We're looking ahead to what changes need to happen for ProofBuddy 3.0 and had a thought, but need to get user input before we head down that path.

What are y'all's thoughts on making ProofBuddy entirely into a WordPress plugin? That is, instead of making a plugin for WP that just interfaces with ProofBuddy have a ProofBuddy be a full plugin with everything done inside of WordPress and ProofBuddy requiring WordPress to be installed?

Potential downsides

• WordPress would have to be installed. We used the WordPress install as a starting point for our install. WP is about as easy to get up and running as any web application I've ever used.
• Don't want WordPress installed. It's possible to install WP and have it with just a single page.

Upsides

• The database and user system inside WP is outstanding, and ProofBuddy could piggyback off of that.
• Themes would be handled through WordPress, and there are thousands of themes.
• The plugin architecture inside of WP is very strong and relatively easy to use. Plugins like Facebook Like, Jetpack, or any of the other few thousand plugins would interact with ProofBuddy.
• ProofBuddy could be rewritten in such a way that it was receptive to WordPress plugins as well.
• One less web application to install. If you're using WordPress already PB would just be a few clicks to get up and running. Many hosts already offer a one-click install for WP.

Thoughts?

This is something I've had running through my head for a few days and wanted to get input before starting up. After all, y'all are the ones that use ProofBuddy to sell to your clients.

If you have an opinion one way or the other, please leave a comment and let us know.

Fixes in this release:

• Database creation script is now compatible with MySQL 5.5.
• Image scaling issues when using the Files on Server option and ImageMagick.
• No orders found when clicking on the Orders tab, but would show up when clicking on "All"
• Auto coupons not applying when there are no other coupons in the cart.

Pro files were not affected as part of this upgrade so Professional version users should not need to re-enter their registration keys.

Link : Download

Note that this will only with version 2.1 of ProofBuddy.

Download

Download link for the latest version is http://www.proofbuddy.com/latest.zip

Updating

If you've already upgraded to 2.1, updating to this release is just a matter of uploading the new files on top of the old.

Upgrade instructions from an earlier version are available on our documentation wiki.

One note for Pro users. If you've already upgraded from 2.0 to 2.1 Pro, you will need to re-enter your registration code. When you update to 2.1.0.1 you will revert to the Lite version, but entering your code will update you back to Pro.

Fixes

• 135 - A child album was not being counted as a valid choice when adding images.
• 136 - Add images from server box was blank. This was due to a setting that slipped in that's only valid in PHP 5.3 and ProofBuddy 2.1 targeted PHP 5.2 as the minimum required version. A work around was added.
• 137 - Unable to reorder child albums
• 138 - Errors uploading images once registered as a Pro user. This didn't affect actually loading images, but did display an error at the end of processing along with showing that twice as many images were loaded as actually were. The issue did keep the watermarking feature of the Pro version from working, but that is fixed as well.
• 139 - Check settings for image height or width of 0 to keep from a divide by zero error on image import
• 141 - Hint on the add images page was wrong. It was a tip for 2.0 instead of 2.1.
• 142 - Typo - Images were "quened"  instead of "queued"
• Basic White theme was mistakenly called "Basic White - INI"

Mobile theme running on an iPhone

This was our first task after releasing ProofBuddy 2.1, and since that was done this morning the mobile cart plugin has been updated to work with version 2.1.

Biggest change, aside from working with ProofBuddy 2.1, is that this plugin is now free and works with both the Lite and Pro version of ProofBuddy.

How does it work?

One of the settings is a string that does a regular expression match on the browser user agent string. If that is too geek for you, don't worry. Just let the plugin do its thing. If you understand regex and user agents, the plugin looks for an identifier in the user agent to determine if the visitor is using an iPhone or Android.

Why a plugin and not a theme?

There was too much involved basically hijacking what ProofBuddy normally does to make this a theme. A theme just couldn't give the control needed. Plus, by making it a plugin it only affects visitors on mobile devices. A theme would affect all visitors.

