Installation

Locate the install file

The main plugin package (that CodeCanyon offers to download by default) contains useful assets like the documentation, examples and source files. WordPress, however, expects a very specific install file. In order to provide you both the installable plugin and additional assets, we've bundled them together into one ZIP file. This is the reason why in most cases you will need to unpack the downloaded ZIP file first, then use the installable package inside.

1. If you explicitly chose the Installable WordPress file only option when you've downloaded the plugin from CodeCanyon, then you have nothing to do. That is the file you will need to use during the installation.
2. In any other cases, you will need to first unpack the ZIP file you've downloaded from CodeCanyon. The installable file will be inside, it's usually called something like "layersliderwp-x.x.x.installable.zip".

Installation through the WP admin interface

1. Locate the installable file described in the above section.
2. On your WordPress admin area navigate to Plugins -> Add new, then press the Upload Plugin button on the top of the page.
3. Choose the installable ZIP file mentioned previously, then hit the Install Now button.
4. WordPress might ask you to enter your FTP login credentials. Click on Proceed when you've finished.
5. The plugin is now installed, click on the Activate Plugin button.
6. A new menu entry called LayerSlider WP should appear on your WordPress admin sidebar.

Check out our video tutorial!

If you're unsure where or how to install the plugin,
just watch our short screencast video.

Installation via FTP

1. Locate the installable ZIP file described at the top of this page, then unpack it.
2. Open your favorite FTP application and connect to your server. Navigate to the "/wp-content/plugins/" folder.
3. Copy over the "LayerSlider" folder extracted from the installable ZIP file.
4. Navigate to the Plugins page on your WordPress admin area and click the Activate button below LayerSlider WP.
5. A menu entry called LayerSlider WP should appear on your WordPress admin sidebar.

Troubleshooting

• Please be aware that you must use the "layersliderwp-x.x.x.installable.zip" file when you try to install the plugin on the WP admin area. The main package downloaded from CodeCanyon contains a lot of other assets. You must unpack it first, then find the above mentioned file inside for installation. The only exception is if you explicitly chose the Installable WordPress file only option on CodeCanyon.
• If you receive a No valid plugins were found error message, you've almost certainly uploaded the wrong ZIP file. Please read the previous point and the installation instructions again.
• The Destination folder already exists error message means that you already have another copy of LayerSlider installed and you can't use multiple versions simultaneously. Make sure to deactivate and delete the previous copy or check your theme settings to disable bundled versions (if any) before attempting to install the new release. This will not affect your sliders and settings, they will remain still and be available after you've finished installing the new version.
• In some very rare cases, certain server settings (e.g. upload size limit, memory limit) could prevent you to install the plugin from your WordPress admin area. If you're experiencing any issue, please contact your server host and ask them to change the relevant settings. Alternatively, you can also revert to the FTP installation method, so you don't have to wait in the meantime.
• If you receive an error message that says "Are you sure you want to do this?", it's most likely the same server configuration issue explained in the previous point. WordPress displays this as a generic type of error message, so there could be other reasons as well.
• Your web hosting service provider might offer other methods to install plugins such as web-based FTP clients or 3rd party solutions made explicitly for WordPress. Although these should be fine, it's possible that in some cases they might not work as expected and you will need to revert to one of the conventional methods.
• If you're experiencing any issue after installing LayerSlider, please try to temporarily disable other plugins and switch to one of the default WordPress themes to see if it helps. LayerSlider should play along nicely with any plugin/theme you use, but incompatibility issues could occur due to several other reasons.

Activating the plugin

Why activating?

In addition to your purchase, you're entitled to the following exclusive features and services by activating your site with a purchase code:

• Enjoy our priority support services to get help quickly and easily.
• Receive 1-Click plugin updates, including early access releases.
• Unlock premium features in the plugin providing new and interesting ways to extend the capabilities of your sliders.
• Import premium slider templates, which you can use as a starting point for your projects. We're releasing and updating premium content regularly.

I received LayerSlider bundled in my theme

We take plugin development very seriously and we're dedicated to offer the best product we can produce. Even if you're using a non-activated copy, it still has great features with almost unlimited capabilities to be a premium experience. Nevertheless, some additional features are only available for our direct buyers who have supported the plugin development by purchasing LayerSlider.

Theme bundles is a great way to increase our popularity by offering our unique and useful products to the crowd. However, product development and customer support require a lot of resources thus we can only offer our services to our direct buyers. By offering some exclusive features we're encouraging users to support the development of future versions of LayerSlider.

How do I activate LayerSlider?

You just need to enter your Item Purchase Code received after purchasing LayerSlider into the PRODUCT ACTIVATION section and press the Activate Now button.

Can I activate multiple sites?

A purchase code can be used to activate 2 domains. One for your main site, and one for a local/development mirror. In line with the Envato's licensing terms, each site requires separate licenses with a unique purchase code. However, by deactivating your site, you can freely migrate your license to another server/domain if you're moving your site.

Where is my Purchase Code?

You can find your Purchase Code in the email received upon the purchase. You can also download your license certificate from CodeCanyon at any time. Just navigate to your Downloads page, then find LayerSlider and choose the License certificate & purchase code option from Download button. Your Purchase Code is inside the downloaded text file.

Why was my activation canceled?

If you received a "LayerSlider product activation was canceled on this site" notification, please review all the potential issues that could cause this:

• you've moved your site or your domain name has changed;
• you've remotely deactivated your site using our online tools or asked us to do the same on your behalf;
• your purchase have been refunded or the transaction disputed;
• Envato have revoked your purchase code with an undisclosed reason;
• your Envato account was temporarily disabled due to an ongoing sale reversal;
• your Envato account has been terminated.

Please note, the exact circumstances might not have direct relation to LayerSlider or us, but caused by recent changes on your Envato account. In those cases, you should try re-activating the plugin after a few days when any ongoing dispute has been resolved.

If none of the above mentioned reasons can explain your case and you feel it happened mistakenly, please let us know by opening a support ticket, so we can help you uncovering potential issues and restoring product activation.

Troubleshooting

• You can't use your theme's purchase code in case if you've received LayerSlider bundled in a theme. For more information, please read the Theme bundles section above.
• Please double check that you've entered your purchase code correctly if product activation doesn't accept it. Verify that you haven't accidentally included spaces or other surrounding text and characters.
• Rarely, a temporary outage in our/Envato services could also result in unrecognized purchase codes. Please try it again a little later.
• In some edge cases, servers might be configured in a way that prevents your installation from connecting to our server. Usual symptoms include An unexpected error occurred error messages. It's worth asking your web hosting company about this if you've ruled out other possibilities. Also, check the LayerSlider -> System Status menu on your WP admin sidebar to identify potential issues you might have on your site.
• If your activation was canceled, please refer to the Why was my activation canceled? section.

Updating the plugin

Updating via Auto-Updates on activates sites

After activation, LayerSlider updates will automatically appear on your site in the same way as any other WordPress update. You can check if there is a new version available on the Plugins or Dashboard -> Updates pages. A notification will also appear on the LayerSlider WP admin pages about new releases.

To access early-access versions, select the beta release channel in the PRODUCT ACTIVATION box.

Updating the plugin manually

Once you've downloaded the most recent version from your CodeCanyon downloads page you can deactivate and remove the old version, then install the new one. Your sliders and settings are in the database, removing the plugin won't touch them. You don't have to worry about losing your work, as keeping LayerSlider backward compatible is one of our top priorities, even for really old releases.

