In this edition:

• New features being released next week
• Friday How To will look at Columns and Column blocks
• Get our meetings on your calendar
  

Some changes headed your way Monday

Newspack's newest release comes out next week and has a few things to look for.

Prompts will be hidden on special pages

Although Campaign prompts can be disabled on any page or any post, we realized that prompts aren't welcome on certain pages. We certainly don't want to interrupt someone who's trying to fill out your donation page, for instance.

Starting Monday, the following pages won't show prompts:

• Privacy Policy page
• Donate page (the one generated by Newspack)
• WooCommerce Shop, Cart, Checkout, View Order, Terms, and Privacy Policy pages

Also, it's worth your time to review all the pages you've created and decide whether prompts are a help or a hindrance. If you don't want them to appear, there's a switch to turn them off in the right-hand settings column while on the Page tab:

Full-site editing blocks have been removed

Quite a few blocks have been added to the core WordPress list of available blocks recently, but some create confusion and offer a poorer experience than blocks we've already chosen or built ourselves. In general, these blocks are designed for themes that offer full-site editing; the Newspack theme does not.

So to keep things simpler, we've hidden these blocks and they're no longer available for use:

If you've used these blocks in the past, the block will display an error in the editor, but don't be alarmed. They'll continue to display properly on the public-facing page, and you don't have to do anything.

New page template: "No header or footer"

We've had a few requests from publishers who want to build a page from scratch, with no header or footer in place. That's now an option under Templates when building pages (but not posts).

The page width will be narrower than a full 1,200-pixel page, but blocks set to the Wide or Full width will expand to fill the space.

Create a customized RSS feed from the Newspack menu

If you have a partner with whom you want to share a specialized news feed, you can now do so in Newspack, without adding a plugin.

In the back end of your site, go to Newspack --> Syndication and turn on RSS Enhancements. You'll find an array of choices for tailoring your feed.

Friday How To session will look at the Columns block

It's easy enough to add columns to a page or post, but how many blocks are you adding? And what's the difference between a Columns block and a Column block?

Sure, you can find plenty of support documents and even a video or two. But if you'd like a chance to ask questions and get ideas from your colleagues, join us Friday at 1 p.m. Eastern Time for a casual 30-minute Zoom session.

And set the date on your calendar for this recurring event by choosing the appropriate link in the last item in this newsletter.

Get our regular meetings on your calendar with a couple of clicks

We have a meeting every other Tuesday at 11 a.m. Eastern Time. This is for publishers and developers to get together, but it is by no means mandatory. Most of the meeting is turned over to guest speakers for professional development, or to one of our team members to highlight a major change to the Newspack platform. We use this meeting to update you on business and product developments, as well.

The next meeting is June 28.

And here’s a handy way to get them all on your calendar:

Add event to calendar

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We also hold a 30-minute How To session each Friday at 1 p.m. Eastern Time. We offer a quick look at one topic, block, feature or other useful maneuver. You can see how these work by going here for or small-but-growing library of videos. The password is ilovenews

Add event to calendar

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