Google published an update to its Site Kit plugin for WordPress this afternoon with a hot fix for a critical issue affecting an unknown number of users. Reports of broken websites were popping up on Twitter and in the plugin’s support forum on WordPress.org. Users affected by the issue reported having a critical error on all sites using Site Kit, which forced deactivation of the plugin in recovery mode. In some cases it prevented them from accessing their dashboards.
“On Wednesday, August 11, we identified a fatal error in the Site Kit plugin that could be triggered by other plugins or themes using an unprefixed version of Composer,” Google Site Kit Support Lead Bethany Chobanian Lang said in a pinned post on the support forum.
Version 1.38.1 contains a hot fix for this issue, since it was critical enough to take down users’ websites. The plugin’s maintainers began investigating the issue less than 24 hours ago but are still not sure which plugins trigger the error due to their usage of Composer.
“The reports do not include which specific plugins or themes were causing this, but the error message clearly highlighted the code in Site Kit that was the problem,” Google Developer Relations Engineer Felix Arntz said. “Technically, that problematic code had been in Site Kit since several versions ago (months back), so maybe another plugin/theme recently got updated with new code that exposed the problem.”
After looking at popular plugins, Arntz said he hasn’t been able to find one so far that would have triggered the problem. Given Site Kit’s broad usage, other affected sites are bound to turn up once users realize there is a problem. Google launched the plugin in 2019 and has since amassed more than a million active installations. The majority of the plugin’s user base is running older versions, which may or may not be affected by the current issue.
WordPress.org shows 35.6% of the plugin’s users are on version 1.38.x. The hot fix is not backported for older releases, but users running Site Kit version 1.38 with background updates enabled should automatically receive the fix.
There are hidden HDR videos playing at the corners of this page. When a HDR-capable browser encounters one, it switches to HDR mode. For some reason, CSS backdrop-filter + brightness >100% combo seems to behave like HDR—reaching beyond the user-controlled display brightness, up to the maximum HDR brightness—while the everything in between follow[s] along. At least that’s the overall idea, but I still don’t know exactly why it works; especially why with those two CSS properties.
As I look at that demo in Chrome, I see an extra-white text-shadow. In Safari, I see extra-white text. In Firefox, the whites match so I see nothing. Probably a bug.
I wouldn’t recommend actually using the trick, as I’d think the extra-whiteness almost certainly takes extra battery power that a user isn’t opting into, even without the video playing—even though it does feel like a bummer that our screens are capable of whiter whites than we normally have access to. The good news is that the gamut of color on the web is expanding, generally.
Chris and Klare chat about the incredibly daunting task of planning a project that is huge and long-term. We know we’re pretty OK at planning smaller-scale projects. We plan, we kanban, we get the job done. But a single basic kanban isn’t going to cut it for a truly gigantic project. We get into talking about chopping the project into phases, chopping those phases into sections (sometimes with their own phases), and a databasing/kanbaning strategy to tie it all together. This also touches GitHub workflows and meeting structures, so there is a lot to think through here and it requires constant effort.
The WordPress.com Growth Summit is coming up August 17th (Americas & EMEA) and August 18th (Asia Pacific) and is focused on running a business with a WordPress website as a core.
Get expert advice on how to design your site, write effective copy, attract traffic, build a community, and earn money.
With the pandemic ravaging the world all over, companies and individuals have been forced to adapt and make the best of the situation. We all realize that somehow life would need to go on, and we would need to find new and creative ways to work, carry on with our education and our social lives. One of the major ways in which organizations have evolved is by working from home and using software such as Zoom to carry out meetings and connect. While this has been quite effective and helpful in maintaining social distance, there have been plenty of mishaps such as pets showing up in front of the screen, or having kids run into the room screaming. All of these are normal life scenarios, and we have to find a way to maintain a good balance. Below, we have highlighted a couple of tips to help you with just that.
