Total Theme v 5.0

Release Date: September 16, 2020

New CSS Utility Framework (clear your cache): New mobile first CSS utility framework has been introduced so it's extra important that you properly clear your site and browser cache after updating (you should always do that anyway).
Child Theme Checks: Many Template parts have been updated to make use of new theme classes. If you have modified any template parts via a child theme these will most likely need updating. You can compare your child theme file to the parent theme to see what has changed. If you have modified any template part this would be a good time to update your child theme to use hooks/filters instead of modifying the template parts which is always best. If you aren't sure how, let me know in the theme comments so I can write up a snippet for you (for many elements it's now possible to simply add/remove classes via a filter to customize the design rather then using CSS if you prefer as well). For any customization you may need where you may have copied the whole template part if there isn't a filter/hook available we will consider adding one and sending the updated files. The goal has always been for the theme to be fully customizable without having to ever actually modify theme files.
Page Header Title Hook Changes: The page header title area now has two new elements page-header-content and page-header-aside. The page header title and subheading have moved from the "wpex_hook_page_header_inner" hook to the new "wpex_hook_page_header_content" hook and the breadcrumbs has moved from the "wpex_hook_page_header_inner" hook to the "wpex_hook_page_header_aside" hook - please search for "wpex_hook_page_header_inner" in your child theme and update accordingly. This change was so that the breadcrumbs did not require javascript for placement and absolute positioning. It also will allow you to easily insert any custom content to the side of the page header to replace the breadcrumbs if wanted. This change also allows for new Breadcrumb position options (more details below).
Theme Cards: New awesome functionality introduced, you may want to check out the new card styles to see if you would like to update your site to make use of any. Learn more.
Typography Heading Changes: The heading options (h1,h2,h3,h4) in the Customizer Typography settings tab will no longer target WPBakery modules (such as the heading, icon box, feature box, etc) and theme grids by default. This was a highly requested change and optimization (it was actually a "bug" that these settings targeted those modules). The reason is because heading tags are important for SEO and shouldn't be used for design reasons only. Let's say you setup a bunch of pages with icon boxes using h3 tags for the heading and gave your h3 a custom design. You also setup a bunch of feature boxes with h2 tags and their own h2 heading design. One day your client or you decide all the h3 tags should really be h2 tags you won't be able to change them without affecting their design unless you alter the h2 headings to look like the h3 but now you've altered your h2 heading design. This type of customization of the heading tags for modules can cause a lot of issues in the future as you should be able to switch heading tags for SEO reasons without having any affect on the design. Plus, headings are generally styled much differently for blog posts (larger font, later margin, bolder) so having the Typography headings target both modules and the blog isn't a good idea either. It's best to either target module headings specifically with custom CSS or use the settings available in the module itself for the heading design, this will allow you to always be able to alter your tags in the modules without affecting the design. Plus, having those heading settings target builder blocks also caused conflicts with 3rd party WPBakery addons. Now if you prefer having these settings target the module headings as well you can use this plugin I made that put's it back to the old ways OR you can use the new Customizer setting added in Total 5.0.2 that allows the heading settings to target the Heading module which is mostly where you would want that to take affect anyway, see the 5.0.2 changelog for more details. Last, if you are displaying a lot of Icon Boxes you may want to consider setting these up via a post type instead using Theme Cards for easier management and design control.

AddedMobile First CSS utility framework – this includes styles for text colors, background colors, displays, paddings, margins, border styles, boxshadows, alignments, text colors, text backgrounds, font sizes, widths etc. Most of the theme, custom widgets and Total shortcodes (WPBakery modules) have been updated to make use of these utility classes to greatly slim down the overall site CSS, increase page speed scores, limit inline CSS from customizer settings and allow for easier mods and maintenance.
Added “Theme Cards” functionality which is a new way for displaying post entries selecting from various preset designs. You will find options in the Customizer under the Archives & Entries tab and the Related Posts tab for each post type so you can select your Card style for the archives and related posts separately if wanted. You will also find options to select your custom Card style when using the Post Types Unlimited plugin for the post type, post type related items and taxonomies.
AddedCard Settings metabox for applying custom settings on a per post basis (custom link, link target, custom thumbnail) for the card display.
Added Admin screen for managing custom fonts (Google, Adobe, Custom Upload, Child Theme/Other) under Theme Panel > Font Manager. This allows you to define the font selections for the Customizer Typography section and Total builder shortcodes. You can create unlimited fonts for use on the site and give them unique names for easy management (screenshot).
Added Customizer options so you can define Dynamic Templates for your portfolio, staff, testimonial and blog category/tag archives (screenshot).
Added Customizer Option to define a Dynamic Template for your Search Results page so you can design your own custom search results page.
Added “Automatic Query” option to the Post Types Grid module (also included in the new Post Cards module) so it can display the current post. To be used with the new Archive template settings in the Customizer (see previous item).
Added Theme Panel Option named “Editor Styles” which can be used to enable/disable Gutenberg/Classic editor style matching which will match your Body & Post Content Customizer Typography settings to the editor (sample video)
Added Option to enter your Google Analytics ID in the main Theme Panel due to many requests for this (screenshot).
