[ad_1] WordPress developer Keanan Koppenhaver announced today that he has acquired WP Pusher and Branch from Peter Suhm. WP Pusher, a product we have covered for the past six years, allows users to deploy plugins and themes from popular code hosting services like GitHub, GitLab, and Bitbucket. In 2018, Suhm expanded his offerings to include Branch, a Docker-based continuous integration service for WordPress. Both products were selected for the TinySeed Startup Accelerator, a remote accelerator that funds early-stage SaaS founders to live for a year and focus full-time on their startups. “I raised money from TinySeed and a few angels to build Branch, but wasn’t able to find enough traction to get it to a point where it would be sustainable,” Suhm said. Earlier this year, Suhm began working on reform.app, a form builder. He described Branch as a “set it and forget it” product that didn’t require much support, as he had closed it for new signups. WP Pusher also required minimal support and had been stable for years. “It wasn’t really the time that was a problem for me, it was more the mental overhead of having the responsibility,” Suhm said. “I quickly realized that Reform probably aligned better with my goals and wanted to focus 100% on starting that business. Selling WP Pusher and Branch allowed me to work on Reform, without needing to necessarily raise money or have a job.” In contrast to the rash of smaller WordPress product companies getting scooped up by larger ones lately, WP Pusher and Branch will retain their “indie” status. The products are being transferred from Suhm’s one-man company to another. “I knew Keanan because we had been working on getting his agency on Branch awhile back and knew he was a great guy,” Suhm said. “I wouldn’t sell WP Pusher to whomever, because it’s basically what I’m known for in the WordPress space and its reputation means a lot to me.” Koppenhaver had been searching for a WordPress product to acquire when he happened to be tagged in responses to Suhm’s tweet. He didn’t have the free cash so he spent some time fundraising to make the deal happen. Who’s buying WordPress plugin businesses these days (at mid 5 digit ARR level)? — Peter Suhm (@petersuhm) May 16, 2021 “I’m looking forward to integrating GitHub Actions with WP Pusher, focusing pretty heavily on tutorials and content for both products, re-opening Branch for new users and getting the Billable Hours podcast going again,” Koppenhaver said. When asked if he has any pricing changes planned for WP Pusher, he said, “Not at the moment.” Existing customers can expect no changes for now and may even see some improvements to their current plans. “I definitely want to focus on filling in any gaps that the current users see in the product and especially adding value to the higher level plans,” Koppenhaver said. Like this: Like Loading… [ad_2] Source link
Continue readingTag Archives: Tavern
Should Users Be Able To Select More Than One Block Style? – WP Tavern
[ad_1] When I first tried the block styles feature in WordPress, I was impressed. As a theme creator, it was a simple way of allowing users to select a design-related class without them actually needing to know what was happening under the hood. In that first week or so, I hit the problem that many others had. I wanted to combine two or more classes/styles to offer a wide range of user options. This was back in late 2018 or early 2019 — around the time of the WordPress 5.0 release. Others have requested the ability to combine styles since, and Keith Devon, the co-founder of Highrise Digital, brought the issue up again via Twitter last week. However, these multiple requests have never resulted in a change to the core code. This snail’s pace has been beneficial. Jumping too early on some features when others have yet to mature can create unnecessary legacy baggage. Over the past couple of years, I have reassessed my position on combining block styles. As the editor has evolved, there is a clearer vision emerging around what options users will have. While I initially wanted to combine block styles, I am not so sure anymore. The primary reason for this is that core has already made many obsolete through block options, and it will continue to do so with other controls in the future. When WordPress itself handles this, it creates a standard that all themes can rely on. With one of those passion projects I’m building in my free time, I currently have six styles for the Image block: Rounded Flip: Horizontal Flip: Vertical Polaroid Polaroid: Tilt Left Polaroid: Tilt Right Polaroid-style image tilted left. There are times when mixing and matching some of those might make sense. For example, the Flip: Horizontal style fits well with all the others and would not cause issues when combined. I could also go overboard by adding choices to meet every possible variation. Some combos would break down entirely or not be aesthetically pleasing. For example, the Rounded style does not work well with the Polaroid styles. However, these are simple styles that barely scratch the surface of what is possible. Most of these are not block styles that I would want to ship with a theme. For example, the Rounded style could easily be handled via the WordPress-supported