Series 3 Blogs - Beta testing info
Last updated: 27th January 2020.
Thank you for joining the Dedicated Blog beta test! We're so excited to have you on board and to hear your feedback.
About template testing
Dedicated Blog is our most versatile template yet and creating it has been a big endeavour. Its flexibility and near infinite options mean that it's incredibly powerful. We're proud to have built it from the ground up using the latest web technologies and including all the features that we ourselves wanted from a modern, image-rich blog. We took on a blog template, but on the way we also overhauled a lot of existing DPG blog features. That means there is a lot to test!
Where are we now?
We've done a lot of internal testing and have been living with this template for a number of months, so we classify this user testing period as a stable final release of the template. This means that this is more or less the template that will be rolled out to all users. There should be no big issues, but there may be some bugs, the occasional odd behaviour and changes to the function or appearance of elements as we move forward.
We think that this template is ready for users to create public sites. Based on this testing period, there may be changes or bug fixes in the near future that mean you would need to rebuild your site from the updated version of the template. As the blogs/posts are separate to the website template, this should be as simple as creating a new site and re-linking your blog. Your blog content will be preserved and transferred over to the new site. However, any changes to the theme design may need to be made again.
There are currently only a handful of pre-made themes for this template, with more in progress. You are able to fully customise all elements of the design in the meantime using the Design section.
What's your role?
Our primary goal is for you to enjoy using it! We made the template by observing the kind of blogs our users make and listening to the features you requested over the years. We can't wait to see what you create with it. If there is a blog feature or customisation that you would like to see or a design element you want to change, or if you can't figure out how to do something - please get in touch.
Support
Another purpose of this testing period is for us to create all of the support materials covering the breadth of the template and all its new features. This means that you may not be able to find an article or guide for every Dedicated Blog related question at this time.
We are working as fast as we can, but until we have everything covered we're happy to answer any questions, talk you through things or even hop into your account and take a look over your progress (if you want us to!).
Contact us at support@digitalphotogallery.com any time, we're here to help.
About the template
What's new
- Index view - truncated blog view with 6 new layout styles
- Post templates - a new way to visually lay out blog posts
- Featured posts - highlight best content at the top of the blog as a carousel
- Related posts - select similar posts to display in post view
- Post navigation - navigate between posts in post view
- New mix and match headers and footers
- Optimised for all modern devices and beautiful mobile design
Get started
If all that sounds good and without further ado, let's dive in.
Follow a step by step guide to create and set up a new Dedicated Blog here.
What next?
Once you've set up your new blog site, why not try some of the other new features: