ProcessWire Weekly #40

Core updates of the week: ProcessWire 2.5.19 is all about image management

This week the core updates are all about ProcessWire's image management and image editing capabilities. Great as they were, there have always been requests for an additional set of tools, and ProcessWire 2.5.19 is an answer to some of those needs.

First and foremost, the core package of ProcessWire now includes built-in cropping support. Since a feature like that wouldn't be very useful without the front-end tools to back it up, this new feature is actually accompanied by a vastly improved image editing/embedding tool for rich text editor (RTE) instances, such as CKEditor.

In addition to cropping images (and re-cropping from the original image), the newly updated image embedding tool also includes easy-to-use image positioning settings and adds support for embedding HiDPI/Retina images with one click. All in all this is a brand new way to handle images in ProcessWire, and a huge improvement to what we used to have.

As if that wasn't enough, a new variation management tool was also added for image fields. This tool lists all the variations created for a particular image, with comments describing the purpose of those variations, and an easy way to clean up unnecessary or outdated variations.

Since a video is worth a thousand pictures, here's a screencast of these new features in action:

Process Roles Overview is a new helper module for site administrators

Process Roles Overview is a new admin helper module by Benjamin Milde. The module adds an overview page with a table listing all existing templates and roles, with clear indicators pointing out which roles have (or don't have) specific type of access to said templates.

What this module does is best illustrated by an image, so please feel free to visit the module support topic for more details (and a full screenshot). Either way, this module should be really useful especially for administrators of a site with more complex permission structure.

Big thanks to Benjamin for sharing this with us!

Textformatter Twitter Replace, a simple yet functional Textformatter module

Textformatter Twitter Replace is a new module by Joss Sanglier, a respected community member, active contributor to the ProcessWire tutorials directory, and now a module author too. In a nutshell Twitter Replace is a simple Textformatter module that, when applies to a field, replaces all instances of @profile with links to Twitter profiles and #searchterm with a link to Twitter search with given term.

Nothing too fancy, but it's definitely a helpful addition for cases where you know for sure that all such references should point to Twitter. Additionally this module is a great starting point for any new module authors – just take a quick look at the module source and you'll see how simple developing modules for ProcessWire can be!

Congratulations to Joss for your first module, and thanks for sharing this with us!

Support forum highlights of the week

Our support forum is very much alive, and these are some of the recent highlights from there, in no particular order. Since we couldn't possibly introduce each and every interesting thread here, don't forget to visit the forums every now and then for more great stuff!

• First of all, our support forum isn't just about answering specific technical questions. If you need proof, just take a look at some of the replies to this question about improving an events site concept. We're always proud to say that we're a full-service community!
• For "off topic" discussion, the Pub is where we go to discuss topics ranging from books and movies to headsets and virtual reality, with an occasional topic about development, with or without ProcessWire. One of the latest and greatest Pub topics poses an alluring question: what are you currently building?
• WordPress is a big player in our area of business, and not too surprisingly a topic that comes up every now and then at our forums too. Things to spice up a WP users life, would anyone ever use WordPress over ProcessWire for a particular project, and Ex WordPress are just some of the latest and most interesting discussions about this.
• Last but not least, a small yet interesting module update: take a look at the new clockpicker implemented for InputfieldTime. Looks pretty neat, doesn't it?

Among all the interesting areas of the support forum, the one that has earned it's place as my personal favorite is the Wishlist & Roadmap. This is where anyone can post suggestions and feature requests for ProcessWire. If you've got an idea of your own, don't keep it to yourself – let us know, and perhaps we can do something about it!

Site of the week: Pulfer Maler + Gipser AG

Responsive, well built, and neatly designed, this time our site of the week belongs to Pulfer Maler + Gipser AG, a company based in Thun, Switzerland. The site was skillfully crafted by novu, whose own site was featured as our site of the week in the 32nd issue of ProcessWire Weekly.

As much a company profile as a slideshow, this site is really quite something. There's enough text to cover various topics related to subjects such as interior design and painting, but the focus is obviously on the beautiful images – in other words, work samples. Then again, for a company like this, isn't that the most important thing, after all?

Great work from everyone involved – and we're definitely happy to see sites like this built with ProcessWire!

Stay tuned for our next issue

Hope you've enjoyed your stay, and please let us know if there's anything we could improve in these weekly updates. Your feedback is always appreciated. For more news, updates and great discussions, remember to visit the ProcessWire support forum.

Our next issue, ProcessWire Weekly #41, will be out Saturday, 21st of February. Until then, happy hacking with ProcessWire!