Change log
Listed here is every change made to The en since 2011. Report bugs to tpope@the-en.com.
The en 5.1.2 july 19th, 2020
Changes Reviews, Articles, Podcasts now populate on the homepage.
The en 5.1.1 May 24th, 2020
Bug Fixes Black text on images fixed. Refreshed ad placement on mobile devices.
The en 5.1 May 17th, 2020 “Alexandria”
Changes The biggest update to The en since we took Lost and Microsoft’s Kinect sensor seriously, this update address the generational changes that have cropped up since my last complete upgrade six years ago.
- Faster: Icons are based on fonts, not image files. There’s significantly less stylesheet loading and more aggressive browser caching. Featured images and font styling act as the visual focal point. Rather than loading multiple ad spaces, when possible, a single ad space while follow the user as they scroll down a page.
- Less Chrome: The previous design, while great for the time, had way too much space being hogged by navigation bars, social media links and things that were not content. There’s now a single menu that gets out of the way.
- More Mobile: The en is now fully, and I do mean fully responsive to mobile and tablet browsers.
- Less Workarounds: There are fewer plugins and more functions built into Carrier, my custom plugin: This includes caching, RSS, featured image control, and shortcodes.
- More Options: Every piece of content on the site now offers options to continue enjoying that type of content at the bottom. On short posts, you’ll find buttons to read more posts on that topic; articles pages deep link to other articles; reviews link to related reviews; handbook chapters link you to other chapters.
- More Flexibility: This update allows The en to make use of the latest WordPress features. All content now uses the Block Editor that made its debut a few years ago. For me, this translates to less shortcodes and back-and-forth edits to get you great looking content. I’ve also finally, fully adopted The WordPress Customize system for fast visual updates, and the WordPress Menu system because not doing so was dumb. All content is now fully visible to a REST API. Translation: I can now build apps for iPhone and Android that offer all our content instead of just posts.
- More Common Sense: There were some things that just didn’t make sense about The en. Now seemed like the perfect time to make those adjustments. I have renamed the Articles + Columns hub to ‘Longform’. The Media + Videos hub is gone because I have merged all media with posts. Going forward, news posts, reviews, articles will have related galleries and videos embedded within them. I have also done away with the dedicated Source areas on news articles. It’s my policy to always source where news comes from and it still is. However, I was already sourcing it in the body of the article so there’s no need for a dedicated field and two data pulls to populate it. Finally I’ve made an honest effort to make the Reviews hub where you go if you want any type of review. As such, Saturday Night @ The Movies, What’s On and Album Drop will now live there.
Known Bugs Black text may appear on featured images. I’m working on a fix. The site my appear slightly out of balance on very small displays. Some articles and reviews my have visible shortcodes. I’m addressing those individually, starting with the articles that are most popular with readers.
In keeping with my tendency to name big upgrades after historic cities, this upgrade is named for the Egyptian city of Alexandria. I may have gotten the idea from Assassin’s Creed Origins, which is currently enjoying a renaissance on Twitch right now.
enconnected/the en 4
enconnected/the en 4
The en 4.12 November 4th, 2018 “Brenda”
Changes Xbox Handbook is now its own post type tied directly to the Xbox Handbook app in the Microsoft Store. This allowed me to ditch all the extra chrome that the web version of the site uses for app users. Also, you can now see all published chapters no matter what chapter you’re currently reading.
Known Bugs No known bugs.
This upgrade is named for Brenda Lee Johnson, the main character of TNT’s The Closer.
The en 4.11 April 16th, 2018 “Reboot”
Changes Refreshed homepage area with emphasis on visuals and recent articles. Added intro to the top-right of the homepage.
Known Bugs No known bugs.
This upgrade is named for Reboot, the CGI TV show that Netflix revamped into a positively dreadful live-action television show. The original was solid Saturday morning cartoon material.
The en 4.10 November 4th, 2017 “Stack”
Fixes Restored ads (I’m sure you guys missed those).