One of the easiest ways is to make your office space Zoom friendly. To do this, it is necessary that you have a good background, as it will be one of the major areas that your clients and colleagues will view through the screen. A few tips you can use include:
Pay attention to the color of your background
You want to select a space that will create contrast against your silhouette. For instance, if you have dark clothing on, then a brighter background will be good for you, and vice versa. Creating this contrast will prevent you from blending in into the background, and will instead help to define your outline.
Invest in good equipment
One of the major challenges in Zoom meetings is not being able to hear or see the other with clarity. To avoid these issues, then one of the things you can do is to invest in good Zoom Room equipment. A ring light, for instance, will greatly help to brighten up a dark room. It will also ensure that you are visible through the camera, thus making you presentable and boosting your confidence. Investing in good audio equipment is pretty helpful too since you will be able to articulate your points clearly and communicate with your colleagues with ease.
Tone down on visual distractions
While having a zoom meeting, it may be helpful to ensure that you clear away any personal items that you would not want your colleagues to see. This may include your family photos, for privacy, for instance. Furthermore, if you do not have the luxury of having a separate office space but instead have a desk in your bedroom, then you may consider background filters. These are an excellent and easy way for you to make your background conducive, without having to move around too much stuff.
With the new working from home setup, we have to embrace the new ways of working and adapt to the times. Setting up a comfortable and conducive office space is necessary, as it will help make you more productive. We do hope that these few tips will at the very least help to get you started.
Earlier today, theme.es released its Emoji Toolbar project to the plugin directory. It is a simple picker that integrates with the WordPress Rich Text toolbar, allowing users to insert emoji directly from the editor interface.
After Nick Hamze pulled his Emoji Conbini plugin from WordPress.org last year, there has been an emoji-sized hole in my editor toolbox. The plugin was the perfect implementation for quickly plopping a quick smiley face or any of the other thousands of characters available. Unfortunately, his departure from the WordPress space meant losing one of my favorite block-related plugins — and several others that I enjoyed.
It was also on par with 10up’s Insert Special Characters plugin, a solution for users missing a similar picker from the classic editor era.
Emoji Toolbar is filling that void and is a solid alternative for those who need a solution. The difference between the two implementations is the location. Emoji Conbini added the picker button directly to the toolbar, and Emoji Toolbar adds it to the “more” dropdown.
Clicking the Emoji button in the Rich Text toolbar.
Placing the picker button inside of the dropdown makes it a little harder to find. It also requires an additional mouse click to insert emoji. What matters is that the implementation works, but I would love to see it as a top-level toolbar item.
Using the plugin is a simple matter. When in a Rich Text field, which includes blocks like Paragraph, Heading, List, and more, the Emoji Toolbar appears in the block toolbar. After clicking it, the plugin creates a popup of the emoji picker.
Emoji Toolbar popup picker.
From that point, users merely need to click the emoji they want to insert into the post.
The plugin bundles the Emoji Mart library, which has quickly become almost a standard for emoji pickers. The component is a Slack-like box that categorizes each of the characters, and it provides a field for searching for that perfect emoji.
There is still at least one emoji inserter alternative. Instead of adding a picker to the block toolbar, Emoji Autocomplete Gutenberg allows users to type : and use keywords for inserting characters. For those who prefer to work from the keyboard, it is a quicker method.
Emoji Toolbar shines over Emoji Autocomplete Gutenberg and the now-retired Emoji Conbini based on how it formats its output. It inserts the actual characters into the content, but the other plugins insert an <img> tag instead. That method results in output that is not forward-compatible with any changes in the future or alternative libraries. Users who also prefer to disable image output on the front end cannot do so. This is a non-issue with Emoji Toolbar — it plays well with other solutions.
On the whole, the plugin is solid. It has well-written code and provides an easy-to-use picker for inserting emoji.
Internet users today are an impatient bunch. Seemingly small time delays are hugely significant, and have a big impact on user-experience. This is particularly true for eCommerce sites, with an estimated 40% abandonment rate accompanying just a three-second delay. Put another way: a sluggish website will kill your bottom line. People just don’t want to […]
Since there is so much content circulating nowadays, the threshold for mistakes is becoming lower and lower. A site, regardless of content, is expected to be engaging, easy to look at, fast, and fully functional....