Added New “Post Cards” module for the WPBakery page builder (can work as a standalone shortcode also though) where you can disable posts from any post type and choose from various preset designs as well as choose between grid, carousel or list display (screenshot).
Added Many more options to the Post Types Unlimited plugin screen when adding post types and taxonomies to further tweak theme functions. Also separated the Theme Settings into multiple meta boxes to make it easier to find what you need (screenshot).
Added Option to the Post Types Unlimited plugin when creating taxonomies you can select a template to override the taxonomy archive display (screenshot).
Added Option to “Show in Rest” for Portfolio, Staff and Testimonials under {Post Type}->Settings which provides support for the Gutenberg editor.
Added Bottom Margin option to Total WPBakery modules so you can easily add spacing between items without having to use the spacing module (the bottom margin label will display in the backend editor so you can quickly see items that have margins and items that don’t).
Added Option to enable/disable the single post display for the built-in Testimonials post type.
Added “Theme Style” option for WPBakery Tabs, Tours, Accordions, FAQ for a simple design that better matches the core theme (screenshot).
Added Native browser lazy loading to all featured images displayed by the theme (learn more). This is enabled by default but can be disabled under Theme Panel > Image Sizes or using the filter “wpex_has_post_thumbnail_lazy_loading”.
Added Action hooks vcex_shortcode_before and vcex_shortcode_after to Total builder modules/shortcodes which can be used in a child theme to insert any html or run any functions before or after the module (sample snippet). These actions run BEFORE the query for modules such as the Post Types Grid. This means they can be used to insert the WordPress switch_to_blog function for querying items on a multisite.
Added Theme Panel option “WooCommerce Integration” which can be used to disable the default theme tweaks and CSS for WooCommerce if you prefer to run vanilla WooCommerce (when disabled the theme will still add a few customizer settings to alter the single product and archives layout under Customize > WooCommerce > Theme Settings as well as register support for gallery-slider, gallery-zoom and gallery-lightbox). This is a great option for plugin developers that want to showcase their WooCommerce products using the native WooCommerce styling or if you are using advanced WooCommerce plugins that don’t require or can’t use the theme tweaks.
Added New Customizer tab under Header for “Overlay/Transparent header” so you can enable the functionality site wide as well as select a template to display behind the header if wanted (also works great with new page header title styles – see next point).
Added Ability to select the “Background Image” page header style for your entire site via the customizer with added options for vertical alignment and default min-height (sample video).
Added Option to Total Grid/Carousel WPBakery modules to select a style for the content display (boxed, bordered, none) – this makes it easy to remove the background/border from various module entry styles without having to mess with the design options. (screenshot).
Added New breadcrumbs location/position options and added styling options for greater control. You can now display breadcrumbs by itself if wanted even when the page header title is disabled (sample video).
Added Subheading position Customizer option (sample video).
Added Author Box options for heading color, description color and avatar size (enter 0 to disable) and avatar style (square, rounded, round).
Added New wpex-heading global CSS class which can be used to target any element with the Headings typography settings (makes the text bold and black by default).
Added Options to Icon Box module to use Accent Color for the icon color or background.
Added Label tag to the Mailchimp newsletter and search modules.
Added Support for font-display swap for theme loaded Google fonts and new Customizer setting under Typography > General to enable/disable this feature – set to “swap” by default (learn more).
Added Support for Gutenberg alignfull and alignwide images.
Added Option to the skillbar module to disable animation.
Added Option to the Social Links widget to “Expand” items to fit the widget.
Added ID and Shortcode columns to templatera admin screen.
Added Alert formats that are accessible via the Editor “Formats” button & new WPBakery “Alert” module (screenshot).
Added New Local Scroll settings panel under Customizer > General Theme Options.
Added Preset-styles for the scroll to top button (default, black, accent), scroll speed option and breakpoint.
Added Lightbox & border radius option to the Posts Thumbnail Grid widget.
Added Style, border radius, border-width, padding, collapse, box-shadow and Layout options for the Total callout module and deprecated the custom content/button width settings to make use of utility breakpoints for better responsiveness.
Added Image Border radius option for various Total builder modules including the grids and carousels (options are none, semi-rounded, rounded, round).
Added Two new Breadcrumbs location/position options “After Page Header and After Site Header” (new “After Header” option will allow you to display breadcrumbs in it’s own container so if you have disabled the page header you can use the breadcrumbs between the site header and site content).
Added Breadcrumbs customizer options for background color, vertical padding, top/bottom margin, inner item spacing and custom separator.
Added New action hooks wpex_hook_page_header_title_before, wpex_hook_page_header_title_after.
Added Customizer option for the Top Bar to select a breakpoint where the Top Bar collapses/stacks as well as an alignment option for the collapsible state (default was centered).
Added Page Header Title as a section that you can override in the Elementor Pro theme builder.
Added Pricing Table module option to enable/disable “Advanced Styling Options” and 3 new styles to choose from (screenshot).
Added Heading module settings (new styles, bottom margin, option to use the accent color for the text color, icon side margin, badge).