Great, so where can I get it?

Easiest is to download and install through ProofBuddy. Head to Options -> Plugins and click on the Add Plugin button on the top right.

Or, you can go to our extend section and download through there.

What's New?

We'll get a full list of new features out, but here are a few for now.

• Flash Uploader - Instead of the simple file field, there is now a Flash uploader that should fix all sorts of issues. On the backend, ProofBuddy thinks that each file uploaded through Flash is an individual file so the file size limits are not there. Plus, you can select as many files as you want. ProofBuddy will queue them up and upload one at a time. The FTP option is still there though.
• Switched from Prototype to jQuery JavaScript library (mostly) - Most pages are using the jQuery library, and related jQuery UI and datatables, instead of the Prototype library. We found that we could develop faster with jQuery and the available plugins for jQuery made it a better choice. Some pages are still using Prototype, although they will get switched out in later versions.
• Image processing hooks - We've made the image uploading process much more open to plugins. For now, you won't see much difference. But the new hooks open up the possibility for plugins to work with images while they're uploading.
• Error page - At the request of several users, we've simplified the page that comes up when ProofBuddy comes up with an error. It is now just simple black text rather than the page with the ProofBuddy logo in previous versions.
• Plugin and Theme installer - You can now browse the theme and plugin libraries from within ProofBuddy and install directly by entering your FTP information.
• Currency Symbols - You can now change the currency symbol system wide. There are many levels of customization possible, but for a majority of users simply changing the symbol under options will be enough.
• More caching - Requests to our server for things like the RSS feed and theme and plugin lists are now cached in the database instead of in a file.
• Home folder - ProofBuddy now automatically determines where it is located on your server. This may not matter to you, but it will help if you ever need to move ProofBuddy to a new server.

Upgrading

Rather than re-write the instructions, I'm going to point you to the upgrade instructions on our wiki.

Pro Users

ProofBuddy 2.1 is a free upgrade for users who are currently using version 2.0 Pro. You will need to get in touch with us when you're ready to upgrade so that we can update the version you have registered in our database.

Download

You can get ProofBuddy 2.1 at our download page. You can also always visit www.proofbuddy.com/latest.zip to get the latest stable release.

Found an issue?

Of course software is never really finished, so if you come across an issue with ProofBuddy please let us know either by sending us a comment or posting on our support forum.

If you are a Pro user and are interested in being listed we have a form set up where you can submit your information including up to 4 images.

For now we will add any submissions into the rotation on our home page with a link to your web site and the small image that you submit. In the next few weeks we plan to create  a new section on this site where all of the featured photographers will be listed.

Along with several minor issues, the most significant fix is to the theme and plugin loader. There was an issue where the plugin and theme zips were corrupted when downloaded from our server. That's been fixed and you should now be able to install themes and plugins without having to fire up your ftp program.

www.proofbuddy.com/latest.zip will always be the latest stable version of ProofBuddy. As of this post it's 2.0.4.

www.proofbuddy.com/latest.zip?beta will always link to the latest version, including pre-release versions. When there's a pre-release version like there is now with version 2.1.beta it will download that file. When there isn't an active pre-release version it will download the most recent stable version.

The reason we did this, aside from making it easier to keep the downloads page updated, is that it is planned for a future version of ProofBuddy to be able to automatically update itself.

Last week I was able to take all of the wireframe sketches I've done over the past few months and build a home page that I am happy with.  It's cut down to not look like a blog, even though we're still using WordPress to power the site. Much of the noise got removed, and we're left with a much cleaner home page.

The download page was also updated to just link to what y'all are after, the download for ProofBuddy. All of the download links to support files have been removed and replaced with a big red download button. Plus, the page will automatically update as we push out new versions. Themes and plugins were moved to their own section.

And very exciting for us, although probably not so much for y'all, is that we have streamlined how we package releases. From the time we finalize a new release to the time it's live on the site is now less than a minute.