border-radius option. The Polaroid style is just a fancy name for some padding and a box-shadow on the image. These are all standard design features that should eventually be a part of the base editor experience. Currently, themes that ship such styles are filling in the gaps where WordPress has yet to do so. In the short term, theme authors must cater to their user base. However, down the road, WordPress should offer a more robust set of tools that cover the basics. There really is no reason for every theme to have a different, non-standard slug (i.e., class name) for essentially the same block styles (e.g., Polaroid vs. Framed vs. Borders). It creates cross-theme compatibility issues that we should avoid when possible. Block styles are handy for introducing quick methods for achieving these fundamental design options, but I am looking at what they should be for the long term. If core WordPress evolves to the point where it makes most of these styles obsolete, what should theme authors do with the feature? That is where more specialized block styles make sense. The goal is the same: fill in the gaps that WordPress leaves open. One example that would be tough to replicate with simple design options would be a tag/label style for the Tag Cloud block, as shown in the following screenshot. Tag/Label style for tags. I also have a Pill Outline style for the same block: Pill Outline block style for tags. Obviously, those two styles would not work together. Creating a system where users could choose both would result in some problematic outcomes. The more complex any two block styles become, the more likely they will conflict with each other. Right now, it is too early to commit to a multi-select feature for block styles. We need to let this thing play out a bit and give the core design tools a chance to catch up. We can reevaluate when most of the blocks packaged with WordPress have a broader set of styling options. At that point, it may even make more sense to begin using block variations, an API that allows developers to preconfigure block attributes. If a solid set of design options exist, it would be simple to offer multiple combinations out of the box for users. In the meantime, I would like to see a reevaluation of the UI for block styles. Shaun Andrews has an in-depth piece, Thinking Through: Switching Block Styles, that explores various options on how we could iterate on it. Like this: Like Loading… [ad_2] Source link
Continue readingAwesome Motive Acquires Sandhills Development – WP Tavern
[ad_1] Awesome Motive, the company behind OptinMonster, WPForms, MonsterInsights, and other popular WordPress plugins, has acquired Sandhills Development. The deal includes all of the company’s WordPress products and services: Easy Digital Downloads, AffiliateWP, WP Simple Pay, Sugar Calendar, WP Simple Pay, and the Payouts Service. The majority of the development team will be joining Awesome Motive to continue supporting the products. In a personal farewell to the WordPress community, Sandhills Development founder Pippin Williamson confesses he lost his passion for WordPress and the web: In the last few years I discovered a truth about myself: I had lost my passion for the web and building software products. I used to absolutely adore WordPress and building plugins to extend it and power businesses. That passion helped create amazing platforms that have helped tens of thousands of businesses grow, succeed, and thrive on the web, and I am so immensely proud of that. But when the passion is gone, the drive and motivation to build great things leaks away as well. It has been several years since I last felt truly inspired and motivated to build something with WordPress. Sandhills Development has created an iconic and beloved suite of products with more than 100,000 users. Its Payouts Service paid out over a million dollars to affiliates in May and is on track to pass $2M this year. The service has more than 6,500 individuals and businesses registered and able to receive deposits and more than 1,350 businesses setup to pay their affiliates. The financial details of the deal were not disclosed but Williamson has always been transparent about Sandhills’ financials. In last year’s summary he disclosed that the company brought in $4,331,814.12 in revenue from plugin sales, affiliate agreements, services, real estate, and payout processing, with a net profit of $232,201 after heavily investing in new projects and payroll increases. Many of Awesome Motive’s products use EDD, so the company has a vested interest in the product’s future, alongside others in the WordPress ecosystem who depend on it. Williamson explained in his announcement why he selected Awesome Motive as the new home for his products: Awesome Motive has been an innovator in WordPress for more than a decade and during that time they have built infrastructures, processes, and a level of polish rarely seen in the WordPress industry. The learnings and strategies that have made Awesome Motive so successful will be applied to the whole suite of Sandhills products, making the products better than ever before and at a pace previously unseen by our customers. Despite Williamson’s professed confidence in Awesome Motive, multiple sources inside