February 21, 2019

Genesis Prose Extras Plugin

Additions for the Prose Child Theme for Genesis Framework: Widgetized Homepage, layouts, menu positions, translation loading, plus various helpers.

FINALLY: Add a Widgetized Homepage to Your Prose Child Theme
Finally have a homepage template for Prose that’s widgetized! Plus, it works with Prose 1.5+ auto update system, that means, you don’t lose your home template/ widget stuff when performing these sweet auto updates!
In general, a great helper tool for the Prose Child Themes for Genesis!
In other words, THE add-on plugin you’ve waited for if you’re a die hard Prose fan 🙂

Please note: This plugin requires the Genesis Theme Framework AND the “Prose” Child Theme – both are premium products by StudioPress/ Copyblogger Media LLC via studiopress.com.

Video of Plugin’s Settings Walkthrough:

original video linkby plugin developer David Decker

General Features

Up to 15 additional admin setting options for Prose 🙂
Up to 17 different new features for Prose powered sites 🙂
Widgetized homepage template, with up to 3 widget areas (one on top; two more below, 2-column-style)
Optional extra Sidebar (widget area) for this homepage.
Layout setting for the homepage (only if “Genesis Layout Extras” plugin is not active)
Optional: remove Footer Widgets on home page/ static front page.
Optional: up to 5 different positions for the navigation menus – Primary Navigation & Secondary Navigation.
Optional: add menu descriptions to both, Primary & Secondary Navigation menus.
Optionally remove the (default) “After Post” widget area.
Optionally display a “Prose After Page” widget area after content on single pages.
Custom CSS meta box on inpost edit screens – by default for posts & pages (devs could add post type support!) — especially handy for unique styles for singular posts/ pages (to avoid Prose’ global Custom CSS and/ or body/ post classes)
Conditionally loading of “a better Custom PHP” file (located in /wp-content/uploads/prose/) because the default “Custom PHP” section in Prose settings doesn’t work most of the time (wrong priorities etc., seems to fire way too late…).
Some Shortcodes for the “adventurous” users among you… 🙂
Hooking the plugins settings into Genesis Export/ Import admin section, allowing you export/ import for this plugin alone or combine plugin settings with Prose and/ or Genesis settings to transfer settings from one Genesis/ Prose site to another.
Adding a monospace font for the Prose “Custom Code” section to improve Code readability.
Adding a warning message & short explanation on the “Theme Editor” admin pages for “Prose” child theme – as editing “Prose” core files will result in lost additions/ customizations on auto updates!
Fixes small CSS issues with Firefox Browser on some textareas and input fields in Prose & Genesis admin settings pages. (I am happy to remove this ASAP after Genesis devs fixed that 🙂

Multisite Features

Plugin is fully Multisite compatible!
Optional for Multisite installs: load site-specific functions files for each sub-site in a Network where Prose is a network-activated child theme. (In lots of cases this is more handy & developer friendly than the use of Prose’ “Custom Code”.) — Consider this little site-specific functions files.
Conditionally loading of “a better Custom PHP” also fully Multisite compatible — consider that a global “functions file” for Prose for all Multisite sites/ sub sites.
NOTE: Multisite setting only available within Multisite installs and for user role/cap of “Super Admin”!

Translation Features (i18n)

Plugin is fully internationalized and comes with English and German language packs by default!
Load translations for Prose (backend & frontend) – won’t be overridden on Prose auto updates!
Prose child theme translations for German included – in formal and informal version!
NOTE: Translation setting only available for non-English installs (based on WPLANG constant).

Advantages & Benefits

All of the above features WILL NOT be overridden on Prose auto updates! All is safe and controlled by the plugin – the “Prose” child theme folder (‘/wp-content/themes/prose/’) is NEVER touched by this plugin! So, relax and do your 1-click auto updates, we’ve all come to love :-).
User friendly I: Easy to setup and use — builds on top of already awesome Genesis and Prose features.
User friendly II: Help texts included on admin screens, and WordPress help tab system integrated.
Developer friendly with lots of action hooks and filters, to additionally customize things via the above alternatives for functions files or via third-party plugins.
And, have more fun: With Sidebars, Layouts, Menus, Widget Areas…

Useful for:

Prose fans who are passionate about Auto Updates for their favorite child theme :).
Clients who love Prose Design Settings but need more control, especially for the home page!
International clients that need their Prose stuff translated but keep translations on Prose updates.
Agencies/ Developers working with Prose for clients and want to speed up their dev time and have portability of settings.
Super Admins using Prose as network-activated child theme for numerous (sub) sites within their network install.

