ProcessWire Weekly #38

Latest ProcessWire core updates: introducing FieldtypeOptions

ProcessWire 2.5.17, as described in detail by Ryan in his latest blog post, introduces a new core fieldtype called FieldtypeOptions. What this new fieldtype does is that it allows you to type in selectable options directly into field settings, thus providing a quick and easy alternative to using pages as selectable options.

While Pages still provide much better support for extendability in the long run and flexible Page relations remain one of the core strengths of ProcessWire, in some cases they can be a bit "too much" for a simple select field. That's where FieldtypeOptions steps in and makes your work a bit easier.

Compared to pages as selectable options, FieldtypeOptions is slightly faster to set up, and there's less need to carefully plan data structures beforehand. Other notable features include support for API features (querying, adding, or removing options, etc.) and multilanguage features, making this a very useful addition to the ProcessWire core package!

Check out the new FieldtypeOptions documentation page for hands-on tips and tricks, and the latest processwire.com blog post for more details.

ProcessJumplinks is an advanced alternative to ProcessRedirects

ProcessJumplinks is a module by Mike Anthony, and an advanced and enhanced version of ProcessRedirects, originally built by Antti Peisa. Just like Redirects, Jumplinks adds a new admin GUI for managing redirects – URLs on your site that should redirect the visitor to another URL. Typical use cases for such a module are things like migrating from another system with different URL structure or simply creating shorter URLs for actual pages for campaign use, etc.

While Redirects was a simplified and easy-to-approach tool for such a task, Jumplinks introduces a whole bunch of new features, all of which are very useful for advanced users and/or more complex use cases:

• Support for extremely flexible Wildcards and Smart Wildcards
• Mapping Collections for redirecting ID based URLs to pages
• Support for timed activation and deactivation of redirects
• Importing redirects from CSV or ProcessRedirects
• Legacy domains, useful during site migration, etc.

Overall Jumplinks is a wonderful module, and most likely able to handle pretty much all your redirect needs, no matter how complex they might be. Thanks to Mike Anthony for building and releasing this module, there's definitely demand for it!

Base payment module and a Stripe payment module by Antti Peisa

Lately we've been hearing about Padloper, an upcoming eCommerce module by Antti Peisa, the author of Shop-for-ProcessWire. While we're still waiting to get our hands on the Padloper itself, Antti's latest module gives us a little taste of what to expect: a new abstract base class for ProcessWire payment modules, and a complete example implementation for Stripe.

For usage examples and more details, please visit the support forum thread. From what we can tell right away, the Stripe Payment module already looks like a fully functional tool for embedding simple payment methods on your ProcessWire site. No pressure, Antti, but we're most eagerly awaiting to see Padloper in action!

FieldtypeFontIconPicker for easy selection of font icons

FieldtypeFontIconPicker is a new Fieldtype for selecting and embedding font icons. Built by İskender Totoğlu, this module is similar to the icon selection module in ProcessWire's core, but being both a Fieldtype and an Inputfield, it can be used directly in your templates.

If you want to give content editors direct access to font icons, this module is your best bet at the moment. Thanks to İskender for making this available for us, and keep up the good work!

For output, markup generation, and other related subjects, please visit the support forum thread. You can download (or pull) the module from GitHub.

InputfieldChosenSelect is a tagging UI for Page fields

InputfieldChosenSelect is a great-looking new Inputfield module built by Benjamin Milde. It works flawlessly on top of Page fields, much like our native AsmSelect, Autocomplete, and Page List Select inputfields, but provides a clean "tag style" input method.

This Inputfield supports inline adding of new tags, selecting existing tags, sorting selected tags, and more. In a nutshell it's a complete solution if you need tagging support for your pages – a really common need, and thus a really useful module. Thanks to Benjamin for putting this together, we'll definitely find use for this one!

For screenshots, details, and instructions, please visit the modules directory page or the support forum thread. You can download or pull the module from GitHub.

Site of the week: Columbus College of Arts & Design alumni magazine TURN

TURN is an alumni magazine for the Columbus College of Arts & Design. The online version features the same content as the print version, making this a very visit-worthy site for anyone interested in all kinds of art projects and, of course, both the CCAD itself and its graduates.

The site, built by Process Interactive, is a truly great example of an online magazine. Both the cover page and actual articles are streamlined and simplified, giving the amazing content the weight it deserves. It seems quite obvious that the site was built around the content, and not the other way round – something that we see way too often on modern websites.

TURN works flawlessly in all shapes and sizes of devices, and the navigation is both unobtrusive and useful, with links to the main areas of the site and previous/next articles. Everything that isn't somehow related to the main content is stuffed in the footer area, making it constantly available without burdening the main content area at all.

All in all, we can't find a single thing to complain about in the CCAD TURN online magazine. Fantastic work from Process Interactive and especially everyone involved in making the content itself – we'll be eagerly awaiting the second issue of TURN!

Stay tuned for our next issue

We'll be back next week with all new topics – hope you've enjoyed your stay, and please let us know if there's anything we can do to improve these weekly updates. Your feedback is very much appreciated!

For more news, updates and great discussions remember to visit the ProcessWire support forum and follow @processwire at Twitter. Our next issue, ProcessWire Weekly #39, will be out Saturday, 7th of February. Until then, happy hacking with ProcessWire!