You Can Now Create and Edit Projects From the Frontend of UpStream

We’ve just released a new version of UpStream and the Frontend Edit extension.

These releases solve the most popular request from UpStream users: the ability to create and edit projects from the frontend of your site.

Creating projects from the frontend

On the main /projects/ page of UpStream, you’ll now see an “Add project” button.

You’ll now see a pop-up that allows you to create a new project and choose many of the most important settings:

Editing projects from the frontend

On the frontend of UpStream, you’ll now see a pencil icon on the /projects/ page. This will allow you to edit the details for individual projects:

This pencil icon is also available on single project pages:

If you click on either of these pencil icons, you’ll be able to edit the same details as when you create a project.

Permissions

These new creating and editing features are controlled by two permissions.

• publish_projects: controls who can create new projects
• edit_projects: controls who can edit projects

The best way to control these (and other UpStream permissons) is with a plugin like Members. This plugin is free and allows you to completely customize the permisson in UpStream.

What comes next?

As an UpStream user, you might be able to suggest more things we can add to this new frontend feature. For example, we hope to add support for the Copy Project extension so you can duplicate projects via the frontend.

But to our mind, there’s one big thing we need to tackle next … the ability to control Project Users. At the moment, we realize that you currently can’t choose people from your own team (at least without going to the WordPress admin area).

The reason for this is, our next step will be a comprehensive improvement to the way Project Users are added:

• More clarity. At the moment, it’s not always clear who has access to a project. We’ll add a single box where you can explicitly choose who is assigned to each project.
• More flexibility. Currently, everyone on a project has to be assigned to an UpStream Manager or UpStream User role. We’ll allow you add anyone who has an account on your site. This will make it quicker and easier to set up your projects.

If you’re keen to get these improved user features, look for a second update to UpStream and Frontend Edit in the next couple of weeks.

One more feature: Custom permalinks

We slipped in one more feature to this UpStream update. You can now change the permalinks for UpStream projects. The /projects/ URL can cause conflicts with other themes and plugins, so you can choose your own UpStream permalinks.

If you have any permalink issues are this UpStream update, please go to Settings > Permalinks and click the “Save” button.

Yes, you can choose also choose URLs for Clients. At the moment, Clients aren’t easily accesible and editable from the frontend of UpStream, but we’re working on that too!