It’s been a while since I last posted but I think this was defiantly worth the wait. At the start of this year I focused on rewriting the documentation, so all users could understand how Auto Load Next Post works and how to setup.
It was too focused for developers. Clearly a major fault on my part so I hope it’s all good now as I have not had any complaints since. To better manage the documentation and to allow translations be submitted I decided to place the documentation on GitHub again in it’s own repository.
Would you be interested in translating the documentation in another language? Check out the contribution instructions for more details.
After taking care of the documentation, I pushed out 6 tiny releases with tweaks, corrections and support for 2 new themes and a lot more is about to come.
On to what’s coming!
1.6 is almost finished and is a minor release – and being a minor release – everything included in this release is backwards-compatible. This means if you are updating from any version since 1.5, you should encounter no issues.
Major improvements for general users to setup Auto Load Next Post with more ease has been implemented. 1.5 introduced the plugin settings via the Theme Customizer but that was not enough.
After a lot of time researching WordPress themes to provide a better solution I am pleased to introduce a Setup Wizard, improvements throughout the plugin and much more.
Setup Wizard
I’m very excited for this feature as it will help the general user. I would not say it’s full proof.
There is one thing I had to accept when developing Auto Load Next Post that not every theme out there follows WordPress code standards which is a shame so depending on how the theme your using is developed, some manual work maybe still required.
This is main reason I built the setup wizard and so far it works very well and I think you would be impressed with the results if you failed to get Auto Load Next Post setup before.
How does it work?
The setup wizard will scan your active theme theme’s selectors and set the location for it’s template directory.
A series of AJAX requests will be made as you progress with the wizard returning results for each step. When it scans through the theme, the user is notified what it finds and sets appropriately in the plugin settings automatically.
Anything the setup wizard is not able to find, the user is notified and given options to view documentation to help for that area.
Once complete, Auto Load Next Post is ready. Any theme that already supports Auto Load Next Post will disable the setup wizard as it is not needed.
For theme developers, if you are wanting to add support for Auto Load Next Post and have WP_DEBUG enabled then you will also be presented with guides to add the support as you get your results from the wizard.
Improved Settings
The UI of the settings page has been improved for accessibility and user-interaction making it cleaner and sharper across all browsers. Certain fields will also be disabled if the active theme supports Auto Load Next Post to prevent human error.
Validation has been applied so empty required fields will now warn the user that it needs to be filled before saving the settings. Other various tweaks have been made such as the localization for better translations and adding support for RTL.
A new section for setting the template location has been added so users don’t have to apply it via a filter (which requires coding), just enter it via the settings page. Should the setup wizard find the template directory an option to enable fallback support becomes available should the theme structure fail.
One neat new option I added was the ability to disable Auto Load Next Post for mobile users should your site be heavy or not mobile friendly. You can find that option under Misc.
Template Change
The repeater template has been updated to support fallback support should a user use a theme that is not up to WordPress code standards or the Setup Wizard failed to detect the template location for that theme.
Fallback support provides the basic WordPress loop to display content. This will also help the general user with setting up Auto Load Next Post manually.
If you have overridden the repeater template in your theme from setting up Auto Load Next Post before, don’t worry. Auto Load Next Post will still load the same. No changes will be required on your end.
System Support
I had plans to create my own system report but WordPress beat me to it in version 5.2, introducing a new feature called Site Health under the Tools section so rather than create another system report, I extended the information to include all the settings applied for Auto Load Next Post under it’s own section.
This is perfect for when you are in need of support and you can copy and paste your site health information in the support forum when submitting your support ticket.
3rd Party Support
Supporting other various popular WordPress plugins and services is something I am working on and if you have been updating Auto Load Next Post with the smaller releases you will already know that I have recently supported WP Rocket as the first 3rd Party plugin.
When testing with WP Rocket I saw that Auto Load Next Post would not run unless the JavaScript was excluded from minification. I love using WP Rocket so it was important to me that this was supported.
To fix this issue (so users did not have to figure this out for themselves), I applied a filter to exclude Auto Load Next Post from the JavaScript minification. Now both WP Rocket and Auto Load Next Post work together.
This is just the first 3rd party plugin support and more will be coming in the future.
Extensions
You will find a new section on the settings page for extensions listing available support made to enable other plugins or services to work together.
A plugin like WP Rocket is best supported directly in the plugin while others are more optional and this way keeps the code base for the core of Auto Load Next Post clean and easier to manage.
You be surprised but a large number of plugins and services are designed for the initial load of a single post or page only so getting them to trigger before, after and on load of a new post is a challenge.
So I have selected a range of plugins and services that I can support and will be available for you to install when needed soon. None of the extensions require any additional setup. Any configurations that plugin has will be with the plugin it’s self and not the extension.
More supported themes
While I have made a considerable amount of improvements to Auto Load Next Post, there is always that one theme that users like that can not be supported.
Sadly I can not support every theme out there. It would be an insane work load, which is why it’s up to the theme developers to support Auto Load Next Post instead.
I recommend that if you want to use Auto Load Next Post and struggle to get it working with that one theme, ask the theme creator to add support.
While I will do my best to help you via support it’s not always possible and the main reason for this is because of code quality and structure in those themes.
To make the setup wizard possible, I have had to look at so many themes and compare their differences to put together a list of the most common structures and theme selectors that those themes use.
This list is used in the setup wizard for when it scans your theme. If the wizard can not find it then it is most likely that the theme is unrecognizable and the user will be notified on what part it was not able to find.
Changes for Developers
Nothing much really, only with the new and improved template support, developers can set the template directory via add_theme_support() rather than applying via a filter.
This filter will still be available and can be used to support other post types for when Auto Load Next Post Pro comes out. New documentation for this will be available soon.
Changelog so far
You can follow the progress made so far as I get closer to a beta release which is coming soon so do keep a look out for when it is time to test. New features or functionality may change during beta testing so I look forward to your coming feedback.
View the full changelog so far.