This (mostly) bi-weekly serves to inform and enlighten our minds on latest happenings in the sprawling countryside we call WordPress Land.
Release News
- The WordPress 5.1 Field Guide has been published. Check it out for a good overview of all the features and bug fixes coming our way this Thursday, February 21.
Extending WordPress
- It’s no secret the Advanced Custom Fields is my favorite plugin, not just for its out-of-the-box features but also because it is super extendable. They recently published a new post with a great run down and deep dive into applying filter variations.
- Speaking of ACF, since my last digest, there have been two more releases: 5.7.11 & 5.7.12. Lots of bug fixes and lots of code refactoring for better performance.
- As someone who is currently embracing core Gutenberg functionality for my builds, I also try to keep an eye on the features being worked through on the feature plugin side of the Gutenberg house. One very interesting new feature is the FocalPointPicker which allows content editors to choose the best center point on images. This will be very handy.
- If you use a plugin to handle social media buttons on your site, there’s a good change it’s the Simple Social Buttons plugin. Last week there was a critical update released to patch a vulnerability, so if you are using it, make sure to update to the latest version ASAP.
Grab Bag
- Alex Mills, the author of several great WordPress plugins, including the Regenerate Thumbnails plugin, which I use on every single WP site I build, is battling cancer and his latest update is pretty rough. He’s in my thoughts and I am looking forward to a positive update and good news in the future…send him all your good vibes.
- There was some recent drama around YoastCon which seems to have really just been another troll session for people who don’t like the idea of gender equality and I’m not here for it. Miss me with that shit.
- Automattic CEO Matt Mullenweg recently recorded a talk for TED called “Why Working from Home is Better for Business”. As someone who has been working remotely for the past 5+ years and can’t ever see myself going back to a daily office environment, this one struck a chord with me. I highly recommend anyone who runs a business but is iffy on the idea of remote work take a look at how it can be done successfully. “I believe that talent and intelligence are equally distributed throughout the world, but opportunity is not.”
“Happiness can exist only in acceptance.” – George Orwell