Donnie D’Amato built a whole site around the thesis that “digital designers still expect to use the grid while experienced layout engineers have moved beyond it.” The idea isn’t that we should never literally use display: grid; but rather that strict adherence to an overall page grid isn’t necessary. Brad’s reaction was interesting, as someone in and out of a lot more projects than I am:
One of the most frequent, confusing conversations w/ designers is “No, the pink lines that overlay design comps aren’t all that helpful for how things actually work in the browser.”
[…] throw your transparent pink 12-column grids in the trash can.
Donnie feels this is all in the spirit of responsive design, and I’m inclined to agree, except that browser technology has evolved quite a bit since the coining of responsive design and it might be time to call it something new. “Content-driven design” is one of Donnie’s headers and that’s a nice phrase.
This all resonated with Michelle as well:
CSS layout features like flexbox and Grid enable us to build more flexible layouts that prioritise content. We talk about intrinsic and extrinsic sizing in CSS — sizing based on both content and context. The promised container queries specification will put even more power in the hands of developers. But it feels to me like the design process is still stuck in the past.
[…] you should truly consider all other options before using a [browser window size] breakpoint. Ask, is the component expected to always be related to the page size (headers, modals, etc.)? Then a breakpoint might be acceptable. However, components that are placed deep within the page should not be using breakpoints to inform their layout.
The easiest way to start an online shop with WordPress is the dropshipping method. It is a very popular, easy, and fast way to create websites, upload products, and start earning money. Dropshipping allows you to start an online shop without owning a product physically that decreases the cost a lot. The only requirement for […]
Xignite, a financial data services provider, has announced a new exchange-traded funds (ETF) API that is intended to provide developers with comprehensive market data and analytics tools. The XigniteGlobalETFs API release is timed to align with a surge in the popularity of ETFs over the past several years.
The company outlined the value provided by the new API in stating that:
I have managed to get blog posts displayed from each blog category but I want to limit it to 1 article from each blog category but unsure how to do it in the sql query I have, below is what I have so far
(SELECT BP.postID,postTitle,postSlug,postDesc,postDate,postImage
FROM
blog_posts BP, blog_post_cats BPC
WHERE
BPC.catID = 6 AND BPC.postID = BP.postID OR BPC.catID = 5 AND BPC.postID = BP.postID OR BPC.catID = 4 AND BPC.postID = BP.postID OR BPC.catID = 1 AND BPC.postID = BP.postID
)
UNION
(SELECT BP.postID,postTitle,postSlug,postDesc,postDate,postImage
FROM
blog_posts BP, blog_post_cats BPC
WHERE
BPC.catID = BPC.postID = BP.postID
)
Do you want to allow blog users to moderate comments in WordPress?
If your site gets a lot of comments, then it can be difficult to moderate them all. One solution is creating a separate user role so that other people can manage the comments for you.
In this article, we will show you how to allow blog users to easily moderate comments on your WordPress blog.
Why Allow Blog Users to Moderate Comments in WordPress?
Comment moderation can take a lot of time and effort, especially for big blogs that get lots of comments. If you are slow to approve comments or delete spam, then visitors may stop interacting with you.
By giving blog users the power to moderate comments, you can combat spam and deliver a better experience for your visitors.
These users might be members of your customer support team, your community manager, or even an active and trusted commenter on your WordPress blog.
By default, WordPress doesn’t let you create a user who is only responsible for moderating comments. With that being said, let’s see how you can easily allow blog users to moderate comments using a WordPress plugin.
Simply use the quick links below to jump straight to the method you want to use.
Method 1: Add a Comment Moderator Role to Specific Users
The Comment Moderation Role plugin allows you to quickly and easily give a comment moderator role to specific users. This plugin creates a new WPB Comment Moderator role that enables the user to approve, decline, or edit comments on any post without giving them access to other parts of the WordPress dashboard.
