Plugin Readme files now support video
A new feature that will benefit WordPress plugin authors and plugin users alike: you can now add video in the readme.txt file of a plugin. This information will be displayed in the WordPress Just like WordPress posts & pages support shortcodes and oEmbed, so do plugin readme files now. There are two ways of doing this: oEmbed, by entering the URL of the video in its own line, and shortcodes, by entering the type of video and the URL in between square brackets, e.g.:
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7EiKx_WSesk][vimeo http://vimeo.com/173714][wpvideo OO4thna8]
The feature currently supports three video providers: YouTube, Vimeo, and VideoPress. It must also be noted that object embed codes (the usual way of embedding videos on websites) is not supported, just the two methods above. View the test example here.
BuddyPress 1.2 installs on WordPress
The biggest roadblocks to adopting social network software BuddyPress have finally been eliminated. With the latest version 1.2 coming out, you can now install BuddyPress on WordPress and not just WordPress MU. That goes for any WP version. Consider this the official way to run BP following this one.
Another highlight of this release is a quicker, simpler installation process: just 3 steps detailed in the download page. Simply add BuddyPress from your plugins page and activate a theme for it.
Probably the most exciting part of this release is a new default theme, which you can see running on the official site and the BuddyPress Test Drive site. BP is looking cleaner and more flexible than ever—you can create child themes with BP too.
Add Google Buzz to WordPress & BuddyPress
WPMU.org lists 5 different ways you can integrate Google Buzz into your WordPress and BuddyPress site. Aside from a the Buzz This WP plugin and the Digg-like button, you can also display your Buzz stream and share BP profiles to Buzz.
- “Buzz This” Plugin for WordPress
- Make Your Own Button to Add Anywhere in Your Template
- Share Your Google Buzz Posts on Your Site with Google Buzz ER Plugin
- Add the Ability to Share BuddyPress Profile Links With a “Buzz This” Button
- Add “Buzz This” to Individual BuddyPress Activity Stream Posts
Although Google Buzz is facing controversy right now for privacy issues, it could become a huge social network overnight since it’s built right inside Gmail, and bloggers will definitely want to take advantage of that audience.
Update: see also this post by Mashable.
BuddyPress can now run on WordPress single user
Great news for everybody itching to run BuddyPress but are still having second thoughts running WordPress MU: BP no longer requires WPMU! The latest trunk version can now run on single-user WordPress (that’s the original flavor of WP we all know and love) and these are all you have to remember:
- Install WP Single User.
- Make sure Pretty Permalinks are turned on.
- Download the BuddyPress Trunk here.
Scroll down to the bottom and grab the zip archive.- Unpack it and upload to your wp-plugins directory.
Make sure you move the bp-themes folder to the wp-content/themes directory and you should be good to go.The BP theme folder shows up automatically in the Appearance tab in WP 2.9.
I didn’t expect that this would happen before the WordPress-Wordpress MU merger, so this is a pleasant surprise. Read more details on this forum thread.
As an aside: this is the first time I’ve heard of WordPress being referred to as “single user”. Of course, this is just the counterpart to the term “multi-user” for WPMU, since we all know WordPress can have multiple users/authors in one installation.
Read & blog on WordPress.com from your iPhone via Twitter
Here’s an odd but fascinating hack discovered by Team 55 at the WP Quebec meetup: using the Twitter API, you can read and publish posts on WordPress.com from your iPhone! Matt Mullenweg explains step by step in this article. Pretty much any third-party Twitter client is okay; the key is to change the API URL to twitter-api.wordpress.com and then you can log in using your WordPress.com account.
Instead of following users you will follow blogs. Refer to them by their domain names (e.g. matt.wordpress.com). Support for replies and retweets will be added soon.
When you post a status update using our Twitter API, the update will appear on your blog. (If you have more than one blog you can choose which one gets the updates. The option is in your profile.)
Read more about this here. Matt also announced that they plan to release a WordPress MU plugin for this, so stay tuned for that one.
How to use the WP.me URL shortener for self-hosted WordPress
WordPress.com users have enjoyed the WP.me URL shortener since August, but here’s a neat discovery for self-hosted WordPress users, courtesy of the folks at WP Tavern: if you upgrade to WordPress 2.9 and install the WordPress.com Stats plugin, you can get to use WP.me too. Once you type in a post title, a “Get Shortlink” button will appear right beside the “Edit” button for the post permalink. For example, the clicking on said button gives us the shortlink http://wp.me/pely2-Aq.
What do you think of the requirements? Stats buffs probably won’t mind grabbing yet another analytics plugin if they haven’t already. But upgrading to WordPress 2.9 this early might still be discouraging.
What exactly is more attractive about choosing to use WP.me over, say, native post ID-based permalinks instead? Probably the number of characters you can save with a much shorter URL.
But take note that both Google and Facebook have just rolled out their own URL shorteners in goo.gl and fb.me. Seems like the URL shortening arena is getting more serious competition than ever.
Will bbPress turn into a canonical WordPress plugin?
BloggingPro reports that sister software for forums bbPress might become the first WordPress canonical plugin after the first IRC meetup for new direction.
Between the integrating of WPMU into the WordPress core and this development, it seems that the Automattic and the rest of the development team is pushing WordPress as the end-all, be-all publishing platform on the web. It will definitely be much easier to persuade site owners to choose bbPress as their forum software over third-party brands like vBulletin, or third-party plugins like SimplePress. And of course, it will also be exciting to see how bbPress can tap into the core features of WordPress.
Plugin problems? Try these steps
Don’t panic! Daily Blog Tips has a list of things to do when a WordPress plugin you installed suddenly stops working or breaks your site.
- Try to de-activate the plugin
- Rename the plugin via FTP
- Delete the plugin via FTP
- De-activate all the plugins via PHPMyAdmin
There are several ways to disable your plugin and it will depend on how “broken” the situation is. The higher the number the more drastic the measure. The concept should apply to themes as well—try deactivating using the WordPress admin first, then try it through your FTP client, and so on.
Good luck!
Upgrade multiple plugins at once in WordPress 2.9
Here’s another new feature coming in WordPress 2.9 that will make maintaining your blog a lot easier. You can now upgrade multiple plugins that have updates available all at once. No need to go through them one at a time. A welcome improvement for WordPress sites of all sizes. Visit WP Engineer for a screenshot of the feature.
There are few details yet but it’s great that we’re getting news about all these new improvements to WordPress before it comes out, so we know what to expect.