Sandhills Development expressed reservations about the deal. The company was called to an all-hands meeting where employees were given the option to jump ship or continue on with Awesome Motive. “Well the thing that made this the most frustrating was that there was little room for discussion, or choice,” one source said. “We were given a very short heads-up (2 weeks), and no opportunity to discuss employment terms. Basically it was ‘in two weeks, you’re working for Awesome Motive, or you are out of a job.’” Awesome Motive currently employees more than 200 people across 36 countries. For years, the company has been known for its aggressive sales tactics and upsells in the WordPress admin. These concerns, along with the change in culture from Sandhills, gave some employees reason to pause when considering the change. “Given AM’s questionable business practices, such as using screen recorders on many employees’ laptops, trigger happy firing tendencies, and incredibly aggressive non-competes, it felt like we were being coerced to work for a company that was so, so far from the fundamental values that brought us to Sandhills in the first place,” one source within the company said. Despite this criticism, the same source said they believe “every product acquired will become considerably better,” with Awesome Motive’s investment. “Going into the meeting with Syed, I’d describe the prevailing sentiment as cautiously optimistic,” Sandhills’ former Director of Operations Kyle Maurer said. “Obviously none of us were involved in this decision; that was Pippin only. We didn’t ask for this and didn’t know what to expect. But our many questions have been answered and at this point everyone is wholly on board. Syed’s excitement and enthusiasm are infectious and, along with his team, he’s done a tremendous job welcoming and accommodating us. It feels like new energy has been injected into the organization and I’m personally very optimistic about the future.” Awesome Motive Founder and CEO Syed Balkhi confirmed that in the past the company has used time tracking software on its employees but “shifted away from doing so as the vast majority of our employees are on full-time salary now.” “Many people may think of AM as one large company, but I always see us as a collection of over a dozen small companies,” Balkhi said. “Each product team operates independently and will continue to do so.” Balkhi confirmed that no pricing changes are planned for the products. He said Awesome Motive also plans to share several internal tools the company has built for EDD to help scale the business. Acquisitions are ramping up in the WordPress space, with major players like Automattic and hosting companies scooping up smaller businesses and plugins to create a suite of products tailored to their users. Some question whether this is a healthy part of a maturing ecosystem or a trend that may stifle the unique range of diverse, smaller products that have always been available to WordPress users. “I know that our goal is to help small businesses grow and compete with the big guys, and our growth is a result of us living true to our mission,” Balkhi said. “We never set out to become investors. “As you can see the products that join AM — the founders have been around for a long time and they know of us already. Founders choose to join us because we are an independent bootstrapped business not some big PE /venture-backed corporation.”
Continue readingGoDaddy Pro To Host Second EXPAND 2021 Event on September 24 in India – WP Tavern
[ad_1] GoDaddy Pro will kick off EXPAND 2021 – India on September 24, the second event of its kind this year. It is a one-day virtual conference that will feature sessions from industry leaders and experts in the field. Nikhil Arora, the Vice President and Managing Director for GoDaddy India, will present the keynote address. In total, there will be nine sessions that will run between 15 and 45 minutes throughout the day. The goal is to provide guidance and resources for those starting and growing digital businesses. GoDaddy Pro launched its first event, EXPAND 2021 – U.S., in late April. Over 5,000 people registered for the two-day virtual conference. However, tens of thousands more have viewed individual sessions since then. Each session is available for free viewing via the GoDaddy Pro YouTube channel, and new videos will be added for future events. When Adam Warner, the Global Field Marketing Sr. Manager at GoDaddy, spoke of the event earlier this year, he described it as a project he had wanted to do since 2018. For him, it was a way of giving back to the community and helping the next generation along. “I’m pleased with how our EXPAND conference series is growing and the feedback we’ve received from attendees so far,” he said. “The overarching goal of EXPAND is to showcase the solutions that our Pros are providing for their clients, and to do so in a way that both inspires and educates others to follow their passion for building the web and their own businesses.” The first event did not go off without any bumps in the road. The team learned from it and will tweak things to improve the conference. “One important lesson we learned from our first EXPAND event was to clearly define chat moderation