GD Rating System Pro 1.1 – Oceanus is new major release and it brings many new features, improvements, and fixes with two new addons (for Bayesian calculation and easy bbPress topics/replies integration).
GD Rating System 1.1 development is largely based on the feedback from the previous few weeks and this trend will continue in the future with several more feature request already added to the roadmap. Next 1.2 major version is expected in February, with regular maintenance versions released when needed.
New features
Plugin has new background daily job that can be used to perform various tasks plugin or plugin addons might need. Currently, this job will recalculate ratings when you change number of stars and calculate basic rating statistics. Rating calculations are added to Stars and Thumbs rating methods, and Thumbs rating has 2 calculation types available: summary rating and percentage rating.
Stars Rating and Review methods have a new set of options to change colors for the font icon based stars display. You can adjust colors globally, using custom rules, through widgets and shortcodes all using color pickers.
New addons
The simple addon for bbPress integration allows you to add rating block into the topic or reply. In the same time, Posts addon will no longer show bbPress post types since it can’t work with them due to different filters required. bbPress addon is available only in Pro version.
Bayesian addon adds new calculation method to the plugin for Stars Rating method using a weighted formula that can be adjusted differently for each rating type. There are several ways the formula can be used and all have one thing in common: the more votes you have, better results you will get. Bayesian addon is available only in Pro version.
Improvements and fixes
There are many improvements and tweaks in this version related to plugin core and some of the addons. Font icons are improved to include loader status animated spinner icon, Rich Snippets addon has new options for additional control, and Pro version includes blank templates that only include rich snippet and nothing else.
There are several things fixed in this version, including problems with comments rating type, problems with the custom rules editor, problems with stars review metabox, problems with order of the ratings based on votes and few more things.
If you want to test GD Rating System Pro, you can request demo website where you can check out all the plugin features and decide if the Pro version is what you need. If not, you can download the free version, and evaluate it and maybe later decide on an upgrade. The free version can be download from WordPress plugins repository: GD Rating System on WordPress.org.
