This blog is a quick notice to anyone who is using our Google Maps plugins. As of June 2016, Google Maps now requires everyone to get an API key in order to display a map on their website. Unfortunately, this is beyond our control. Fortunately the fix is quick and free.

We just pushed out an update to our Google Maps plugin which will allow for API keys to be entered for Google Maps and has instructions for how to get it. You can find that in your WordPress dashboard under “Dashboard” > “Updates”. Then, after updating, edit the Brick containing the map to follow the steps.

In case you have trouble locating those steps, I will put them here for you to follow as well:

1. Click here and then click on “Create Project”. Call it anything you like.
2. Once you’ve created the “Project”, look for the list of links under “Google Maps APIs”.
3. Click on “Google Maps JavaScript API” and then click “Enable”.
4. Click “Go to Credentials” – or, on the left sidebar, click “Credentials”.
5. Under “Where will you be calling the API from?” select “Web Browser”.
6. You’ll now be on “Step 2”. Under “Name” anything you like – possibly the name of your website.
7. Under “Accept requests from these HTTP referrers (web sites)” enter your website’s exact URL
8. Click “Create API Key”.
9. Copy the string of text listed beside “API KEY” and paste it below.
10. That’s it! The rest of the heavy-lifting is done by the MP Stacks + GoogleMaps Add-On.

If you have any trouble at all, send us an email and we’ll be happy to help! Our email is support@mintplugins.com and our support team will get back to you as soon as possible – usually within 1 day (usually much quicker depending on how busy we are).

If you’d like to read more about Google’s new API requirements, you can read them here:

https://developers.google.com/maps/pricing-and-plans/standard-plan-2016-update

WordPress has just released version 4.5 – and with it some nice changes but also some things that break old version of many many plugins. In order to make sure that all of your plugins keep working, make sure to update them as well.

We have just released MP Stacks 1.0.4.9 to go along with the WordPress 4.5 release and it fixes all of the bugs that were introduced by the changes in WordPress 4.5. For those interested, mostly the bugs were related to an update they did to ‘jQuery’.

Regardless, you can update everything all together and you shouldn’t run into any issues at all 🙂

Happy updating!

We just released version 1.0.3.0 of our MP Core plugin which powers all of our other plugins and themes. It contains some simple updates which bring it to full compatibility with PHP7. Most web hosts aren’t running PHP7 yet – but it is dramatically faster than older versions of PHP and many webhosts are likely to begin updating to it. This is a great thing for WordPress websites as PHP7 will DOUBLE the speed of WordPress and WordPress websites.

So when the time comes for your web host to upgrade to PHP7, you can rest assured that all of your plugins/themes from us here at Mint Plugins are also fully ready for PHP7 and a lightning fast WordPress!

We hope to make the transition to PHP7 for MintPlugins.com and look forward to the speed increase it will give to our customers!

WordPress version 4.4 has just been released. It has a bunch of new bug fixes and features. When you go to do the new update, you may also notice some updates from us here at Mint Plugins as well under “Dashboard” > “Updates” in your WordPress dashboard. Make sure to do all of those updates as well as they make sure that everything keeps running like a well oiled machine.

We have done testing to make sure that these latest versions fix any bugs that may have arisen from WordPress 4.4. If you find a bug or something isn’t working quite right, feel free to let us know!

You can always reach us by emailing support@mintplugins.com – and we’re always quick to respond (just read the testimonials at the bottom of this page for proof ;).

We just released an update for our Free Google Maps Add-On for MP Stacks (Our Page Designing/Building Plugin for WordPress). Previous to this version (1.0.0.6), you had to enter a Google maps API Key – which was a nice feature for those who wanted tracking control – but in reality was never used by any of our users.

This unnecessary complication has now been removed from the Add-On plugin and it will work right out-of-the-box now without any additional ‘digital handshakes’ with Google needed.

If you already have this plugin installed in your WordPress, you can easily get this update by going to “Dashboard” > “Updates” and clicking the “Update” button.

Let us know if you have any questions about this update and we’ll be glad to answer them for you.

We just released a new update for our Slider Add-On Plugin for MP Stacks called “MP Stacks + Slider“. It now has the ability for any slide to link to any URL. It also has open-type controls which allow you to choose how you wish for the link to open. You can tell it to open in a new window/tab, in the same window, or even in a Lightbox Pop-up with a specific size. This is great if you want it to open a YouTube or Vimeo Video!

Here’s a screenshot of the new controls:

New Link Controls in MP Stacks + Slider.

We just updated our MP Stacks + SocialGrid Add-On to version 1.0.0.7. This update moved the YouTube Comments from Google “Old” way of fetching the comments to their “new” way – also known as Version 3 of their API (for the techies in the room).

YouTube comments will be broken if you have an old version because of this so update as soon as you can by logging into your WordPress dashboard and clicking on “Dashboard” > “Updates”. You can do the update directly there.

Let us know if you have any trouble getting the update by emailing us at support@mintplugins.com and we’ll be glad to help you out!

We just pushed out version 1.0.0.3 of the Launchstack Theme Bundle which now includes a “Works” page – perfect for showcasing any recent project you/yourcompany have completed. It’s great for video professionals wanting to showcase their work in a classy/unique way. Check out the new layout here:

In order to get that nice “Play” button overlay on the video thumbnails, check out this article:
How to make Launchstack Video Buttons

Want to checkout the Launchstack Theme Bundle? Click here!

We just pushed out version 1.0.0.4 of the free Widgets Add-On for our MP Stacks plugin (also free).

This release addresses a bug which prevented you from having multiple widgetized bricks per page. Now you can have as many widgetized bricks as you need – so get as crazy as you need to with widgets!

