AWSOM plugins compatible with WordPress 2.3
After testing it has been determined that all 3 AWSOM plugins are fully compatible with the new WordPress 2.3 version. Now you just have to check your theme and other plugins :)
WordPress 2.3 released, Go Slow
WordPress 2.3 has been released, and I advise everyone to go slow on the upgrading. Make sure you try it out offline first with your theme and plugins before trying to post it live to your site. Anything involving categories or other archive related plugins might very well not work correctly anymore due to the database changes they’ve instituted in this version.
But hey, you now get to play around with tags without a plugin, so it’s got some benefits.
Studies In Frustration: Upgrading
I had one long weekend of frustration. One of my favorite online store site packages, X-cart, was resisting my efforts to run some upgrade scripts to move to the newest version of the software. No matter what I did, X-cart did not see the upgrade package to move from version 4.0.17 to version 4.0.18. I changed every file permission I could think of, moved files all around, and still nothing.
I finally had to start pulling apart the code of the upgrader and the software to figure out why it wasn’t working. After a ton of time and testing I finally discovered the issue: A bug in the upgrade code for this patch was preventing X-cart from seeing the patch as valid. It turns out the coders had only set it to search for the database string for the version as 4.0.17, where if you had ever upgraded the program the string was listed as 4.0.17gold_upgrade…..so the patch would never be visible. To correct this issue you had to edit the database entry in the config table to simply list the current version as the number.
This reminded me of how simple in general it is to upgrade WordPress. Simply overwrite the default files with the new ones and run one simple database upgrade script and you’re done. With WordPress 2.3 being released very soon it’s good that this part of WordPress is easy. Now, making sure your theme and plugins don’t break due to the database changes they’ve done, now that’s not going to be easy…..
Restructuring in Progress
Sorry for the lack of news updates this week. My background setup is going through some major restructuring so it’s been difficult to get things done this week. I’ve been working on some plugin updates while also getting my PC systems in working order. Add to this some real world stuff and it’s been a hack or a week.
To make up for it I’ll try to get out all of the new plugin releases I want to do by next week. So expect some updates to all three of my plugins early next week.
AWSOM Archive updated to version 1.2.0
The new version of the AWSOM Archive (formerly called the AWSOM Drop Down Archive) is now available for download. While retaining the default drop down setup of the previous versions, the new version expands the possibilities of usage for the plugin to any type of archive the admin wants to set up. The new version features expanded CSS customization, custom name, custom location placement, and more. You can download the new version from it’s product page at AWSOM.org