Please note: This plugin requires the Genesis Theme Framework AND the “Prose” Child Theme – both are premium products by StudioPress/ Copyblogger Media LLC via studiopress.com.

Plugin Localization

English (default) – always included
German (de_DE) – always included
.pot file (genesis-prose-extras.pot) for translators is also always included 🙂
Easy plugin translation platform with GlotPress tool: Translate “Genesis Prose Extras”…
Your translation? – Just send it in

A plugin from deckerweb.de and GenesisThemes

Feedback

I am open for your suggestions and feedback – Thank you for using or trying out one of my plugins!
Drop me a line @deckerweb on Twitter
Follow me on my Facebook page
Or follow me on +David Decker on Google Plus 😉

My ‘Genesis Widgetized’ plugins: “Genesis Widgetized Not Found & 404”, “Genesis Widgetized Archive” plus “Genesis Widgetized Footer”
Also see my other plugins or see my WordPress.org profile page
Tip: GenesisFinder – Find then create. Your Genesis Framework Search Engine.
Hey, come & join the Genesis Community on Google+ 🙂

Plugin Links

Donate

Enjoy using Genesis Prose Extras? Please consider making a small donation to support the project’s continued development.

Translations

English – default, always included
German (de_DE): Deutsch – immer dabei! Download auch via deckerweb.de
For custom and update-secure language files please upload them to /wp-content/languages/genesis-prose-extras/ (just create this folder) – This enables you to use fully custom translations that won’t be overridden on plugin updates. Also, complete custom English wording is possible with that as well, just use a language file like genesis-prose-extras-en_US.mo/.po to achieve that.

Easy plugin translation platform with GlotPress tool:Translate “Genesis Prose Extras”…

Note: All my plugins are internationalized/ translateable by default. This is very important for all users worldwide. So please contribute your language to the plugin to make it even more useful. For translating I recommend the awesome “Codestyling Localization” plugin and for validating the “Poedit Editor”, which works fine on Windows, Mac and Linux.

Idea Behind / Philosophy

“Prose” is an AWESOME child theme for Genesis with great design options. Period. With version 1.5, released in spring of 2012 it became even better, with adding the auto update feature, for example. Being a cool feature, it has also the effect of removing everything that’s within the Prose child theme folder when performing the update. So you would lost a homepage template file (home.php) if you customized & added one. To resolve this issue and to have “some workaround” plus adding some tiny additions to Prose I just made this plugin. It was born out of experiences of some of my client sites using the Prose child theme. I use Prose also on a Multisite install for different sub sites and needed special functions files features myself, so I thought this might help other users as well ;-).

Credits

WordPress trainer Bob Dunn of BobWP for his post plus video tutorial for setting up a widgetized home page and slider for Prose with this plugin! — Whoa, this is awesome stuff, THANKS, Bob!
British Genesis Community contributor Keith Davis of WM Web Design for his “Genesis people” feature about me, also mentioning this plugin — THANKS, Keith!
Australian Genesis Community contributor Brad Dalton of WPSites.net for his post about setting up a slider for Prose with my plugin — THANKS, Brad!

Installation

NOTE: Only works with “Genesis Framework” as the parent theme plus “Prose” as the Genesis child theme. (Both are paid premium products by StudioPress/ Copyblogger Media LLC, available via studiopress.com.)

Installation of Plugin:

Upload genesis-prose-extras folder to the /wp-content/plugins/ directory — or just upload the ZIP package via ‘Plugins > Add New > Upload’ in your WP Admin
Activate the plugin through the “Plugins” menu in WordPress
Go to the plugin settings under “Genesis > Prose Extras” – configure to your liking and SAVE the settings one time!
Then you may place some widgets for your new widgetized homepage in Prose.
Enjoy 🙂

Video of Plugin’s Settings Walkthrough

original video linkby plugin developer David Decker

Post/Video Tutorial for Setting Up A Widgetized Home Page and Slider

Post plus video tutorial for setting up a widgetized home page and slider for Prose with this plugin
by WordPress trainer Bob Dunn of BobWP

