The Weekly round up of news, tips, and information to help you create the best possible WordPress website.
This is a weekly round up of WordPress news I have accumulated from across the web some old some new but always interesting. The new relates to WordPress and sometimes other areas of the web. It often has a focus on security and more.
We try to have news here that is not only important to help you with your website as well as new from the #wpdrama scene and more to share.
Some of the news here will be of interesting links to not only articles but training materials and other sources I can find online that will help you create a better WordPress website.
This week we have the following news for you.
WordPress 4.8 “Evans” Released Featuring Nearby WordPress Events, New Media Widgets, and Link Boundaries
WordPress 4.8 “Evans” is available for download and is the first major release of the year under the new release cycle. WordPress 4.8 is named after William John “Bill” Evans, an American jazz pianist.
WordPress 4.8 includes three new widgets. All three widgets make it easier to display images, video, or audio without using HTML. The Text widget now has support for TinyMCE providing rich-text functionality. Similar to the post editor, users have a choice between using a Visual or Text editor with limited formatting options.
New in WordPress 4.8
See the new features coming in WordPress 4.8, including new audio, video, and image widgets, plus an enhanced Text widget.
Here’s what the WP devs say about why it took so long:
“A primary reason for the long delay in incorporating TinyMCE into the Text widget was the difficulty of cleanly instantiating another copy of the WordPress visual editor dynamically after the page has loaded.”
Version 4.8 « WordPress Codex
On June 8, 2017, WordPress Version 4.8, named for jazz pianist and composer William John “Bill” Evans, was released to the public. For more information on this enhancement and bug-fix release, read the WordPress Blog, and see the Changelog for 4.8.
For Version 4.8, the database version (db_version in wp_options) changed to 38590, and the Trac revision was 40888.
Have you ever tried updating a link, or the text around a link, and found you can’t seem to edit it correctly? When you edit the text after the link, your new text also ends up linked. Or you edit the text in the link, but your text ends up outside of it. This can be frustrating! With link boundaries, a great new feature, the process is streamlined and your links will work well. You’ll be happier. We promise. Read original article here…. codex.wordpress.org
What’s New in WordPress 4.8
A new update of WordPress will be released by the WordPress team in June. Crucial patches and new features are among the exciting things eagerly awaited by WordPress platform users.
Improved Visual Text Editor The visual editor is now more user-friendly and hassle-free. TinyMCE features have been included in the latest WordPress update to improve the visual editor. Navigating through links is now easier as compared to previous versions of WordPress. A Click on a hyperlinked text area extends the blank space in front of the text. The extra blank space can be used to add extra text which is automatically hyperlinked. Read original article here…. wplook.com
Tips Tuesday
The next major release of WordPress is slated to release on Thursday of this week.
They’ve already made a bunch of bug changes to the first release candidate and rolled out a second release candidate a few days ago. I’m poking all over it already.
Adding Custom Images Sizes to the WordPress Media Library
Automatically uploading images into WordPress creates different sizes from the original but, unfortunately, it’s not a one-size-fits-all solution.
The default sizes that are created are thumbnail, medium, large and full-size. But, if you need a different size, such as for products in an eCommerce store, then you can create your own custom size to suit your needs.
In this post, I’ll show you how to create custom image sizes by registering them in your theme with code.
Before you dive right in and start adding code to your theme, you should create a child theme if you’re working with a pre-existing theme. This prevents all your changes from being erased if you apply updates to your theme once they become available. Read original article here…. premium.wpmudev.org
Top 20 WordPress Plugins for Business Websites 2017
Why do you need WordPress plugins if WordPress is as impressive a platform as they say? That is, indeed, a great question. Well, you don’t need all WordPress plugins, but just a select few to take your business website to the next level.
As a content management system, WordPress is quite impressive. Still, a lot of the action we love is found in the thousands of free and premium WordPress plugins out there. And there’s a horde out there man, of hungry developers making even more as we speak.
First, how about we drop a couple of fun facts just so know you’re in for a great ride. If that’s a yes I hear from the guys at the back, who I am to keep you waiting? Did you know? Read original article here…. wpexplorer.com
Where and How to Hire a WordPress Developer (Places and Tips)
Finding a skilled and professional WordPress developer can truly be a long, grueling, and daunting task. There are literally hundreds of sites out there with millions of members, all fighting for projects and undercutting each other’s prices. The problem is that a lot of these gladiators are nowhere near ready for the arena. Many sites don’t actually take the time to vet their providers, instead opting to let natural selection (ratings and reviews) cull the weakest members through time. This translates to a bad user experience for many customers who become frustrated and quickly lose faith in the development process. It can also be quite costly, as some have to try multiple developers before finding one they are confident they can work with.
Thankfully, there are several platforms out there that do take measures to make the hiring experience better for their users and actually attract professional talent to their sites. In this article, we’ll look at eight great sources and finish with some tips on how to find and hire the best WordPress developers. Where and How to Hire a WordPress Developer (Places and Tips)
Holler Box: A Smart Notification Plugin for WordPress Websites
Scott Bolinger, co-founder of AppPresser, has launched a new sales and conversion tool for WordPress websites called Holler Box. The plugin offers a lightweight, elegant popup message for capturing email addresses, displaying a (fake) live chat, or announcing a sale or event.
