Affino 8.0.24 - the My Library and Bookmarking Release

This release is a fast followup to the major Key Feature Request release. For more details of the key Affino 2.0.23 release see here. What is entirely new in this release is the new My Library, which empowers your audience to bookmark articles, videos and podcasts for future reference. It is another key step forward for Affino’s ability to provide a personalised experience to your audience.

 

Most of what’s new in this release involves polishing up the new capabilities launched in the previous release, ensuring that all the new podcasting, video and my interest elements work smoothly and look great across all devices.

 

Key Enhancements

 

My Library and Bookmarking

This release sees the launch of the Affino My Library service. Users can now bookmark articles, products, videos and podcast episodes to their personal My Library. These can then be watched and listened to, directly within the My Library, and it is easy for users to reference the articles and products for future reading and purchasing.

 

We have extensively updated the core templates and design elements to add the bookmarks there, and the bookmarking action is simple and instant with one click to bookmark and one to remove.

 

Upgrade Guidance

 

If you have a Staging site, we recommend updating to this release and testing thoroughly prior to updating your main Affino instance. Note that all active scheduled tasks are wiped when you update the site so make sure that any required ones are completed prior to running the update.

 

It is important to liaise with the support team to schedule in an update window where they can be on hand to support with the update. It is essential that you run through the complete update process starting with the Affino Updater, followed by the sequence of the system and design updates laid out on the Control > Update screen.

 

Other Enhancements

 

Accounts - we have improved the display of Podcast episodes and videos on the Accounts pages.

 

Button DE - we have added a new Auto link to the Button DE to take the user to the My Library.

 

Campaigns - Affino now matches up to 10 topics against campaigns. Up till now we’ve kept the limit to 5 so as to get the best matches, and minimise the loose ones. Based on popular demand though we have changed that to 10.

 

My Account - major improvements in how Cancel buttons are displayed against subscriptions. It is now possible to choose whether to display (or not) depending on the payment method used for the purchase. There is also an option to hide the renew button on Free Mailing List based subscriptions if set on the My Account Profile. We have also added the navigation to the My Library to the My Account navigation.

 

My Interests - this release sees the official launch of the Interest Content Alerts. When users go to the My Interests channel they can select the frequency of the alerts, e.g. realtime, daily, weekly and monthly. Affino will then send them the best matching content for that period.

 

Metering / Paywalls - we have new settings on the Metering Profile to show the main image and a specified number of text characters of the main body (this text then fades out when displayed). Note that at this time only the settings are in place with the full features coming in the next release.

 

Podcasts - We have added the the settings to link Podcasts directly through to third party services for users to subscribe through, e.g. Spotify, Apple and Google. When enabled on the Media Library Profile, you will be able to add a link to each service from the Podcast Section. Note that whilst some settings are in place the full functionality is coming in the next release. We have also made a host of styling improvements to ensure that Podcasts look great across all devices.

 

VAT / Orders - we are in the process of implementing the ability to include VAT numbers to Zero VAT rates on Pro Formas and Orders. Note that the fields are visible throughout the Control centre, but the logic is not yet fully implemented. Expect in the next release. There are two new options on the Checkout Profile for capturing customer VAT information on orders, it is essential that you do not enable these at this time.

 

Videos - Improved styling across all devices.

 

Fixes and Minor Enhancements

 

Fixes are elements which didn’t work as well as they should, and have now been made to work better. Minor enhancements provide subtle improvements that most people won’t notice (some will love), but which nonetheless improve on the overall Affino experience.

 

Accounts (display text tweaks)

 

Articles (display, topics)

 

Awards (checkout / order management)

 

Campaign Analysis (export)

 

Channels (media and podcast listing)

 

Orders (date filters)

 

Order Invoice (edition display)

 

Pro Forma (copying)

 

Promotions (security / presentation)

 

Removed

 

The following elements were removed from Affino in this release:

 

No features were removed in this release.

 

Integration Updates

 

The following integrations were updated in this release:

 

Stripe - key update to Affino’s Stripe integration which means that when you select a renewal catalogue item on any existing product, and the subscription renews, then Affino now sends the new catalogue item code through to Stripe. This is essential where you start off with an initial discounted subscription and then are looking to switch it over to a full priced one after a given period.

 

Component Changes

 

Affino benefits from using some great frameworks, here are the updates we’ve rolled out for these frameworks in this release:

 

DataTables updated to - no change

 

JQuery updated to - no change

 

JQueryUI updated to - no change

 

FontAwesome updated to - no change

 

HighCharts updated to - no change

 

TinyMCE updated to - v5.5.1

 

Video.js updated to - no change