Code Changes (transparent to end-users)
1. Performance Updates– Updated the following plugins and settings to improve overall site security and performance:
a. WordPress 5.5.1 Maintenance Release – General bug fixes, enhancements and specific bug fixes for block editor.
b. Slider Revolution- Bug fix for post-based sliders showing featured image instead of correct setting.
c. Yoast SEO- Optimized performance by preventing regular database queries. Added update notification for major and minor releases. Disabled script concatenation entirely to fix Javascript and Yoast SEO errors caused by WordPress 5.5. Added Schema section to metabox and sidebar, improved readability for Portuguese and Indonesian and improved keyword recognition for right to left languages.
d. ACF Content Analysis for Yoast SEO- Updated compatibility to Yoast SEO 14.9.
e. Publish Press Permission Pro- Bug fix for Show Tables query executing on each site access. This improved site performance issues on certain sites.
f. Gravity Forms- Updated background updates to work more seamlessly with WordPress automatic updates. Updated Rest API for WordPress 5.5. Bug fix for issue where honeypot field description can be assigned same id attribute as other forms on the page.
g. Redis Object Cache- Updated bundled Predis library to v1.14. Bug fixes for bytes metrics calculation and non-standard Predis configurations. Improved WordPress coding standards.
h. Contact Form 7 Conditional Fields- Bug fixes for general error message not appearing if step validation fails and Rest API calls aborting.
i. Query Monitor- Bug fix for extra early error handling introduced in previous version.
j. Custom Post Type UI- Added support for default terms with a custom taxonomy. Removed the forcing of underscores for post type slugs. Bug fix for jQuery
compatibility issue with WordPress 5.5.
k. UberMenu- Display line numbers in Theme Template Backtrace. Replace x character with Font Awesome times icon in modal menu close button.
l. Advance Custom Fields Pro- Added new Field Groups Admin and new ACF Blocks features. Bug fix in Color Picker field causing JS error on front end forms. Bug fix in Post taxonomy location rule causing incomplete list of rule choices. Updated Indonesian and Turkish translations.
m. Admin Menu Editor- Performance optimizations.
n. Flow-Flow- Improved Facebook token updating. Fixed iframe responsiveness on mobile.
o. ACF QuickEdit Fields- Bug fixes.
p. Inactive Logout – Added WordPress 5.5 support.
q. Google Tag Manager for WordPress – New Google Optimize container ID format now accepted.
Functionality Changes
1. Alert Header Message Bar– The new Header Message bar allows the user to display an additional alert in the site header complete with “Read More” hyperlinked text. This feature is a separate entity in the Dashboard and any post or page URL may be linked to the alert. The Header Message can also include an optional image (175x45px) and can be set to expire. (Instructions located in the next section).
Screen Options – Post/Page Editor Boxes – The location of specific boxes on a Page or Post edit screen can now be moved with the arrows in the top right corner of each box. Previously, this could only be done by dragging and dropping boxes. These options allow for users to customize the edit screen per personal preference and have no impact on templates or published Posts or Pages.
Instructions for New Functionality
Header Message:
Select HEADER MESSAGE from the DASHBOARD on left and Click ADD NEW HEADER MESSAGE.
1. Select YES to Turn On.
2. Enter TITLE. (40 character limit)
3. Enter DESCRIPTION. (70 character limit)
4. Add IMAGE. (175x45px) (optional)
5. Enter URL to hyperlink.
6. Confirm “Read More” is auto-filled in READ MORE section.
7. Check ENABLE EXPIRATION box and Enter date/time to expire. (optional)
8. Click PUBLISH.