The concepts behind AEM have been around for quite some time. While a lot has changed over the years, most of the basic ideas and theories are still valid. This article provides some background on the history of the product in general and may cause some flashback melancholy for those who still remember some of the UIs.
So, let’s start with some history and digging through the Internet Archive:
| 1993 | Foundation of Day Software in Basel, Switzerland 1 | |
| Day Communiqué 1 | CGI scripts for Netscape Enterprise Server | |
| 1999 | Day Communiqué 2.0 (to 2.6) | Standalone CMS, implemented in C |
| 2002 | Day Communiqué 3.0 (to 3.5.6) | Java web application with Content Bus storage |
| 2005 | Day Communiqué 4.0 (to 4.2) | Two different web applications: JCR/CRX + CQ |
| 2008 | Day CQ 5.0 | Completely new system developed on top of an Apache Foundation software stack |
| 2008 | Day CQ 5.1 | GA Press Release (Internet Archive) |
| 2009 | Day CQ 5.2 | New advancements (Internet Archive) |
| 2010 | Day CQ 5.3 | Release Notes Day / Adobe (both Internet Archive) |
| 2010 | Acquisition by Adobe 2 | |
| 2011 | Adobe CQ 5.4 | Release Notes (Internet Archive) |
| 2012 | Adobe CQ 5.5 | Release Notes (Internet Archive) |
| 2013 | AEM 5.6 | Release Notes (Internet Archive) |
| 2014 | AEM 6.0 | Release Notes (Internet Archive) |
| 2015 | AEM 6.1 | Release Notes (Internet Archive) |
| 2016 | AEM 6.2 | Release Notes (Internet Archive) |
| 2017 | AEM 6.3 | Release Notes (Internet Archive) |
| 2018 | AEM 6.4 | Release Notes |
| 2019 | AEM 6.5 | Latest release for on-premise or Managed Services, Release Notes |
| 2020 | AEM as a Cloud Service | SaaS offer of AEM, Release Notes |
Sources:
- Wikipedia – Day Software (German only)
- Adobe buys Day Software
- Adobe product EOL matrix
- Blog entry AEM History on AEM CQ5 Tutorials
My path into the AEM world started with a project based on Communiqué 4.2 and shortly after that I was involved in another project running Communiqué 3.5.6. The latter has been around until as late as 2021, spanning an impressive period of almost 20 years from it’s original release until retirement from the – presumably – last production platform.
While I have never touched or seen Communiqué 1 or 2, I still have 3.5.6 and 4.2 running on the old Windows XP laptop I used at that time. My current machine holds the heavily customized 3.5.6 from the above mentioned project (including a lot of back-ported cutting-edge features from Communiqué 4) and every CQ/AEM version starting with 5.3 up to the latest 6.5. Still looking to complete my collection with the missing version 5.0 to 5.2, though.
Some other Day CQ melancholy (all Internet Archive links) that may bring up some memories if you were involved with the earlier versions of CQ:
- Apache Jackrabbit – David’s Model: A guide for content modeling
- 2008 – PlanetDay
- 2009 – Igniting CQ 5.3: What’s New and Roadmap (slideshare presentation by @davidnuescheler)
- 2010 – CQ5 and Sling overview (slideshare presentation by @bdelacretaz)
- 2010 – docs.day.com for CQ 5.3
Thanks for reading and have a great ⚫ D a y !