Added Badge option for heading and icon box modules (screenshot).
Added Shadow & Padding Options for the Icon Box Module (screenshot).
Added Option to disable the Header Menu on a per page basis under the Theme Settings metabox (below the page/post editor) inside the Header tab (new “wpex_has_header_menu” filter added as well for developers).
Added vcex_icon_box_icon_class, vcex_icon_box_heading_class, vcex_icon_box_content class filters so you can alter the default classes used for icon box elements via a child theme or plugin (sample snippet).
AddedInner border style & inner border margin options to the Image Banner module.
Added Hover speed option for the Image Swap module.
Added Choose from bordered, boxed, plain style for various modules (login form, milestone).
Added Settings to the Milestone module (style, align).
Added Settings to the Users Grid module (content style, align, avatar border radius, avatar bottom margin.
Added Native WP caching for oEmbed videos/audio displayed in entry/post featured media.
Added Native WP support for responsive embeds in Gutenberg video blocks via add_theme_support( ‘responsive-embeds’ ).
Added Some new options to the “Image Filter” setting which previously only allowed for “Grayscale” (sepia, saturate, high contrast).
Added Customizer setting under Header > Menu called “Stretch Menu Items” which will display when using header styles two, three or four and will alter the menu so that the menu items fill the entire site widths evenly.
Added Post Terms module spacing option so you can define the margin between buttons.
AddedSetting to the Mailchimp Form (now named Newsletter Form) module to enter any number of custom hidden fields for your form.
Added Newsletter Widget settings for “style (boxed, bordered, plain), border radius, email input attribute, first name input attribute and last name input attribute.
Added Next/Previous posts links module settings (Arrow Side Margin, Button Spacing, Expand and Button Min-Width).
Added Social Links module settings (Expand Items, Show Labels).
Added Post Types Slider options for caption opacity, caption breakpoint (when it switches from over to under the image), Image Overlay style and Image Filter.
Added Comments with Avatars widget options to select avatar size, border radius, excerpt length and vertical align.
Added Post meta module options for last updated block, callback block (so you can enter a callback function for a custom block), block labels, date format, style (default/vertical), bottom margin, classname, CSS animation, visibility.
Added Action hooks “wpex_hook_mobile_menu_toggle_top” and “wpex_hook_mobile_menu_toggle_bottom” which would allow you to insert extra content via your child theme or the Custom Actions panel to the Header Mobile Toggle area (sample snippet w/ screenshot).
Added New “Taxonomy Terms” Widget which can be used to display terms from any taxonomy (screenshot).
Added Terms/Categories grid and carousel module settings for Overlay Title background color and opacity (screenshot).
Added Terms/Categories grid module option to enable a button.
Added Filter “wpex_button_default_args” so you can globally define your theme button arguments (style, size, color) and new settings in the Customizer to define the options (screenshot).
Added Skill Bar (renamed to Percentage Bar) module so you can select a text source and select from Custom Field or Callback function so you can use the module in dynamic templates. If the value returned is 0 or an empty string the module will not display, this way it’s dependent on the custom field/function return value. Also added extra options for bottom margin, label color, percentage color and style (screenshot of new style).
Added Page Header breakpoint Customizer setting to be used with header styles that display content on the side (such as breadcrumbs on the right side).
Added Divider module margin option to select from preset margin classes instead of having to enter your own custom margin.
Added Customizer option to enter your custom lightbox open/close animation speed.
Added Customizer option to select the header menu dropdown icon (angle, double angle, caret, chevron, arrow, circle arrow)
Added Customizer options for related posts (blog, portfolio, staff) to select the taxonomy to get related items from (screenshot).
Added Hooks “wpex_hook_header_search_overlay_top” and “wpex_hook_header_search_overlay_bottom” so you could insert custom code inside the Header Search Overlay before or after the search input.
Added Page Title module for displaying the current page title in your Dynamic Templates. You can already do this via the Heading module, but this new module is much slimmer as you wouldn’t generally need things such as links or icons when displaying the page title in a template.
Added Term Description module for displaying the current term (category) description in a dynamic template.
Added “First paginated page only” option to the list of “User Access” settings when editing a WPBakery row. If you are creating a template to display on archives/categories you can hide rows from showing up on the subsequent paginated pages using this option.
Added Option when creating taxonomies with the Post Types Unlimited plugin to select the sidebar/widget area to display on the taxonomy archive.
Added Image Carousel option to vertically align items.
Added Customizer setting for WooCommerce on sale text.
Updated WPBakery & Slider Revolution to the latest version.
Updated Total Theme Core plugin to version 1.2.
Updated Theme framework file structure and file names.
Updated Default theme font family is now System UI font stack instead of Open Sans.
Updated Visibility Settings so the new breakpoints are +1280px (large desktop), +1024px (desktop), 1023px – 768px (tablets), 767 and under (phones)- this means there is no longer a seperate tablet landscape and tablet portrait option but a singular Tablet setting.
Updated Tested with the new WordPress “Test jQuery Updates” plugin to ensure the theme will work with upcoming WordPress 5.6/5.7 changes (full theme compatibility with jQuery 3.5.1 and jQuery migrate disabled).
