Sneek Peek at ClassiPress 3.0
Yes, the rumors are true. ClassiPress version 3.0 is late, behind, belated, blown, delayed, held up, hung up, in a bind, in the lurch, jammed, lagging, missed the boat, overdue, postponed, put off, slow, tardy, and any other synonym I failed to list. Why do you ask?
Well, as you might have read from my forum response, there are several reasons but that won’t stop us from working hard on getting it completed and released as soon as we possibly can.
If you haven’t already purchased ClassiPress and are holding out until 3.0, I recommend you get in now while the prices are still low. They will increase once 3.0 comes out so even if you don’t want to install 2.9.3, you can lock in your price and just wait for the free 3.0 update. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. 😉
In the meantime, I wanted to treat you to a sneek peek at what the new ClassiPress will look like. This is a first hand look of never before seen screen shots. There will be 5 different color variations so don’t be upset if you don’t like this shade of blue.
The inner pages are still being finalized but i will post them as soon as they are finished and approved. When will ClassiPress 3.0 be available? Read the forum post link included above to find out the details. 🙂
Any feedback of this design is of course welcome but it’s already pretty much locked and loaded at this point.
Comments (137)
Although the new design looks nice, I’m with Grant on this re: forcing a classified system into a typical blog type design, especially as this sort of design is starting to look tired already.
I’d like to see a better solution to the categories also. I’ve yet to see anyone come up with such a neat category filter using as WP as this site: http://www.swiss-miss.com <- this site runs off WP.
@Micha: thanks for the heads up on the other classified theme – they also offer customisation services, which is cool.
Classipress 3.0 is very good.I wait for the update to work with them.
enjoy classipress !!!!
Update looks good.. and hopefully we get it real soon! 🙂
Here’s a superb example of a classified site specialising in mid-century modern furniture: http://www.lushpad.com/
Apart from the beautiful typography, there’s a few things that should be noted:
– It doesn’t look like a blog
– Nicely structured categories
– Save items to clipboard function (very useful!)
– It doesn’t look like a blog!
– Ability to filter and refine search results when on archive pages, e.g. http://www.lushpad.com/lighting.html (a must have for any classified listing site worth its salt)
– Ability to change geographical location (nice!)
– It doesn’t look like a blog!!
Almost ALL WP theme developers are very lame when it comes to navigation and filtering search/browse results in their themes. If you notice, the top part of the sidebar in most premium themes is dedicated to displaying 125 x 125 banner ads at the expense of navigational and filtering controls.
A classified listing site will fail if it doesn’t have decent category filtering functionality.
Lushpad is a very nicely designed site indeed. A LOT of the design and functionality could and should be implemented into Clasipress.
I like Lushpad as well. They don’t have too many categories so putting them in the sidebar or on the homepage works well for them. Trying to come up with a clever solution with the CP categories has been difficult to do. Putting them in the sidebar works but it also takes up a lot of real estate. Having a mega tab works well because it hides the categories until you need to see them. If you have a ton of categories, then you can only show 1-2 levels deep.
A lot of the feedback I got said they wanted a sidebar on the home page. The great thing with WordPress is you can always create your own home page and use that instead. Either create a home.php file (WP looks for that first) or use a page and just assign it as your home page within the WP admin setup.
Carlos do you know what classifieds ad platform this website is using? The website is great. Like it very much
i want to know when the 3.0 is ok?
thanks
@Jess I think the same quality of design as LushPad can easily be achieved with Classipress, but if the theme doesn’t have good categorisation functionality AND the ability to refine/filter results when on any of the archive pages, then it will be pointless.
As I said in my previous comment, the ability for users to filter and refine search results when on archive pages is a ‘must have’ feature for any classified listing site worth its salt.
I agree Carlos.
@ Carlos Takemura
“A classified listing site will fail if it doesn’t have decent category filtering functionality.”
You are completely right!
@ Carlos Takemura and others interested in the filtering functionality.
You can find more info in this thread:
http://wpclassipress.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=1914
@chabri – thanks for the forum link.
I notice that WordPress itself has recently implemented a tag filter on its theme page: http://wordpress.org/extend/themes/tag-filter/
It’s not bad but nowhere as good as this: http://swiss-miss.com
@chabri – I just read the thread you started in the forum. Search is one thing; filtering is another.
Filtering is more useful, and valuable experience for the user, because you are drilling down choices based only on structured content published on the site you are browsing.
Just recently I’ve been looking at a real-estate premium theme and whilst the design is dazzling and options page nice and slick, it’s a load of crap because say I choose a country such as Afghanistan from their drop down list, the resulting page then tells me: sorry, we do not have anything in that country!
I kinda guessed that perhaps there wouldn’t be many real-estate listings in Afghanistan, if any right now, but what is the point of showing countries when there’s no actual content on your site?
Totally useless!
Filtering is better, but if WP is very weak on search then what is it like with filtering?