The first thing you need to do is install and activate the plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
Upon activation, you will have access to a new user role called ‘WPB Comment Moderator’.
To assign this role to an existing user, simply go to Users » All Users. Then, check the box next to that person’s username.
After that, simply open the ‘Change role to…’ dropdown menu and select the ‘WPB Comment Moderator’ role.
You can then go ahead and click on ‘Change’.
Now, this person will have access to the WordPress comment moderation panel.
You can also create a new user and assign them the comment moderator role. To do this, simply go to Users » Add New and enter the person’s information, such as their email address.
Next, you need to open the ‘Role’ dropdown and select ‘WPB Comment Moderator’.
When you are happy with the information you have entered, just click on the ‘Add New User’ button.
Now, this person can log in to their account and see a comment moderation dashboard, similar to the image below.
As you can see, this person can only moderate comments and edit their profile. All other WordPress admin dashboard features are hidden.
Method 2: Add Comment Moderation Capabilities to Any User Role
You can also add the comment moderation permission to a user role or even create a completely new user role for managing your site’s comments.
This is a great choice if you want to allow multiple people to moderate comments.
For example, you might create a comment moderation team or give your site’s Contributors permission to moderate comments. This makes it easy for guest bloggers to interact with their readers.
The easiest way to edit user permissions in WordPress is by using the Members plugin. This free plugin allows you to customize the permissions for every user role and even create completely new roles.
The first thing you need to do is install and activate Members. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
Upon activation, go to the Members » Roles page to see all the different user roles on your WordPress website.
To start, you can add the comment moderation permission to any existing user role.
To do that, simply hover over that role and then click on the ‘Edit’ link when it appears.
The left column shows all the different types of content, such as reusable blocks and WooCommerce products. Simply click on a tab, and you will see all the permissions for that content type.
To allow users to moderate comments, you need to select the ‘General’ tab in the left-hand menu. Then, find ‘Moderate Comments’ and check the ‘Grant’ box.
With that done, simply click on ‘Update’ to save your changes. Now, anyone with this user role can moderate your website’s comments.
Another option is to create a new user role by going to Members » Add New Role. You can now type in a title for the new role, such as Community Manager, Comment Moderator, or something similar.
After that, you can add the comment moderator permission to this role by following the same process described above. To give this role additional permissions, simply check any of the other ‘Grant’ boxes.
We’ve been plucking away at some UI changes that will help slowly morph our existing Pen Editor into the editor we’re imagining for the future. That will be a big change, someday, but in order to make it feel less abrupt, we’re doing smaller changes where we can so that the final change won’t feel so big.
So anyway, a little update to the Change View menu. Featuring fun animated rotations!
Just a quick note on this Pen Editor UI/UX change. The Save button used to be only that. You click it, the Pen saves. It’s only other job is a little line on the top of it to let you know when the Pen has unsaved changes. We’ve updated it to have a little dropdown menu to give you easier access to a variety of other functions relevant to any Pen:
If you ask me, Format Code on Save is under-utilized (as it’s not a default), and it’s such a pleasure to use. I’m sure most of y’all have autoformatting going on in your local editor using something like Prettier, which is exactly what we use. Give it a try!
Do you want to add footnotes to your WordPress blog posts?
If you are writing an article that references research or contains a lot of complex information, then you may want to use footnotes in your content. These are little numbered marks in a text that provide additional context to a sentence or paragraph.
In this article, we will show you how to add simple and elegant footnotes to your WordPress blog posts, step by step.
Why Add Footnotes to Your WordPress Blog Posts?
If you run an educational blog, publish research, or cover news stories, then footnotes are a great way to give more context to your content. You can use them to add comments, highlight important facts, or insert citations to academic sources on your website.
A footnote typically appears as a small, superscript number within the main body of your text. The actual footnote content is then placed at the bottom of the page or appears as a tooltip to distinguish it from the main content.