roles and increase the amount of pre-written platform navigation directions and tips for our Guides to share with attendees in the general and session chats areas,” said Warner. “When our event started, we were walking over ourselves a bit. The chat conversations move so fast, we ended up duplicating a few replies, coming from multiple people.” The EXPAND 2021 – India conference will be different than the inaugural event held earlier this year. Instead of focusing on a more general or U.S. audience, GoDaddy Pro is leaning into its regional teams and members. “All the speakers are from India, as well as the Pros whose stories will be featured,” said Warner. “We have dedicated GoDaddy and GoDaddy Pro teams in India, and they’ve played a lead role in defining the best approach for the Indian audience. The biggest challenge with putting this event together so far has been the differences in time zones for our multiple teams. We’ve tried to accommodate everyone’s schedules as much as possible.” The GoDaddy Pro team is already planning EXPAND 2022 events. Warner said those interested to be on the lookout over the next couple of months for more news. “To date, our EXPAND conferences run parallel with our location-specific launches of the GoDaddy Pro brand,” he said. “As GoDaddy Pro continues to grow, and when the world gets back to in-person events globally, we would love to accommodate attendees in multiple physical locations.” One glaring issue for the India event is the lack of gender diversity within its speaker group. Only one woman is leading a session. I asked Warner why there was such an imbalance. “The number of women in the technology sector in India has been a matter of concern for small and large businesses alike,” said Warner. “GoDaddy is an inviting place to work and an industry leader for women in technology. We are actively working to create platforms and ecosystems to encourage more women to join the fray. We are delighted to have Kriti Aggarwal, Founder of Anaha Services, join us at this year’s EXPAND Event in India and are focused on all future EXPAND Conferences recognizing diverse groups of leaders in their sectors.” The team is holding two Meetups each week. Yesterday was an all-female panel of GoDaddy and GoDaddy Pro team members in prep for their sponsorship of FemTechConf, held between September 24 and 25. Like this: Like Loading… [ad_2] Source link
Continue readingOpen Collective Launches New Way to Support Open Source through Public Stock Shares – WP Tavern
[ad_1] It’s no secret that companies are making loads of cash using open source technology. A 2021 survey of 1,250 IT leaders commissioned by Red Hat found that 90% are using enterprise open source software. Following the trail of major acquisitions (Red Hat at $34B, GitHub at $7.5B, and MuleSoft $6.5B), it’s becoming more common to see companies built on open source valued at billions of dollars. With so much invested in open source infrastructure, many companies will assign employees to work on specific important issues for the projects they depend on, or hire them to support these projects full-time. This is an effective way to support maintainers when it works out but sometimes projects need to be able to funnel support to those who can further the software but who don’t happen to work for one of these corporations. Open Collective is exploring a new way for individuals and companies to give back to the projects they use by donating public stock. The new initiative is called Open Stocks. It allows donors to support open source without having to pay capital gains tax on the appreciated amount of their stocks, which is up to 37% for those based in the US. They receive a tax write-off at the current market value of the stock. Donating some of those profits is one way to lessen the tax burden for capital gains while keeping the open source software alive that made the public stock possible in the first place. Open Stocks is using Overflow, a VC-backed philanthropy platform, to streamline the stock donation process, which may have the potential to increase the average donation amount for open source projects. The startup claims “the average stock donation through Overflow is 47X the average online ACH/debit/credit donation.” Here is how it works: Donors select the open source collective they want to support and then proceed to the checkout process, which happens on the Overflow website app. Donors are asked to connect directly to their brokerage account by authenticating through the app. The Open Source Collective team will receive the donated stock converted to cash and the cash is then transferred automatically to the specified project’s balance with a public contribution notice on their page. It is not very clear up front for donors what fees they will have deducted from their total donation. Open Collective did not publish this information, and it wasn’t available on the Overflow website. Open Collective co-founders were not immediately available for comment on this. All currently-registered collectives are automatically able to receive stock donations. The announcement hints at future support for non-traditional forms of payment: Stocks and shares are a huge part of the economic power of traditional geopolitical structures, and while we believe that equivalent access to those structures is a positive move for the communities we support we can’t ignore that the world is changing… how we embrace and organize around that change may have an even bigger impact on our work. Open Collective co-founder Pia Mancini confirmed on Twitter that donation via cryptocurrencies is next on deck for the organization in its efforts to support open source creators. Like this: Like Loading… [ad_2] Source link
