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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Apr 10

Also note: this is what happens when you fall down the rabbit-hole of the complexities of rigging and weight-mapping in Blender, and balancing a new job plus freelance work.

Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Apr 10

Quick head's up on the upcoming WordPress 6.8 release. I haven't had a chance to test Manga+Press against the new version (been way too busy lately) but from WP's own changelog, I don't foresee any changes that would actually break Manga+Press. #wordpress #release

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Mar 8

Yes, I'm still here. Mostly staying off social media to protect my mental health, but also getting into the swing of a new job I started back in December. That being said, still keeping an eye on #wpdrama, and still thinking about Manga+Press' future.

Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Jan 13

There's also a caveat that I want the update server itself to be independent of my own website, so if manga-press.com ever goes down, the plugin updates are still available.

Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Jan 13

Exploring options to move updates for Manga+Press away from relying on WP.org. I found a possible solution, but the drawback is it will require me to use PHP-Scoper because I can see other plugins using the same library. github.com/YahnisElsts/...

GitHub - YahnisElsts/plugin-update-checker: A custom update checker for WordPress plugins. Useful if you don't want to host your project in the official WP repository, but would still like it to suppo...

A custom update checker for WordPress plugins. Useful if you don't want to host your project in the official WP repository, but would still like it to support automatic updates. Despite the nam...

github.com

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Jan 11

sigh #wpdrama techcrunch.com/2025/01/11/m...

Matt Mullenweg deactivates WordPress accounts of contributors planning a fork | TechCrunch

Matt Mullenweg has deactivated the accounts of several WordPress community members, including two with plans to fork WordPress.

techcrunch.com

Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 22

Of course, that could get derailed if I decide to commit maintaining my own update server instead of relying on WP(dot)org.

Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 22

So we'll see. I may leave Comic Bookmarking on the table for a later release, and focus on JSON-LD instead.

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 22

It's another feature that I'm currently rethinking. While it might be a good idea for usability, what's the best approach?

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 22

Feature: Comic Bookmarking. This one is a tough one and is running neck-to-neck in terms of development difficulty with JSON-LD integration. Tl'dr, this feature is basically going to use LocalStorage for readers to bookmark their place for later.

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 22

Feature: Social Media integration. This isn't anything special. Just adds OG tags to the header of the comic. This also defaults to "Off" if users are utilizing another plugin for this feature.

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 22

Feature: Lightbox integration. Just adds a very simple lightbox script that should allow users to view a comic in a lightbox if they choose. This should also be integrated into the gallery template option for the archive page (oops, oversight on my part). Defaults to "Off"

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 22

QoL improvement: indicators on the Page screen to indicate which pages are assigned to be the Latest Comic and Comic Archive page, similar to how WordPress marks which page is used as the static Home Page.

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 22

Another part of 3.2 is bringing in features that were part of the original 4.1 release that turned out to be such a headache that I ended up pulling and replacing with the more stable 3.0. What were those features?

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 22

One thing that's going to set Manga+Press 3.2 apart from previous versions is I'm adding PSR-4 autoloading. The change wasn't without some headaches, since for some weird reason, the Calendar Widget wouldn't load without throwing errors.

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 22

The Manga+Press Github repo github.com/mangapress/m...

Also more notes on upcoming updates: 🧵

GitHub - mangapress/mangapress: The webcomic CMS plugin for WordPress

The webcomic CMS plugin for WordPress. Contribute to mangapress/mangapress development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 22

Unserious side-note: moving Manga+Press off WP(dot)org with the intent to get away from needing to remember SVN commands might be a plus in itself.

Haven't used SVN regularly in 12 years but still have to remember it whenever I push updates.

No serious updates—just a README.txt update this time.

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 20

What I mean by "feature flag" is some kind of conditional that a user can toggle on or off so that they can decide for themselves whether or not they want the fancy bells and whistles.

Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 20

Ugh, data-modeling is hard. It's even harder when you're trying NOT to disrupt the workflow of existing users. Which on that note, maybe I hide these goodies behind a feature flag?

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 20

ComicStory would just be that page's description, plus—this isn't shown in the wireframe—but a new post type called "ComicCoverArt" would have to be added and would have a 1:n relationship with the Issue meta field?

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 20

Or perhaps I add a new data-point called "Issue." This wouldn't be a new custom taxonomy, but a meta field—which means that the field won't be autopopulated. In a weird way, that means that it would probably act more like a taxonomy but it has to be numbered because that's what JSON-LD is expecting.

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 20

My main problem is mapping the existing data, like the Series taxonomy, to the JSON-LD schema. It got me to thinking that maybe "Series" was a misnomer—maybe "Chapter" would have worked better instead? Unfortunately, it's too late to change it without breaking current installations.

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 20

Here's a wireframe of how the edit screen updates would look. The "creator" fields would match the additional fields in the schema and what I'm seeing is basically a repeater field that allows authors to add what they need.

Wireframe of Manga+Press Add Comic screen in WordPress admin

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 20

To get an idea of what I'm talking about, visit this link: schema.org/ComicSeries

ComicSeries - Schema.org Type

Schema.org Type: ComicSeries - A sequential publication of comic stories under a unifying title, for example

schema.org

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Manga+Press: The Webcomic Manager for WordPress @mangapress.bsky.social · Dec 20

Creator of Manga+Press here. I do have some new updates planned—namely one that adds JSON-LD schema support for comics but as for a timeline? I don't know yet. The schema addition requires some updates to the current interface🧵

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