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v3.0: Planned Deprecations

Hey all! We are getting ready to release version 3.0.

Elementor 3.0 will introduce many changes to the way our users build websites with Elementor, and the way Elementor operates.

If you are a developer who extends Elementor please review the below changes to keep your plugin up and running.

Elementor 3.0 is a major release. We took the opportunity to introduce substantial changes and improvements to the infrastructure of Elementor.

Here are the planned deprecations (last update – 07/28/2020):

PHP

Functions & Methods

Soft Deprecation

When a function/method is in the soft deprecation phase, it means that the function/method will still work while it’s in this phase, but a comment will be placed in the code mentioning the upcoming deprecation.

v3.0 Updated Convention: Creating New Widgets (For Improved Performance)

As part of our effort to simplify and minimize the markup created by Elementor, we have decided to truncate the prefix we use for any Elementor CSS classes, from .elementor- to just .e-.

This move is joined by another important step in our journey of performance enhancement – reducing the number of wrapper HTML elements used by our widgets and by the system in general.

What does it actually mean?

In all of our new widgets, controls, and all-in-all system markup, we will be prefixing all of our classes with .e-.

We will NOT be changing pre-existing widgets, controls, or any other system elements, in order to allow for backwards compatibility and avoid causing serious problems in existing Elementor websites.

As opposed to the wrapper removal step, this is not a breaking change, so it’s not a big deal – if you see a change in our conventions, we just wanted you to let you know that it’s legit and share with you the reasoning behind it.

How does this affect me as an Elementor user or extension developer?

First of all, there is no need for you to make any changes to pre-existing widgets or system elements. If you are developing extensions that manipulate existing system elements, controls or widgets, and used the .elementor- prefix before – we recommend you to follow this guideline and start using .e- instead in your new developments.

Elementor is Officially Dropping Support for Internet Explorer in v3.0

Elementor officially supported Internet Explorer 11 for front-end display (excluding the Editor) up until version 3.0. Starting from Elementor 3.0.0, it will no longer officially support IE 11 at all, not even for front-end display.

Why are we doing it?

Web standards and technology are constantly evolving, providing web developers with more features and better technology for creating websites and web applications. Modern Browsers like Google Chrome, Firefox, and even Edge (now Chromium-based), are constantly evolving with it, constantly being updated and improved upon. Do you know what’s not evolving, at all? Internet Explorer. Internet Explorer browser is old and outdated, and even Microsoft themselves say that using Internet Explorer is highly unrecommended. In addition, less than 3% of web traffic comes from IE browsers.

Why now?

Elementor has been already gradually introducing new widgets and features that utilize Modern web technologies and tools such as CSS Grid and CSS variables. In order to provide our users with a better experience using Elementor, as well as the ability to build faster, better-performing websites with more advanced features, it was inevitable that we would have to drop IE support completely, in order to proceed in the right direction.

How does this affect me?

If you or your target audience don’t really use Internet Explorer, this should not affect you at all.

However, If your target audience includes a large portion of Internet Explorer users, it might be a good idea to consider holding off on upgrading Elementor and Elementor Pro to v3.0.0 until you’ve made sure you have solutions that enable your site visitors to use your website conveniently.

Users who already upgraded don’t need to worry, simply use Version Control tool to downgrade back to an earlier version and everything should work as it used to.

URI Protocols Handling Update

Elementor has now updated the way it handles URLs in the URL control.

From v2.9.11 and on, Elementor will use the use wp_allowed_protocols() function to handle allowed URI protocols in links. These protocols are often used to create a deep-link (i.e. a direct link to an app via unique protocol) to a 3rd party application (such as mailto: or tel:)

This means that from this version, only protocols allowed by this WordPress function will be available.

Examples of allowed URI protocols: mailto:, tel:, sms:, etc…

If you wish to add another protocol to your website, you will need to alter the function that retrieves the list of allowed protocols, and add your own protocol.

function allow_additional_protocol( $protocols ){
     $protocols[] = 'my-protocol';
     return $protocols;
}
add_filter( 'kses_allowed_protocols' , 'allow_additional_protocol' );

Swiper Update to 5.3.6 & New Wrapper Class

In Elementor Core 2.9.0, we integrated an update to the Swiper.js library used in all of Elementor’s carousels (Core and Pro). Up to 2.9.0, the included Swiper version was 4.4.6. In Elementor 2.9, the Swiper library was updated to version 5. This version includes potentially breaking changes. Please read on for more information.

Why Did We Update?

As part of standard maintenance, we update our external libraries from time to time, including Swiper. Swiper 4.4.6 was released in December 2018, and many issues and features were added in the current 5.3.6 version.

Major Changes From Swiper 4.x

The biggest change, for Elementor, which was introduced in Swiper 5.0, was an inversion of the library’s breakpoints system. Up until Swiper 5.x, the breakpoint system worked on a max-width basis: meaning, for a given breakpoint (say, 768px), a given setting would be implemented on all screen widths under 768px.

In Swiper 5.x, the library author changed the breakpoints system to work on a min-width basis. Meaning, for a given breakpoint (e.g. 768px), the given setting would be implemented on all screen widths above 768px. There used to be an option to actively invert the breakpoint system (an optional parameter), but the library author removed that option for reasons unbeknownst to us.