Changes Moved advertisements in the header and shrunk header size. Updated templates for videos and galleries to show content from their post and not their excerpt.
Named for Robert Stack, the original host of Unsolved Mysteries.
The en 4.9 May 27th, 2016 “Fred”
Fixes Repaired broken issues Video Hub index that kept people from browsing YouTube content. Fixed breakpoint for Date on articles with page wide headers.
Changes Added tagline to all pages to reflect what the site is and what we do. Changed color of headings from grey to red. Adding more spacing for H3s. Adjusted header accent color. Changed bylines to match accent color. Made divider in articles and reviews match current accent colors. Added subscription boxes to all sidebars. Removed larger subscription box from all content types.
Known Bugs Video post design is broken.
This upgrade is named for Fred Rodgers, the host of Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood, a show that changed lives and taught us all to be better people. Twitch streamed all 886 episodes of the show this month.
The en 4.8 November 19th, 2016 “Ifil”
Fixes Added archive for One Community content that’s no longer important enough to surface on the timeline. Decreased size of mobile responsive ad. Added conditional logic for older One Community content to still appear on the site and in links, but not surface on the timeline. Updated all social links.
Changes Refreshed header with upgraded branding and colors. Discontinued Google+. Added Support for Instagram. Removed News hub. Refreshed Backstage/About page. Added support for Events to One Community. Added Backstage to navigation. Refreshed Changelog.
Known Bugs Gallery post type renders incorrectly. In some instances, Community Hub doesn’t sort new events in chronological order. Safari doesn’t show featured images of individual upcoming releases.
This upgrade is named for Gwen Ifil, Moderator of Washington Week and anchor of PBS Newshour. She passed away this week of cancer.
Fixes Newsletter subscribe box for reviews and One Community items now work. Eliminated duplicated meta boxes in the back end. Post subtitles fixed in news posts.
Changes Updated base theme that powers The en. Added temporary Facebook and Twitter buttons for One Community. Modified Get It Now buttons across the site to support more than just Amazon. Now apps and services have links too. Added Newsletter subscribe boxes for articles and posts.
Known Bugs Gallery post type renders incorrectly. In some instances, Community Hub doesn’t sort new events in chronological order. Safari doesn’t show featured images of individual upcoming releases. This a known bug we’ve decided to not fix.
This upgrade is named for Elizabeth McCord, Tea Leone’s character in the CBS show Madam Secretary
Fixes Broken social media Twitter link on some pages. All Google AdSense ads are now responsive and change dimensions based on browser window size.
Changes Expanded newsletter integration beyond reviews. Introducing One Community Hub, the 2016 version of the Xbox One Timeline and permanent addition to The en.
Known Bugs In some instances, Community Hub doesn’t sort new events in chronological order. Post Subtitles aren’t appearing on news and post pages.
This upgrade is named for Evie Fry, star of Assassin’s Creed Syndicate and bad-ass member of the Assassin Order.
Fixes Cleaned up formatting for Subscribe area in Reviews. Standardized around Amazon Affiliate program. News posts now support Amazon Buy when possible. Added conditional statements so that Sources, Via and Image Sources no longer appear by default on news pages.
Changes Behind the scenes work to support Timeline 2016, a new system coming to The en in just a few weeks. Added Amazon Buy button and eliminated individual discretionary text option for writers. Eliminated Buy Now text links for Buy Now buttons in Reviews. Tweaked Reviews carousel on the homepage to extend across the entire page.
Known Bugs H4’s on reviews are smaller than they should be. Comments formatting needs updating. Galleries post type not displaying correctly.
Named for Claire Underwood, the ambitious heroine and villainess in Netflix’s House of Cards.
Fixes Fixed date for Gallery Viewports. Updated layout rendering subsystem. Refreshed header code with added splash of color. Fixed metadata output to search engines. Fixed internal shortcode error limiting long-form design. Compressed logo to be easier on bandwidth for smartphones and tablets. Refreshed comments with tighter code.
