WordPress Plugin – Scheduled Announcement Widget

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Description

The Scheduled Announcements Widget lets you add a scrolling list of site announcements, independent of normal posts and pages, to any widgetized area of your site, or to your theme files. Perfect for publicizing an event, alert, or notice that doesn’t require a full-page write-up. Announcements can be scheduled to run indefinitely or during a specific date range, and admins can chose between horizontal or vertical scrolling.


Download

WordPress Repo: http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/scheduled-announcements-widget

Direct Downloads:

Version 0.29/5/2104
Version 0.1.8.1
4/22/2014
Version 0.1.8
12/5/2013 *bug fix
Version 0.1.7
12/4/2013
Version 0.1.6
5/16/2013
Version 0.1.512/13/2012
Version 0.1.4
11/23/2012
Version 0.1.3
11/6/2012 *bug fix
Version 0.1.2
6/27/2012
Version 0.1.1
3/7/2012
Version 0.12/1/2012


Screenshots


Contributors: kionae
Tags: announcements, alerts, scheduled announcements
Donate link: http://nlb-creations.com/donate/
Requires at least: 3.2.1
Tested up to: 4.0
Stable tag: trunk


Installation

  1. Unzip and upload plugin to the `/wp-content/plugins/` directory
  2. Activate the plugin through the ‘Plugins’ menu in WordPress
  3. Add announcements using the Announcements tab in the WordPress Dashboard.
  4. Configure your widget under Announcements > Settings

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I re-order my announcements?

Yes, as of version 0.1.1. Each Announcement now includes a numerical Order field. You can set whether you want the widget to display Announcements in ascending or descending order based on this field in the plugin’s Settings panel.

Can I put the ticker in a post or page?

Yes, using the shortcode [announcements]

The shortcode function can use the default configuration options set in Announcements > Settings, or it can be customized manually using any of the following variables.

title – Will display a header title above the ticker
show_titles – Will show or hide the title field of the announcements. Set to 1 for show, 0 for hide.
order – Set whether announcements display in ascending or descending order. Valid options are ‘ASC’ or ‘DESC’.
scroll – The scroll style of the ticker. Valid options are ‘horizontal’ or ‘vertical’.
speed – The speed in milliseconds at which the ticker will scroll
transition – The length in milliseconds at which the scroll animation will take to complete
width – The width in pixels of the ticker
height – The height in pixels of the ticker
link – The hexidecimal color code to use for links in the announcements (eg. 0000FF for blue)
text – The hexidecimal color code to use for text in the announcements (eg. 000000 for black)
saw_id – User-specified CSS ID for the ticker
tax – The taxonomy/category ID (you may use the ID or the slug) to filter by

For example:

[announcements title="Announcements" order="ASC" show_titles="1" scroll="horizontal" speed="4000" transition="800" width="600" height="50" link="0000FF" text="000000" saw_id="news" tax="my-news"]

Can I display announcements by category?

Yes. Assign a category to your announcement, and then select that category from the dropdown menu in the widget settings. If you are using the shortcode rather
than the widget, set the “tax” attribute to either the ID or slug of the category you wish to display. Make sure you are using slugs/IDs for the Announcement Categories
(displayed under the Announcements tab in the Dashboard) and not the default WordPress Categories.

[announcements tax="news"]

or

[announcements tax="7"]

I want to put more than one ticker on a page, but it breaks when I try.

You need to give each ticker its own unique id. In the shortcode this is done with the saw_id attribute (see shortcode example two questions back). In the widget, just fill in the
text box label Ticker ID.

You should also avoid the use of hyphens in your ID names, because it will royally mess up the javascript. In most cases, if you forget, the plugin will automatically replace them
with underscores.


Changelog

0.2

  • Fixed an issue with the shortcode not having default configuration settings if the user hasn’t visited the config page.
  • Verified WordPress 4.0 compatibility

0.1.8.1

  • Added some text to clarify the purpose of some of the widget fields.
  • Updated the icon

0.1.8

  • Fixed a badly written query for announcements filtered by category (thanks to Jurrien Dokter for pointing it out and offering a fix!)

