What’s New in WordPress Version 4.8

Video Transcript

Once again, WordPress has made some changes to items both under the hood and on the surface for all to see. The biggest noticeable change is in the widget area. Let’s have a look.

I’ve already logged into my admin area here. And to get to the widget area, we have to come over here to the sidebar, and hovering over Appearance in the fly-out section, click on Widgets. And there have been a couple of additions, actually three new widgets and an update to the text widget. The way this page looks depends on the actual theme that you’re using. I’m using the default 2017 WordPress theme, so that explains why I’ve got the look that I’ve got. Other themes might have more footers, less footers, or different types of blog sidebars and so on. But the widget that I’m wanting to highlight here is the Audio widget. They’re all media related. We’ve got the Audio widget that’s been added, we’ve got the image widget that’s been added, and we’ve got the video widget down here at the bottom that’s been added.

First let’s go ahead and take a look at the newly updated Text widget. This Text widget now has the TinyMCE built right in to give it kind of a what-you-see-is-what-you-get look, similar to that of what you get in the Post and Page editors. Let’s have a look. Let’s add this to our blog sidebar, and it automatically opens it up. And right here is where I’m referring to. Now it doesn’t give you the full-blown kitchen sink so to speak that you get in the Page and Post editors, but it does allow you to quickly add links, ordered or unordered lists, italicized and bold your text content. Now you could’ve done this in the past, but it would require you to have some HTML editing skills. As you can see, you have both the Visual tab and the Text tab, just like you do in the Post and Page editors. Now there are plugins that you can install that will put in the entire, full-blown kitchen sink here, but that’s the making of a different video altogether. Let’s close this.

Let’s add this Image widget and have a look at it. And basically, all three of these image, video, and audio are attached to your media library. So just as you could add video and audio file or an image to a post by way of your media library, you can do the same exact thing here within your widget area without having to open up another tab, copying and pasting the links, and all that other kind of stuff. Much more streamlined now. I don’t think I’ve got any images here, but if I clicked on that button, you can see it brings us right to the media library where we can click on Select Files to navigate to a location on our computer where we can upload a file or we can go to our media library.
I don’t have anything there right now. And then once the item is selected, you can click over here to the lower right and add to widget. Just like in a Post or Page editor, you would say Add or Insert into Post or Page. And if we check out the video widget, same exact thing, only instead of saying Add Image, it says Add Video. But if we click on the Add Video button, opens up in our media library. And just as before, you can either upload it from your computer, drag and drop the file right into this window. And once you’ve got your items selected, click on Add to Widget. Very cool.

Some of the other changes include in the Admin Dashboard area, the module called WordPress News. Let’s head over there and I’ll show you. This module here that used to be called WordPress News has now been changed to WordPress Events and News.

And if we open this up, you can see I live in the Midwest here in the United States, which just happens to be where Arkansas and Omaha, Nebraska is. What this now does, in addition to providing WordPress-related news, is it also provides nearby WordPress meetups and wordcamps. Now it is just a little creepy that it knows where I’m at, but you can also edit that by clicking on this pencil icon here and putting in a city. Click on Submit, and then it will display upcoming and current wordcamps and meetups based on that location you put in that box.

There are a couple of other changes that may be helpful in speed and security, but in my opinion, they’re just not as noticeable as these that I’ve mentioned. And to learn all about those, head over to make.wordpress.org/core/2017/05/26/wordpress-4-8-field-guide. Basically, you’re heading over to the WordPress 4.8 Field Guide. And that covers all the stuff that I just mentioned and all the other goodies that are being added to your WordPress install in version 4.8.

That’s going to bring us to the end of this video on a look at what’s new in WordPress version 4.8. Thanks for watching and you have a great day.