Hi. Backlight 6.2.1 is now available.
The most exciting feature is probably the new audio/video support, collectively referred to as "Media", via Kookaburra's essay features.
Here be players:
Be aware, however, this is a PROVISIONAL implementation. There are things you need to know.
The essay extension is not built in. We are distributing it as a PHPlugins script, and you will need to activate it. Like our sample PHPlugins files, find the script in:
backlight/modules/custom-resources/essay__extension--media.php
- Copy the file to `backlight/custom/phplugins`.
- In your template, enable PHPlugins and select the file.
- Open the file, then copy the `head` and `essay_script` functions into your existing PHPlugins file.
- Remember, may only have a single instance of each hook. For example, if already using a `head` function, then you should merge the contents of this new `head` function into your existing function.
For more information, see our PHPlugins documentation.
So, why the extra setup?
We are pulling the media player files from CDN hosting.
In short, the Vidstack library does not provide downloadable assets for self-hosting. It's a really nice package, but the logistics of the thing, being that we have to pull the assets from CDN hosting, may prevent users in the EU being able to use this player.
I need to spend more time trying to figure out how we might be able to get the assets into Backlight. Failing that, I will have to find an alternative solution.
By providing this feature as an essay extension for PHPlugins, if you are unbothered by the CDN, you can use it immediately, and you will be able to use it in the future, no matter what. Even if I end up building alternative means of playing media, if you prefer Vidstack, you will be able to continue using it.
Stay tuned for further updates as the situation evolves ...
Typography updates
Depending on your settings, this may be a breaking change. Font-size controls have been updated for headings. Be sure to revisit your template, and select desired font-size for your Headline (h1), Subheadings (h2) and Tertiary headings (h3-h6).
"Block headings" is now "Tertiary headings (h3-h6)". Previously, these settings applied only to H3 tags, leaving H4, H5 and H6 unstyled. Settings now apply styling to all remaining heading tags, H3-H6.
I feel it would be overly burdonsome to stuff the designer UI with individual styling options for H4-H6, as these are seldom used, so using Tertiary Headings for blanket styling is a nice middle ground. If you do want to style these differently, then custom stylesheets are your friends.
hr + h[2-6] + hr, a.k.a Hr "Sandwiches"
^^^ That thing, right there.
The new section "hr + h[2-6] + hr" allows you to style what I am affectionately calling Hr "Sandwiches". This a horizontal rule, followed by a heading tag, followed by another horizontal rule.
These make nice section breaks, introductory headings for image presetations, etc.
Because you should use headings in sequence, Hr Sandwiches style all headings the same. Follow your H1 heading with Hr + H2 + Hr; follow an H2 heading with Hr + H3 + Hr, and so on. The heading styles will only kick in when the heading is immediately preceded by an Hr element, AND immediately followed by another Hr element.
Headers
You can now apply different aspect ratios to Primary and Secondary Headings at a breakpoint. For example, if you don't want to design an entirely separate, secondary header for mobile use, you set a different aspect ratio for the Primary Header to ensure your text, logo, whatever has enough space.
This update also fixes the background and logo image options for Secondary Headers, which were previously broken.
Footers
Auto-refresh buttons are no longer in the footer, and now float near the top of the page.
The default copyright text has been improved to provide better line-breaking at small screen sizes. You may want to copy-and-paste the new version from a new template, into your existing template.
Floating navigation chevrons now provide "Back to top" and "Go back" functionality at the bottom of your viewport.
"Powered by The Turning Gate" and "Built with Backlight" logomarks are now optional additions to your footer, disabled by default.
You can see most of this in effect on this very page.
Blog excerpts
Auto-generated blog excerpts are improved. We are now stripping tags to prevent cases where excerpts would clip mid-HTML in posts. We have also improved the handling of text truncation, so that excerpts will attempt to truncate at the end of words.
Image Comparison presentations
Additional customization options are available in the Kookaburra Page template.
Single and Static essay presentations
Alignment and width constraint options have been added to the essay presentation composer for Single and Static presentation types.
If images are aligned to the left or right, text will wrap around them at desktop display sizes. On mobile, images will be centered, revert to full-width. So even if you set a width of "50%" for your image, it won't be too small on someone's phone.
Tutorials
Finally, I've posted new tutorials how to extend an existing essay presentation with new options, and how to write your own essay presentations from scratch.
See Essay Customization in our docs.
This is a very first draft tutorial, so if you go through it, please leave feedback in the forum about how I might improve it.
Especially the first part, how to extend an existing essay with new options, I might want to overhaul. After writing the tutorial and all the code that goes along with it, I ended up just putting the code into the update. This is great for everyone, but means that if you go through the tutorial, there's nothing new to show for your effort. I will likely revisit this, so that you will be adding options that don't already exist.