WordPress Store Locator v4.0 is a PHP 7 compatible store locator that’s now ready following a thorough update & improvement.

WordPress requested these updates in order to allow Store Locator to continue providing all the great benefits you’ve had for many years. Additionally, new addon features are now available, many of which topped users’ request list for a while.

Changes

All addons, labeled v2.0 or higher, are official WordPress plugins, meaning that they are much easier to install and update than ever before (much less FTP needed now).

Additionally, it more tightly integrates into WordPress’s platform. This allows Store Locator to take advantage of WordPress’s ongoing security enhancements with each new update.

The previous way of installing and updating addons — via our Addons Marketplace — will not be available to new users since WordPress’s admin plugin interface now provides the installation and updating functionality for the base plugin and addons.

Now, Addons Platform Lite v2.0 — which powers all Store Locator addons, just without the Addons Marketplace — will be provided with Store Locator v4.0+.

New Benefits

So many new benefits for developers and their clients exist, but here a some important ones of note:

Fully PHP 7 Compatibility:

PHP, just like WordPress, Store Locator, Google Maps, and any other platform, continues to evolve year by year. PHP 7 is the latest iteration of PHP, thus, stay on top of the eventual shift of web hosting over to PHP 7+. This PHP 7 compatible Store Locator helps accomplishes this nicely.

Still on PHP 5.2? Store Locator still supports that too currently. Would suggest bumping up your PHP version to at least PHP 5.3+, with PHP 7.0+ being preferable, however.

Custom Ordering of Location Results:

One of the many great features provided by the Power Options addon. A popular request that is available for your benefit.

New Addons:

Power Options, as previously mentioned, incorporates several new heavily requested features that give you more power to customize your Store Locator just as envisioned. Developer Console, similarly, provides the tools and guidance to create custom addons that can change & enhance the way that one’s Store Locator operates.

Painstaking effort and thought has gone into building Store Locator v4.0+ based on feedback — the responses from users so far have been positive as it has helped provide the benefits, functionality, and compatibility needed to serve their clients’ needs.

Confident it will do the same for you. There are even more new benefits in the works, so more improvements are coming.

Dynamic Text Translating:

WPML 3.2+ and Polylang plugins provide dynamic text translating — Store Locator v4.0+ integrates with both.

Dynamic translating essentially is being able to translate customizable texts in a plugin’s settings. For Store Locator, these customizable, translatable texts can be found on the MapDesigner admin settings page.

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Over the Holidays …

WordPress Store Locator v3.85 and later resolves this problem for pages specific to Store Locator, so once you’ve updated, everything should be fine again.

Download Here or Update Via Your WP Admin Dashboard

The post Many Map APIs – Update WordPress Store Locator for Smooth Operations appeared first on Viadat Creations.

As WordPress becomes more advanced, so do the techniques employed by theme & plugin authors.

To keep in step, noticed that custom post types, statuses, and page builders were sometimes causing some users’ maps not to show up at times by preventing the WordPress Store Locator‘s javascript from loading. Store Locator v3.7+ should fully fix that now.

Download Here or Update Via Your WP Admin Dashboard

Now, all should be fine — if your map is sometimes not loading, make sure to update! The latest version is now v3.8 as of this writing.

The post Store Locator v3.7 — Improvements With Custom Post Types & Page Builders appeared first on Viadat Creations.

If you have already made modifications to your ‘location-template.php’ file, save a copy of it to your computer before updating to Location Pages v1.1, released today. It will become ‘location-sample-template.php’ moving forward and will be used as a default template for first-time users.

After this update, your template’s HTML & template shortcode will be stored in the Store Locator’s database, but still modifiable from your Location Pages admin interface.

Great Feedback

Great feedback from our addon users, Early Access members, and regular/non-members in recent months — it has really aided in the development of new addon features and learning what users are looking forward to. Just released WordPress Store Locator v3.5 today, with many base Store Locator and major addon updates as a result.

The post Store Locator Addon Notice: Save Template Before Updating Location Pages appeared first on Viadat Creations.

Using FTP

Not everyone using the WordPress Store Locator plugin & its addons are highly technical — and that’s okay.  WordPress is an online publishing tool that makes life very easy for both highly-technical developers and non-technical users alike.  Likewise, the aim has always been to create a Store Locator that also follows in the mold of WordPress’s ease of use.