Note: The “Genesis Framework” plus the “Prose” child theme are required for this plugin in order to work. If you don’t own a copy of both yet, these premium parent & child theme combo has to be bought. More info about that you’ll find here: http://ddwb.me/getgenesis

Own translation/wording: For custom and update-secure language files please upload them to /wp-content/languages/genesis-prose-extras/ (just create this folder) – This enables you to use fully custom translations that won’t be overridden on plugin updates. Also, complete custom English wording is possible with that, just use a language file like genesis-prose-extras-en_US.mo/.po to achieve that (for creating one see the tools on “Other Notes”).

Uninstallation of Plugin:

When deactivating/ re-activating, all settings are still be there!
If you delete the plugin via “Delete” function in WordPress Admin then all settings will be deleted from the database, also per site settings in Multisite! — This is recommended standard behavior and my plugin just leverages that :).
NOTE: Custom fields (from single Custom CSS feature) won’t be deleted – only if you delete these certain posts, pages etc. where you’ve used that feature.

Screenshots

Genesis Prose Extras: Overview of complete settings page. (Click here for larger version of screenshot)
Genesis Prose Extras: Settings help tab - top right corner. (Click here for larger version of screenshot)
Genesis Prose Extras: The 3 alternate layouts on Genesis Theme settings page :). (Click here for larger version of screenshot)
Genesis Prose Extras: The 3 alternate layouts on inpost edit screen. Click here for larger version of screenshot)
Genesis Prose Extras: Inpost Custom CSS screen - works for single Posts and Pages (post type support possible!). Click here for larger version of screenshot)
Genesis Prose Extras: Additional widget areas - fully optional. Click here for larger version of screenshot)
Genesis Prose Extras: Extra warning in Admin Theme Editor to not edit/ touch the original Prose Child Theme files! Click here for larger version of screenshot)
Genesis Prose Extras: Widgetized home page layout - possible with this plugin :-). See the Widget Areas, as well as the alternate layout option ("Sidebars below Content"). Cool, heh?! Click here for larger version of screenshot)
Genesis Prose Extras: Alternative menu positions - there are even more positions possible! Also, notice the enabled menu desciptions?! Awesome details, yeah :) Click here for larger version of screenshot)
Genesis Prose Extras: Sample post with inpost Custom CSS activated - higher Header section, custom background color (only for that post!). Also, notice the alternative layout option ("Sidebars below Content"). Click here for larger version of screenshot)
Genesis Prose Extras: Alternate layout option "Content / Sidebar-Alt." on frontend - fully responsive of course! Click here for larger version of screenshot)
Genesis Prose Extras: Alternate layout option "Sidebar-Alt. / Content" on frontend - fully responsive of course! Click here for larger version of screenshot)

FAQ

Why 3 alternate layout options, aren’t the 6 default ones enough?

Maybe the default ones are enough, maybe not. These 3 additional layout options are more like variations of existing layouts. So, in the end you have even more flexibility with no overhead! This could be great for content oriented blogs, marketeers websites and so much more…

Sidebars below Content – Think of it as “Full-Width-Content”, but with Primary & Secondary sidebars below the content (as 2 50%-wide responsive columns).
Content/Sidebar-Alt – Think of it as a variation of “Content-Sidebar”.
Sidebar-Alt/Content – Think of it as a variation of “Sidebar-Content”.

Are the alternate layouts responsive?

Yes, they are! All is working like it should with minimal additions on CSS style rules (only what’s really needed).

Why there are 3 new widget areas for Home, isn’t ONE enough?

One should be enough for a lot of use cases. However, having 3 widget areas enables you to use one top column and 2 columns below which makes up for a more suiteable homepage layout. How cool’s that? 🙂

Are the widgetized areas responsive?

Yes, of course they are! If your child theme is already responsive and you use the top area plus the 2 columnized areas they just adapt to your viewport nicely. Any additional CSS rules/ media queries you could add via your “Custom Code” section under Genesis menu.

Note, if your version of Prose child theme isn’t responsive yet these CSS media queries won’t have any effect and also do no harm :-).

Could I disable the Shortcode support for widgets?