Updating the bundled version in themes

If you've received LayerSlider as a bundled item in your theme, new releases will be provided by the theme author through theme updates, since Auto-Updates won't work without activating your copy of LayerSlider. However, if you choose the purchase a license for LayerSlider, theme bundled versions can also be activated and updated without reinstalling the plugin.

Troubleshooting

• Please note, WordPress checks for new updates periodically at certain times and caches the results. Even if there is a new version available, it might not appear immediately after activation.
• Keeping LayerSlider backwards compatible is one of our top priorities. However, there are times when major updates introduce new features and new settings, which depending on their defaults might alter your sliders a bit. If you experience any unwanted change, it's always a good idea to check the settings of your sliders, there are probably new options to control these changes.

Managing sliders

Importing slider templates

Press the Templates Store button located before your list of sliders, to reveal the template store screen.

Importing templates will allow you to see our settings and get familiar with the plugin. You can find both simple and complex sliders to discover LayerSlider's capabilities. You can freely experiment on these sliders without worrying since you can always import a new, untouched copy.

Premium slider templates are particularly useful as a starting point for your future projects. We're releasing and updating premium templates regularly. Our goal is to cover most use cases, whether you need a slider for personal use (such as slideshow for family photos), or you want to use it on your business website, or even on billboards. Our selection includes great examples for retail shops as well as templates for creative work.

Troubleshooting

• Check the LayerSlider -> System Status menu on your WP admin sidebar to identify potential issues you might have on your site.
• Importing our demo sliders requires the PHP ZipArchive extension installed on your server. To see the availability of this extension, please navigate to LayerSlider -> System Status. Please contact your web hosting service provider if it's unavailable.
• Importing a slider will add its images to your WP Media Library. Larger sliders might have a file size that exceeds the upload limit set on your server. To increase the maximum file size of an upload, please contact your web hosting company.
• Larger sliders with many images could also consume considerably more memory during the import. Most servers should not have any issue with larger sliders, but in some cases you might experience unexpected issues like partially imported sliders.
• If you're experiencing any issue with importing, it's probably linked to memory or execution time limitation on your server. To fix these issues, please contact your web hosting company, since they usually don't offer a way to change these settings remotely.

Import / Export sliders

Importing sliders

At the top of the LayerSlider home screen press the Import Sliders button. This will open a modal window where you can choose a previously exported .zip or .json file to be imported by pressing the Import button. For additional information, please read the details in the modal window.

Exporting sliders

Hover over your slider and click on the icon to reveal slider actions, then select the Export option. This will download a .zip file that you can upload on other sites or use as a backup.

You can also export multiple sliders by selecting them with the checkbox when hovering over them, then choose the Export Bulk Action option below the slider list. Please note, selecting multiple sliders with images can drastically increase the exported file size and could lead import issues on sites with certain server settings.

Troubleshooting

• Check the LayerSlider -> System Status menu on your WP admin sidebar to identify potential issues you might have on your site.
• Importing sliders requires the PHP ZipArchive extension installed on your server. To see the availability of this extension, please navigate to LayerSlider -> System Status. Please contact your web hosting service provider if it's unavailable.
• Importing a slider will add its images to your WP Media Library. Larger sliders might have a file size that exceeds the upload limit set on your server. To increase the maximum file size of an upload, please contact your web hosting company.
• Larger sliders with many images could also consume considerably more memory during the import. Most servers should not have any issue with larger sliders, but in some cases you might experience unexpected issues like partially imported sliders.
• If you're experiencing any issue with importing, it's probably linked to memory or execution time limitation on your server. To fix these issues, please contact your web hosting company, since they usually don't offer a way to change these settings remotely.

Using Google Fonts

LayerSlider can load custom fonts hosted by Google on fonts.google.com. You can find the corresponding section on the plugin's admin page, see the illustration below. Custom fonts loaded with the editor will be automatically added to the pre-defined fonts you can choose from in the Slider Builder.

Character set support

By default, LayerSlider uses Latin characters for added Google Fonts. However, it supports Cyrillic, Devanagari, Greek, Khmer and Vietnamese scripts as well.

Themes with Google Fonts support

Many WordPress themes support Google Fonts. However, it's common that they only load them on the front-end pages and they will appear incorrectly when you would build a slider on the admin interface. To workaround this issue just add them in LayerSlider and check the "Load only on admin interface" option. This way you can avoid loading the same font multiple times on the front-end pages.

Permission settings

Under the Permissions tab, you can easily select any user role. Members of the selected group will have permission to change plugin settings and manage your sliders. By selecting the option Custom and entering a capability you can target users more accurately. For more information about WordPress capabilities, please read the Codex page.

About the Advanced Settings section

Under the Advanced tab, you can find many troubleshooting options to workaround common issues you might experience on your site.

System Status

System Status is intended to help you identifying possible issues and to display relevant debug information about your site. It also provides tools to list every server settings, easily set up a debug account or to erase all plugin data. To find out more about using System Status, please follow the on-screen instructions when navigating to its page on the admin interface.

Getting started with the slider builder

Since LayerSlider allows you building professional grade animated material, its slider builder interface can be a bit overwhelming at first. There are many options to control every aspect of your content. This is why it is important to take time and try to understand the basics with the following tips:

• Read the tooltips: Almost everything on the admin interface reveal further information with tooltips. Just move your mouse cursor over option fields, buttons, and other interface elements, and the exact description of those will appear in a tooltip message.
• Use the preview mode: By pressing the Preview button you can see your work in action instantly. Don't be shy to change settings. If you're not sure about how an option works exactly, just change it and observe the differences in the preview mode. When previewing a layer, you can change the content and settings on the fly, and see the changes instantly, without the need to jump in and out of preview every time something changes.
• Use slider templates: Discussed under Gettings Started / Importing slider templates, you can see how we built our demo sliders and which settings we used to achieve certain animations. You can find both simple and complex sliders to discover LayerSlider's capabilities. Don't be afraid of making changes on these samples, you can always import a fresh copy at any time. Premium slider templates can also be the starting point of your projects since we're focusing on covering most use cases.

Slider settings

This is the page where LayerSlider navigates you after adding a new slider. On this screen you can set common settings like the size of the slider, and customize its appearance or features in the other sub-sections.

We do not provide an extensive list of settings here since every option has its description displayed on the admin interface. Please review them carefully, so you can customize your slider behavior and appearance in the way you like.

Adding slides

As mentioned previously, we don't have an extensive list of all the available options in this documentation, since the admin user interface contains all these information and you can access them on the fly. Just hover over an option/button with your mouse cursor, then a tooltip will appear describing the option in question.

Please note, keeping space efficiency in mind we hide some options used less frequently. Just click on the SHOW MORE OPTIONS button, then you can reveal every slide option.

Managing slides

About slide transitions

LayerSlider offers more than 200 pre-defined 2D/3D slide transitions. By using the Transition Builder it can be easily extended with custom ones for your own needs. Slide transitions will only use the background image of slides since web standards don't offer a way to "capture" all contents within a slider. It's important to keep in mind that layers will not be used for slide transitions, even if they made to look like a background image.

Modern web browsers are required for 3D transitions to work properly. If you select any 3D transition, LayerSlider will prioritize them over 2D ones. The plugin has multiple fall-back levels whenever a visitor's machine is not capable of showing certain transitions. In general, 2D transitions are supported on all major web browsers.

Linking slides

Linking a slide will make its entire surface clickable. You can also link layers to add a button or a smaller control. Layers appear on top of slides and will gain priority if you link both a slide and one of its layers.

Smart links

Smart links can control the slideshow and slider navigation with pre-defined special links. Just enter one of the following to the linking field, then the linked content will automatically perform the corresponding action.