Continue readingStellarWP Acquires Learning Management System LearnDash – WP Tavern
[ad_1] StellarWP announced today that it acquired LearnDash, a learning management system (LMS) for WordPress. The product allows educators to create online courses, quizzes, and dynamic content. LearnDash will continue to operate autonomously, keeping its team intact. In May, Liquid Web launched its new umbrella brand, StellarWP, alongside its acquisition of Impress.org and its flagship product, GiveWP. iThemes, The Events Calendar, Restrict Content Pro, and Kadence WP are included in this family. Each of the brands operates independently. Essentially, StellarWP functions as a “branded house” but is very much a “house of brands,” according to Chris Lema, who will be switching roles and taking the General Manager position for LearnDash. The LearnDash acquisition is StellarWP’s largest to date, but the company did not provide a specific dollar amount. The LMS market size grew to $10.84 billion in 2020. It is projected to increase to over $13 billion in 2021, according to Fortune Business Insights. However, when asked why the company was jumping into the space, Lema talked about the vision. “The way I think about things is less about the bottom line and more about the larger vision,” he said. “At Liquid Web, we believe that things will continue to get more abstracted for customers. They will want, less and less, to deal with the complexities of hosting. They don’t really want ‘managed’ hosting or even ‘managed WordPress’ hosting. They want a hosted solution. In other words, they want a solution that works. If they need it hosted, great. If they already have a host, great. So we’ve been focused on building a solutions-orientation toward folks who are doing digital commerce or are building digital commerce solutions for their customers.” He said that LearnDash fits perfectly into that vision for the company. In some ways, the global COVID-19 pandemic that began in 2020 may have hit the fast-forward button in many online sectors. The landscape shifted for small and large businesses. More people have had opportunities to take online courses or even create their own. “Yes, we saw a dramatic increase in the take rate on online learning platforms across the entire space,” said Lema. “Last year saw a COVID dip for many, but for online learning, it was a bump. That said, I think we’re seeing the numbers drop back down a bit into a more normal but elevated range based on what happened last year. And most importantly, more people than ever have tried their hands at online learning, and I don’t think that’s going to stop.” Now that Liquid Web and StellarWP have built a library of multiple products, one question is how the company might begin to tie them together. There are some easy wins with cross-product integration that would fit into the vision of selling solutions. “Yes, we think so too,” said Lema. “RCP and LearnDash, GiveWP and LearnDash, LearnDash and Nexcess, and more. I think we’ll see a lot of collaborations across the StellarWP brands. But to be clear, each brand runs independently, so for LearnDash, we’re still focused on all sorts of other integrations, from chat to testimonials to CRM to better Zoom integration.” While he did not offer any specifics, it is likely in the cards in some form. Each of these is robust a product that, when used together, can provide a powerful toolset for building commerce-based websites. Lema wrote a more in-depth post on his personal blog about integrations being a vital strategy for business growth. He shared a riddle that he likened to the WordPress ecosystem. “I thought about it because it’s a bit of a parable for how I see so many product owners in the WordPress ecosystem build their plugins – as if there’s no one else in the world, building anything else that a customer might use with their product,” he wrote. We will have to wait to see what sort of integrations LearnDash might have in the future. For now, the team is working on the roadmap for its updated course grid and version 4.0 feature release. The update should include dynamic learning paths. “The reality in online learning is that students don’t move in a linear fashion through material like the instructor always hopes,” said Lema. “Or maybe an instructor wants to support an almost choose-your-own-adventure approach. I know in my coaching, I don’t move everyone through the same lessons in the same order. So we’re excited to innovate in this space.” Like this: Like Loading… [ad_2] Source link
Continue readingWordPress Contributor Teams Seek to Curb Spam Pledges in Five for the Future Program – WP Tavern