Note: If you already have some widgetized bricks, just open the Brick Editor for that brick (by double clicking anywhere on the brick). This will “refresh” the brick and make your widgets appear again.

If you have any feedback to give or feature requests, make sure to let us know!

Check out the MP Stacks + Widgets Addon here.

We are kicking the new year off right – by giving away our Knapstack Theme! The new update (version 1.0.7.0) changes the Knapstack theme to now include free updates. Initially we were charging $5/year for updates to the theme but realized most people were just leaving their theme un-updated – which isn’t good for anybody. So to help keep the wheels greased and the machine ticking along the way it should, we are giving away both the Knapstack Theme – and all future Knapstack Theme updates for free.

Another major upgrade is the sidebars. There are now 3 different sidebar areas in the Knapstack Theme:

• The Category Sidebar (displays to the right of any category archive)
• The Post Sidebar (displays to the right of any post)
• The Page Sidebar (display to the right of any page using the 600px wide page template)

The new sidebars in the Knapstack Theme can be found on the “Appearance” > “Widgets” page in your WP dashboard.

One of the coolest things about sidebars is that the newest version of MP Stacks (our free Page Building Plugin for WordPress) allows you to use a Stack in a sidebar using the “Stack” widget under “Appearance” > “Widgets”.

This means that all the power and flexibility of MP Stacks can be used on JUST the sidebar! This expands the power of sidebars hugely – allowing you to have your own backgrounds, content-types, grids, and even Add-ons like Parallax.

So to sum it all up, you never need to worry about paying for updates to the Knapstack Theme ever again! They are on the house – courtesy of us here at Mint Plugins.

We just released a big update for the MP Stacks Page-Building plugin. One of the best new features in Version 1.0.1.3 is the auto sizing of large text for small screens. Prior to this release, if you made a Text Content-Type in a Brick with a large font size, the words would get cut off on mobile screens.

Now, MP Stacks will automatically figure out the maximum size the text can be based on the longest word in your text area so that it fits perfectly on the Mobile screen without being cut-off or split up in any way.

This is all part of our philosophy to make it easy and fun for you to make fonts in a brick exactly how you’d like them on large screens, without needing to be bothered with options for smaller screens – but handling it perfectly all by itself. It’s small things like that that are often overlooked in mobile layouts – and is now one that MP Stacks handles perfectly. The update is available completely for free. Enjoy!

Hey everybody! WordPress 4.0 just dropped and it’s time to update your installs. This also means that many of your plugins and/or themes may also need updates. As grueling as that can be sometimes (and scary), it’s an important thing to not let yourself fall behind in updates because security risks are always addressed with new updates – and better ways of doing things too!

Rest assured, if you have any questions at all, I’ll be glad to answer them as quickly as I can – just send an email to support@mintplugins.com and I’ll do my best to help you out.

Our Knapstack Theme needs to be updated to keep up with changes to the Easy Digital Downloads plugin. Some of the styling on your download archive pages (categories, tags, etc), may not line up correctly if you update EDD. The new Knapstack Release fixes those issue – so grab it from your dashboard under “Dashboard” > “Updates” (if you’ve paid for auto updates), or manually update the theme by downloading the latest zip from here:

https://mintplugins.com/plugins/knapstack-theme/

If you’re rocking the MP Stacks plugin, make sure you upgrade both MP Core and MP Stacks when you upgrade to WordPress 3.9. It’s fully working and has has also had a few great upgrades to improve speed and performance.

Here’s the full list of upgrades and fixes in the latest version:

== Changelog ==

= 1.0.0.9 = April 16, 2014
* Updated TinyMCE Plugin for TinyMCE 4.0
* CSS is now output in the header instead of the footer
* Added “Stack Only” pages and rewrite parameter
* Changed variable for mp_brick_additional_css filter from $css_output to null
* JS Scripts are now enqueued to show in the footer instead of header
* Smooth Scrolling and anchor points added for bricks

= 1.0.0.8 = March 22, 2014
* Removed priority of 1 from Brick size settings metabox action
* Add-on directory now links to https://moveplugins

= 1.0.0.7 = March 8, 2014
* Enqueue Magnific in normal wp_enqueue_scripts vs mp_stacks_enqueue

= 1.0.0.6 = March 8, 2014
* Prevent default event for brick edit links – wasn’t working in Firefox

= 1.0.0.5 = March 5, 2014
* Better responsive Handling
* Double click on bricks to edit them
* mp_stacks_metabox becomes mp_stacks_size_metabox
* Content Type Margins added to size metabox

= 1.0.0.4 = March 5, 2014
* Added context to footer css to prevent double style tags in footer

= 1.0.0.3 = March 5, 2014
* Attached Brick CSS to footer instead of scanning posts for shortcodes

= 1.0.0.2 = February 23, 2014
* Upgraded Security using Nonces for Ajax
* Fix wp_query to show all bricks in stack rather than posts_per_page
* Improved code documentation on Custom Post Type file
* Added 15px margins below links in Text Areas – except if last-child
= 1.0.0.1 = February 19, 2014
* Added Video Tutorials for all default Metaboxes
* Added MP Stacks Dashboard/Welcome Page
* Improved Default Responsive Styling

= 1.0.0.0 = February 10, 2014
* Original release

We just released version 1.0.5.2 of the Knapstack Theme which has some cool upgrades.

Header Upgrades:
You can now have a transparent background behind your header, set it to either scroll or stick to the top of the screen.

Footer Upgrades:
Footers have been upgraded to have their own stack! Now, all the power and control from MP Stacks can be used for the footer of your theme – using a single footer stack on every page. To use it, go to “Appearance” > “Customizer” and select the stack you wish to use for your footer.

= 1.0.5.2 = March 5, 2014
* Footer widgets are replaced with a Stack.
* Header can either be fixed or scroll
* Header background opacity option added