Deeplink

You can use deeplinking to give a special URL to users, which will start your slider with a certain slide when they visit your site. To do that, you have to specify a Deeplink name in slide options and use it as a reference in the URL with a hashtag. For example, if you've entered the name "surprise", your URL should look like this: yourdomain.com/yourpage/#surprise. This will start LayerSlider with the slide where you set it (instead of the first one) when someone navigates to the page with this URL.

Preview area features

The preview area has many hidden features, which can drastically improve your productivity.

Preview area toolbar

Hidden features

Adding Layers

Managing layers

Layer types

Device support

It's possible to build multiple layouts for different devices in the same slider by dynamically showing and hiding layers. With the Show this layer on the following devices buttons, you can choose on which devices should the currently selected layer appear.

Embedding videos

LayerSlider supports YouTube, Vimeo, and self-hosted HTLM5 video/audio out of the box. We've integrated many features for these solutions such as setting autoplay, preview image, volume and other controls. They will also automatically pause and resume the slideshow while playing.

Just choose the Video / Audio layer type to embed multimedia contents. For YouTube and Vimeo videos you need to paste the embed code from their website into the text field. Otherwise, click on the Add Media button to add self-hosted HTML5 video or audio.

To use HTML5 self-hosted video/audio, please make sure you're using supported media formats described here. We recommend using MP3 or AAC in MP4 for audio, and VP8+Vorbis in WebM or H.264+MP3/AAC in MP4 for video. The supported formats may vary between browsers, but you can also provide multiple formats if needed by holding down the Ctrl/Cmd key and selecting multiple items from your WordPress Media Library.

At the moment we do not support other media players out of the box since those solutions have their own distinct APIs to control media playback. However, users with web development experience can use the LayerSlider API to detect slider events and run custom code to control 3rd party media players.

Using WP shortcodes and interactive content

Make sure you add WP shortcodes or other interactive content (such as Google Maps embeds, custom scripts, etc) to an HTML layer. Shortcodes will only be rendered on front-end pages, so don't be afraid if the slider builder interface doesn't show the result you would expect.

Using interactive content highly relying on Javascript can be problematic, and might not work properly. Since we cannot workaround every possible issue in someone else's code, it's possible that some shortcodes and embed will be broken.

It also worth mentioning that in responsive mode LayerSlider only scales the layer element itself to gain extra performance. The content inside should adapt the dimension changes on its own. While this happens automatically in most cases, shortcodes and complex HTML might not be resized in sync with the slider.

Layer transitions

This is where you can build your layer transitions. This section can be daunting at first since LayerSlider offers many options to customize every aspect of your work. However, everyone can learn it quickly and easily by following the tips already mentioned previously:

• Read the tooltips: Almost everything on the admin interface reveal further information with tooltips. Just move your mouse cursor over option fields, buttons, and other interface elements, and the exact description of those will appear in a tooltip message.
• Use the preview mode: By pressing the Preview button you can see your work in action instantly. Don't be shy to change settings. If you're not sure about how an option works exactly, just change it and observe the differences in the preview mode. When previewing a layer, you can change the content and settings on the fly, and see the changes instantly, without the need to jump in and out of preview every time something changes.
• Use slider templates: Discussed under Getting Started / Importing slider templates, you can see how we built our demo sliders and which settings we used to achieve certain animations. You can find both simple and complex sliders to discover LayerSlider's capabilities. Don't be afraid of making changes on these samples, you can always import a fresh copy at any time. Premium slider templates can also be the starting point of your projects since we're focusing on covering most use cases.

There are multiple types of animation, you can view one at the time by clicking on its title or icon. In each section, you can find the description of what it does and when it will be used. For clarity, we've made animated illustrations that you can see by hovering over the icons. The green highlight shows which transition types are being used by the layer, while the scaled (larger) icon shows the currently opened transition section.

Linking layers

You can link a layer under its Link & Attributes tab. Enter a URL and set whether you want to open it on the current page or in a new tab/window.

Smart links are also available to control the slideshow and slider navigation with pre-defined special links. Just enter one of the following to the linking field, then the linked content will automatically perform the corresponding action.

Layer attributes

You can also apply commonly used attributes (such as a unique ID or classes) on layers in the same section. These settings are made for users with web development experience who want to use custom coding to achieve a customization level that a visual editor cannot provide.

Apart from the pre-defined list of attributes, it's also possible to add your own. In the custom attributes section, you can enter any attribute name, including pre-defined ones to override them. Many 3rd party plugin uses custom attributes, this section is important if for example you would like to set up a FancyBox image gallery on LayerSlider layers.

Layer Styles

Under the Styles tab of your layers, you can find commonly used formatting options to customize their appearance. We highly recommend using these settings whenever it's possible, instead of adding unnecessary HTML code to the contents of layers.

This is where you can also set the position of layers with the Left and Top options. While you can use the visual editor to move layers around, it's often better to fine-tune them here for a pixel-perfect result.

Image editor

With the help of Adobe's Creative SDK, LayerSlider 6 now has a built-in image editor. You can perform common tasks like resizing, cropping, rotating images, as well as photo retouching, adding frames, text, effects, stickers and a lot more. It's like a mini-Photoshop.

Look for the icon on the upper left corner of any image picker button to launch the editor with the currently selected image.

Popout editor

One of the main design goals with LayerSlider 6 was the ability to work right in the preview area, without having to scroll up and down constantly to change settings. In addition to keyboard shortcuts, we've also added a Pop out editor button, which will transform layer options into a floating window that can be resized and placed wherever you want. This makes it extremely easy to edit everything in one place.

Timeline

The timeline feature can be used to review all layer transitions occurring on the slide at once. The color-coded markers clearly show when and what happens. You can even grab the playhead and move it back and forth to play segments at your own pace.

Dynamic layers from posts

You can pull individual post information by using post placeholders. These are working very similarly to WordPress shortcodes. You can enter one or more placeholder into the layer's content area, then LayerSlider will automatically replace them with the appropriate content from posts. You can even mix them with static content. Example:

This post was written by [author] on [date-published] will be
This post was written by admin on March 13, 2015

Using post filters

By using the post filters you can target certain WP posts or pages to pull information from. LayerSlider supports custom post types, tags, categories, and taxonimies to find literally any kind of custom content that themes and plugins may use. To set filters you just need select a dynamic layer and click on the Configure post options button. In the opened modal dialog window you can also order the results in your preferred way.

Get the items from results to work with

The post filters are global across slides, but you can select items from the results independently. This allows you to work with posts in a custom order, for example, you can retrieve only the even/odd posts from the results. If you want to follow the original order you can choose the option following, then LayerSlider will get them automatically.

Using mixed content

You are not forced to build sliders with dynamic contents only. You can mix them with static slides and layers.

Using custom post fields

You can use the [meta:fieldname] post placeholder to pull content from custom fields. Please make sure to replace the fieldname part with the actual field you want to pull information from.

Frequently Asked Questions

• Q: Can I use static and dynamic contents at once?

  A: Sure, you can mix them freely. Just make sure to select the Dynamic content from posts layer type.

• Q: Can I set custom [excerpt] for posts?

  A: Yes, just enable the excerpt field under Screen Options when you're editing a post/page, then enter the desired content.

• Q: How excerpts are generated?
  • Manually entered excerpts will remain "as is", without any modification or formatting. Custom HTML code is allowed.
  • Auto-generated excerpts have all shortcodes and HTML tags removed and they will appear as plain text.
  • Auto-generated excerpts will be trimmed down to 55 words. The [...] "hellip" sign will be appended at the end if the text exceeds this limitation.
  • Custom word count used by themes will be automatically applied in your sliders. Developers can override it by using filter hooks.
  • Auto-generated excerpts respect WP's <!--more--> tag, so you can easily split your content at the point you want.
• Q: Can I work with fixed posts?