Updated Renamed the wpex-visual-composer.css file to wpex-wpbakery.css and separated the Total custom module CSS into it’s own vcex-shortcodes.css file this way if you are using the theme’s shortcodes but have WPBakery disabled the theme won’t be loading unnecessary CSS and it also ensures that if you decide to disable the custom Total modules the theme still loads needed CSS for WPBakery.
Updated Theme Icons CSS is now loaded via it’s own CSS file this way if you aren’t displaying any theme icons you can easily remove the script from the site.
Updated Typography heading settings for h2, h3, h4 will now only target headings inserted via the post content or text block to prevent the settings from messing up wpbakery modules and card styles.
Updated Post Content module so you can now drag/drop items to sort them and added Featured Media, Title and Meta options (screenshot) – you can also add custom blocks via a child theme using a filter.
Updated Header logo image to include the data-no-lazy tag to prevent it from being lazy loaded as it could cause issues with your header layout and sticky header (also it doesn’t look nice to fade in your header image).
Updated Optimized Customizer styling options CSS output (slimmed down code, combined media queries and media queries are now added at the bottom so we don’t have to use !important attributes).
Updated Customizer Layout settings CSS output to longer add max-width values for various settings as it wasn’t needed and fixed issue where the medium container width was being overritten by a custom desktop container width.
Updated Customizer Layout max-width setting so it can be used for the Boxed Layout.
Updated Various Customizer settings to use placeholders for the inputs so you can quickly see the default theme value and also slim things down by removing unneeded field descriptions.
Updated Carousel modules (portfolio, post type, blog, image) to display videos in lightbox when lightbox is enabled and a video is available for the item
Updated WooCommerce see-through overlay when updating cart items to display svg spinner.
Updated Optimized the wpex_get_mod function and removed the global $wpex_theme_mods variable (all options will now pass through the theme_mod_{$name} filter).
Updated Default admin icon for Staff & Testimonial post types.
Updated Author Bio CSS so it can adjust accordingly depending on the avatar width.
Updated Portfolio, staff, testimonials post type registrations to include the singular name for the add_new_item, edit_item, new_item, view_item parameters so instead of saying “Edit Item” it will say “Edit Staff Member” or instead of “View Item” it will say “View Staff Member”.
Updated Various functions/modules that add may add a target _blank to a link to include a rel tag with noopener noreferrer.
Updated Accent hover color so it’s also applied to the buttons active state.
Updated Posts With Thumbnails widget so the entire block is clickable.
Updated Posts With Thumbnails widget with options for image boder radius, image filter (grayscale, sepia, high contrast, saturate) and vertical align (so if you are using the left/right format you can vertical align the image and text in the center)
Updated Comments with avatars widget to have a cleaner design.
Updated Footer Callout output to make use of new helper functions with added filters (partials/footer/footer-callout.php).
UpdatedFooter callout to have slimmer HTML when there isn’t any content and it only displays a button.
UpdatedFooter Callout to have it’s own defined color so it won’t change when altering the default body color.
Updated Top Bar Links color to “inherit” instead of a fixed #555 hex to change automatically when altering your top bar color in the customizer.
Updated All Total Image Overlay template files to make use of new global CSS classes to greatly slim down theme’s style.css file
Updated Total Image Overlays will no longer automatically “stretch” to 100% as this may not always be wanted and are set to display as inline-blocks instead of blocks to allow overlays to be contained by the image size (so if your image is cropped to 100×100 the overlay will be contained inside it as well).
Updated Category Tag #2 Overlay style to display filled in white buttons instead of the older border style design which very hard to see and caused accessibility warnings.
Updated Image Swap Overlay style so the secondary image is now centered and not stretched out (this means you can now display an image on hover that doesn’t fill up the whole area).
Updated Tablepress CSS is now loaded only if the plugin is active and fixed issue where the original “blue” tablepress colors would flash at initial page load.
Updated Theme now add a custom classname to the categories, archives, recent posts, recent comments and nav widgets for adding the padding and bottom border rather than targeting every widget’s class to greatly slim down theme CSS and make child theme customizations easier (new “wpex_widget_has_bordered_list” filter available).
Updated Total Image module to use figure as the containing element type and added an option to enable the image caption below the image.
Updated Full-width topbar so it doesn’t reset at 960px anymore it will remain full-width on all device widths.
Updated Post image with captions design to remove the borders and backgrounds for a cleaner look.
Updated When selecting the “Solid Color & White Text” page header title style it will now use the accent color by default for the background unless you specify a custom color.
Updated Page Header Title & Subheading are now inside a “page-header-content” element and the breadcrumbs inside a new “page-header-aside” container – this makes it easier to position the breadcrumbs without ever conflicting with the page title (removed theme javascript used to swap breadcrumbs position when conflicting with the header title) – you can now also hook into the “wpex_page_header_aside” hook to insert custom content to the right of the page title (great for adding buttons if you disable the breadcrumbs for example).
