autoptimize beta

Introducing zytzagoo’s major changes for Autoptimize 2.4

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[UPDATE 29/03/2018: Autoptimize 2.4 can now be downloaded from https://github.com/futtta/autoptimize/archive/beta.zip and will automatically update so ensure all new functionality and fixes are applied]
TL;DR Autoptimize 2.4 will be a major change. Tomaš Trkulja (aka zytzagoo) has cleaned up and modernized the code significantly, making it easier to read and maintain, switched to the latest and greatest minifiers and added automated testing. And as if that isn’t enough we’re also adding new optimization options! The downside: we will be dropping support for PHP < 5.3 and for the “legacy minifiers”. AO 2.4 will first be made available as a separate “Autoptimize Beta” plugin on wordpress.org via GitHub and will see more releases/ iterations with new options/ optimizations there before being promoted to the official “Autoptimize”.
Back in March 2015 zytzagoo forked Autoptimize, rewriting the CDN-replacement logic (and a lot of autoptimizeStyles::minify really) and started adding automated testing. I kept an eye on the fork and later that year I contacted Tomas via Github to see how we could collaborate. We have been in touch ever since; some of his improvements have already been integrated and he is my go-to man to discuss coding best practices, bugfixes and security.
FFWD to the nearby future; Autoptimize 2.4 will be based on Tomaš’ fork and will include the following major changes:

  • New: option only minify JS/ CSS without combining them
  • New: excluded JS- or CSS-files will be automatically minified
  • Improvement: switching to the current version of JSMin and -more importantly- of YUI CSS compressor PHP port which has some major performance-improvements of itself
  • Improvement: all create_function() instances have been replaced by anonymous functions (PHP 7.2 started issuing warnings about create_function being deprecated)
  • Improvement: all code in autoptimize/classlesses/* (my stuff) has been rewritten into OOP and is now in autoptimize/classes/*
  • Improvement: use of autoload instead of manual conditional includes
  • Improvement: a nice amount of test cases (although no 100% coverage yet), allowing for Travis continuous integration-tests being done
  • dropping support for PHP below 5.3 (you really should be on PHP 7.x, it is way faster)
  • dropping support for the legacy minifiers

These improvements will be released in a separate “Autoptimize Beta” plugin soon (albeit not on wordpress.org as “beta”-plugins are not allowed). You can already download from GitHub here. We will start adding additional optimization options there, releasing at a higher pace. The goal is to create a healthy Beta-user pool allowing us to move code from AO Beta to AO proper with more confidence. So what new optimization options would you like to see added to Autoptimize 2.4 and beyond? 🙂
[corrected 19/02; wordpress.org does not allow beta-plugins]

Autoptimize 2.2 coming your way, care to test?

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So work on Autoptimize 2.2 is almost finished and I need your help testing this version before releasing (targeting May, but that depends on you!). The more people I have testing, the faster I might be able to push this thing out and there’s a lot to look forward to;

  • New option: enable/ disable AO for logged in users for all you pagebuilders out there
  • New option: enable/ disable AO for cart/ checkout pages of WooCommerce, Easy Digital Downloads & WP eCommerce
  • New minification/ caching system, significantly speeding up your site for non-cached pages (previously part of a power-up)
  • Switched to rel=preload + Filamentgroup’s loadCSS for CSS deferring
  • Additional support for HTTP/2 setups (no GUI, you might need to have a look at the API to see/ use all possibilities)
  • Important improvements to the logic of which JS/ CSS can be optimized (getPath function) increasing reliability of the aggregation process
  • Updated to a newer version of the CSS Minification component (albeit not the 3.x one, which seems a tad too fresh and which would require me to drop support for PHP 5.2 which will come but just not yet)
  • API: Lots of extra filters, making AO (even) more flexible.
  • Lots of bugfixes and smaller improvements (see GitHub commit log)

So if you want to help:

  1. Download the zip-file from Github
  2. Overwrite the contents of wp-content/plugins/autoptimize with the contents of autoptimize-master from the zip
  3. Test and if any bug (regression) create an issue in GitHub (if it doesn’t exist already).

Very much looking forward to your feedback!

Preparing (for) Autoptimize 2.0.3 or 2.1.0

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It’s that time of the year again where I humbly ask Autoptimize’s users to download and test the “beta”-version of the upcoming release. I’m not entirely sure whether this should be 2.0.3 (a minor release) or 2.1.0 (a major one), but I’ll let you guys & girls decide, OK?
Anyway, the following changes are in said new release;

  • Autoptimize now adds a small menu to the admin-toolbar (can be disabled with a filter) that shows the cache size and provides the possibility to purge the cache. A big thanks to Pablo Custo for his hard work on this nice feature!
  • If the cache size becomes too big, a mail will be sent to the site admin (pass `false` to `autoptimize_filter_cachecheck_sendmail` filter to disable or pass alternative email to the `autoptimize_filter_cachecheck_mailto` filter)
  • An extra tab is shown (can be hidden with a filter) with information about my upcoming premium power-ups and other optimization tools- and services.
  • Misc. bugfixes & small improvements (see the commit-log on GitHub)

So, if you’re curious about Pablo’s beautiful menu or if you just want to help Autoptimize out, download the beta and provide me with your feedback. If all goes well, we’ll be able to push it (2.1.0?) out in the first half of August!

Bringing Autoptimize 2.0 (beta) to a Christmas-tree near you

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While over the last couple of months Autoptimize was quietly picking up users to reach 100.000 active installations, work was ongoing on the next version, the magical 2.0 (the PowerUps mentioned here before are still on the roadmap, albeit with some delay as I want AO 2.0 out first). Yesterday I uploaded what I consider to be the first Beta of Autoptimize 2.0 to the wordpress.org plugin repository and before inviting you to download & test this release I think this is the ideal moment to document some of the changes in that new version. Here goes;

  • Option to (de-)activate aggregation of inline JS and CSS which would allow to fix or prevent some of the recurring problems people have with AO (I’ll post a follow-up post on this with more info soon).
  • Option to remove Google Fonts (special request from my favorite user who obviously doesn’t like (Google) Fonts and who is too lazy to just dequeue them).
  • On average 30% faster minification (I’ll spill the beans on how that was done and what this implies in a later blogpost)!
  • Cache-size will be checked daily and a notice will be shown on your wp-admin pages if cache size goes over 512 MB (threshold can be changed using a filter).
  • Small autoptimized CSS (e.g. some print CSS) will be inlined instead of linked (256 characters by default, can be changed using a filter).
  • New in API: filters to declare a JS and CSS whitelist, where only files in that whitelist are autoptimized and all others are left untouched.
  • New in API: filters to declare “removable” CSS and JS, upon which Autoptimize will simply delete that code (emoji’s for example, if you prefer not to dequeue them).
  • lots of small and bigger bugfixes, I won’t bother you with a full list but have a look at the commmit log on GitHub.

I consider the code for this version feature-complete (have to keep some things up my sleeve for later versions), but what is needed now is testing, bug-reporting, bug-fixing and more testing. And translations, if you’re into those (I already contacted some earlier contributors). You can download Autoptimize 2.0 beta here, bug-reports are more then welcome on GitHub as an issue.
I’m pretty excited about this new version, so I’m looking forward to your feedback! Who knows we can push this out before the year is over?