Changes Updated name to The en. Added Feedly to all content pages. Removed Google Plus promotion. Updated homepage design. Updated logo. Updated title header. Added support for podcasting. Fixed layout issues on Reviews area. Added support for Buddypress. Updated Breakdown colors. Updated tags background on homepage news area to match the color scheme.
Known Bugs Galleries post type not displaying images correctly.
Fixes Recolored author area on all pages to match the updated color theme. Changed video backgrounds to white and removed drop cap in video description. Changed longform date area so that it disappears on smartphones and small tablets with a viewport of less than 991px.
Changes New navigation menu allows users to deep dive into different sections from anywhere they are. User bar is now hidden for anyone who isn’t logged into enConnected, cutting down on loading times for everyone. Long form television and movie reviews moved to Articles system (Saturday Night @ the Movies and What’s On). Added Xbox One Handbook and new series of articles to the Articles Hub. Added new subscription box for full-page reviews. Added new social profiles to the footer. Some ads are now responsive.
Known Bugs Navigation text sometimes glows white instead of black.
This release is named for Matt Murdoch, otherwise known as the superhero Daredevil, which launched on Netflix this week.
Fixes Galleries caption color updated. Update dates, related pieces, and comments added to galleries too. Tweaked CSS in support of more drop caps.
Named for the song by D’Angelo & the Vanguard.
Introduced Media area after a soft launch early this month. The new Media + Video area allows users to browse enConnected’s complete archive of photos and videos. Previously, these photos were made available only in reviews themselves. Some date back to our time as ZuneSpring. This update includes a refreshed version of the Videos post type. Galleries are a new post type that can be slideshows of related images or photo essays. The first photo essay from enConnected, Xbox One Year One, is already available. Podcasts are back.
Fixes Killed NextGEN Gallery. Updated individual reviews with a new gallery and secondary advertisement spot. Added more headlines for easier browsing on individual pages. Better image compression. Tweaked search engine optimization and caching. Videos and galleries now appear in the Stream on the homepage. Colorized different categories based on branding. Isotope, HTML5, JavaScript. Padding changes for mobile throughout.
Named for the song by Naughty Boy.
Colorized mobile search for easy use. Added Backstage access option. Recolored foot menus. Killed bullet points in comments. Other miscellaneous style changes based on feedback. Cleaned up source attribution. Fixed Articles and Reviews date display issue. Reviews now have in-line advertisements. Review scores and links for purchasing things we review online are back following their loss with the 4.0 upgrade. Reviews and articles can be formatted in different ways: full page and half a page.
Named for a song by Drake.
Massive internal and external system update. New responsive design added with tablet support and faster loading. New section systems allowed for custom index building from inside the back-end instead of a code editor. Full-screen new articles, customized news articles with or without a side-bar are both possible. New ad units now correspond to industry standards. Videos and Podcasts and enConnected Social aren’t available but will make a return in a future update. Deprecated features include enConnected for Windows Phone API.
Named for the song by The Intruders in memory of Lisa Wilson Taylor, who lost her battle with cancer on August 24th.
enConnected 3
enConnected 3
Updated internal Carrier plugin to streamline sharing and posting for our writers. Added APIs that’ll be surfaced in upcoming mobile apps. Exploring load balancing issues and font changes.
Named for the song by Pharrell Williams.
Changed “This Week” bar to “Trending” with updated algorithms for surfacing content that matches those on Twitter. Split essential elements from enConnected Three design into separate CMS plug-in called Carrier. Addressed font rendering issues and standardized all fonts. Added Twitter & Facebook social bar to all news posts per feedback.
Named for the song by Jay-Z.
Addressed loading times and stability issues on the front-end of enConnected. Replaced full news stories in enConnected RSS feeds with summaries. Added reviews, articles, podcasts, and videos to RSS feed system. Investigated bug reports following the upgrade to WordPress 3.6.
Named for the vessel assigned to the Starfleet space station Deep Space Nine in Star Trek: Deep Space 9.