Updated “Hidden Page Header Title Spacing” Option will always be visible in the Customizer so it can be used even if the default page header title isn’t hidden incase it’s being hidden via a page setting or on a specific part of the site such as the blog.
Updated Breadcrumbs no longer hides by default on small devices.
Updated When setting breadcrumbs to a “custom” position in your child theme you no longer have to use remove_action to remove it from the default position.
Updated Page Animations loading icon to use theme accent color, be thinner and a bit larger to look more modern.
Updated Topbar will now swap for RTL sites automatically (no need to change default layout).
Updated Theme Settings metabox so if you are on a post type (staff, portfolio, post it will have the tab pertaining to this type open by default).
Updated Total Button to just say Button in the WPBakery page builder.
Updated The way the “Customizer Manager” works to only save a list of disabled panels instead of a list of enabled panels.
Updated Page Header Title element to include new “default-page-header” classname to the page for easier customization of the default page header style while not affecting other page header styles.
Updated Page Header Title selector in the Customizer so you can select “Background Image” as the default page header style.
Updated Page Header Title with background image style to display breadcrumbs by default.
Updated Page Header Title with background when selecting a pattern (dotted/lined) for example if there is a custom background set for the page header title it will be used in the overlay.
Updated Code in various places to use strict comparisons instead of lose comparisons.
Updated WBakery row setting to use Featured Image as background to to fetch category images if current page is an archive.
Updated Slight changes to default theme text colors in a few places for better contrast.
Updated Theme Google Font calls to use newer CSS API v2.
Updated Portfolio & Staff Archive Grids will no longer switch to a left/right design when set to 1 column for consistency with other post types.
Updated Global $wpex_count variable used to clear floats in grid loops to use set_query_var and get_query_var instead.
Updated Staff carousel block to match staff grid block default design.
Updated Staff customizer option to enable/disable the “Position” display in the single post heading to work for both the page header title and the title block.
Updated Optimized method of loading masonry scripts for archives which also fixes a bug with the Post Types Archive module.
Updated Bottom padding on #primary wrapper is now added conditionally via the wpex-has-primary-bottom-spacing class added to the body tag to slim down the CSS (wpex_has_primary_bottom_spacing filter available).
Updated Equal heights function in the theme to run on window loaded rather than doc ready to prevent issues when the imagesLoaded script isn’t being added to the site and fix bugs in certain browsers.
Updated Optimized the javascript used to re-trigger Total slider and masonry grids inside WPBakery tabs.
Updated Function that checks a post for a custom sidebar defined in it’s taxonomy to first check the “primary” taxonomy incase you have custom sidebars defined for multiple taxonomies.
Updated Instances of wp_get_post_terms to use get_the_terms function instead.
Updated Related posts to look for a “Primary Category” to get related items from (checks the Yoast SEO primary category function but there is a filter in place you can use to define primary terms via a child theme @see wpex_get_post_primary_term).
Updated Full-width blog/post type entries now use a wpex-divider element for the border between items instead of a bottom border with added padding/margin (helps keep spacing consistencies and makes it easier for child theme mods).
Updated Post Content module to include a Sidebar Position option when enabling the sidebar so you can place it on the left or right.
Added Filter “vcex_maybe_display_shortcode” to all Total WPBakery shortcodes which can be used to hide specific shortcodes via child theme conditional checks.
Updated Post Thumbnails to not use the post title for the alt attribute but rather grab the alt from the image itself if one exists (better for accessibility).
Updated Header Menu Cart dropdown widget to work with the Vertical Header instead of forcing the Overlay cart style.
Updated Legacy “Light” style overlay/transparent header so the header doesn’t turn black on sticky but rather uses your default header styles for consistency.
Updated Vertical Header active menu styling to be the same as the hover which prevents conflicts with the custom Accent color setting (you can still change the active background/color in the Customizer).
Updated Header cart/search dropdown functions to have a new “header-drop-widget” classname for easier targeting via CSS and javascript.
Updated Site Frame Border so it displays on all devices.
Updated Total Image Slider (used for both post galleries and WPBakery shortcode) to load the core sliderPro CSS library only when needed instead of being part of the core style.css.
Updated Total WPBakery carousel modules to load the core owlCarousel CSS only when needed instead of being part of the core style.css.
Updated The isotope-entry classname used for masonry grids to wpex-masonry-col to prevent any possible conflicts with 3rd party plugins (plus added wpex-masonry-grid class to all theme masonry grids to optimize the associative javascript).
Updated Divider module so it won’t take on the Border Accent color defined in the customizer for consistency.
Updated Divider module to change the “vcex-icon-wrap” class to “vcex-divider-icon-span” and added aria-hidden attribute to the icon.
Updated Divider module so the icon will take on the divider color by default so you don’t have to define the color twice.
Updated Feature Box so if you select to collapse at tablet it will be collapsed on phones as well without having to enable the collapse on phones option as well.
Updated The “Enable Flush Dropdowns?” Customizer settings has been renamed to “Full-Height Menu Items”, a description has been added in the customizer to explain what this does and it now uses CSS to make your menu li items 100% tall instead of javascript to relocate dropdowns fixing some hover bugs on certain browsers causing the dropdown to dissapear (it will also be enabled for the Overlay/Transparent header which was previously not supported).