  A: No, the purpose of dynamic sliders is to automatically update their contents when you add a blog post or any other content on your site.
  
  However, there is a simple workaround with a similar result. You can find specific posts with unique properties (e.g. custom tag) just by setting the right filters in the Post Options section of dynamic layers. The results will not update as long as you don't add more posts that match to the selected filters.

• Q: Can I use content from multiple posts on the same slide?

  A: At the moment you can't. This feature is yet to be added in a later update.

• Q: Can I pull content made by WooCommerce or other plugins?

  A: Yes, see the "Using custom post fields" part.

• Q: Can I pull content from custom post fields?

  A: Yes, see the previous point.

Multilingual sliders

How to translate the admin user interface?

1. Download PoEdit

   There are several apps available to help you with translating .PO files. PoEdit is a popular one, and it's available on every major platform. You can download it from here.

2. Start translating

   Open the default LayerSlider-en_US.po file from your "/wp-content/plugins/LayerSlider/locales/" folder. When you save your work PoEdit will generate you a .MO file which will be needed to apply your work.

3. Name your files properly

   WordPress recognizes your localization by a special formatting of file names. You will need to include the right language and country codes so it can identify what language your work is made for.

   For example, a French localization would have the file names: LayerSlider-fr_FR.po and LayerSlider-fr_FR.mo. You must follow this syntax, including the dash, underscore, and lower- or uppercase letters.

4. Apply your localization

   Copy your newly created .PO and .MO files into the "/wp-content/plugins/LayerSlider/locales/" folder. WordPress should use them immediately if you named your files properly.

Creating multilingual sliders with qTranslate

qTranslate is the one of the easiest way to create multilingual sliders in LayerSlider. It is a free and simple plugin that supports a shortcode-like syntax to enter text in multiple languages, so it can display the proper one for your visitors. LayerSlider supports shortcodes and other special syntaxes within the contents of layers, so you can enter something like this to create a multilingual slider:

[:en]English text[:de]German text

The line above will output "English text" if the visitor selected English page and "German text" if the visitor selected German. You can read more about qTranslate on its WP.org plugin page.

Translating with the WPML plugin

You need the "Multilingual CMS" version of WPML with installed WPML String Translation add-on.

Translating the plugin's user interface:

• Navigate to WPML -> Theme and plugins localization
• Select Translate by WPML option in Select how to localize the theme section.
• In the newly appeared list of plugins, select LayerSlider and click the Scan selected plugins for strings button.
• Under WPML -> String translation menu item, you can now see and edit the texts that LayerSlider uses.

Creating multilingual sliders:

LayerSlider registers translatable strings when you save your work. If you want to translate a previously created slider, you need to re-save it, even if you won't change anything. Once LayerSlider registered the translatable items, they will appear under the WPML -> String translation menu item in your WP admin sidebar.

Troubleshooting

• Your sliders might always show the same language string if you don't disable the "Use slider markup caching" option under the Advanced tab on the main LayerSlider admin page.

Keyboard shortcuts

General interface shortcuts

Slide actions

Managing layers

Positioning layers

Slider revisions

LayerSlider 6.3.0 introduced a new premium feature: Revisions. Have a peace of mind knowing that your slider edits are always safe and you can revert back unwanted changes or faulty saves at any time. This feature serves not just as a backup solution, but a complete version control system where you can visually compare the changes you have made along the way.

Reverting a slider to an earlier version adds another snapshot to Revisions, which can also be reverted if you change your mind and would rather return to the original copy. Slider Revisions also saves the undo/redo controls. Even if there is no perfect snapshot, you will be able to undo the changes in-between to find what you are looking for.

Method 1: Using shortcodes

Shortcodes are special placeholders, which you can paste into the WordPress text editor when editing posts and pages. They will be automatically replaced with the appropriate content on your front-end pages. Shortcodes are one of the most commonly used methods of inserting contents to your site. A lot of other solutions (e.g. page builders in themes) can also accept LayerSlider shortcodes to add sliders to your pages.

Each slider has a unique shortcode. You can hover over a slider in your list and click on the icon to reveal slider actions, then select the Embed option to see its shortcode. You can also find the shortcode of a slider at the bottom of the Slider Builder page next to the save button.

For advanced customization, you can add a filters attribute to your shortcode to control on which pages the slider should appear. Read the Using filters section to learn more. Example shortcode: [layerslider id="1" filters="homepage"]

There is also a way to override the "Starting slide" option with the shortcode. Using the firstslide shortcode parameter you can force embeded sliders to start with the specified slide, even if the slider has different settings. This is particularly useful when you want to embed the same slider in multiple times showing different slides. In the following example we're forcing the slider to start with the second slide: [layerslider id="1" firstslide="2"]

Editor helper utility

We've also added a small utility to the WordPress text editor toolbar. It will pop up a modal window with your most recent sliders to choose from. After selecting the sliders and changing the embed options as desired, press the "Insert into post" button to put the corresponding shortcodes into the editor. See the illustrations below.

Method 2: Using the LayerSlider widget

LayerSlider supports widgets, so you can add sliders to your front-end pages just by a drag n' drop. To do that, navigate to the Appearance menu on your left sidebar and select "Widgets". Grab the LayerSlider WP widget and drop it into one of your widget areas.

Please note that some themes may not support a widget area that you're looking for. In this case, you can create a new widget area by editing your theme files. Here is the official documentation about widgetizing your theme. However, this requires web development knowledge and we don't recommend for users without experience.

For advanced customization, you can enter custom filters in your widget settings to control on which pages the slider should appear. Read the Using filters section to learn more.

By entering a custom value into the "Override starting slide" option field, you can force embeded sliders to start with the specified slide, even if the slider has different settings. This is particularly useful when you want to embed the same slider in multiple times showing different slides.

Method 3: Page Builders, Visual Composer

Most page builders in themes support embedding LayerSlider sliders out of the box. Whether you're using a custom solution or a popular plugin like Visual Composer, there is likely a way to use them with LayerSlider.

Either there is a dedicated module/block/widget for LayerSlider, or you can insert shortcodes in the same manner described in the first method.

If you experience any issue, please review the available options your page builder offers. Since each solution differs in design and behavior, there is no universal guide to them. You can also consider just using more conventional methods like shortcodes and widgets described in method 1 and 2 respectively.

Method 4: PHP function

Because a slider can be an integral part of your site, you may want to insert it dynamically from the template files. There is a PHP function (with additional filtering options) to do just that. For example, you can call it from the header.php file of your theme and it will insert your slider into the corresponding area. By providing filters you can show it on certain pages only depending on your settings. Here is the function definition:

The following examples are all valid:

						<?php layerslider(1); ?> // Displays the first slider on every page
						<?php layerslider(1, 'homepage'); ?> // Displays the first slider only on your home page
						<?php layerslider(1, 'my-custom-post-title'); ?> // Displays the first slider on a custom page by name
						<?php layerslider(2, '1369'); ?> // Displays the second slider on a custom page by ID
						<?php layerslider('homefullwidth', 'category-name'); ?> // Displays the slider with the slug 'homefullwidth' on ali/custom page by a category name
						<?php layerslider(3, 'homepage,about-us,1234'); ?> // Displays the third slider on multiple pages

It is important to check the corresponding slider ID on the LayerSlider WP slider list page. When you remove some sliders, their IDs won't be re-indexed and the sequence you would expect may broke up. This is important for data consistency.

