Changelog

Summarized: (new!)

This update focuses on a better admin experience, not only are you better informed on where all numbers come from, but they’re now also always correct.

This update also adds new functionality to the Automated Description, on which you can select a few options for the description. The description has also recieved an overhaul where special characters are beautified and it’s now adjustable through new options.

Moreover, this update has added red colors to checkboxes which are dangerous for your site’s SEO when checked.

Also, a few very specific bugs are fixed and this plugin has been optimized even more to reduce the server processor and memory usage on existing code. Overall, this means this plugin is even faster now, even though more options have been added.

A lot of functions have been rewritten, that’s why it took over a week to push this update. A lot of testing has been done and the cache has been optimized.

SEO Tip of the Update:

• Search engines do not always pick out the description you’ve provided, but sometimes take an organic part based on your search query. This only proves more that your content is more important than SEO optimization. But every little part helps!
• One little part that helps, a lot, is that you reduce the amount of styles and scripts you push to the visitor. Use a great theme from the WordPress repository or use a premium theme from Genesis or WooThemes. They work according to the standards and are following guidelines set by Automattic. Also avoid using many plugins that provide front-end goodies, but only use what you really need. Your visitors and Search Engines alike will love your site for it!

For everyone:

• Added: New options for the Description so you can change how the automated description works.
• Added: Checkbox Options within the SEO Settings page that would remove your pages and posts from the Search Index are now colored red.
• Added: The Home Page title default placeholder will be placed after you empty it within the SEO Settings Page.
• Added: The Home Page description default placeholder will be placed after you empty it within the SEO Settings Page.
• Added: The Blog Page will now also take the latest post in consideration for the automatic description.
• Added: The Canonical URL now shows a placeholder for what it becomes when it’s emptied.
• Added: Shortlink now parses the day too on date archives.
• Added: The Canonical URL now parses the day too on date archives when using the default (not recommended) permalink structure.
• Added: Because we now use transients, the automated description is being parsed for every page as an example for if you were to empty it, since the generation time is negligible.
• Added: The Automated Title placeholder now represents what it would be when it’s emptied.
• Added: German capitalized Nouns are now supported on The SEO Bar. Toll! :)
• Added: Extra sanitation within the description placeholder.
• Added: Beautified description with some filters (like in the Title). Creates room for more characters too in special occasions.
• Added: HTML Entities are now decoded for character length calculation. This change affects Title, Description and Javascript.
• Added: Terms and Taxonomies SEO Settings Page title is now fetched dynamically and no longer uses $_GET.
• Improved: Detection of blog page.
• Improved: Javascript speed.
• Removed: Title Separator length calculation based on option, since it’s unreliable on how search engines handle them. This also provides a more consistent admin experience.
• Changed: The description transient caches a smaller part of the whole description. This way we can manipulate the description better without sacrificing much speed. Because of this change, all previous page transients have been invalidated. WordPress will clean these up automatically after they expire.
• Changed: Adjusted the button width of the separator settings so it fits on one line on tablets and bigger screens.
• Updated: POT File.
• Updated: Dutch Translations.
• Fixed: Typo (Seperator -> Separator). This fix is reflected also on all variables, functions, one filter, but not the Title Seperator option key.
• Fixed: When you have the tagline disabled within the SEO Settings page, the Custom Home Page Title Character length now doesn’t calculate the full length of the title anymore after reload.
• Fixed: The Home Page from In-post settings Placeholder within the SEO Settings page doesn’t add a tagline anymore if it’s disabled.
• Fixed: The Description and Title Length calculation resets to what it becomes when the custom description being emptied.
• Fixed: The Automated description on the Front Page Inpost Meta Box now reflects the SEO Settings description if filled in.
• Fixed: The Blog Page will now get the intended automatic description (‘Latest Posts:’) on the front end as the back end.
• Fixed: The Blog Page will now fetch the description set on the Blog Page.
• Note: If you have not set a static front page, but did select the option for a static front page within Customizer, the “static” front page (which is now a blog) will fetch all SEO values from the latest post. This weird setting will cause all kinds of bugs, even within WordPress, because a Page ID can’t be fetched. I do not have a “fix” for this weird setting planned, I did however prevent cache conflicts in this scenario.

For Developers:

• Added: New filters!
• Added: New class within deprecated.class.php. This class is autoloaded and contains all deprecated functions. The previous class that recided within the file has been moved to AutoDescription_Load.deprecated.class.php
• Added: Removal of Title Doing it Wrong notice if the WordPress version is 4.4 or higher.
• Added: Extra parameters to AutoDescription_Generate::title().
• Added: Extra parameter to AutoDescription_Generate::generate_description().
• Added: Lots of new functions, too many to document at this moment.
• Added: A .patch file is now located within the Plugin Tags.
• Changed: The Transient Cache description/excerpt key has been renamed. It now also supports up to 99,999,999 to 9,999,999,999 blog ids before cache fails on day pages (who visits those?).
• Changed: Split up a few functions (mainly generate.class.php’s title and description).
• Changed: Moved around the order of function calling in AutoDescription_Generate::title() for efficiency.
• Changed: Moved metaboxes() from siteoptions.class.php to adminpages.class.php.
• Changed: Moved get_option(), get_site_option() and get_default_option() from adminpages.class.php to siteoptions.class.php.
• Removed: unnecessary/duplicate calls within Doing It Right.
• Removed: unnecessary/duplicate calls within the Inpost Metabox.
• Optimized: Removal of redundant function calls within the Sitemap Transients API.
• Updated: CSS Files.
• Updated: Javascript Files.
• Cleaned up code.
• Added: New constants! THE_SEO_FRAMEWORK_DEBUG & THE_SEO_FRAMEWORK_DEBUG_MORE, define those to true-ish to see what’s going on. This outputs debug values from title and description functions, everywhere, so be careful.

Notes for developers:

• This update has moved around a few functions. If you did what I noted so many times before (Do not call any class directly) then there shouldn’t be any problem. All Classes are cached through ‘the_seo_framework()’ function and shouldn’t affect page speed.
• The next update will remove all old style filters, constants and actions. This will speed up this plugin and reduce its resource useage. If your filter/action/constant doesn’t begin with “the_seo_framework” (capitalized for constants) it will be rendered useless. So be sure to update them if you wish to continue to use its functionality :). Search for “Marked for Removal” to see the list of filters/functions/classes/constants/actions which will be removed.
• All filters, constants and actions have a new name which will maintain support until further notice.
• The next update will have no more redefinable constants.
• The next update will remove all deprecated functions within /autodescription/deprecated/deprecated.php To reduce plugin conflict.