New major release for GD Custom Posts and Taxonomies Tools Pro is here! Version 4.0 adds many new features, enhances on existing features, improves and fix many things. Focus is on easier creation of post types and taxonomies, and much improved meta boxes and custom fields.
First of all, plugin now requires WordPress 3.2 or newer, and it will not work with older version. This means that PHP 5.2.6 (or newer) is also required. All old and obsolete features are removed from this version. Plugin is compatible with WordPress 3.5. But, there is one thing that wasn’t updated: use of new WP 3.5 media manager. Until some examples are released on how media manager can be used with plugins, GD CPT Tools Pro still uses Thickbox to select images for custom fields.
Custom post types and taxonomies panel are improved to allow use of drag’n’drop to rearrange the order of post types and taxonomies. New Add Quick options is added to allow for faster creation of post types and taxonomies with less options to worry about. New features include option to duplicate existing post types and taxonomies. Third party post types now can use advanced rewriter features, but there is not guarantee on our part that this will always work since there are things to consider beyond the control of this plugin.
But, majority of work is done on improving custom fields and meta boxes. Plugin now has 25 custom fields types build in (image on the left). If you don’t see all of them on new installations, check out the plugin settings panel to enable them. Content Types fields are added through an internal module. In the future, new fields will be added through modulas.
Custom fields system is now modular, and it allows expanding list of available fields. Some fields support use of repeaters so you can add more than one value for a field. Plugin now also support use of metabox groups, and each group can hold one or more meta boxes. They will be displayed using tabs on the editor page.
Some fields now use popups to get their values, like all 3 content based fields (image on the left for pots selection).
Some fields now use popups to get their values, like all 3 content based fields (image on the left for post selection).
GD CPT Tools Pro 4.0 will get even better with new features planned for next releases, and with upcoming modules. Right now, there are 3 modules planned: Fields (to add extra custom fields), Posts To Posts (relationship between posts) and Newsletter (implement simple and easy to use newsletter system).
Try new version, and report any problems you might encounter, and it will be fixed as soon as possible. If you have suggestions on improving some of the fields, let me know. Few new tutorials are planned for the next few days to help with metaboxes and custom fields.
