After a nearly four-year run at version 2, the HCSB Verse of the Day plug-in has been updated to version 3. The latest version available is 3.0.1, which contains a quick fix that was found just after I had released version 3. When you see that “.0.1,” just think, “Oh, this was written by a human!”

Major changes in this version include:

• The addition of “(Plus)” to the name, as this version supports five different translations - in addition to the Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB), it now supports the English Standard Version (ESV), the New King James Version (NKJV), the New International Version (NIV), and the King James Version (KJV).
• A new settings page, where you can select the version.
• A widget, that will drop right in any widget zone.
• The replacement of several function calls that have been deprecated in the WordPress API over the past 3 years and 8 months.
• Formal dropping of support for PHP 4, following WordPress's lead in 3.2.

While a lot of the code is different, if you only used the template tags, you should notice nothing different with this release. You can download HCSB Verse of the Day (Plus) 3.0.1 at the WordPress Plug-In Directory, or upgrade on the WordPress Plug-In Administration Page in your blog.

I have released version 2 of HCSB Verse of the Day, the WordPress plug-in that provides a verse or passage each day, using the reference provided by BibleGateway.com. I also completed the required files for the WordPress Plug-In Directory, so it can be downloaded from there.

New in this version…

• New Tag - There is now a tag votd_hcsb() that puts out the heading, the text, the reference, and the credit line all in one. This will simplify the template modification required to implement the plug-in.
• Custom Tag - There is a separate file where you can specify a separate group of tags, and the votd_hcsb() tag will utilize it instead of its default. This also means that, even if future versions change the default, the custom tag layout will be used.
• Two Versions - WordPress (and most plug-ins) must be compatible with PHP version 4. However, if your web server is running PHP version 5, there is now a PHP 5 version included. It incorporates the object-oriented enhancements in PHP 5.
• Options Revamped - Since I initially wrote the plug-in, I've learned that WordPress allows an option to be an array. So, to streamline its usage, the options are now an array, and only require one row in the database instead of five. There is also a file to clean up the old options.
• Bug Fixes - BibleGateway.com changed the way they display multiple passages (ex. “Matthew 1:13, 17-19”); version 2 has a fix that makes that work again.

As always, if you encounter any problems with the plug-in, just let me know and I'll try to help. Enjoy!

I have released version 2.0.1 of Daniel's DropDowns, the WordPress plug-in that provides category and archive dropdown template tags. It is available on its page at the WordPress Plug-In Directory.

This was a minor change - the auto-navigating lists added in version 2 needed a slight tweak. There wasn't a “select category” entry, so one could not navigate to the first item in the list without going somewhere else first. The category dropdown now has this entry, and is consistent with the archive dropdown.

Enjoy!

(UPDATE: This plug-in is inactive, as its functionality is now part of WordPress core.)

I have released version 2 of my category and archive drop-down plug-in for WordPress. It is hosted at the WordPress Plug-In Directory - you can go get it there. Following are a few of the changes that were made.

• Both tags now have only 2 parameters - the type of navigation and the text for the link or button. For navigation type, ‘button’ remains the default, and ‘link’ is still available. However, a third option of ‘auto’ has been added, which will render the list as an auto-navigating select box.
• The CSS parameters for the select and button elements were dropped. How these elements can be specified using CSS is detail in the top-of-plugin comments, along with an example.
• The usage examples in the comments now have an example of how to put the tag in a template in such a way that, if the plug-in is disabled, the template will still render. This could be done with 1.0, but I didn't give an example.
• I added PHP Documentor-style comments to both functions.

Let me know if you have any problems with it, or any ideas for other behavior. Enjoy!

(UPDATE: This plug-in is inactive, as its functionality is now part of WordPress core.)

Version 2.3 of WordPress, the blogging software I use to produce this blog (as well as the other blogs on my site), will be released later today. I'll be upgrading these blogs on Monday evening. There have been major pieces of WordPress that have been re-worked, and those are causing some plug-ins to not work correctly. None of my blogs are all that reliant on plug-ins - the “Share This” plug-in is the main one, and it's been verified in 2.3 already.

There's lots more information on the WordPress Development Blog - I won't go into the details here. I'm confident this will be a smooth upgrade. I just wanted to let you know in case some things look strange, I'm on it.