Updated Grid Filter links so they don’t stack on mobile since I got a lot of requests for this.
Updated Larger default font size when using a Total builder grid module set to left image / right content style.
Updated Facebook Page Widget to use v7 of their API code with added nonce and added option to disable the JavaScript SDK code in case your site is already loading this.
Updated Outline style button to use accent color for default hover instead of the older blue color.
Updated Desktop Visibility option to say 1024px instead of 959px as it was technically showing/hiding at 1024 in Chrome due to a bug with chrome ignoring orientation on the media query for tablet landscape CSS, plus 960 was the standard for desktop sizing when the theme was originally released and this has since been changed to 1024px.
Updated Heading Module so links aren’t alway rendered as a “block” to prevent issues with the link being added on empty space to the side of the heading and to separate the link element from the main element to prevent the need for the extra “vcex-heading-link-wrap” element.
Updated The way links are applied to the icon box module when using the “Link Container Wrap” option (which has also been renamed to “Apply Link To Entire Icon Box”) to prevent any possible design issues as well as updated the way the link is added by default when not using the wrap setting so that it’s only added to the text and not the icon for better SEO/accessibility.
Updated Icon Box (left/right) styles to use a flex-box model so that they can automatically adjust based on your icon size.
Updated Complete re-coding of the Font Icon module to slim things down, fix some bugs and inconsistencies.
Updated Hover Animation css file (hover-css-min.css) to remove transition property declarations to prevent conflicts with other element color hovers.
Updated Image Banner fade-up animation so it’s smoother and more apparent.
Updated Milestone module so when a link is added it gets added as its own element rather than overriding the default div tag.
Updated Milestone module so the left/right styles use a flex-box model instead of absolute positioning and added a “Spacing” option to the module to enter a custom spacing between the icon and the milestone content.
Updated Various modules (Icon Box, Feature Box, Milestone) to move the CSS animation class outside of the main element to prevent issues with hover animations due to clashing CSS properties.
Updated Optimized checks for self-hosted video/audio displays.
Updated Optimized Image CSS3 Hover styles to prevent image stretching and remove old CSS used to fix older browser bugs that are no longer needed in modern browsers.’
Updated Grayscale image affect from the “Image Filter” setting to remove default hover affect and instead added new Grayscale and Grayscale Inverse options to the “Image Hover” setting.
Updated Blog Entry Galleries/Slider to support the image hover affects.
Updated List Item module to use flex styles so if text is very long the text wont wrap around the icon.
Updated Recent News module to use a flex-box model for the design instead of a fixed width on the calendar with and absolute position to provide greater flexibility, uses new wpex-divider element for the borders between items instead of a border applied to the entry and added some new options (divider style, divider spacing, divider size, date min-width, date format, date side margin).
Updated Recent News module so you can enter a custom date format for the day and month/year and support for WPML so you can translate the date format (screenshot)
Updated Small increase to headings (h2, h3,h4,h5,h6) font sizes to keep consistency with new utility CSS.
Updated Post Terms module so if the Taxonomy field is empty the theme will try and locate a taxonomy for the post type using the new “wpex_get_post_primary_taxonomy” function (filter available).
Updated Mailchimp Form module renamed to “Newsletter Form”, updated the HTML to remove any unneeded ID’s/classes and removed code to allow browser field validation. Also added option to enter a custom “name” attribute for the email input.
Updated Various functions that pull image captions to use wp_get_attachment_caption instead of get_post_field.
Updated Custom aria-labels (saved in Accessibility panel) are now stored in a single theme_mod and new “wpex_aria_label” filter available for child theming.
Updated Mobile Icons menu are now wrapped inside a “wpex-mobile-menu-toggle-extra-icons” element and will display on all devices (previously hidden on phone size).
Updated Social share so if using Yoast SEO if a twitter title/description is defined the theme will properly parse variables and encode for use.
Updated Contact Form 7 to optimize the CSS output so if the plugin is enabled the theme loads its own wpex-contact-form-7.css file with all the styles needed rather then having to load the plugins CSS and make overrides in the theme.
Updated Contact Form 7 will now display messages under the fields that need fixing for better accessibility.
Updated Contact Form 7 message boxes to use new theme utility color scheme.
UpdatedContact Form 7 custom loader as it no longer requires custom javascript to alter the preloader, it can now be done with CSS (this means the “wpex-wpcf7-loader” classname has been removed and the theme now targets the plugin’s .ajax-loader class).
Updated Category/Taxonomy descriptions so if the Page Header Title area or subheading is disabled it will display above the posts by default.
Updated Better sanitization for dynamic post templates output.
Updated Terms/Categories grid and carousel modules to use a flex-box model for the overlay title style and added options for vertical and horizontal alignment (screenshot).
Updated Outline Style button so the default style takes on the accent color instead of light gray for consistency.
Updated Optimized the loading of scripts used for theme metaboxes in the admin.
Updated Gallery metabox to display in the side area by default and re-designed the delete buttons to match WooCommerce product galleries for consistency.
