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Hello again! ??

I can understand how tag output inconsistencies can be frustrating and you’re right; sitewide coding consistency is a good thing to have. After all, theme developers (and webmasters in general) are encouraged to stick to coding patterns when developing themes.

Unfortunately at the moment, there isn’t really a fix for it (I don’t think, but granted, I haven’t investigated any plugins) aside from sticking to just the Text Editor and never swapping to Visual or simply disable Visual for the time being.

I reproduced the tag order swapping issue myself when I enabled Visual Editor and as such, I submitted a trac ticket to Core on behalf of this thread in hopes of getting the issue addressed. ??

https://core.trac.www.ads-software.com/ticket/28191

Hi there again!

Sorry to be late in getting back to you. Can you please link to the site (or link to a site that demos the theme you are using) so we can hopefully better troubleshoot where the rotating images are being inserted in?

Thanks!

Hi there! ??

Has deactivating the plugin and using a default theme helped your situation?

If you write a post with the plugin disabled and the default theme on, does the post look correct?

I know that it doesn’t seem like it at times, but I want to reiterate that we DO ‘hear’ you all and I’m sorry if it feels like your voices haven’t been heard and listened to.

We hear the frustrations, we hear that hours upon hours can and have been ‘lost’, we hear that it has been a difficult time not just adjusting to these changes but also trying to pass on this adjustment period smoothly to clients as well who may be even less comfortable with the changes, and we also hear that this change to WordPress does not make sense in some ways.

It’s such an awesome thing – to have such a diverse userbase whose members can all say that they are a part of WordPress – but unfortunately as seen in an issue like this one, we also have instances where frustrations are coming in from multiple angles of the spectrum of people who use WordPress and are passionate about WordPress.

Personally, I’m an in-between user – a combination between the end-user who uses WordPress fairly ‘vanilla’ out of the box and a theme developer – and I would like to share my thoughts on the issue at hand.

Firstly, In-Editor Image Padding and Border Was, Indeed, Useful…

Even though I myself never used that function as I turn Visual Editor off, I HAVE handcoded inline styling for individual images outside of my normal CSS specifications and I have done it enough to see where this function could definitely be a time-saver and useful…

Especially if it was quick and able to be applied as needed per image per Post or Page and existed as a functionality that was once straight out of the box.

Perhaps what is most important to note and bold and underline is the phrase as needed per image per Post or Page.

And Here is Where the Arguments Happen…

Yes, CSS styling and within a stylesheet is possible and – for the sake of web standards – considered the ‘best practice’.

Web Standards is not something WordPress on its own decides but rather, the web development world at large.

Web Standards affects things like web browsers and how they render websites.

This in turn means that, to ensure that WordPress-generated sites render correctly now and in the future, WordPress (and TinyMCE which WordPress uses in its content Editor) needs to follow the ‘best practices’.

This in turn eventually translated into something like the removal of some native inline image styling via the Editor via TinyMCE and offering the functionality as a plugin, instead.

Why?

Because Web Standards has – for quite some time – said time and time again that inline styling is best kept to a minimum.

The rationale?

It helps to keep coding clean (which helps with not just rendering but also debugging) and helps to ease the ‘patching’ of broken sites if a certain style option becomes defunct (easier to patch a single CSS file than thousands of images with inline styling on a site, for example).

There are other reasons, but these two probably make the most sense.

And Here is a Reason/Viewpoint on Why the Removal of the Native Image Styling Function Could Have Significant Impact on Users…

Unfortunately, what CSS in stylesheets does NOT do ‘well’ (in my opinion) – without adding a lot of highly post-and-page-specific code – is customize styling on the fly per image per post/page.

For example:

Let’s say someone wants to stylize the images in Post 100 with a padding of 10 and a border of black and a background of dark grey to give the impression of the images being framed.

But then in Post 101, that particular ‘framelike’ styling is no longer necessary and instead, the background color needs to be changed, the padding thickened or thinned, etc.

Or, let’s say in Post 102, there is ONE image out of a collection of 10 that needs to be ‘framed’ nicely while the rest can just be as they are.

CSS is great… but it honestly is best used when it can be applied uniformly with a few tweaks here and there. Like, one style set for ALL images posted in posts… one style set for images in sidebars… and one style set for elsewhere.

If a website doesn’t follow that sort of predictable pattern then there is more specific CSS that is needed and soon, what was supposedly ‘cut out’ of the visible website coding itself (when you look at a site’s source code) is simply added bulk in the CSS file.

Additionally, this is slower than in-Editor editing (editing the CSS every single time an image needs to be styled differently) and it would need to be individually applied for every. single. person’s. WordPress install (for those managing other people’s WordPress installs, and nobody is going to have the same image styling preferences or habits!).

Yes, inline CSS can also be typed in as a person types posts… but then that leaves a lot of room for human error. Forget to close a tag or add a semicolon or add an extra space or something and you get a broken post/page/website.

