

Independent admin and front-end languages

The admin panel language and the site's front-end language are now fully independent settings. You can run the admin in English while the public site serves content in French, or any other combination. Both are configurable from Settings → General.

Four New Themes

All themes are available for download here:

  • SynaptikDocs — built for documentation sites, with a structured sidebar layout
  • Atrium — clean and editorial, suited for content-heavy sites
  • Myelin — minimal, strong typographic hierarchy
  • Axion — bold layout with pronounced visual sections

Architecture: Tags and Categories Now Store Slugs

This is an internal change but an important one for anyone who has existing content.

Tags and categories are now stored as slugs in item files ("tags": ["my-tag"] instead of "tags": ["My Tag"]). Display names are resolved at render time from tags.json and categories.json.

The practical benefit: renaming a tag or category now only requires updating the store file. Item files are only rewritten when the slug itself changes — not when you fix capitalisation or a typo in the display name.

Creating a tag or category inline from the content editor now automatically upserts the entry into the store, keeping everything in sync.

Migration scripts (normalize-tags.php and normalize-categories.php) are available if you are upgrading from a previous version.

Download migration scripts

Static Assets Moved

/css and /js are now at /assets/css and /assets/js. Front-end locale files moved from /lang/ to /lang/front/. This is a structural cleanup with no impact on theme development — all paths are handled internally.

Admin Improvements

  • The admin interface is now fully responsive
  • Sidebar flyouts work correctly in collapsed mode for all sections
  • The editor sidebar is collapsible, giving you a full-width writing area when needed
  • Tab styles have been updated for better visibility
  • The Alt Text Assistant and SEO Overview now use consistent tab styling
  • SEO Overview has been moved to the Tools section of the sidebar
  • JS files are now loaded with async for faster front-end load times

Bug Fixes

  • Fixed a tag duplication bug where renaming a tag (e.g. "Themes" → "themes") would leave the old string in existing item files
  • Fixed missing categories in data/categories.json that caused getCategoryPath() to fail silently and break hierarchical URLs
  • Fixed a CSS display issue in the file manager list view that was hiding folder names; folder icon replaced with an SVG matching the admin design

How to Update

If you are running SynaptikCMS 1.1, the one-click updater in the admin dashboard will handle the upgrade. It downloads the release, validates the archive, creates a safety backup, and replaces core files without touching your content, uploads, or settings.

Manual download is available on GitHub.

SynaptikCMS is open source, MIT licensed, and requires no database — just PHP 7.4+ and Apache with mod_rewrite. If you run into anything, open an issue on GitHub.

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