Enjoy!

Oh and by the way, if you’ve found Organize Series to be helpful, can you help us out a bit by taking a few minutes and posting a review?  Your reviews help us, help you.  Thanks!

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue with the Jetpack plugin that caused the series-meta strip to disappear on single post pages when the Jetpack sharing module was enabled.
• Fixed an issue where the Series icon (image) was not getting saved on the first save while creating a new series on the Manage series page.
• Various minor compatibility fixes for WordPress 3.5 (and 3.5.1)
• Various fixing up of PHP notice/warnings throughout the plugin. (8 fixes)
• A problem with posts losing series information when saved within the Editorial Calendar plugin exposed an issue with how series information is saved with posts. This was fixed and will apply to any plugins that use `apply_filters(‘save_post’)`

Features

• Paging on Series Table of Contents page: This is been a much requested feature and we’re pleased to make it available. This release introduces a new option in the series options page for setting how many series are displayed in the table of contents. As well, we’ve released a new template function `series_toc_paginate()` that allows you to indicate where you want the pagination links displayed. You can see an example of the new function in the updated `seriestoc.php` file included with Organize Series. Note: if you are using permalinks, make sure you regenerate your permalinks either by saving the series options page or visiting the WordPress permalinks setting page and saving the permalinks. That will flush the wp_rewrite array and make sure paging works as expected.
• Ability to change “Other Posts in Series…” text in Series TOC widget: This is another requested feature from users. Basically in the Series Table of Contents widget, you now have the ability to modify the text that is displayed in the widget when a single post belonging to a series is viewed. Some users have been using Organize Series for “Issues”, or “Chapters” and this allows you to keep the language consistent.
• More css styling options: Eventually we’re going to have an addon available that allows you to style series elements in the backend. In the meantime, we’ve dropped in a couple of .css options for you to try with your theme. One is for dark themes, and one is for light themes, and then there remains the default one that has always been included with Organize Series. You can try out and select the new .css options via the Series Options page.

Translators:  There are some new strings for Organize Series Core – if you can visit our glotpress installation and update the translations that would be AWESOME!  Next week I’m planning on putting up a page that will enable users to download various translations that have been prepared AND give recognition to our contributors!

Organize Series Extra Tokens 0.8

We’ve released Organize Series Extra Tokens 0.8 as well.  Here’s the update notes:

• A new token available for series templates listed on the Organize Series Options page.  In Organize Series 2.4.3 we had released an update that enabled you to see your scheduled and draft posts belonging to series easier in the backend.  With this version of Organize Series Extra Tokens we’ve added the functionality for you to display unpublished posts belonging to a series in the front end!  Two new tokens and a new template field accompany this new feature.  ”%unpublished_post_title%” and “%total_posts_in_series_with_unpub%” are the tokens and the “Series Post List Post Title (unpublished) Template:” is available for styling posts that are displayed.  This allows you to give readers a heads up on what new posts are coming for the series.

Organize Series Multiples 0.9

Just a couple things in this update:

• Integrate a fix related to the “Editorial Calendar” issue as mentioned in the Organize Series 2.4.4 changelog
• Fix a PHP notice/warning
• Implemented a new feature that gives the ability to change the series short title for the addon (this is related to the widget update as noted in the Organize Series 2.4.4 changelog).

This addon does one thing, and one thing well.  Make it possible to not only use Organize Series with WordPress pages but ALSO any custom post type you may have active on your blog that you want to use Organize Series with.  Yeah, groovy.  Make sure you visit the FAQ to read more about this neato addition to the Organize Series family.

Oh, and I should mention.  If you decide to purchase and use this addon, you’ll need to make sure the Organize Series core plugin is up to date.  If you are a user of Organize Series Multiples, you’ll need to make sure it’s up to date as well.

• Initial release of addon

To install:

1. Backup your database.  This is a usual step for trying any new plugin.  If anything goes wrong you want to be able to restore your data!
2. You can either upload the .zip file via the Plugin page in WordPress OR you can ftp the “organize-series-cpt-support” folder and all it’s contents into your “wp-content/plugins/” directory on your server.
3. Activate it.
4. Visit the Series options page (via the “Settings” top level menu in your WordPress Admin) and at the top you’ll see the new CPT Support settings area.  In that area you can select which Custom Post Types (including pages) you want to use series with.

That’s it!

CPT stands for “Custom Post Type” and this addon enables Custom Post Type support for Organize Series. Which means, with this addon, not only can you use series with WordPress posts, but you can also create series with pages, or any other WordPress Custom Post Type

So this means I can now use series with pages?

Yup!  Or any other custom post type that you may have active on your WordPress site.  Oh and you know what is even cooler?  The series can have parts across different post types.  That means you could have part one that is a post, and part two that is a page, and part three that is a another post type…  Personally, I don’t really think it’s a great idea to have a series run across multiple post types but you can do it if you want.

What about the quick-edit on the edit.php page (for viewing the list of posts).  Will it work for pages and other post types?

Yes sir/ma’am.  All the stuff you are used to doing with posts can now be done with this addon active.