0.1.7

  • Fixed some WordPress 3.7.1 compatibility issues
  • Altered shortcode to accept either category ID or category slug.
  • Added default CSS id to the shortcode to prevent conflicts with the sidebar widget.
  • Added code to replace hypens with underscores in user-defined ID names so javascript doesn’t freak out.

0.1.6

  • Removed divider between anouncement title and text, and replaced it with a CSS span styles can be applied to if desired

0.1.5

  • Fixed issue with unpublished announcements showing up in the scroller.
  • Clarified how the date scheduling feature works.

0.1.4

  • Added the ability to change the transition speed of the scroll animation

0.1.3

  • Fixed a bug that was breaking pages with multiple widgets in use
  • Fixed a bug with the taxonomy filter within the widget

0.1.2

  • Announcements now support shortcode in the body text
  • Bug Fix: If no announcements are scheduled, the announcment block is hidden
  • Announcements can now be filtered by category, allowing you to have multiple types of announcements (e.g. News, Alerts, Events, etc.)

0.1.1

  • Added the ability to specify order of the announcements
  • Announcement scrolling now pauses on mouseover

0.1

  • Initial release

 

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112 Comments to "WordPress Plugin – Scheduled Announcement Widget"

  1. Ronnie says:

    Is there a way to change the announcement order form oldest to newest. Thanks

  2. Mark says:

    Great plug-in. Is there a way to add the scroller to the header.php file? The shortcode [announcements] only works on pages and posts. I’m trying to add it to the header. Thx

  3. Ahmad says:

    Hi,

    I’m having problem with the plugin css. The annoucement is indented which makes it not align with the widget placement. How can I solve this? or at least to turn off the plugin css

    • Nikki Blight says:

      I tried to limit the css embedded in the plugin only to what was necessary for the javascript to function correctly. I can look into moving the css into an external file that you can override from your theme, though.

  4. Hi Nikki,

    #1, thank you for a plugin that actually works. That makes you a goddess!

    I was just wondering if it’s possible to see more than one announcement at a time? for instance, for vertical scroll, if the height is 100, if we could fit in as many announcements fit in 100 pixels and then scroll from there.

    Thanks!

  5. Or … a way to link the widget to a list of all announcements? I can find permalinks for individual announcements but you still have to click/scroll through them. Did I miss something? I will check the documentation again.

    • Nikki Blight says:

      Currently, there’s no way to link to just a straight list of announcements outside of the scrolling plugin or display more than one at a time.

      But it’s certainly something I can look at adding in a future release. 🙂

      • LeeAnne Egge says:

        Here’s an easy way to get an archive page listing all announcements:

        *********************************

        In scheduled-announcements.php find register_post_type(

        Right under:
        ‘public’ => true,

        Add:
        ‘has_archive’ => true,
        ‘rewrite’ => array(‘slug’ => ‘announcements-list’),

        ****************************

        Then when you go to yourwebsite.com/announcements-list/, your entire announcements list will be there, styled by your theme.

  6. aroengbinang says:

    It works great, thanks Nikki!

    Just wondering if there’s a way to stop the rolling text on mouse over, so that readers may read it longer or copy the information.

  7. NewsMan says:

    Hi, this could be exect the plugin i need. But it’s not working. No vertical scrolling widget als also the horizontal isn’t working. WP 3.31

    • Nikki Blight says:

      I’ve tested the widget in WP 3.3.1 and have had no problems, so my guess would be that there’s a conflict with your theme or with another plugin.

      Does anything you’re using on your site disable jQuery (which is required for the scrolling animation)?

      Also, keep in mind that if the plugin detects only one announcement with a current schedule, there will be nothing to scroll and only that announcement will display. Double check the start and end dates on your announcements to make sure that what you think should be displaying is actually scheduled to display.

      • tracersa says:

        same issue here I am on 3.3.2 (latest version). The announcement doesn’t appear. I don’t have any plugins installed except for this one. This is the first plugin installed on my site

  8. Julie says:

    Hello,

    Thank You for this great plug in.
    It works very nicely in a widget. I’m trying to use it in a PHP file (outside the post editor). The do_shortcode is working but I can’t get it to scroll. I’m sure I’m just missing a step or need to keep it in a different directory. I’m stuck. Do you have any ideas or a link to some instruction? Any help will be greatly appreciated.