The native function both addressed the two points above and also took care of the potential ‘ooops!’.

As such, it’s no wonder this function has been so ‘useful’ and so:

A Compromise Happened.

In this case, plugins.

For those who want a uniform way to style the bulk majority of their images, CSS within a stylesheet really is the ‘best’ way to go. It isn’t the only way to do it, obviously, but it really is the ‘best’ way.

Not because I say so or WordPress says so or anyone else related to WordPress says so… but because Web Standards says so and to ensure forward/future compatibility of websites.

It is less about ‘pandering’ to theme developers and more about the sheer necessity of following web standards – standards not dictated by WordPress but standards that more or less ‘rule’ the web development world which includes web browsers and how they render web-based code and therefore, websites… which includes WordPress-generated websites.

Additionally, going back to TinyMCE… TinyMCE is used in WordPress’ content editor (used to write posts and pages) and so part of this whole change is also a TinyMCE thing as well.

In TinyMCE4, the people doing the work on TinyMCE decided to make certain inline styling options less accessible saying that padding and the like ought to be handled in stylesheets rather than in inline styling.

For those who need more of the on-the-fly capacity to edit, the plugin will do the trick going forward as it brings back a functionality that TinyMCE themselves have moved away from (and likely will not return to).

It isn’t a ‘perfect’ solution and I know people are going to be understandably unhappy about it, but unfortunately, the issue is more complex than what it initially may appear to be and going forward, the plugin compromise seems best.

As a web developer and theme developer, I see where web standards take priority.

As someone who has managed a site and has helped others manage image-based sites where images in posts needed to be styled differently from post to post (one of my clients liked to use paddings and backgrounds and borders to create individual frames for their pictures and they didn’t always reuse their ‘frames’), I can see where the flexibility of on-the-fly editing would take priority.

There IS a place for both; it’s the harmonizing of the two that’s what’s difficult to manage at times.

… You’re probably right Dave.

If the title appearing before href doesn’t cause coding errors (there are no validating errors, for example), then in all reality, there is no reason for alarm.

Maybe I should have asked if it was actually causing errors in the website – d’oh!

I’ve been on pain meds for a broken foot; please excuse me (both of you) and thank you for that quote above.

IF there are no coding errors appearing (other people who have noticed code changes have all complained about coding and rendering errors, too, which is kind of why I assumed there must be some errors showing up in rendering and not just how the links are formatted):

It would very likely be something related to the Visual Editor/TinyMCE (since swapping back and forth seems to cause the issue) altering the order of tags (harmlessly, probably).

My own completely handcoded links and embeds and the like (I have Visual Editor completely off since I am doing theme development right now) stay the same in my source code as how I originally input them in my content editor.

WordPress

works the same as:

WordPress

Or should.

… Though if alphabetized is ‘better’ then why would this ‘bug’ of rearranging tags choose to code the embed with the src first and the height in the middle?

I’m afraid that as someone who hasn’t used Visual Editor lately, I haven’t personally experienced some of these issues.

How long have you both noticed this swapping of tag orders? Only 3.9 or earlier?

Is it something you would like to be addressed when discussions are made re: Visual Editor and how it chooses to do things?

You’re welcome and I’m sorry that the other options didn’t work for you.

Out of curiosity, have you been able to specifically pinpoint when and how the issue is triggered?

For example:

1) Inline styling like bolding/stronging, italics, etc.

2) Links

3) Images

4) Embeds

Hi again! ??

It’s a little hard to explain the situation, but I will try my best to do so if you’d like to listen.

TinyMCE is actually a program used by WordPress’ content editor (where you write Posts and Pages) and isn’t managed (or fully managed) by WordPress itself. Think of it as a hardcoded functionality (like a plugin). In particular for those who use the Visual aspect of the Editor, it allows for the WYSIWYG functionality in the Visual Editor.

TinyMCE isn’t used just by WordPress but is also used by applications like forum software and probably the bulk majority of any software that offers content editing functionality.

TinyMCE4 went through a bunch of changes outside of WordPress’ control…

Which, of course, therefore affected WordPress – especially the plugins and themes that might have specifically ‘plugged’ into the TinyMCE functionality.

As a result, a lot of themes and plugins that plugged into the TinyMCE functionality ‘broke’…

And for some people, their installs in general started cropping up with Visual Editor issues without it being a plugin or theme issue that they could find. An example is double spacing or certain formatting (like you would in a Word document) not translating in parallel in WordPress.

That said, I definitely agree that some more public warning could have been given before or bundled with this release – that these changes in TinyMCE could potentially affect themes and plugins and some copy and pasting translations (and therefore the users who use features related to TinyMCE) – but unfortunately, it didn’t quite pan out the way it probably needed to.

It IS possible that we can try to troubleshoot the issue further and see if maybe we can resolve it some way or another. Some people have had success flushing out this problem while others have not (for example, that double spacing issue).