Using filters to display sliders on specific pages

Filters can be used to target specific pages where you want a slider to be displayed. This can be extremely helpful if you're inserting sliders in a way that would show them on multiple pages. By using filters you can set custom conditions that would otherwise require programming skills. Our solution is easy to use for anyone and the currently supported filters should cover most use cases.

• Front Page: The special name homepage can be used to display the slider on your site's main page.
• Page ID: Use a page ID to display sliders on a specific page. You can find the page ID in the URL (post=<number>) when you're editing a page/post on the WP admin area.
• Page Slug: A page slug can also achieve the same purpose as page IDs. The page slug is the editable part of the permalink, which you can see when editing a page/post on the admin interface.
• Category: You can also filter for category pages. Providing a category name will display the slider on all pages belonging to that category.

Important: You can set multiple filters. Just provide a comma separated list if you want to display sliders on multiple pages. Mixing the different kinds of filters together or providing multiple IDs/slugs/category names is not a problem.

Example: The filter list homepage,about-us,1234 can be split into three different filters:

• homepage – your site's main/front page
• about-us – a page slug (permalink)
• 1234 – a page ID if you don't use pretty URLs

Using the Transition Builder

LayerSlider WP supports various types of slide transitions. The Transition Builder offers you an easy-to-use visual editor to create custom transitions for your own needs. Transitions created with the editor will automatically appear in the list of available transitions when you're editing a slider.

Tips & tricks

We can recommend the same tips as we mentioned in the Slider Builder section:

• Hover over an option field with your mouse cursor to reveal more information.
• Watch the preview. The best way to learn is to instantly see how each option affect the transition you're building. Just play with the settings and observe the differences to understand their role.
• We have sample transitions, too! They should be already added to the Transition Builder when you first visit the page. You can see the settings we've used to build these samples. You can also import any of the 200+ pre-defined 2D/3D transitions we're using in the plugin.

Building 3D transitions

3D transitions are made up with 3 animation steps to create more complex transitions with multiple actions. The "animation" step is required, but the "before animation" and "after animation" steps are optional. You can use them to do some preparation before the animation starts or restore back some settings after it is finished.

To help you better understand what are these steps, here is a simple example:

• Before the animation starts, you may want to scale down columns
• Then rotate them to left
• Finally, you want them to scale up back

If you want a really simple transition, you don't have to use all the steps. In this case, please make sure to untick the "Enabled" checkboxes for the corresponding steps.

About LayerSlider WP Skin Editor

The LayerSlider WP skin editor offers you a graphical way on your WP admin area to modify LayerSlider skins without the need to work with files on FTP. The Skin Editor automatically detects additional content, so you can customize skins from other sources as well.

About LayerSlider WP CSS Editor

With this editor, you can enter custom CSS code, which will be included on pages containing LayerSlider sliders. This gives you a chance for much more complex customizations that the Slider Builder interface cannot provide. Your CSS code will also be included in the Slider Builder, thus the Preview mode should pick them up and show the appropriate result on-the-fly.

About LayerSlider API

LayerSlider is built on standard web technologies like HTML, CSS, and Javascript, and offers a way to extend the capabilities of the plugin through the LayerSlider API. Please note, this requires programming skills and web development experience, thus we cannot recommend it to users without the necessary knowledge.

Event reference

Event callbacks is a way to receive notifications and run custom code when certain actions occur in sliders. The following events can be used under the Event Callbacks tab of the Slider Builder.

Event Data object

Most event handler functions will have the same 2 pre-defined variables passed. Those are the jQuery Event object and our custom slider data object. You can name these variables by your choice, but we will refer to them as event and slider in our examples.

Every slider data object will contain the same properties, regardless of the used event. However, it's possible that some values are not yet set depending on the current point of execution. The data object contains the most relevant information, but we've also included the entire LayerSlider instance data source, which you can use to access or modify properties on the fly, as well as to add new methods to implement new features.

We encourage everyone to use the browser developer tools and examine the returned data by using console.log() to see potentially undocumented data. Here is an example that you can paste into your browser's JavaScript console. Please make sure to use the right selection when targeting the slider container element on which the LayerSlider instance was created.

					var data = jQuery('#slider').layerSlider('eventData');
					console.log( data );

API methods

The below API methods can be used to control sliders externally, modify their behavior, or wire them up with 3rd party solutions. By using the right combinations of API events and commands, you can implement new features or extended the capabilities of the plugin with custom code. Please note, API events are exposed to the API commands in the same way as anything else. Be aware that most API methods will trigger the appropriate API events as well.

Examples

• Switch slides with custom controls:

  					<a href="javascript:void(0);" onclick="$('#slider').layerSlider(2);">Change to slide 2</a>

• Combining callbacks and API methods:

  The following example will bring up an alert message after every slide change with the current slide number. It can be used with the slideChangeDidComplete event callback.

  							function(event, slider) {
  								alert('The current slide is: ' + slider.slides.current.index);
  							}

Legacy API - OBSOLETE, DO NOT USE

Event reference

Slider data

To list all properties in the data object just paste this code snippet into a callback function and check your browser's Javascript console:

					for(key in data) {
						console.log(key + ' = ' + data[key]);
					}

API methods

What's new?

Changes in LayerSlider 6.5.1

• Fixed a PHP error that might caused HTTP 500 Internal Server Error in some cases with older versions of PHP.

Changes in LayerSlider 6.5.0

• Introducing our new premium feature: Popups.
  
  Popups is a completely new way of using LayerSlider and it greatly extends its capabilities and what you can build with the plugin. Combining our strong foundation and the vast number of features we already have with the newly introduced Popup feature makes LayerSlider one of the best choice among popup plugins. Click here for more information and live examples.
• Thanks to conseillerphytoaroma, the French localization has been updated to cover areas that weren't translated before.
• Added new skin: Photo Gallery
• Added "Change URL hash" advanced option to Slider Settings -> Slideshow. Enable it to update the URL hash as you navigate in the slider based on slide deeplinks. This makes it possible to share URLs that will start the slider with the currently visible slide at any given moment.
• Added "Prefer Blend Mode" advanced option to Slider Settings -> Misc. Enable this option to avoid blend mode issues with slide transitions. Due to technical limitations, this will also clip your slide transitions regardless of your settings.
• Greatly enhanced the Global Hover feature introduced in the previous release.
• The admin UI now uses deeplinking to always open at the same location when you refresh the page.
• Fixed overflowing issue and improved multiple selection in the new WP text editor "Add LayerSlider" plugin.

Changes in LayerSlider 6.4.0

• Bonjour! Thanks to conseillerphytoaroma, LayerSlider is now fully translated into French.
• Sziasztok! We've also added an experimental Hungarian localization in this release.
• Psst! More languages are on their way! Internationalization in LayerSlider underwent a major overhaul to provide high quality localizations and make translators' life much easier.
• The English locale has also been updated. Instead of using typewriter characters, we now have nicely formatted punctuation with curly quotes and apostrophes.
• Added new Google Fonts script subsets: Arabic, Bengali, Gujarati, Gurmukhi, Hebrew, Kannada, Malayalam, Myanmar, Oriya, Sinhala, Tamil, Telugu and Thai. Welcome, newcomers! :)
• In cooperation with WPBakery, this update introduce changes to improve compatibility & integration with future versions of Visual Composer. Developers should check our updated Filters reference in the Developer documentation.
• Added "Important Notice" feature. In cases of important and urgent matters, we can now display a small banner on the admin dashboard to notify everyone. These might be security issues or other justifiable cases. Hopefully, you will never see any of them. :)
• Entirely new WordPress text editor plugin to insert sliders into your posts and pages. Besides its drastically improved user interface, it also supports keyboard shortcuts, multiple selections and embed options.
• Added a new premium feature: Global Hover. Create spectacular effects by triggering the Hover Transitions of all layers at once when you hover over the slider with your mouse cursor. A simple example demonstrating this can be found here.
• Added "Start immediately" option to the Play by Scroll feature. Now it's possible to automatically start playback and only pause sliders at the first keyframe instead of waiting users to scroll down.
• Added option to override the starting slide of sliders in the shortcode and widget settings.
• Added letter spacing option to layer styles so you can change the character density in a line or block of text.