    Here is the non scrolling page: http://www.jhcband.org/wordpress/jhcb-announcements.php

    I’m going to call it with an include on the front page of my site.

    Thank you for your time,
    Julie

    • Nikki Blight says:

      It looks like your PHP file is not pulling in the jQuery library, which is what runs the scrolling animation.

      WordPress would normally include it in header.php, but it looks like you’re not using the theme’s regular header.php file here. You’ll have to add the call to the jQuery library manually to get the scroll to work. 🙂

  9. Julie says:

    Hello, me again. Is it possible to use a short code in an announcement?

    Thanks,
    Julie

    • Nikki Blight says:

      Hmm… you know, I’ve actually never tried it.

      But I don’t think it would work, since the output is outside of the Loop and thus doesn’t go though WP’s the_content() function, which I think is a requirement for shortcode to work outside of the do_shortcode() function.

  10. Christine says:

    Hi Nikki,
    Great plugin, but I can’t get mine to work!! As you said, it must be a jquery conflict, but I don’t know where to start to attack the issue… can you get me started??? thanks!

    • Nikki Blight says:

      If at all possible, I would start by disabling any other plugins you have running, and re-enabling them one at a time until you find the one that is causing the conflict.

  11. Neil Colvin says:

    The plugin does not work with our theme when it is used as a sidebar widget.

    I have a screen shot of the problem, but no way to upload it here 🙁

    Also, it incorrectly word wrap, truncating the end of each line. That is in the screen shot too

  12. Pat says:

    Hi Nikki,
    Many thanks for your plugin. I have only one remark concerning the layout : when place in the right sidebar, I’m not able to make the full text of the annoucement seenable, even if I play with the width of the widget. There is always a small part of text which is truncated in the right.
    Is there any way to manage this?
    For info, I’m using the weaver II template currently.
    Many thanks
    Pat

  13. Do I need to set both start and end dates for an announcement to “expire?” I only have end dates set, and I’m still seeing a couple announcements a week or more old.

  14. Liz says:

    Nikki thanks for your plug-in; it’s great. One question though: Is there a way to change the way it scrolls? I would like for my announcements to scroll like a basic news ticker: smooth and steady, with one announcement following after the other. But currently, these are swooping right off to the left, and the next title swoops right in behind it, but it doesn’t scroll in the classic sense. How do I change the settings to get the smooth, continuous scroll effect? Thanks..

    • Nikki Blight says:

      I’m not quite sure I understand. Are you looking for a continuous scroll without pauses (which is not currently supported), or are you seeing a jumpy animation?

      • Liz says:

        Hi Nikki. My apologies for the delayed reply. Actually, you answered my question. I was hoping to be able to set it to continuous scroll without pauses.

  15. Oren says:

    Finally a plugin that works!!
    Was struglling with GOPIPLUS’s shitty plugins…

    I do have one question:
    Is there a way to make the messages to stop scrolling once mouse-hovering them?

    That would be great!

    Thanks 🙂
    Oren

  16. Oren says:

    One other question if I may:
    Is there a way to display more than one message each time?

    Thanks again 🙂

    • Nikki Blight says:

      At the moment, no. It’s meant to display one message at a time. This may be something I end up changing, though, as I seem to be getting a lot of requests for it.

  17. Alex says:

    Hi, Could you please let me know how could I set a background color or background image of the announcements.

    Thank you!

  18. komkom says:

    I have a website in two languages. I added two scheduled announcements widgets on the sidebar – one for each language. I have 8 announcements (4 for each language). But when I looked at my site, all 8 of them are showing in both versions.

  19. David says:

    Nikki Hi,

    Great plugin!

    I am wanting to align the scroller to the edge of a table cell but there seems to be a padding attached to the left hand side of scroller of about 20px or so. Can I reduce this to 0px?

