WordPress 5.8 Released With Nearly 300 New Features & Fixes
A major version upgrade of WordPress was released, version 5.8, containing nearly 300 improvements and new features WordPress 5.8 is rolling out right now and is available to all publishers. The new release is named after the innovative jazz musician, Art Tatum. It’s a fitting name for this new version of WordPress because it’s full of brand new features that makes it easier for publishers to innovate and express themselves creatively.Support for Internet Explorer 11 Dropped
This is the release that drops support for Internet 11. IE 11 is a security risk. WordPress now becomes a leaner and faster content management system as it reduces the amount of code in the core.Blocks
Blocks is a modern and updated way to edit the look and feel of WordPress. Editing with blocks has become a feature in bits and pieces across the WordPress system.Widget Area Blocks
The blocks way to edit a site now is available in the Widget Area. The Widget section can now be fully edited with Blocks“Now you can add blocks both in widget areas across your site and with live preview through the Customizer.”WordPress notes elsewhere:
“This gives users powerful new ways to customise their sites using the rich library of core and third party blocks. Existing widgets and third party widgets will continue to work and can be used alongside blocks.”
Query Loop Block
This new feature gives publishers the ability to display posts based on custom criteria. For example, the display posts section can be limited to display posts from a selected category. WordPress compares it to a Latest Posts functionality but more powerful.Edit Templates from the Post Screen
This new functionality allows a publisher to toggle from the post editing screen to a block-based page editing screen. This gives publishers more freedom to edit the template from the context of post editing where a publisher might decide that the post would be better if the template was edited to be different.“Switch from editing your posts to editing your pages and back again, all while using a familiar block editor.”
List View
List View is a new way to look at the structure of a web page. Publishers can now toggle between the regular view and the List View to get an overview of all the blocs on the page being worked on. This can also allow a publisher to navigate to a specific block.Pattern Transformations Tool
This is a feature that suggests block patterns. This feature is currently available in the Query Block and the Social Icon Block.Duotone Filters
This is a new design feature that allows a publisher to colorize images or videos. It’s a way to add more creative flair to a page. WordPress describes it as a black and white filter where the black and the white can be replaced by any colors for the shadows and the highlights.Theme.json Global Styles and Global Settings APIs
This is a huge change that provides more control of the look and feel of a website. It allows theme developers and publishers to change the default style elements of web pages. According to WordPress:“This configuration file enables or disables features and sets default styles for both a website and blocks.”In another article specifically about the the new Theme.json feature, WordPress explains it like this:
“By creating a theme.json
file in the theme’s top-level directory, themes can configure the existing editor settings (the font sizes preset, whether custom colors are enabled, etc.) as well as the new ones as they are introduced (the duotone preset, whether margin and padding controls are enabled, etc.).”
One of the goals of the new theme.json file is to make the handling of CSS more efficient.
According WordPress:
“The theme.json
file absorbs most of the common use cases for styling blocks with the goal of reducing the amount of CSS shipped to the browser, mitigating specificity wars, and providing current style info in the UI controls for users.
This is the first step in having a mechanism that consolidates all the three origins of styles (core, theme, user) and that will become more important once users can provide global styles in later phases of the project.”
Support for WebP
WebP is a new generation image format that can display images at lower images sizes. WordPress support for the WebP format allows publishers to create websites that download faster. That’s a win for publishers and site visitors. According to WordPress:“From WordPress version 5.8 forward, you can upload and use WebP images in WordPress like you would a JPEG or PNG image today (as long as your hosting service supports WebP). Switching to the WebP format for your images will improve your site’s performance and your site visitor’s experience. “
Make Better Websites with WordPress
The total amount of changes runs to nearly 300 bug fixes, new features and improvements.“5.8 offers so much more! Over 170 bugs, 96 enhancements and feature requests, and 24 blessed tasks have been marked as fixed in WordPress 5.8.”WordPress 5.8 represents a leap forward toward modernizing the content management system. It empowers publishers who don’t know how to code to make changes to how the web page looks without having to know the code. The latest version of WordPress makes it easier for publishers to express themselves creatively. Some may decide to wait a few days before updating in case of bugs. But WordPress thoroughly tests each release so it may be safe to update now. The release methodology includes testing consecutively improved versions the release until the developers feel it’s ready to be used.