After helping a number of users to use File Transfer Protocol (FTP), in order to get their addons up and running, decided to share this tutorial that has been shared with them — and hopefully it will help many others.

How to upload folders/files to your website (CSV Importer addon example)

1) You will need to use FTP to upload folders & files to your website.  FTP is “File Transfer Protocol” — It’s how you can upload and download files from your website’s server (“server” is the remote computer hosting your website’s files so that it shows up online as a website)

2) Easiest way to get FTP:  Use the browser, FireFox, and install the FireFTP addon: http://fireftp.net/ (you can also go to “Tools > Add-ons” from within FireFox and then search for “FireFTP”)

3) To log into your website using FireFTP (in order to upload folders & files), click the blue seahorse icon that shows up near your browser’s address bar. Then, from the drop down menu, choose “Create an account…”

4) Then, you will need to create an account for your website using the FTP login credentials for your website (might need to ask your website host about this, or if you use cPanel, the login might be the same for FTP)

(Note: Steps 5 & 6 pertain directly to the CSV Importer addon)

5) Once successfully connected, you will see the files on your computer on the left side of the screen, and the files on your website’s server on the right side of the screen. You will want to take your unzipped folder ‘/csv-xml-importer-exporter/’ and upload it to ‘/{your_WordPress_root}/wp-content/uploads/sl-uploads/addons/’  using the Green Right Arrow in the middle (use the Left Arrow to download files from your website to your computer)

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The latest version of the WordPress Store Locator (version 2.13) addresses a blank admin area experienced by a select few of you when trying to access your Store Locator’s admin.

Seemed to be caused by having certain functionality unavailable or turned off on your server (cURL or file_get_contents), but should now display the admin properly even with those functions off.

Stay Tuned

More Store Locator updates to come in December, stay tuned — and don’t forget to keep your Store Locator updated!

The post Store Locator v2.13: Fixes Blank Admin Area Experienced By a Select Few appeared first on Viadat Creations.

Update to Store Locator v2! Important!

It is mandatory that you update to v2 of the WordPress Store Locator, because it uses Google Maps API v3.

Older Store Locator versions use Google Maps API v2, which is being shut off soon.

Older Versions Will Not Geocode Your Locations Anymore

In fact, Google Geocoding API v2 seems to already be off. No further questions concerning geocoding errors will be answered for those of you using old versions before Store Locator v2 (geocoding: giving your locations latitude & longitude coordinates).

Just like keeping WordPress up-to-date, keeping your Store Locator up-to-date is crucial, due to changes to external services/APIs such as Google Maps.

Announced This Twice So Far, Don’t Hesitate — Update!

1. When first announcing Store Locator v2
2. When telling everyone to update to Store Locator v2.1

The post Important: Update To Store Locator v2.x, Which Uses Google Maps API v3! appeared first on Viadat Creations.

Versions 2.3 & 2.4 have introduced options for updating the message seen by your website visitors if:

1. No locations are found during a Store Locator search
2. The initially searched location doesn’t exist

Additionally, for those choosing to load locations by default, you can now determine whether to show both the map markers and the listing of results on initial load, or just the map markers.

The post New in v2.3 & v2.4 — Additional Options for Map Interface appeared first on Viadat Creations.

Great to see how these products are helping users to enhance their client or their own websites by presenting the Store Locator to their website visitors.

Continue to Rate Us! Tell Us How Great the WordPress Store Locator Is!

Go to our plugin page, and tell us in a review & rating — we would like to personally thank each one of you! Ratings help us to improve WordPress, and continue development.

And of course, you can always contact us or view the documentation if you have any issues or questions! In fact, let us know what you are looking forward to in future releases!

Some of Best Feedback Thus Far (Public & Private)

Have something great to say too? Tell us what you think!

The post August 2013 Recap: Good Feedback, Downloads, and Addon Usage appeared first on Viadat Creations.

Important: Make sure to update today to Store Locator v2.1 (you can do so from your ‘Plugins’ admin page, or download the latest here).

Details

It has improved transitioning into using Store Locator v2 for all users (both those of you currently using Store Locator v1 and those who are already using an earlier Store Locator v2), so that there is even better display of your locations on your Store Locator page.

Also remember, Google Maps API V2 (used by Store Locator v1) is anticipated to be discontinued by Google by November 19, 2013, so it’s important to soon be using Store Locator v2, which uses Google Maps API V3.  Any questions/problems, make sure to make contact via the contact page.

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