[ad_1] The Five for the Future program, an initiative Matt Mullenweg proposed in 2014, may soon be addressing the problem of spam and outdated pledges that appear on the program’s dedicated website. The idea behind the program is that organizations and individuals will contribute five percent of their resources back to WordPress development, ensuring the future of the project. Five for the Future launched a website in 2019 to display pledges and has always relied on the honor system of self-reporting tools for individual and organizational pledges. In a discussion post suggesting iterations on the project, Andrea Middleton identified two major issues with the program’s current implementation that she said “have kept it from reaching its full potential:” Spam or dormant pledges Disconnect between contributor teams and pledged contributors “Two years later, there have certainly been more ‘spam’ pledges than anyone would want, and surprisingly (to me) few reports of fake or spam pledges,” Middleton said. “What that tells me = either people don’t go surfing around in the pledge lists, checking for accuracy, the Report feature is too hard to find (unlikely), or people don’t really care whether pledges are accurate or not.” Middleton said the existence of spam pledges diminishes the value of active pledges, which necessitates disclaimers on the site if it is to continue without a regular spam cleanup. She suggests starting bi-annual or annual spam checks mediated by contributor team leaders, who would report if they have ever worked with or seen participation from a specific list of pledged individuals. WordPress.org could send absent contributors an email prompting them to re-confirm their pledges are not spam. Ian Dunn, a full-time contributor to WordPress, suggested automating the effort to combat spam and dormant pledges. “I think it’d be best to tackle this first, because it won’t matter how good our recruiting docs are if team reps have to dig through hundreds of inaccurate pledges in order to find the 5% of them that will contribute,” Dunn said. “I worry that a manual approach would add too much work for team reps, and wouldn’t be done consistently, especially after the first 6-12 months.” He suggests sending all people who are pledged regular emails for re-confirming their commitment, automating props wherever possible, and removing pledges after 6 months of no activity. Contribution tracking isn’t as straightforward for things like Community team efforts but there may be some innovative solutions for these types of contributions. “As a team rep, I’d love a way to call in contributors that have pledged to the team,” Courtney Engle Robertson said. Robertson contributes 20 hours per week to the Documentation, Marketing, Test, and Training teams. “I’d like them filtered a bit based upon team roles matched with what folks say they are interested in helping with. They could opt out if they need to change their commitments.” This suggestion would help address Middleton’s concern about the disconnect between contributor teams and pledged contributors. The discussion has been active for a week and is still in the the idea sharing stage. If you have any feedback on the ideas proposed or new ones to contribute, jump in on the comments of the post. Like this: Like Loading… [ad_2] Source link
Continue readingA Block-Based WordPress Theme by Anders Norén – WP Tavern
[ad_1] I have been secretly keeping tabs on Anders Norén over the past couple of weeks, awaiting the moment he pushed his first block theme to the WordPress directory. I first noticed it when he tweeted a screenshot two weeks ago. And, today was the day it happened. Tove landed in the review portal several hours ago, and I have been tinkering with it ever since. While it is not downloadable from the directory yet, the review system moves much faster than in times past. It should be available soon. In the meantime, anyone who wants to give it a spin can grab the ZIP file from its ticket. I called his last WordPress theme, Eksell, “the standard by which we should be judging all other” themes, and Norén has a history of releasing solid designs. Could he do for blocks what he has done for classic in years past? The truth is that going 100% blocks has limitations. Designers can experiment and test out some new things, but the underlying system is not up to par with what is possible with traditional theming. However, some feats are much easier to accomplish. Much of it depends on the creator’s goals and how well they work with the system instead of fighting it. At first glance, Tove was not any more impressive than most block themes I have installed and activated. It seemed pretty bare-bones, but I imagine this is what theming will look like far into the future. Many will be a wide-open canvas that allows users to build whatever type of site they want. Themes will primarily add personality. One area where they can and will shine is with custom block patterns. And Tove has over 40 of them. The theme is flexible enough for use with various sites, but its focus is on cafes and restaurants. Many of the patterns lean into this, such as custom menus, call-to-action-buttons, and more. Patterns are these pre-built pieces of a design that users can mix and match to lay pages out how they want. This also opens up things for theme authors by not having to