Of course, it’s possible! Just add the following constant to your child theme’s functions.php file or to a functionality plugin:

/** Genesis Prose Extras: Remove Widgets Shortcode Support */ define( 'GPEX_NO_WIDGETS_SHORTCODE', true );

Some webmasters could need this for security reasons regarding their stuff members or for whatever other reasons… :).

How could I add the inpost Custom CSS feature for other post types?

That’s really easy, just add “post type support” via a plugin, code snippet plugin or your child theme’s functions.php:

/** Genesis Prose Extras: Add post type support for (single) Custom CSS: */ add_post_type_support( 'download', 'gpex-inpost-css' ); add_post_type_support( 'product', 'gpex-inpost-css' );

–> This example code adds the meta box for post type download (like in Easy Digital Downloads, EDD) and for post type product (like in WooCommerce and/ or Jigoshop).

Could I change the user capability for the inpost custom CSS feature?

Yes, that’s possible! Just use this example code below and change the capability to your use case:

add_filter( 'gpex_filter_inpost_custom_css_cap', 'gpex_inpost_custom_css_cap' ) /** * Genesis Prose Extras: Custom Capability for Inpost Custom CSS */ function gpex_inpost_custom_css_cap() { return 'editor'; } // function

Could your “Better Custom PHP” feature be disabled?

Yes, of course! With one line of code, like this:

/** Genesis Prose Extras - disable plugin feature: Better Custom PHP file */ add_filter( 'gpex_filter_better_custom_php', '__return_false' );

Could the Export/ Import Info meta box on plugin’s settings page be removed?

Yes, of course! With one line of code, like this:

/** Genesis Prose Extras: Remove Export/ Import Info meta box */ define( 'GPEX_NO_EXPORT_IMPORT_INFO', TRUE );

How can I customize the widget titles/ strings in the admin?

I’ve just included some filters for that – if ever needed (i.e. for clients, branding purposes etc.), you can use these filters:

gpex_filter_home_top_widget_title – default value: “Prose Home Top”

gwat_filter_home_top_widget_description – default value: “For a widgetized homepage in Prose.”

The same principles apply for ‘Home Left’ and ‘Home Right’ etc..

Here’s an example code for changing one of these filters:

add_filter( 'gpex_filter_home_top_widget_title', 'custom_home_top_widget_title' ); /** * Genesis Prose Extras: Custom Prose Home Top Widget Title */ function custom_home_top_widget_title() { return __( 'Custom Prose Home', 'your-child-theme-textdomain' ); }

Final note: I DON’T recommend to add customization code snippets to your child theme’s functions.php file! Please use a functionality plugin or an MU-plugin instead! This way you are then more independent from child theme changes etc. If you don’t know how to create such a plugin yourself just use one of my recommended ‘Code Snippets’ plugins. Read & bookmark these Sites:

“What is a functionality plugin and how to create one?” – blog post by WPCandy
“Creating a custom functions plugin for end users” – blog post by Justin Tadlock
DON’T hack your functions.php file: Resource One – Resource Two(both by Thomas Griffin Media)
“Code Snippets” plugin by Shea Bunge – also network wide!
“Code With WP Code Snippets” plugin by Thomas Griffin – Note: Plugin currently in development at GitHub.
“Toolbox Modules” plugin by Sergej Müller – see also his plugin instructions.

All the custom & branding stuff code above can also be found as a Gist on GitHub: https://gist.github.com/deckerweb/5905929 (you can also add your questions/ feedback there 🙂

Changelog

1.1.0 (2013-07-18)

UPDATE: Added additional check for frontend loading stuff to ensure compatability with Jetpack’s “Mobile Theme” module. — Thanks to user Jeremy for helping to find this issue! 🙂
BUGFIX: Fixed error message for some Multisite use cases.
UPDATE: Overall, improved Multisite compatibility.
BUGFIX: Removed PHP Debug Notices – improved style/script loading for inpost metabox (inpost CSS).
UPDATE: Fixed some spelling errors, plus improved some wording on the backend settings pages.
UPDATE: Updated readme.txt file here, especially expanded the FAQ section; added Credits section.
UPDATE: Updated German translations and also the .pot file for all translators.

1.0.0 (2013-07-03)

Initial release
Including up to 15 different options via admin settings
Overall, including up to 17 different features for Prose powered sites
Note: A few options are only available for Super Admins/ Multisite installs.