Improvements

• Enabled word wrapping in CodeMirror code editors.
• The System Status now has better recommendations with providing the ideal values of each setting.
• While LayerSlider continues to require PHP 5.3.0 or newer, on the global scope it no longer uses language features that is not available in PHP 5.2.4. This ensures better overall compatibility with WordPress on pages where LayerSlider is not being actively used.
• Updated documentation to fix page jumping issues when deeplinking.

Bug fixes

• Implemented a potential fix for CloudFlare's Rocket Loader issues.
• Fixed the image chooser button when using the "Insert image from URL" option.
• Fixed an isssue that prevented displaying the slider actions popup in some rare cases in the List View.
• Prevent slider selection (colored highlight) when switching into full screen mode by doubling clicking on the slider.
• Fixed certain issues with the Outline, Numbers and Rounded Flat skins.
• Fixed Blend mode with the Origami transition.
• Fixed alt attributes on the slide thumbnail images.
• Fixed an issue with the sliderDidRemove event.
• Fixed a rare issue with the opacity option of the Hover Transition.
• Countless other bug fixes and improvements throughout the plugin.

Changes is LayerSlider 6.3.0

Introducing a new premium feature: Revisions. Have a peace of mind knowing that your slider edits are always safe and you can revert back unwanted changes or faulty saves at any time. This feature serves not just as a backup solution, but a complete version control system where you can visually compare the changes you have made along the way.

Additional changes:

• Improved compatibility with *really old* and outdated slider versions.
• Fixed rare issues when copy-pasting layers across slides and sliders.
• Improved Auto-fit option in Slider Builder.

Changes is LayerSlider 6.2.1 & 6.2.2

This update contains important security fixes. We strongly encourage everyone to install it as soon as possible. [Thanks to WpHutte - wphutte.com for reporting.]

Version 6.2.2 was released shortly after v6.2.1 to solve an API issue.

New features

• Added option to choose whether the slide link should be on top or underneath layers.
• The Template Store can now import slider packs. Stay tuned, they're arriving soon!
• The System Status now checks the install location of LayerSlider and warns you about potential issues (if any).
• Added slide deeplink names to the LayerSlider API.

Improvements

• Lots of improvements in importing sliders.
• The premium features notification now lists the exact premium features being used in sliders.

Bug fixes

• Important security fixes.
• Fixed slide linking that has accidentally been broken by our previous update.
• Fixed an issue in IE11, which caused the browser to jump to the top of the page after slide change in some cases.
• Fixed video overlay image position preview on the admin interface.

Changes in LayerSlider 6.2.0

New features

• Introducing a new premium feature: Blend modes. Blend modes are an easy way to add eye-catching effects and is one of the most frequently used features in graphic and print design.
• The admin UI now warns against potential issues when selecting certain options, which are commonly misunderstood and would result unexpected behavior.
• Added OSD notifications for certain keyboard shortcuts (e.g. Ctrl/Cmd + S for saving the slider) and a corresponding setting under Screen Options to enable/disable this feature.
• Added layerslider_root_url filter to override paths. Check the Developer Documentation for more information.

Improvements

• Improved compatibility with older sliders.
• Improved handling of font variants when importing Google Fonts from templates.
• Certain number input fields are now stepping in more appropriate intervals when pressing the arrow buttons.
• Updated and extended some parts of the documentation.

Bug fixes

• A massive update for multimedia layers:
  • Fixed video size and positioning issues, which was present in rare edge cases.
  • Fixed occasional playback issues with videos being on the first slide.
  • Fixed the slideshow not progressing forward in cases when there was only one video layer on the slide.
  • Hiding a media layer with the Device support feature will now also disable media playback on the corresponding devices. In addition, background videos will also show the video poster image as a fallback. This enhances user experience on mobile devices that has limited playback capabilities due to OS/browser restrictions.
  • Various minor bug fixes and improvements.
• Fixed image chooser when using the "Use post image" option.
• Fixed the "Use post URL" option in linking fields.
• Fixed the Slider Settings -> Appearance -> Global background image option to always use the appropriate URL.
• Fixed the "Use GreenSock (GSAP) sandboxing" option not always taking effect.
• Fixed an issue that could empty your Google Fonts collection when reinstalling the plugin.
• Fixed a rare issue that affected users trying to change settings in the Advanced Settings section without having sliders.
• Fixed issues caused by applying text transitions on non-text layers
• General UI and under the hood improvements and bug fixes

Changes in LayerSlider 6.1.6

This update fixes every issues that we accidentally introduced in our last release (v6.1.5). We were super busy to resolve this as soon as we were able to and we sincerely apologize everyone for the inconveniences this might caused. Thank you for your understanding and patience.

New features

• Added option to enable/disable GreenSock (GSAP) sandboxing to maximize compatibility with other plugins.

Changes in LayerSlider 6.1.5

This is the first update in line of our upcoming new releases developed in parallel. This update addresses most of the issues surfaced recently, introduce a couple of new features and lots of under the hood improvements. LayerSlider 6.2.0 will shortly follow this update to fix any remaining known issues and bring new templates and other surprises.

New features

• Added option to set a custom slider preview image (like the way Template Store sliders are displayed) in Slider Settings -> Misc.
• Added a dedicated stacking order (z-index) option to layer styles.

Improvements

• System Status will now report about more potential issues and provide more helpful messages explaining how to fix them.
• Our online services received a lot of improvements and provide helpful details in case of a detected issue.
• Increased the number of post items you can choose from Post Options.

Bug fixes

• Fixed deeplinking issues.
• Fixed Hover Transition mixed with layer linking.
• Fixed the Stretch option of the slide background image size setting.
• Fixed mobile detection under certain versions of Internet Explorer.
• Fixed the local autoplay setting of media layers.
• Lots and lots of small fixes and improvements.

Changes in LayerSlider 6.1.0 "Anniversary Update"

New features

• Introducing a new premium feature: Origami
• Added slider filters to control on which pages a slide should be displayed.
• Added new smart links options.

Improvements

• Improved compatibility with older sliders.
• Improved compatibility with Internet Explorer 11.
• Improved compatibility with older versions of the GreenSock library.

Bug fixes

• Fixed orientation change issue on Android devices.
• Fixed layer stacking (z-index) issues on iOS and Safari.
• Fixed custom video poster images
• Fixed the Pause on hover option not being saved correctly.
• Fixed layer attributes in front-end sliders.
• Fixed the minimum font size options.
• Fixed footer and conditional script loading options not working properly in some cases.
• Fixed maxRatio issue.
• Countless other improvements and bug fixes.

Changes in version 6.0.6

• Fixed slider export issues that affected some users.
• Fixed the AltGr key in keyboard shortcuts.
• Added Screen Option to disable keyboard shortcuts.
• Other minor bug fixes and improvements.