make any hardline choices on how something like the front page, for example, should look. The theme is offering some suggestions and the tools to put it together. But, ultimately, the end-user gets to decide how it all comes out. With Tove, I had my homepage built in just minutes, as shown in the following screenshot. All I would need to do is fill it in with custom content. It felt empowering to simply mash up just a handful of the theme’s 40+ patterns and create a layout that I was comfortable with. This is what theming should really be all about: handing the keys over to users and letting them take the wheel. The theme’s job is just letting them drive in style. There are other things to love about Tove too. It has several custom user-selectable styles, such as horizontal separators for the Columns block. However, my favorite is the shaded style for adding a blue drop-shadow to several blocks. Shaded block style. The theme is not for everybody. The color palette is a bit on the flashier side and will not fit all sites. Few designers could pull off Tove’s scheme, which is why I think I love it so much. As Norén said in another tweet, it’s “like a plateful of macarons.” Some can work with pretty much anything. The rest of us are just fans. I would not call Tove revolutionary, but it has no need to be. It is built on top of an experimental system that still has many kinks to work out. However, it is nice to see what one of the WordPress community’s best designers can do with a limited toolset. Norén has definitely pushed the boundaries, which should elevate the block theme development space. I cannot wait until all the pieces of full site editing are in place, and we can open this thing up. Like this: Like Loading… [ad_2] Source link
Continue readingGutenberg 11.5 Adds Widget Grouping, Iterates on the Block Gap Feature, and Updates Nav Menus – WP Tavern
[ad_1] Gutenberg 11.5 landed earlier today. It is a hefty release that includes extensive changes to the Navigation block, a new way for grouping widgets, and more block gap feature integration. I have had mixed reactions to the features that made it into the latest release. At some points, I thought to myself, finally, this made it in. At other moments, I rendered my best version of Jean-Luc Picard’s famous facepalm. But, the wheel keeps turning, and the developers who put their time and effort into the project continue to improve it. One quick note is that everyone not running a theme that supports the block editor should check that their backend styles are not out of place. Gutenberg automatically outputs some default editor styles if the user’s active theme does not register its own or have a theme.json file present. This should be bundled in point release such as WordPress 5.8.2 so that users are not waiting for it until 5.9. Navigation Block Changes With nav menus still being a pain point in site editing, Gutenberg has added new levels of complexity. The Site Title and Site Logo blocks are allowed inside of the Navigation container. As Joen Asmussen shared in the original ticket, some complex layouts would benefit from allowing more inner elements within the Navigation block: Navigation block patterns. This could open a world of layout possibilities for theme authors through custom patterns. I have no issue with Gutenberg tackling the foundation for these more advanced layouts. However, we have yet to smooth out the basics of navigation. The experience of searching for and inserting in-site links is lackluster at best, requiring multiple mouse clicks. There is an open ticket for a lighter navigation experience, and that should be the focus. Theme authors should also note that the Navigation block now relies on the CSS gap property for spacing instead of margin. I almost missed this since I customized this for my own projects months ago — welcome to 2021, where we no longer need to rely on hacky margin solutions for simple spacing. This change could impact existing theme designs. FSE Admin Notice Limited to Themes Screen The lone FSE theme admin notice. There are plenty of gripes to be had with the Gutenberg plugin as its features are constantly in flux. However, the most annoying thing about running the plugin has been its persistent, non-dismissible admin notice when a user is running a block theme. In previous versions of the plugin, this notice has appeared on every screen in the backend. Now, it only appears on the Themes/Appearance page. Over the past few months, I have kept the Toolbelt plugin by Ben Gillbanks active for the sole purpose of hiding this notice. Good riddance. Farewell. Widget Group Block Editing a Widget Group block title. While I generally believe the Gutenberg plugin developers and core WordPress make good use of feedback, the block-based widgets system has been one area where the project has dropped the ball. As I have been repeating since September 2020, the feature was fundamentally broken. The goal was to allow end-users to add blocks in more places, but it was never compatible with classic theme markup and styles. I proposed using patterns, but the team went with a Widget Group block. The end result is similar but not exactly the same. The good news is that it fixes what should have been a blocker