It is important to understand – this is a breaking change for anyone using the Swiper library for their custom widgets. Please read the entire article in order to be sure you take the necessary action to keep your Elementor add-ons working properly.

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All Swiper.js Instances in Elementor are Now Exposed

Elementor uses Swiper, an external JS library, to power all of the sliders and carousels in the editor. Swiper has an extensive API which provides methods and events which can be utilized to control and manipulate the slider/carousel and its behavior.

Up until Elementor 2.9.0, the Swiper instances used in our widgets and other features were contained in our JS handler classes and not exposed in the front end. 

Following requests from our developer user base, we have decided to make all of the Swiper instances used in Elementor and Elementor Pro available in the frontend.

Swiper uses the class 'swiper-container' in the slider wrapper element. Starting in Elementor 2.9.0, the Swiper instance will now be available in the cache of this element’s jQuery instance. 

To access a slider or carousel’s Swiper instance, create a jQuery instance targeting the slider’s container, and query the element’s data cache with the key 'swipe'. 

How to Access a Swiper Instance

1. Add an image carousel to an Elementor page/post.

2. Edit the widget > Go to Advanced > Advanced

3. Give the widget a unique class name/ID in the “CSS ID” or “CSS Classes” field.

4. In your Javascript file, create a jQuery instance of the carousel’s 'swiper-container' element using the ID/class you chose and the 'swiper-container' class (replace #my-id with your ID/class):

const imageCarousel = jQuery ( '#my-id .swiper-container' );

5. Now, get the Swiper instance by querying your carousel instance’s data cache using the key 'swiper':

const swiperInstance = imageCarousel.data( 'swiper' );

The swiperInstance constant now holds a reference to our carousel’s Swiper instance. You can now call Swiper methods on this variable, add event listeners, and generally taking advantage of everything the Swiper API has to offer.

Usage Example

Here is an example code snippet you can use to change the active slide to the slide of your choice. Replace #my-id with your ID/class, and replace 0 with the slide number you want to change to:

const imageCarousel = jQuery ( '#my-id .swiper-container' ),
swiperInstance = imageCarousel.data( 'swiper' );
swiperInstance.slideTo( 0 );

Open the page with your image carousel (in the frontend), paste this into your developer console and run it to change the active slide to the slide of your choice.

v2.9.0: Planned Deprecations

Hey all! we are getting ready to release version 2.9.0. Here is the planned deprecation list:

PHP

Functions & Methods

Soft Deprecation

Hard Deprecation

When a function/method is on hard deprecation phase, it means that the function/method will still work while it’s in this phase, but will add a PHP notice if the website WP_DEBUG property is set to true.

Migration of Modules from Pro to Core in Elementor 2.9

In order to support new features in Elementor Page Builder, we are moving the Link Actions module and the Social Share JS library from Elementor Pro into the Core version.

Link Actions

The Link Actions module allowed attaching Elementor event triggers to button links. For example, a hash could be added to a button link to trigger the opening/closing of a popup.

Up until Elementor and Elementor Pro 2.9.0, Link Actions existed as an Elementor Pro module located in the elementor-pro/modules/link-actions directory. In 2.9.0, we split the Link Actions module up into two separate parts and moved it to the Elementor Core plugin.

PHP

The PHP part of the Link Actions module was moved to the elementor/includes/frontend.php file. The original method, create_action_url, was replaced by a new method called create_action_hash, which accepts two parameters: an action (to perform on click), and additional settings related to the action:
create_action_hash( $action, array $settings ).

PHP Examples:

Deprecated Implementation:

<?php 
\ElementorPro\Modules\LinkActions\Module::create_action_url( 'popup:open', [
	'id' => $settings['popup'],
	'toggle' => 'toggle' === $settings['action'],
] );

New Implementation:

<?php 
\Elementor\Plugin::elementor()->frontend->create_action_hash( 'popup:open', [
'id' => $settings['popup'],
'toggle' => 'toggle' === $settings['action'],
] );

JS

The JS handler was located at elementor-pro/modules/link-actions/assets/js/frontend/frontend.js. moved to the JS utils folder at elementor/assets/dev/js/frontend/utils/url-actions.js. The handler runs by default on all elementor pages, scans links for actions, and if it finds any, it executes them. The script is mostly unchanged. Feel free to check out the source code in the GitHub repo.

JS Examples – Adding a link action:

Deprecated Implementation:

elementorProFrontend.modules.linkActions.addAction( 'popup:open',() => { 
// Do your action here
} );

New Implementation:

elementorFrontend.utils.urlActions.addAction( 'popup:open', () => 
{ 
// Do your action here
} );

Social Share (now Share Link)

The Social Share library enabled the integration of social sharing capabilities into some Elementor Pro widgets.

The library generates custom share links to a variety of social networks and exists both as an object on the global scope (object name: ShareLink), as well as a jQuery plugin (method name jQuery.fn.shareLink()).

Nothing has changed in the library’s functionality or the way it is used. To familiarize yourself with the library, feel free to visit the library’s source code on Elementor’s GitHub page: https://github.com/elementor/elementor.

Up until Elementor and Elementor Pro 2.9.0, Social Share existed as a library hosted in Elementor Pro (elementor-pro/assets/lib/social-share/social-share.js). In 2.9.0, we changed the file name to better reflect the library’s functionality and moved it to the Elementor Core plugin.

The newly named Share Link library is now located in elementor/assets/lib/share-link/.