Changes in version 6.0.1 – 6.0.5

• Improved stability and compatibility with older versions of LayerSlider.
• Fixed known issues introduced in LayerSlider 6.

What's new in LayerSlider 6?

Faster, Better, Prettier

Both the admin interface and front-end sliders load faster and perform better. This release has numerous bug fixes and improvements. So much actually, that we can't even write a complete list. The admin interface has also been redesigned a bit to provide familiar but much cleaner and easier controls.

Reworked Responsive Mode, New Slider Layouts, Device Dependent Layouts

The new responsive mode performs significantly better and in most cases it does not require any special configuration. LayerSlider now also have multiple new layout modes like full size, hero screne and full screen sliders. These will allow new use cases such as running slideshows on billboards. It's also possible to make different layouts for different devices (phones, tables, desktop).

New Transitions, Text Animations, Loop, Hover, Filters and a lot more

We've added lots of new transition options, which greatly extends the capabilities of your slideshows. You can now create chainable multi-step animations enhanced with stylish text transitions and interactive hover animations. There's also hidden surprises like the much requested Ken Burns effect, 3D parallax effect, and our new "play by scroll" feature. Oh, and don't forget to try out filters, which can be used to apply blur, sepia, grayscale etc. effects to your layers among many other.

Static Layers

Layers can now enter and leave on any slide. You can easily build more complex animations where layers persist across multiple slides. Or just use it as an "always on top" feature.

Undo and Redo

Web apps usually don't have controls to undo unwanted/accidental changes. LayerSlider now has. And it's even preserved for later use, whenever you need it.

Multi-selection, Resize, Rulers + Guides

Do you ever wanted to move around multiple layers and once? LayerSlider 6 now supports multiple selection, which allows you altering groups of layers seamlessly. With rulers and keyboard shortcuts, you can now move/resize/etc your layers with precision. There's also Guides and a snap to feature built in.

Keyboard shortcuts & Popout Editor

The slider builder interface can now be controlled by keyboard shortcuts. These shortcuts also introduces a lot of new features, like editing layers content right in the preview area or copying and pasting layers across slides and sliders. We've also introduced the Popout Editor, which transforms the layer options area into a floating window that can be resized and placed wherever you want. This makes it extremely easy to edit everything in one place, without the need to scroll up and down constantly.

Image Editor

With the help of Adobe's Creative SDK, LayerSlider 6 now has a built-in image editor. You can perform common tasks like resizing, cropping, rotating images, as well as photo retouching, adding frames, text, effects, stickers and a lot more. It's like a mini-Photoshop.

And a lot more ...

There's way more new features and improvement that we can list here: scheduled sliders, retina-ready, serving dynamically scaled images to reduce data usage and speed up page loads on mobile devices, redesigned transition builder with import feature, continuous live previews, new interactive timeline, reworked multimedia layer support with custom video poster and controls, custom HTML attributes, drag 'n' drop image upload, smart links, copy & paste layer styles and transition settings, named slides, new slider/slide background settings, auto-fit zoom, align layers feature.

The number of new features almost never end, but this list must. :)

The future of LayerSlider

LayerSlider 6 is just the beginning of our awesome new ideas. One of the main goals was to completely rebuild the plugin architecture and modernize its core. This allows us to implement new features way more faster and improve upon existing functionality with an easily maintainable code base. Beyond the predictable feature updates like the complete overhaul of skins, dynamic contents, etc (which will arrive very soon); we already have an experimental offline slider editor and preliminary support for LayerSlider extensions. This later one will soon be available for anyone to extend the plugins capabilities.

Previous versions

Changes in version 5.6.10

• Added LayerSlider 6 beta program signup notice
• Fixed some minor cosmetic issues under WP 4.6

Changes in version 5.6.9

• Embedded YouTube videos are now always using HTTPS protocol
• Fixed a compatibility issue with jQuery 3.0
• Fixed a PHP error that affected some users on front-end pages

Changes in version 5.6.8

• Improved image preload under IE and Edge browsers

Changes in version 5.6.7

• Fixed image preload issues
• WPML implementation fixes to properly generate URLs with language code
• Fixed 'headers already sent' PHP warning that affected some users
• Removed deprecated get_currentuserinfo() WP function call

Changes in version 5.6.6

• Our sites and services now utilize SSL, providing LayerSlider updates and other assets over a secure connection
• Various fixes for HTTPS sites
• Further security updates
• Other minor fixes

Changes in version 5.6.5

• Optimized images with reduced file size
• Auto-Updates fixes and enhancements
• Fixed Google Fonts saving issues
• Fixed Google Fonts 'Load only on admin interface' option
• Fixed YouTube embeds with privacy-enhanced mode enabled
• Fixed a potential WPML-related PHP debug message
• Fixed potential security vulnerabilities

Changes in version 5.6.4

• Fixed Console API calls
• Fixed some YouTube playback issues
• Fixed broken 'use post image' option
• Fixed 'Add Media' button when inserting a video/audio
• Fixed a PHP debug message that appeared in some cases
• Fixed an issue that broke the Slider Builder in rare cases
• Fixed saving issue in Troubleshooting & Advanced Settings section that affected some users
• Quick fixes to support Right-to-Left (RTL) languages. Further improvements will arrive in future versions.

Changes in version 5.6.3

• General bug fixes and stability improvements.

Changes in version 5.6.2

• Added "Use slider markup caching" option to advanced settings
• Added "Download latest version manually" option to the Auto-Updates feature
• The "Concatenate output" option is now disabled by default
• The "Include scripts in the footer" option will now move all inline scripts to the footer as well
  • This will also fix other potential JS errors, such as when jQuery is moved to the footer
• Fixed issues with enabled caching when the same slider is inserted on a page repeatedly
• Fixed the "Conditional script loading" option, which caused sliders to not render properly under WP 4.3

Changes in version 5.6.1

• Fixed saving certain options in Slider Settings
• Fixed Word Wrap option in live preview

Changes in version 5.6.0

• Huge performance boost:

  Our Slider Builder interface loads and works drastically faster, while it uses considerably less resources on both the server and client-side. The amount of content you add to sliders no longer has an impact on performance, the editor should always be fast and responsive. This also fixes the memory limit and execution time issues on servers with limited resources.

• Caching slider markup:

  LayerSlider now uses its own caching mechanism to spare your server from unnecessary load. Most installations support memory caching, which provides instant access to your sliders based on visiting frequency. This means that a slider on your front-page could stay in memory for improved speed, but another one in a sub-page might fall back to regular disk cache to free up resources for the content matters the most.

• Minor interface changes:

  We made a minor interface change in the list of layers, which you hopefully find familiar. Hiding/locking layers now has a permanent effect. The layer settings section has been placed closer to the preview, so you need to scroll less.

• New features:
  • Added bulk slide creation when selecting multiple images
  • The slider builder now restores previous editing sessions (i.e. active slide/layer, etc)
  • You can now easily select overlapped layers just by right-clicking on them in Preview
• Other changes:
  • Updated GreenSock library for improved animation performance (especially on mobile)
  • Removed old media uploader support (pre-WP 3.5)
• Fixed issues:
  • Fixed WordPress debug message under WP 4.3.
  • Fixed Screen Options button under WP 4.3.
  • Fixed several issues with embedded YouTube videos
  • Fixed issues when adding images from external URL
  • Fixed duplicating sliders with really long names
  • Fixed glitches when reordering layers
  • Fixed the layerslider_slider_markup filter hook
  • Fixed losing transition and layer style settings when saving (magic_quotes)
  • Fixed memory limit and execution time issues on servers with limited resources
  • Fixed timeline

Changes in version 5.5.1

• Fixed WordPress debug message under WP 4.3.