Also love lushpad’s front page, very sexy way to present classifieds. Also a big fan of directory style layout (an improved craigslist style) and category pivoting – e.g. you’re in Cars for Sale then you click the region Brooklyn and you automatically get Cars for Sale only in Brooklyn.
I’ve just been doing more digging around and saw a post about the upcoming new features of CP 3.0, and they seem very cool!
I am probably going to use CP for one of our larger sites, but with heavy front end customisation. The ecommerce elements and ability for users to easily post and upload images, and maintain their ads, not to mention the accounting features, are worth the cost alone.
As for my categorisation and filtering concerns we’re just going to see if we can build our own plugins.
However, one question remains: when will version 3.0 be released 😉
I’m targeting to have a 3.0 beta done by the end of Feb. One new enhancement with 3.0 was to replace the image resizing script with the Tim Thumb script. It’s a much better script and easier to troubleshoot any issues.
But now with WP 2.9, it comes with a built-in thumbnail resizer which means themes don’t need to depend on 3rd party scripts like Tim Thumb. I want CP to be as WP native as possible so going back to learn and implement this without Tim Thumb will take additional work.
I guess i am having hard time not knowing when is the D day.. oct -nov dec 2009- now we are at jan 31… My 2 cent of advice is if you wanna run your business well, don’t make promises that might be too huge for you to fulfill.
Just say in a simple plain English when is the released day for 3.0..
Will users be able to post blogs and add listings at the same time on version 3? Will I be able to charge for both blog posts and listings?
No. Only the site owner will be able to post blog articles unless you of course setup a user with wordpress permissions to submit a blog post.
i am sorry i let classipress because a have find another theme classifields wordpress.
i can wait more time.
byeee
Hi,
Can you give us a date when it is coming out?
I may have some potential clients for it, but I can’t promise them anything unless I know if 3.0 will be available at least in the next 60 days???
3.0 is looking Great though.
Thanks!
I’m hoping to have a 3.0 beta by the end of Feb. Then it will take a few weeks of testing and bug fixing before 3.0 will be slated as a RC (release candidate).
Just my two pence worth. Look at the size and PROMINENCE of images on the listings pages of Lushpad. Although I like classipress I do feel the images should be given a lot more prominence, rather than almost an afterthought below the description.
After all, people will look at / for the pictures first – a picture speaks a thousand words.
Perhaps this will be addressed in Version3?
Yes, the ad images section will be much higher up in 3.0.
Any chance of having Oodle API integration to show syndicated ads within Classipress sites? This would be a great feature to help populate new sites with content.
Not with the initial 3.0 release but that’s a good idea for a future feature. 😉
David, how man category and sub-category can be added. Also how can I pay for this?
You can have as many categories and sub-categories as you like. It’s all part of the WordPress framework. ClassiPress can be purchased either using PayPal funds or a credit card.
Just a small thing but having the number of ads next to its category is very helpful. Hate to click at categories just to see no ads.
e.g.
Cars (12)
Yes that option will be included.
David, I have 2 question. What is the Cost and how many locations / state can you add… Is it possible to see a jpg image.
-Thanks
CP starts at $59 for the basic version. In 3.0 you will be able to have as many custom fields and values as you want. There are a couple other blog posts that have screen casts of what it will look like.
David, I see that CP relies on a few plugins by Lester Chan.
According to this post on his blog, as from February 1st 2010 he will no longer be supporting any of his plugins:
http://lesterchan.net/wordpress/2010/01/28/all-good-things-must-come-to-an-end/
That’s to bad about his plugins but I certainly understand his position. Free plugins don’t pay the bills and he should consider either selling them or work directly with WP and get them integrated with the product. He’s done great work and I’ve used several of his plugins on many sites including CP.
His plugins will continue to be supported with CP until they no longer work with WP. Actually modified versions of his wp-pagenavi and wp-email plugins are built into 3.0 so you won’t need to install them going forward.
[…] over to http://wpclassipress.com/sneek-peek-at-classipress-3-0/ to see the new […]
David:
which is the date for launching the new 3.0? I need it. Thanks
3.0 will be out in mid-end of March after beta testing and bug fixes are complete.
Hi David, I have a question with respect to payment processing:
Will v.3.0 have integration with PayPal Payments Pro, or only with PayPal Standard?
Thanks
3.0 will not support PayPal Payments Pro. The main reasons being is b/c payments pro is very complex for your typical ClassiPress user and a lot of development resources to set it up. It requires a shopping cart integrated on your site, SSL, and the ability to store customer credit card data in a database.
You also need to comply with PayPal’s security requirements for collecting and transmitting payment data.
There will be add-ons available for CP standard edition like Google Checkout and other merchants in the future. I also plan to include PayPal IPN which is a great alternative to Payments Pro. The professional (developers) edition will come standard with them, however.
Discussion is closed.