First of all, to give you an idea as to what I’m talking about: https://www.ads-software.com/support/topic/wordpress-39-master-list?replies=4

and this: https://www.ads-software.com/support/topic/how-to-troubleshoot-visual-editor-issues?replies=3&view=all

Now, as for troubleshooting:

1) Make a Backup.

Just in case.

2) Make a Backup of any handcoded/typed specific Contents or settings within Widgets.

Again, just in case. Normally, when swapping themes, widgets TEND to either stay put or become Inactive, but just in case, you have a ‘copy’ of their settings and contents.

3) Try a default WordPress theme, like Twentyfourteen.

This sets your theme to a default theme ‘guaranteed’ to work with WordPress… including changes to the Core, typically.

4) Disable your plugins one by one until you have no plugins installed.

This plus number 3 combined puts your WordPress at a ‘vanilla’ install.

A lot of the TinyMCE issues are coming from either plugins that ‘plug’ into that functionality or from a combination of both. Not necessarily all issues, but lots.

5a) Make a test post and see if the Visual Editor is working okay and if you’re still getting those strange coding errors.

I prefer to make a post like normal and simply private it. Once I’m done, I preview the post which goes into single post view mode which allows you to troubleshoot that post in particular.

5b) IF everything is okay then GREAT; it isn’t -just- because of the TinyMCE functionality inherent in WordPress. Unfortunately, this probably means one of your themes or plugins is the bigger culprit and isn’t plugging in to the functionality correctly.

5c) IF your functionality came back with vanilla (default theme and no plugins), try activating your custom theme. Does the Visual Editor work?

5d) IF your functionality came back with your custom theme, start activating plugins one by one and trying another test post to test the Visual Editor. Sometimes, themes and plugins just need a ‘reboot’ to work correctly again. Sometimes, if they’re not plugging in correctly, then they need to be disabled and their authors notified.

If you’re still getting the errors:

6) If you are willing, try to do a manual reupload of WordPress files.

For some reason, some people have had issues with updating where it updates most of the way, but somehow doesn’t quite finish updating and so there are issues with the install with certain functionalities not working quite right.

Hi there!

Are you using the Visual Editor to do your posting by any chance? If you are, does not using it solve the problem?

I tried to validate your site and it came up with a lot of coding errors related to your posts.

Hi there!

Actually, if it’s an issue with the Visual Editor then it’s more of an issue with the TinyMCE rather than actual WordPress Core itself and unfortunately, there isn’t a fix for it right this moment just yet (but work is being done to rectify this issue).

There are plugins that you could download to give you a more proper Visual Editor experience or you could – for the time being until a patch for the TinyMCE issue is out – turn off the Visual Editor and use the text and HTML-only editor.

I know it isn’t an ideal solution either way, but the WordPress team is aware of the issue and working on it.

Hi again! ??

Hopefully that works for you. One other thing, too: sometimes funny things can happen – plugins freezing, functions in themes not working, etc – after an upgrade so if the theme says that there is literally a customize header option related to your theme and you can’t find it/it’s disabled, always try disabling your theme and re-enabling it and disabling plugins.

Good luck!

Hello there!

The admin panel is typically available through domain.com/wp-admin and not domain.com/wp-login.

If you were trying the wp-login, try using the wp-admin and see what happens.

Hi again!

Thanks for the apology and I understand; it can be frustrating to get started on getting an answer but never get any further than that if the person who starts answering doesn’t come back.

By any chance have you had the chance to double check your WordPress database to make sure that the change you specified has taken place?

Additionally, if you check the admin email address in wp-admin/options.php (normally, I don’t recommend poking at it, but just to make sure the values are correct), is it the correct one?

You mentioned that you don’t have any mail forwarding; does this mean that you don’t have any email forwarding turned on for any of your associated – past or present – email addresses?

EDIT: Also, have you checked the email address you are using for your User Profile (used in conjunction to administer the site), too?

Hi there! ??

Assuming it is the website linked in your username:

<div class="title-area"> is where the header title along with the site description is being generated and if you are unable to modify the header because the theme doesn’t come with the additional header customization, then you can do something like this by either creating a Child theme and overriding the CSS (recommended) or directly editing your theme’s CSS file directly (which may later get overwritten if there is a theme update):

.title-area {
   display: none;
}

will make the title and the description in your header disappear.

For more information on Child Themes if you don’t have it already: https://codex.www.ads-software.com/Child_Themes

Hi there!

When you upload an image, what is the alignment of the inserted image?

Is it possible that instead of whatever previous image and text alignment you had, the settings reset and it is defaulting to aligning the image to the left and wrapping the text to the right accordingly?

It sounds like your old image settings had it set to no alignment while the new ones are defaulting to left alignment.

Hi there,

I am sorry you feel that way; I will be more than happy to forward your thread to someone else.

I misunderstood your post because though you said you were the web designer, you didn’t specify whose business it was in either mentioning "the business" or in mentioning "I am receiving new user registration advice on my business email". I therefore assumed incorrectly that the business was yours for which I apologize.