Here is an example:
Besides providing clarity and transparency for your readers, footnotes can make your WordPress website look more professional and trustworthy. They show that you have done your research and have the sources to support your claims.
The WordPress.org editor now has a built-in footnote feature that you can easily use to insert additional context.
This guide will show you how to add WordPress footnotes to your blog posts or pages using two methods. One is with using the Footnotes block in the Gutenberg editor, and the other is with a plugin.
You can use the links below to jump to a specific method:
Method 1: Add WordPress Footnotes With the Gutenberg Editor
This method is best for people who want to use simple footnotes and don’t want to install a plugin for this purpose.
To use the WordPress Footnotes block, you will need to open the Gutenberg block editor for a new or existing post or page.
After that, just highlight a word in your content that you want to add the footnote to. In the block toolbar, click the dropdown arrow and select ‘Footnote.’
You will now be redirected to the bottom of the page, where the Footnotes block has been added automatically. Here, you can type in your extra information.
Additionally, you can customize the block’s color, typography, dimensions, and border using the settings in the right-hand panel.
Feel free to repeat this step to include as many footnotes as needed.
When you preview your WordPress site, there should be a footnote link to the sentence you highlighted earlier.
If you click on the hyperlink, it will bring you to the bottom of the page with the footnote.
Here, you can also click the hyperlinked arrow to go back to the section where the footnote is assigned.
While this method is fairly simple for beginners, it doesn’t offer tons of customization options. If you are looking for more ways to change the footnote appearance, then just continue to the next method.
Method 2: Add WordPress Footnotes With a Plugin
Another method of creating footnotes is to use the free Modern Footnotes plugin. Unlike the Footnotes block, it offers a lot more options to modify the footnote appearance.
For example, you can make the footnote appear as a tooltip, as well as extra information at the bottom of the page.
The first thing you will do is install the Modern Footnotes plugin. For more information about plugin installation, check out our guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.
Configuring the Modern Footnotes Plugin Settings
With the plugin installed, you can now go to Settings » Modern Footnotes. This is where you can configure the footnote settings to your preferences.
Let’s go through each setting one by one.
‘Desktop footnote behavior’ lets you select how the footnote should behave when the website is being viewed on a desktop computer.
You can make the footnote appear when a cursor hovers over the tooltip or when the user clicks on the tooltip. Alternatively, the footnote can expand below the footnoted text.
Which one you choose is up to your preferences. That said, the footnote will expand below the text by default on mobile screens.
Besides that, you can also check the ‘Make footnote content appear in web browser’s native tooltip when hovering over footnote number’ box if needed. This means the footnote will appear in the browser’s tooltip rather than in the plugin’s when the cursor hovers over the text.
We recommend switching this setting off if you choose the tooltip option for the desktop footnote behavior. Otherwise, you will have two tooltips for the same footnote, which readers may find annoying.
Below, you can also choose to display the footnote list at the bottom of the posts. This way, the reader can see all of the additional information in one place.
You may also want to enable this feature when the blog post is syndicated through RSS feeds.
Scrolling down, you can opt to insert a heading for your footnote list and choose a heading tag for it. This helps separate the actual content of your blog post from the footnotes. You can write something like References, Footnotes, Citations, or Additional Information.
If you want to add some custom CSS to modify the footnote text, feel free to insert it in the ‘Modern Footnote Custom CSS’ box.
Last but not least, you can customize the Modern Footnotes shortcode if you don’t want to use the built-in version. Make sure to enter the shortcode without the brackets.
Once you are happy with the settings, just click ‘Save Changes.’
Adding Footnotes Using the Modern Footnotes Plugin
Now that you’ve configured the Modern Footnotes settings, let’s insert some footnotes into your content. Go ahead and open the block editor for a new or existing post or page.
There are two ways to add a footnote. One is with a shortcode, which is what we recommend.
First, find the sentence you want to insert a footnote. Then, right next to that sentence, type in the following shortcode:
[mfn]Insert your footnote here[/mfn]
Make sure to replace the text between the brackets with your information.