Important Considerations with this release…
I always hold off on major releases (5.7vs. 5.6.X) to see if there are any bugs once the software is out in the wild. If you remember, 5.5.2 had an immediate release the very next day due to unanticipated issues and 5.6 caused older sites that had not kept up to break.Are you looking for Cheap WordPress 5.8 Hosting? Finding a high quality Cheap WordPress 5.8 Hosting provider is crucial for your web application. Your WordPress 5.8 application can only run smooth if it will be hosted on a server which can provide a higher up time & plenty of computing resources. There’re thousands of web hosting providers which offer asp.net hosting, but choosing Cheap WordPress 5.8 Hosting provider is a time consuming task. To make your buying decision easy we’ve concluded 3 Best yet Cheap WordPress 5.8 Hosting providers which are reliable and offer affordable WordPress 5.8 Hosting so that every one can afford it.
Cheap and Reliable WordPress 5.8 Hosting
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ASPHostPortal | DiscountService.biz | UKWindowsHostASP.NET |
$1.00/month | $2.00/month | £3.00/month |
Host 1 Site | Host 1 Site | Host 5 Sites |
1 GB Disk Space | 1 GB Disk Space | 1 GB Disk Space |
10 GB Bandwidth | 10 GB Bandwidth | 20 GB Bandwidth |
Dedicated Application Pool | Dedicated Application Pool | Dedicated Application Pool |
Support UTF-8 Domains | Support UTF-8 Domains | Support UTF-8 Domains |
30-Days Money Back | 30-Days Money Back | 30-Days Money Back |
Latest ASP.NET | Latest ASP.NET | Latest ASP.NET |
Plesk Control Panel | Plesk Control Panel | Plesk Control Panel |
Windows 2008/2012 | Windows 2008/2012 | Windows 2008/2012 |
SQL Server 2008/2012/2014 | SQL Server 2008/2012/2014 | SQL Server 2008/2012/2014 |
Latest MySql version | Latest MySql version | Latest MySql version |
How to Choose Cheap and Reliable WordPress 5.8 Hosting?
Reliability and Speed of Access
Not only should the web host be reliable and fast, it should guarantee its uptime (the time when it is functional). Look for a minimum uptime of 99%. In fact, even 99% is actually too low — it really should be 99.5% or higher. The host should provide some sort of refund (eg prorated refund or discount) if it falls below that figure. Note though that guarantees are often hard to enforce from your end — especially if the host denies there was any downtime. However, without that guarantee, the web host will have little incentive to ensure that its servers are running all the time.
Data Transfer (Traffic/Bandwidth)
Data transfer (sometimes loosely referred to as “traffic” or “bandwidth”) is the amount of bytes transferred from your site to visitors when they browse your site.
Don’t believe any commercial web host that advertises “unlimited bandwidth”. The host has to pay for the bandwidth, and if you consume a lot of it, they will not silently bear your costs. Many high bandwidth websites have found this out the hard way when they suddenly receive an exorbitant bill for having “exceeded” the “unlimited bandwidth”. Always look for details on how much traffic the package allows. I personally always stay clear of any host that advertises “unlimited transfer”, even if the exact amount is specified somewhere else (sometimes buried in their policy statements). Usually you will find that they redefine “unlimited” to be limited in some way.
In addition, while bandwidth provided is something you should always check, do not be unduly swayed by promises of incredibly huge amounts of bandwidth. Chances are that your website will never be able to use that amount because it will hit other limits, namely resource limits.
To give you a rough idea of the typical traffic requirements of a website, most new sites that don’t provide video or music on their site use less than 3 GB of bandwidth per month. Your traffic requirements will grow over time, as your site becomes more well-known, so you will need to also check their policy when you exceed your data transfer limit: is there a published charge per GB over the allowed bandwidth? Is the charge made according to actual usage or are you expected to pre-pay for a potential overage? It is better not to go for hosts that expect you to prepay for overages, since it is very hard to forsee when your site will exceed its bandwidth and by how much.
Disk space
For the same reason as bandwidth, watch out also for those “unlimited disk space” schemes. Many new sites (that don’t host videos or music) need less than 20 MB of web space, so even if you are provided with a host that tempts you with 100 GB (or “unlimited space”), be aware that you are unlikely to use that space, so don’t let the 100 GB space be too big a factor in your consideration when comparing with other web hosts. The hosting company is also aware of that, which is why they feel free to offer you that as a means of enticing you to host there.