    Thanks

    David

    • Nikki Blight says:

      Without seeing it, I’m not sure. All of the padding that’s hardcoded into my plugin’s output should already be set to 0px, so I’m not sure where the padding you’re seeing is coming from.

  20. lar says:

    wow – excellent plugin – took a while to find it, but how wonderful is this: unlimited ordered announcements . . . any one can have a title and/or supporting text/links . . and it can be a widget or short-coded onto a page/post – very nice job – thanks

  21. tarun says:

    Hi,

    I think the plugin is really great but there is some issue while its used as a page.
    The default Permalink: http://website-URL/sched_announcement/announcement/ is set which somehow doesnt work when permalink is set as Day and name. When I try open the page it display me 404.
    Could you please suggest how to fix the issue.

    Thanks,
    Tarun

  22. Katya says:

    Hi There,

    Love your plugin by the way, it is really nice and clean and easy for me to edit with some css. Just one question, is there any way to pause the announcements? Or at least have it so it doesn’t automatically scroll and there are just arrows controlling it?

    Thanks!!

    • Nikki Blight says:

      It should pause when your mouse cursor hovers over the announcement (though I’ve had some reports of it not doing so in all browsers, which is something I’m still trying to figure out).

      The plugin isn’t set up for manual scrolling. Auto-scroll is currently the only option.

  23. Kenn says:

    Great plugin! Is there a way to make it completely disappear unless there’s an announcement? For example: I work at a TV station and we’re designing a new site using WP, and I think this plugin would work great for doing school closing announcements in the winter, but right now if there’s no scheduled announcements it’s still reserving the space, and I get the title (in this case “Announcement:”), then nothing below it. I’d like it to only show up if there’s something scheduled.

  24. Michael says:

    When I select the Announcements link, there are several “Invalid Argument” warnings. I am able to add an announcement, but no way to edit it afterwards.

    Thanks for the help.

  25. Adib says:

    I tried adding [announcements title=”Announcements” show_titles=”1″ order=”ASC” scroll=”horizontal” width=”600″ height=”50″ link=”0000FF” text=”000000″ saw_id=”news”] in the php files, but it only shows the code.

  26. Venner says:

    Hi Nikki,
    Epic plugin. Just wanted to let you know about a problem a friend of mine is having. When the sharing options of WordPress are active for the front page. Share options are displayed in the announcements regardless of being checked.

    Other than that, works and looks great. Please keep up the great work.

    Venner

  27. Craig says:

    Nikki,

    I used the media insert function in the WP editor to insert an image into and announcement.

    The right side of the image was getting cut-off in the sidebar of my site. I went into my media library and reduced the size of the image using the scale feature. If I click on the image in my media library, it is noticeably smaller (50px), and should fit into the sidebar.

    After refreshing the cache on my site, and reloading the page, the image appears to be the original size.

    Any ideas?

    • Craig says:

      Also wondering if you have moved the CSS to an external file. I want to change some font settings.

      • Nikki Blight says:

        Currently, CSS is embedded in the plugin’s output. But I don’t think there are actually any font styles included in that, other than link color (which can be changed in the plugin’s settings panel). The CSS is primarily for positioning.

    • Nikki Blight says:

      My guess would be that either the image is cached in your browser, or the url to the image in the announcement is still going to the original size image (I’m not sure whether WordPress overwrites the original file, or simply creates a new size with a unique name when you resize from the media library… I usually resize directly in the post).

  28. Craig says:

    One More item – How do I stop posts from scrolling on top of each other. You can see a picture Here

  29. Craig says:

    Nikki – I tried to click on the link for an announcement, or even use the View Announcement link when creating the post. It takes me to my 404 page. I installed the plug-in through the WP automated process.

    Can you help me with this as well?

    • Nikki Blight says:

      Try re-saving your permalinks settings. Sometimes when a new content type is added to a site, WordPress’ .htaccess file doesn’t pick up on it automatically.

      • Craig says:

        This one worked – actually I was on a windows wordpress site where I was having issues with permalinks.

        Once converted to Linux, We were good to go.

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Nikki Blight – Web/PHP Developer