Jetpack 4.0 beta now available!

The Jetpack mechanics have been engineering a fresh new Jetpack version. It’s currently in beta and you can grab it right now joining the Jetpack Beta Program.

Here are some highlighted features of this version that need to be tested.

VideoPress Editor View

There’s a new WordPress Editor view for the [videopress] and [wpvideo] shortcodes that will allow you to edit your pasted shortcodes in a dialog modal. For example, if you have VideoPress activated, and you go to your Editor, you can paste

[videopress OO4thna8]

it will be embedded into your post and you’ll be able to work with the settings for VideoPress.

Widget support for Selective Refresh

The Sidebar Widgets have been updated to use the new Customizer feature Selective Refresh which will be included in the soon-to-be-released WordPress 4.5. With Selective Refresh, only the portion corresponding to the updated widget will be refreshed and the page won’t be reloaded, resulting in much faster previews when using the Customizer.

To take advantage of this, your site will need to be using the latest development version of WordPress: WordPress 4.5 RC 1. Your theme must also declare support for ‘customize-selective-refresh-widgets’. The theme Twenty Sixteen is already compatible with this new feature, but if your theme isn’t, you can quickly add the following to your functions.php file:

/**
 * Indicate widget sidebars can use Selective Refresh in the Customizer.
 */
function jetpack_test_selective_refresh() {
    add_theme_support( 'customize-selective-refresh-widgets' );
}
add_action( 'after_setup_theme', 'jetpack_test_selective_refresh' );

Widget Visibility for custom post type archives

We’ve enhanced Widget Visibility so you can hide or show certain widgets for your Custom Post Type single or archive views.

Other new additions

Breadcrumbs: added schema.org microdata so search engines like Google can better understand the current page’s position, where breadcrumbs are displayed, in the site hierarchy.
Subscriptions: removed the option to subscribe to comments for custom post types as the feature is only available for regular posts.
Contact Forms: updated to properly render the telephone field.
Sharing: updated to ensure sharing via email is not marked as spam by certain email providers.

We’ve also added a lot of enhancements under the hood for flexibility and performance. How can you help put these new features through their paces? Join the Jetpack Beta Program and start testing!

Found a bug? A typo? Do you have ideas to improve a Jetpack feature? Let us know in the comments below!