Updated Footer Widgets Customizer panel to include all settings on a single tab so it’s easier to manage.
Updated Skill Bar now reads as “Percentage Bar” in the WPBakery page builder.
Updated Sidebar mobile menu close button to be added differently so if extra content is inserted to the top of the mobile menu via the “wpex_mobile_menu_top” hook it gets added after the close button and not before it.
Updated WPBakery Text block so if a custom color is added via the Typgraphy tab it will be applied to all elements in the text box including links (underline added to links to make visible). This will prevent issues where if you added a background to the text block you may not be able to see the links based on the selected color for your text.
Updated Heading with Bottom Border with Color style so the gray border is the same thickness as the colored border.
Updated Re-coded Total theme javascript to prevent possible issues where the jQuery window load event is being triggered before the document ready event.
Updated Better accessibility support for menu cart (puts focus on cart items when hitting enter on the cart icon).
Updated Icon Selector for theme post type admin icon selector to slim down the page and make it more accessible and added new WP 5.5 dashicons (screenshot).
Updated Icon Selector in the Customizer to display icons for easier browsing (screenshot).
Updated Advanced Parallax script (scrolly2.js) is only loaded on the page if there is a row with an advanced parallax defined to slim down any pages without advanced parallax.
Updated Sidr.js script used for the sidebar mobile menu style will only be loaded if you are using that specific module menu style to optimize/slim down code for those using the other mobile menu styles.
Updated Superfish, supersubs and hoverIntent scripts used for the theme header menu dropdowns to be loaded on the site only if needed (not using the header builder & a header menu is defined)- these were previously combined into the total.min.js main file.
Updated Author bio box will display even if the post author doesn’t have a description added for their profile.
Updated Default orderby for related items is now “date” instead of “rand” because random ordering in WordPress is very resource intensive and can cause some issues with caching. You can now select your orderby parameter value via the Customizer though.
Updated Slimmed down CSS used for the numbered pagination.
Updated Blog “link” format posts will display image overlays now.
Updated Optimized the theme integration with the Post Types Unlimited plugin so instead of filtering the theme output it will use a new helper function to first check for a post types unlimited value to limit checks.
Updated Optimized the Mobile menu show and hide class CSS (which is used by default to hide the main header menu and display the mobile menu toggle). Previously the CSS was added in the style.css file which would require resets when adding a custom mobile menu breakpoint via inline CSS. This CSS is now added via new files “wpex-mobile-menu-breakpoint-max” and “wpex-mobile-menu-breakpoint-min” files which are loaded via media queries so they only get added as needed. This also allows us to enable the custom mobile menu breakpoint when using the Vertical Header style. Plus, you can now enter any number greater than 9999 into the Mobile Menu breakpoint field to render the mobile styles always without a media query being added.
Updated Optimized CSS for the different mobile menu toggle styles used to tweak the logo and header aside placements. Previously the theme added this CSS in the main style.css and then added custom CSS inline if a custom mobile breakpoint was defined. It’s now added in its own CSS file and gets loaded only as needed via media queries so there is no need for duplicated code added inline.
Updated Image Module can now display the term thumbnail when used on a template defined for your archive/category/tag – simply select “Featured Image” from the Source dropdown.
Updated Image module to display a placeholder image in the Front-end editor if an image hasn’t been defined (will never display a placeholder on the live site though incase you wanted to display a custom field based conditional image).
Updated Renamed “User Access” setting for WPBakery rows to just “Access”.
Updated Custom Actions panel design to fix bugs from WP 5.5 and also improved the javascript for accessibility so you can open/close the toggles via keyboard.
Updated Leader item is no longer a UL list. It’s created with standard divs now so it’s easier to style and requires less CSS resets.
Updated Recent News module so the Include/Exclude categories will actually search all terms not just standard categories.
Updated The way Total modifies certain WooCommerce actions so they are easier to modify via a child theme if needed (actions previously added in a WPEX_WooCommerce_Config class which no longer exists and now added via new custom functions).
Updated Various WooCommerce customizer settings so they can work in the Customizer without having to save and refresh the live site.
Updated Moved the WooCommerce option to enable the native WooCommerce Image sizing functions from the Customizer to the Theme Panel > Image Sizes panel where it makes more sense.
Updated The mobile menu icons menu will now render on the navigation bar and fixed top style mobile menu toggles.
Updated Post Series “box” to have a more minimal design and look more like a “Table of Contents” and added some extra Customizer settings to alter the link/header color.
Updated Admin display for Testimonials to include new columns to display the testimonial author (by) and rating.
.Fixed Issue with rgba site background color not working on a per-page/post basis.
Fixed Next/Prev arrow icons on RTL.
Fixed Load more button on Recent News module being placed outside the visibility container.
Fixed Masonry grids not working correctly with the “Post Types Archive” module and load more function.
Fixed Masonry not working on search page results when search was set to “Inherit from Blog”.
Fixed Issue with Social buttons when set to the “default” style it wasn’t adding the defined default classes.
Fixed Issue with Total breadcrumbs “First Category Only” option not working correctly.
Fixed Issue where you could use the front-end editor to modify posts using a dynamic Template.
Fixed Issue where enabling Social Share on standard pages would cause them to display on cart/checkout pages (easier for the theme to remove them automatically rather then using the single page meta settings).
Fixed Alignment Option in Carousel modules affecting the content only and not the image (images used to have a forced centered alignment now they don’t have any default alignment).
Fixed Outline style button for the multi-button module not showing an outline unless a preset color was chosen.
Fixed Animated Text custom Width and alignment options only working when static before/after text was added.
Fixed Sepia image hover style applying always and not just on hover.
Fixed List Item custom color not applying when adding a link to the module.
Fixed Link target not working on the Post Terms module.
Fixed RTL issues with next/previous module icons when choosing custom a different icon style.
Fixed Issue with Stretched WPBakery rows added to WooComerce product descriptions not displaying correctly when the description tab is hidden on page load (like when a user posts a review).
Fixed Issue with not being able to edit Total WPBakery module that have custom font options after choosing a different Google font (you can delete and re-install the Total Theme Core plugin to get this fix immediately).
Fixed WordPress 5.5 debug warning for the deprecated “wp_make_content_images_responsive” function.
Fixed Console error in the WP admin caused by the WP 5.5 update in regards to wpColorPicker.
Fixed Design issues with post pagination when breaking up the post into multiple pages.
Fixed Total breadcrumbs WPBakery module missing aria-landmark and itemtype.
Fixed RTL issues with the “flip-drops-smallscreen” class used to alter the position of the dropdown menus on smaller screen sizes.
Fixed Background image customizer setting not working on the vertical header.
Fixed Issue where you could assign a drafted Template as a dynamic template for your singular posts.
Removed IE8 & IE9 CSS files and HTML5 shiv.
Removed Featured Box default bottom margin to be consistent with all other modules since no other builder module has a default margin.
Removed Deprecated vc_row-fluid references in the theme CSS and Customizer settings (this class was deprecated from WPBakery).
Removed Not needed rel=”bookmark” from various links.
Removed 30px default margin on the teaser box module to keep consistency with other modules.
Removed Legacy Styling options under Customize > WPBakery.
Removed Default border-style solid and border-color transparent CSS attributes applied to WPBakery modules as this causes issues with various module settings and 3rd party addons. When using the Design Options tab in WPBakery you should always choose a border style and border color. If you prefer to keep the old default styles you can add the following CSS to your site but beware that you could have issues in the future.
Removed “heading-typography” theme class (replaced with wpex-heading) – this class was only used in one place, the newer wpex-heading class is used in multiple locations.
Removed Customizer option for Left Position for scroll to top button for RTL devices (theme will now use the same side field for both LTR and RTL).
Removed Theme Panel setting to disable deprecated functions.
Removed Outdated wpex-layerslider.css to respect core plugin styling.
Removed Audio entry format icon overlay on featured image.
Removed Version number parameters from theme icons (ticons) font files (eot, woff, ttf, svg).
Removed All inline HTML comment tags.
Removed Legacy “meta-with-title” class from post meta (date, author, category, comment count).
Removed Javascript that was adding equal heights on the related blog post items (was used in older theme versions when related items had a gray background).
Removed The orientation landscape value from the responsive CSS applied to “Tablet Landscape” ( 768px to 1024px ) as it was causing confusion and there is also a known bug in newer versions of Chrome that ignores orientation.
Removed Display declarations for the hover animation styles to prevent conflicts when used with different elements
Removed Classnames responsive-video-wrap, responsive-audio-wrap and wpex-roembed and replaced with new “wpex-responsive-media” classname
Removed Font Family selector in the WP editor because it caused more harm then good such as customers manually altering fonts in the Editor instead of globally in the Customizer then having to re-change them manually as well as this functionality requires loading extra scripts in the WP admin slowing things down. It’s best to set your site fonts in the Customizer, WPBakery builder modules or Gutenberg. This is an optimization.
Removed LayerSlider zip from the full download – this plugin has decided to stop selling on ThemeForest and so we won’t be supporting it as they don’t have to follow any coding guidelines as they are selling the product on their own and we don’t feel comfortable with this. We recommend using the updated Slider Revolution plugin. If you do need updated LayerSlider versions because you have been using it for a long time you can send us private messages to request updated zip files but we would recommend purchasing your own license to receive auto updates and support from the author.
Removed Mousewheel.js script loaded in the theme’s main js file but no longer used (previously used for the original lightbox script)
Removed Option to disable responsive layout in the customizer (usually this causes more issues from people accidentally clicking it and mobile design is so important these days it shouldn’t be disabled – however, you can still disable it via theme filter if needed).
Removed Extra “Heading” before the Post Series title.
Removed Post h1 from Typography settings as it can cause conflicts with plugins and the page header title.
Removed The default/forced image size for search entries.
Removed The Instagram and Flickr Widgets. Instagram started disallowing the display of images from their site a few years ago and Flickr recently removed their old API completely and the new API is not allowed for commercial use.

Developer Notes

No dev notes for this update.