Add sidebar for individual videos that directly link to YouTube. Fixed colorization issue when loading individual author pages. Fixed disappearing images. Added a consistent header to news articles and featured articles. Addressed spacing issue and introduced new header for individual reviews. Add the ability to share individual forum topics.
Named for the song by Justin Timberlake.
Introduced new front end editing systems. New lazy loading Featured Articles area for the Home, News, Articles + Columns, Reviews, Podcast, BackStage, Social and Videos. Added ‘This Week’ area to keep users informed of all weekly activities at enConnected. Added social icons to header area for easier access. CSS cleaned up. JavaScript scaled back to maintain reasonable loading times. Introduced “This Week” header bar for easier access to forums.
Named for the song by Justin Timberlake.
Tweaked fonts and font colors. Updated Top bar area. Laid foundation for new features coming in next update. Introduced newer homepage and hubs design featuring a more “newspaperish” feel. Added timestamp to all news stories, and added tags topic tags to homepage for even easier browsing. Numerous changes to CMS framework for writers and editors.
Tweaked code for compatibility with WordPress 3.5. Main navigation added to footer along with access to social media accounts. Reduced the number of colleagues noted in footer.
New ad space added to Home. Video hub now includes links to enConnected on YouTube. Hub and browsing options added for enConnected In Print. Podcasts, videos, articles, and reviews will now also show in line in Home for even easier natural discovery. Schema search engine support fixed. Killed support for Feedburner API. Facebook login positioning bug squashed. Mobile device overflow bug squashed.
Changed the way dividers in content are rendered, updated font faces, decreased the size of sharing bar on all content types, cleaned up footer. Facebook login for comments as well as overall registration are back online, cleaned up registration page. Addressed styling issues with enConnected Social. New Video Hub added.
Ad spacing bugs fixed. Podcast hub, Reviews hub, Articles hub now all feature small featured areas and code to not have content that is being featured not show in the index area of each hub. Fixed Social hub’s spacing, side bar issues, activity stream overrun, and killed unnecessary featured image. Fixed incorrect loading sidebar area on generic pages.
New responsive design, Support for coming Reviews rubric, testing for new enConnected Social features including external updates from official blogs, media sharing for enConnected Social users. Image credits introduced.
enConnected 2
enConnected 2
Bug fixes. Added Friends & Colleagues to footer. Cleaned up comments CSS.
Articles + Columns, Reviews, Latest News, Podcast indexes will now auto update their featured areas. Articles + Columns and Reviews will now display Recent entries along with an excerpt from each article for better context browsing. Reviews updated to allow system to auto remove spacing for fields and descriptions that were not around for our much older content. All reviews and articles can now take advantage of headline/feature images in their design. Articles join News posts and Reviews for new Gallery, Video, and Byline compatibility built-in. Addressed spacing issues on Homepage and reprioritized what images are featured higher on the page.
Bug fixes.
New homepage design, direct podcast integration, support for public test of enConnected Reader for Windows Phone, enConnected Social goes 1.0, activity stream now on homepage, ability to mention other users in your activity update added, streamlined process for writing content in the backend. Updated RSS feeds.
Named for the song by Jay-Z.
Mild updates to the front page, return community backgrounds back to the header.
Made strides to bring content to the forefront of the visual design even more. Killed enConnected Artist backgrounds because of load times, and changed background color to white. The new footer also puts more focus on content. Sidebars on certain pages have also been modified for clarity. Increased size of paragraph text for easier reading. The homepage has been slightly tweaked for easier view and to give it a more “magazine-ish” feel.
Couple of light CSS changes to flatten the design and unify its looks. Grays are out blue is in. Also, field testing enConnected Artists background system with a holiday banner for evaluation purposes.
Adjusted for issues with Reviews and Articles indexes. Video Review issues repaired. Menu navigations added to enConnected Social. Updated galleries system for Reviews. Fixed headline images in Blog view, Articles + Columns hub, and Reviews hub.
Named for the song by Wale.
All systems go including new versions of enConnected Social, Reviews, News, Articles, Search, and Podcast.
Named for the Roman city.