Technical support
Does its technical support function 24 hours a day, 7 days a week (often abbreviated 24/7), all year around? Note that I will not accept a host which does not have staff working on weekends or public holidays. You will be surprised at how often things go wrong at the most inconvenient of times. Incidentally, just because a host advertises that it has 24/7 support does not necessarily mean that it really has that kind of support. Test them out by emailing at midnight and on Saturday nights, Sunday mornings, etc. Check out how long they take to respond. Besides speed of responses, check to see if they are technically competent. You wouldn’t want to sign up with a host that is run by a bunch of salesmen who only know how to sell and not fix problems.
Email, Autoresponders, POP3, Mail Forwarding
If you have your own site, you will probably want to have email addresses at your own domain, like sales@yourdomain.com, etc. Does the host allow you to set up whatever email addresses you want on your domain, so that mail can be forwarded to your current email address, or placed into a mail box on your web hosting account itself? Can you set an email address to automatically reply to the sender with a preset message (called an autoresponder)? Can you retrieve your mail with your email software?
Control Panel
This is called various names by different hosts, but essentially, they all allow you to manage different aspects of your web account yourself. Typically, and at the very minimum, it should allow you to do things like add, delete, and manage your email addresses, and change passwords for your account. I will not sign up with a host where I have to go through their technical support each time I want to change a password or add/delete an email account. Such tasks are common maintenance chores that every webmaster performs time and time again, and it would be a great hassle if you had to wait for their technical support to make the changes for you.
Web Server and Operating System
Is the type of operating system and server important?
In general, most people will want to sign up for a web host offering a Unix-based system (like Linux, FreeBSD or OpenBSD) and running the Apache web server. Most web-based software assume your website is running on such a system, and you will usually experience fewer compatibility issues with it. There are also a lot of guides available on the Internet on configuring such systems, so finding help when you need it is easier as well.
In my opinion, the only time when you will want to use a Windows server is if you’re running Windows-specific programs, like ASP scripts. But even then, you’ll probably be better off looking for a PHP-equivalent, and using a Unix-based system.
Price
I was actually hesitant to list this, but I guess it’s futile not to. However, I would caution that while price is always a factor, you should realise (“realize” in US English) that you often get what you pay for, although it’s not necessarily true that the most expensive hosts are the best.
Monthly/Quarterly/Annual Payment Plans
Most web hosts allow you to select an annual payment plan that gives you a cheaper rate than if you were to pay monthly. My current personal preference is to pay monthly with all new web hosts until I’m assured of their reliability and honesty. Paying monthly allows me to switch web hosts quickly when I find that the current host does not meet my requirements: this way, I’m not tied down to a bad web host because I have prepaid for an entire year. I do this even if the new web host guarantees that they will refund the balance if I’m dissatisfied, since at the point I sign up, I have no assurance that they will honour their guarantee. Later (usually after a couple of years), when I’m satisfied with the host, I may change payment plans to the discounted annual plans.
Resellers?
Not all hosting companies own or lease their own web servers. Some of them are actually resellers for some other hosting company. The disadvantage of using a reseller is the possibility that you are dealing with people who don’t know much about the system they are selling and who take longer to help you (they have to transmit your technical support request to the actual hosting company for it to be acted upon). However, this also depends on both the reseller and the underlying hosting company. It is thus wise not to rule out all resellers; there are a number of reliable and fast ones who are actually quite good and cheap. In fact, a number of resellers sell the same packages cheaper than their original hosting company. If you find out that a particular company is a reseller, you will need to investigate both the reseller and the real hosting company.
International
If you don’t stay in the USA, you have the option of hosting your site with some local provider. The advantage here is the ease of dealing with them (they are after all easily accessible by phone call or a visit), your familiarity with the local laws and easy recourse to those laws should it be necessary. It should be your choice if your target audience is local (eg a local fast food delivery service). On the other hand, hosting it in USA has the advantage of faster access for what is probably the largest number of your overseas visitors (particularly if you have an English-speaking audience). You also have a large number of hosting companies to choose from, and as a result, cheaper prices too.