Bolinger designed it to be non-intrusive – it’s not the kind of modal dialog that obscures content with an animated box in the middle of the page. Holler Box appears at the bottom right-hand of the page by default. Read original article here…. wptavern.com
Top 20 WordPress Plugins for Business Websites 2017
Why do you need WordPress plugins if WordPress is as impressive a platform as they say? That is, indeed, a great question. Well, you don’t need all WordPress plugins, but just a select few to take your business website to the next level.
As a content management system, WordPress is quite impressive. Still, a lot of the action we love is found in the thousands of free and premium WordPress plugins out there. And there’s a horde out there man, of hungry developers making even more as we speak.
First, how about we drop a couple of fun facts just so know you’re in for a great ride. If that’s a yes I hear from the guys at the back, who I am to keep you waiting? Did you know? Read original article here…. wpexplorer.com
And now for something older in the past article collections.
StudioPress Puts WooCommerce Compatibility on the Roadmap for New Themes
In Rainmaker.fm’s recent interview with Matt Mullenweg, StudioPress founder Brian Gardner confirmed that the company has put WooCommerce compatibility on the roadmap for its themes, starting with new products first. The “unofficial announcement” was not a secret, as Gardner has been hinting at it on social media and also posted a sneak peak on Dribbble of StudioPress’ upcoming WooCommerce theme.
“We are focusing our themes and I’m literally designing one as we speak that will be WooCommerce compatible,” Gardner said. “The writing is on the wall. We’re now at a point where we can focus and dedicate some of our time. My hope is that we can take all our existing themes on StudioPress and work in the WooCommerce component – at the very least – to make WooCommerce out of the box look good.” Read original article here…. wptavern.com
Mullenweg Takes Aim at Wix over GPL Abuses, Wix Response Fails to Address Licensing Issue
Over the weekend WordPress co-creator and Automattic CEO Matt Mullenweg called out Wix for copying GPL code from the WordPress mobile app and distributing it in its proprietary app. He identified two repositories that Wix forked in order to bring the GPL-licensed WordPress Rich Text Editor into its app.
“If I were being charitable, I’d say, ‘The app’s editor is based on the WordPress mobile app’s editor.’ Mullenweg said. “If I were being honest, I’d say that Wix copied WordPress without attribution, credit, or following the license.” Read original article here…. wptavern.com
Beware the 100 Page WordPress Limitation
If you are having performance issues on the backend (in your dashboard) you might want to check on how many pages you currently have. WordPress was not meant for over 100 pages as it will start running into memory issues. This won’t affect the front end load times, but you will want to start banging your head against your desk. I had a client recently with a little over 1,000 pages and it brought WordPress to a crawl. And yes they are on a high-end VPS. It doesn’t have to do with the server, but rather how WordPress is structured. Read original article here…. woorkup.com
WordPress creator Matt Mullenweg slams Wix: ‘Your app editor is built with stolen code’
WordPress creator Matt Mullenweg has taken exception to the editor used in Wix’s mobile app, alleging that the do-it-yourself web building service has copied his platform’s editor and failed to give proper attribution and adhere to the general public license (GPL) — basically, to open source the work.
“If I were being honest, I’d say that Wix copied WordPress without attribution, credit, or following the license. The custom icons, the class names, even the bugs. You can see the forked repositories on GitHub complete with original commits from Alex and Maxime, two developers on Automattic’s mobile team,” he wrote in a blog post. “Wix has always borrowed liberally from WordPress — including their company name, which used to be Wixpress Ltd. — but this blatant rip-off and code theft is beyond anything I’ve seen before from a competitor.” Read original article here…. venturebeat.com
8 Must-Do Steps for Securing and Hardening Your WordPress Website
Imagine with me for a moment that you’re a hacker looking for ways to hijack reputable websites and use them to funnel unsuspecting traffic to a nefarious phishing scam.
How would you target websites for maximum impact? One option would be to locate and target a single vulnerability that affects hundreds or thousands of sites. If such a thing could be found and exploited you could create digital carnage in very short order.
Are you starting to see why hardening WordPress is so important?
As the most popular content management system on the web, WordPress is a prime target for hackers everywhere. But there’s something you can do about it. Read original article here…. premium.wpmudev.org
How to Move Your Blog from WordPress.com to WordPress.org
When you’re ready to scale up your WordPress.com blog or website without limits, migrating to a self-hosted WordPress.org site is the best way to go.
You can get full reign over your site’s design and functionality, as well as access help from people in the WordPress community (and us here at WPMU DEV!) when you’re in a jam.
When you’re used to the WordPress.com interface, navigating your way through the migration process to a self-hosted server can be tricky. Read original article here…. premium.wpmudev.org
Well that’s a wrap for this week more next week from WP Plugins A to Z.
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