for the feature landing in core. The better news is that this is likely to land in WordPress 5.8.2 instead of the 5.9 release later this year. I would not go as far as calling it a perfect solution. The experience does not make it immediately clear how to add a widget title. Users must first add a block. Once a block is added, they can then click on the heading/title placeholder that appears. Then, the UI switches to a field for typing the title. The following video shows how the Widget Group block works: I would rather have a bit of a janky experience than no solution at all. At least users now do not have to manually create widget wrappers. Some could even deactivate the Classic Widgets plugin if this issue was a holdup. “Row” Group Variation and Flex Layouts Adding a post meta (byline) section with the Row block variation. To begin testing the new flex layout system introduced in Gutenberg 11.2, the development team has added a variation on the Group block named Row. This allows users to align inner blocks side by side instead of on top of each other in the default “flow” layout. There are tons of use cases for the feature. One of the primary scenarios for theme authors will be aligning post and comment metadata bocks next to each other. Previously, this required use of the Columns block or custom styles, neither of which are ideal. The experience is rough around the edges. I often found it hard to click in the right spot to edit a block, and the appender button did not always appear for adding new ones. The Social Icons block also uses the new flex layout. However, there is currently no way to switch it to flow mode for vertical social links. More Block Gap Integration Gap between each Column block. The Columns block now uses the gap feature introduced in Gutenberg 11.4 for handling the spacing between individual Column blocks. There is no UI for end-users to control this yet, but it is likely to land in a future release as the feature evolves. Gutenberg 11.5 has now added a bottom margin to the post title in the editor. For whatever reason, the development team has made a leap and assumed its current handling of the block gap feature needed this. It is a complex problem to solve. In the meantime, some users might see more whitespace than they are accustomed to between their title and content in the editor. Lots of extra
Continue readingGravity Forms Launches INPUT YouTube Channel and Podcast – WP Tavern
[ad_1] Gravity Forms has launched a new YouTube channel and podcast called INPUT, which will focus on sharing the stories and experiences of people inside and outside the WordPress ecosystem. James Giroux, a Rocketgenius employee who joined the company in 2020, is the host of the show and will be interviewing guests from various industries and disciplines. The first episode is a deep dive into the history of Gravity Forms, one of the most successful WordPress plugin companies that has been operating for 14 years. Its founders share a nostalgic look back at the early days of Rocketgenius, including the story of their first sale and first hire. They also discussed how the Gutenberg era marks a major shift in WordPress that has impacted the future of the Gravity Forms. The average WordPress user is decidedly no longer a developer who knows how to tinker with PHP, but is now more often a content creator or power user. As the barrier to WordPress development is getting higher, the Gravity Forms team is focusing on making the product easier to use for non-developers but still powerful for those capable of extending it. The episode is part of what Giroux calls a 3T sub-series (team, tools, and techniques) that will feature discussions about the company’s product, marketing, operations, culture, and ecosystem. The next sub-series is called Agency101 and will feature topics related to agency life for both small and large companies. Brad Miller from 10up will be the first guest of that series. “The third is a bit of a departure, but we’re interviewing people outside of the WordPress ecosystem in a sub-series called ‘The Story Of…,’” Giroux said. “The episode after Brad’s is with the lead singer of Anberlin, who have sold over 1M albums and have charted multiple times on the Billboard Rock charts. The idea behind this series is to introduce WordPress problem-solvers (developers, agencies, freelancers, etc.) to new industries and perhaps create some opportunities for new ideas and products to spring up in support of them.” Giroux also plans to chat with TV show creators/hosts, radio broadcasters, inventors, and others to create a well-rounded mix of shows that appeal to everyday WordPress users as well as those who are deeply involved in contributing. “To me, the WordPress lifestyle is that feeling you get when you show up to a WordCamp or meetup and see other WordPressers,” Giroux said. “It’s about rocking the t-shirt, celebrating unique and diverse voices, promoting a WWW that is accessible to all, inspiring and being inspired by creativity and how WordPress powers us to do great things. There’s a little Wapuu in all of us and Input, I hope, will be a space where we can celebrate that.” Like this: Like Loading… [ad_2] Source link
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