We also suggest putting the shortcode within the same block as the sentence, right next to the text, without any space in between, just like in the example below. Otherwise, the footnote may look disconnected from the text.
The other method is to type your footnote text next to the sentence you want to add the footnote to. Make sure there’s no space between the footnote text and the sentence.
In the example below, we want to add a footnote containing an academic citation for the sentence that begins with ‘Studies suggest…’
Next, highlight the footnote and click the down-arrow button in the toolbar. After that, select ‘Add a Footnote.’
The drawback with the second method is it can be hard to track which lines of text have been given a footnote and which ones haven’t when you are editing the content. That’s why we recommend the shortcode method.
When you preview the blog post, you will see that there is now a number next to the sentence. If you use the tooltip option, this is what the footnote will look like:
On the other hand, the footnote will appear below the text if you use the expandable formatting.
Here’s what it looks like when you click on the number:
Finally, if you choose to display all of the footnote content at the bottom of the post, you can scroll down to find everything there.
Bonus Tip: Use WordPress Custom Fields to Add More Information to Your Content
Besides footnotes, another way to provide extra information in your WordPress posts and pages is by using custom fields.
WordPress custom fields are metadata used to insert additional information into a post or page. For example, if you run a blog with multiple authors, then you may want to display your contributors’ names on the blog post, not just your own.
We will show you how to add custom fields using the block editor and some plugins, including WPCode. This plugin offers a safe and easy way to add code snippets to your WordPress website, even if you are a beginner.
PublishPress, makers of the PublishPress and PublishPress Blocks plugins, have adopted the Organize Series plugin from Darren Ethier. Organize Series is a 15-year-old plugin for organizing and displaying posts in a series, useful for novel writers, educators, magazine sites, and anyone breaking their longer content up into a series.
image credit: PublishPress
PublishPress is also adopting seven extensions for the plugin that add features like custom post type support, shortcodes, the ability to add a post to multiple series, bulk publishing, and more.
Ethier, who works as an engineer at Automattic, said he began losing interest in maintaining the plugin and knew it was time to search for a new owner.
“Most of you have noticed that I haven’t been actively contributing to Organize Series or it’s extensions for some time now and it’s been bugging me,” he said. “I’ve been gradually losing interest in maintaining the plugin as I’ve expanded my developer horizons and as a result, I’ve struggled with making the time to work on it.”
Ethier connected with PublishPress by describing his situation in a post on the Post Status community and agreed to transfer his plugin and extensions in exchange for a donation to a charity.
“Darren asked us to make a charitable donation as part of the handover,” PublishPress founder Steve Burge said. “We chose the American Journalism Project. Over 2,100 communities in the U.S. have lost their local newspaper since 2004. The AJP is trying to reverse that trend. It is a non-profit that is investing in local news. Their goal is to help grow newsrooms that hold the powerful accountable, combat disinformation, and deepen civic participation.”
Burge assured current users that the free version of Organize Series will remain free on WordPress.org with all of its current features and some improvements. The company will also keep the extensions freely available on GitHub but Burge said they plan to release a commercial version with updated versions of the extensions.
With the adoption of Organize Series, PublishPress now has nine plugins available in its niche collection of publishing extensions as part of its mission to “help WordPress publishers succeed.” In the near future, Organize Series’ website content will be transferred over and the company will be changing the plugin’s name to “PublishPress Series.”
Internet users today are an impatient bunch. Seemingly small time delays are hugely significant, and have a big impact on user-experience. This is particularly true for eCommerce sites, with an estimated 40% abandonment rate accompanying just a three-second delay. Put another way: a sluggish website will kill your bottom line. People just don’t want to […]
The easiest way to start an online shop with WordPress is the dropshipping method. It is a very popular, easy, and fast way to create websites, upload products, and start earning money. Dropshipping allows you to start an online shop without owning a product physically that decreases the cost a lot. The only requirement for […]