If I decide I don’t like this addon can I go back to using just Organize Series without the addon?

Yes.  But you could see some funky things happen with  your post types that are part of a series (especially if you decided to span series across different post types).

Um… I’ve activated this addon, and I’m not seeing the ability to add pages {or insert other post type here} to series.  Is it broken?

No,  more than likely you just haven’t visited the series options page (in the WP Settings menu of your WordPress admin).  At the top you’ll see some checkboxes next to the names of custom post types active on your WordPress website.  You just need to check the ones you want to use Organize Series with and then save the options and you’ll be good to go.

Speaking of the series options page,  I want to display series information for different post types differently.  Is this possible using the series template fields on the series options page?

At the moment, no.  That’s a good idea though (why didn’t I think of that?)!  Right now any changes you make in the series template fields will apply across all post types that Organize Series is being used with.  HOWEVER, if you are php savvy (or know someone who is) you can use the provided Organize Series template tags (functions) and some conditionals to change the output depending on what post type is being displayed.  (oh, we also have a line on some great developers who could do it for you if you want… just contact us).

Hey, I’m using Organize Series Multiples.  Will this work with it as well?

Yes, it most certainly will.  Just make sure you are using at least Organize Series Multiples 0.8+ because there is some special sauce added to the Multiples addon so custom support types work properly there.

Have any other questions?  Ask away  in the comments!  The really good ones will be updated in this post.

• multiple php warnings, error notices were fixed.
• fixed bug with add new button in Organize Series not working (on edit posts page)
• properly escaped html on series navigation characters
• in Series Options page, added in a link for helping with translating Organize Series.
• NEW FEATURE: Added in an “orderby random” option for the Latest Series widget.
• converted all variable language domain references to concrete string (proper usage).
• fixed up some usage of deprecated wp functions.
• using 

  1	plugin_dir_path()

   instead of 

  1	plugin_basename()

   in certain cases.

• changed xlmns namespace for the “series” term from “unfoldingneurons.com” to “organizeseries.com”
• NEW FEATURE: Series part ordering now tracks unpublished posts in a series with helpful ui on the administration side. Coming in a future release we’ll also provide a way for you to show readers all the planned posts in a series.

I just want to highlight a couple new features:

Orderby Random in Latest Series Widget:

This had been requested by a number different users.  Now, when setting up the Latest Series widget, you can choose to have the series listed in a random order every time a page is loaded that the widget is on.  Let’s say you have a total of 10 series,  this feature allows you to have the list only show 3 series but every time a user visits a page they will see three random series from the 10 total series you have.  Pretty cool eh?  And it’s super easy to use, just select “random” from the orderby drop down. You’re welcome.

Tracking Unpublished Posts

Thanks to the efforts of a new guy on our team (announcement introducing him will come in the future), we have a brand new feature that was also requested.  It used to be that you could not have a draft, scheduled, or pending post in a series with a specific part and then when it’s published it would keep that part and all existing parts in the series would automatically renumber.  There was also some funky stuff that would go on if you moved posts in and out of being published while they were part of a series (i.e  a post have something like “part 4 of 3″ or something like that”).  This has all been fixed (well we’re pretty sure it is anyway).  Not only did we fix this but we laid the groundwork for another requested feature in the next release.

Now when you save a draft (or pending, or scheduled).  You can choose to have that post be a specific part in the series and the post will “remember” that.  Also, on the edit post page when viewing the information about series, posts that belong to the same series as your unpublished post will show something like “Part 1 of 3 (4)” where the number in brackets indicates the total posts in the series INCLUDING unpublished.  Very handy.  When an unpublished posts is published, it will retain it’s set part and all the other posts in the series will renumber automatically.  Groovy.  Let us know how it works!

Oh, and we also made sure that Organize Series Multiples will still work well with this new formatting (and you’ll see some slight changes to the ui there as well).

Because we like you…

Know what the best part about the new features we put in?  It’s included with the core plugin.  So you don’t have to be a user with a paid package in order to get the new features!  We try to be nice sometimes.

OH, and one more thing… we need TRANSLATORS!  Yup, a number of people have contacted me over the past year and have asked if they can contribute a translation to Organize Series.  While Organize Series has always had the code in place to allow for internationalization, we just haven’t been in the position to make user translations easily available here on OrganizeSeries.com. That’s all changed.  Now all we need are some translators to help us get the ball rolling on helping our international users see Organize Series in their own language.  Can you help?  If so, go to the translator page and get started!

I just wanted to post a quick update that it looks like there are no show stoppers and all the current versions of Organize Series and the addons will work fine with WordPress 3.4.  If you want to upgrade, go ahead and everything should work just fine.

However, I have uncovered and fixed some unrelated bugs and I have a few more bits and knobs I want to work on before releasing the next version so it may not get released today.  I just wanted to let you all know!

Full testing and any fixes needed for WP3.4 will be completed on Monday, June 18, 2012 so for those of you who want to wait until the official go is given that gives you a timeline for planning.

Now back to our regular programming…