Changes in version 5.5.0

• Added back the auto-generated excerpts based on the native WP behavior:
  • Manually entered excerpts will remain "as is", without any modification or formatting. Custom HTML code is allowed.
  • Auto-generated excerpts have all shortcodes and HTML tags removed and they will appear as plain text.
  • Auto-generated excerpts will be trimmed down to 55 words. The [...] "hellip" sign will be appended at the end if the text exceeds this limitation.
  • Custom word count used by themes will be automatically applied in your sliders. Developers can override it by using filter hooks.
  • Auto-generated excerpts respect WP's <!--more--> tag, so you can easily split your content at the point you want.
  • Text length limitation will remain as an optional feature on a per layer basis.
    
    
• Providing update notification for unauthorized sites as well
• The settings boxes below your list of sliders has been grouped under a tabbed interface
• Significantly improved YouTube video playback behavior
• Fixed an issue that prevented some users to properly import our sample sliders
• Fixed update installation from LayerSlider's admin interface
• Fixed 'yourLogo style' option in Slider Settings
• Fixed an issue that caused appearance issues for a few users in Slider Settings
• Prevent the LS Help menu entry showing up on non-LayerSlider admin pages
• Fixed the 'Enjoy using LayerSlider?' share sheet appearing in cases when it should not
• Extended developer documentation with improved examples
• Updated End-User documentation

Changes in version 5.4.0

• Entirely new documentation
• Added option to import sliders without their images
• Slide backgrounds now parse shortcodes when used in "Enter URL"
• The LayerSlider shortcode can now accept filtering options
• Improved compatibility with image preloaders
• Improved compatibility with certain plugins/themes
• Fixed several issues with dynamic layers
• Fixed issues when the same slider was inserted on a page in multiple times
• Fixed TinyMCE editor tool to properly work with multiple instances on page
• Fixed some potential JS errors that could happen in some very rare cases
• YouTube video thumbnails have not been loaded until the previous slide

Changes in version 5.3.2

• Fixed skins on Windows servers
• The skin URL now respects HTTPS sites
• Importing sliders now restores their slug/alias
• Various other small fixes and improvements

Changes in version 5.3.1

• Fixed issues with skins
• Fixed a PHP fatal error on certain installations

Changes in version 5.3.0

• Added new API method 'redraw' to update the slider's layout and contents.
• Fixed Javascript error if a slider doesn't have any slide.
• Fixed several issues related to self-hosted HTML5 video playback.
• Fixed responsive mode of full width sliders when the orientation changes on mobile devices.

• Added LS_Sources class for developers to load skins and demo sliders externally.
• Added Turkish translation thanks to marketplace user thernic.
• The LayerSlider shortcode is now registered globally, thus page builder solutions can pick it up automatically.
• Improved compatibility with CloufFlare's RocketScript.
• Revamped auto-update modal window to fit WP's new design.
• Fixed an issue related to invalid JSON data, which caused various issues on the admin interface in some cases. Most notably it broke adding/removing slides and the WYSIWYG editor.
• Fixed "enter URL" button of slide background.
• Fixed "undefined constant WPLANG" error message that occurred on some installations.

Changes in version 5.2.1

• Added "Latin Extended" to default Google Fonts character sets
• Fixed slider slugs/aliases
• Fixed the transition chooser appearing when hitting the Enter key in text fields
• Fixed broken layer style settings when using double quotes in certain options
• Fixed some dynamic contents not showing up in real-time previews
• Selecting recently used colors in the color picker now properly update the WYSIWYG slider editor
• Other small bug fixes and improvements

What's new in version 5.2.0?

• New features
  • A major interface revamp with flat design
  • New transition gallery design with filtering options
  • Added option to apply the currently selected transition to other slides
  • Added option to set post image as the slide background
  • Added option to link the whole slide to post URL
  • Added option to easily link layers to post URL under the 'Link' tab
  • Added option to easily use post image without placeholders
  • Supporting meta post placeholders to print out non-standard post informations (e.g. product details in WooCommerce)
  • Supporting all Google Fonts character sets
  • Added an option to set the duration of the fade transition when the slider is showing up for the first time on page load
  • Added an option to start the slider only if it enters into the viewport
  • Added an option to hide the slider on mobile devices
  • Added an option to hide the slider under the given value of browser width in pixels
  • Added an option to hide the slider over the given value of browser width in pixels
  • Recently used colors in the color picker
  • Support qTranslate in dynamic post contents
  • Support 'random' in shortcode and LS_Sliders PHP class
  • Support category-name filter in layerslider() PHP function
  • Support for including multiple media sources for self hosted video/audio
  • Added new API methods: userInitData, defaultInitData
  • Changed API properties: prevLayerIndex, curLayerIndex
• Improvements
  • Quicker and more reliable saving method
  • Fixed every known issues with import/export
  • Fixed character encoding issues
  • The plugin no longer relies on mb_eregi() PHP function
  • Fixed missing custom thumbnails when the 'hover' option was selected for the navigation area
  • Fixed several issues with full width sliders, including the "jump" when the page loads
  • Fixed TinyMCE LayerSlider button under WP 3.9+
  • Sliders are no longer remain visible on front-end when they removed instead of deleting
  • Fixed an issue that reset the post options after duplicating slides
  • Fixed several issues with embedded HTML5 videos
  • Fixed an issue which prevented to show embedded video thumbnails on first slide
  • Fixed the stuck loading indicator when some images were missing or couldn't be loaded
  • Fixed the curLayerIndex API variable
  • Security fixes, including a potential directory traversal issue
  • Added an updated version of Greensock Animation Engine with performance improvements and bug fixes
  • Lots and lots of other fixes and improvements
    
    
• Bug fixes
  • Prevent Google and other search engines to index the plugin folder of LayerSlider
  • Slide background images now have proper "alt" attribute based on the attachment/post details
  • Video layers are ignoring the Show until parameter while playing
  • Fixed an issue that caused background flickering in some cases
  • The slider won't hang up if an image layer couldn't be loaded
  • Reduced package file size by removing unnecessary files and legacy code
  • Added some extra CodeMirror instances to edit custom CSS more easily
  • Added play icon to the 'noskin' skin
  • Fixed broken autoplay feature of HTML5 videos

Changes in version 5.1.2

• Fixed 3D transitions in the latest versions of Chrome
• Improved compatibility with WeatherSlider WP and wpStickies

Changes in version 5.1.1

• Fixed some appearance issues
• Fixed an issue in the new import method

Changes in version 5.1.0

• Added support for exporting/importing sliders with images
• Added ability to export/import multiple sliders with custom selection
• Added slider slug/alias support
• Added notification of plugin dependencies when detecting issues
• Fixed several issues related to dynamic sliders from posts
• Fixed several issues related to embedded videos
• Fixed timeline view
• Fixed slide linking issue
• Fixed the slide ID attribute
• Fixed issues with relative URLs
• Fixed invalid error messages after saving
• Fixed "Convert" button when updating from outdated versions
• Various other fixes, improvements and interface enhancements
• Extended APIs for developers with extended documentation

Changes in version 5.0.2

• Added [image-url] post placeholder
• Fixed excerpt post placeholder
• Fixed slide transition issues
• Fixed blank slider editor issue
• Fixed loops slider setting
• Fixed HTML5 video sizing issue
• Reduced installable ZIP by dropping old sample sliders to avoid installation problems
• Interface adjustments

Changes in version 5.0.1

• Added Dashicons support
• Fixed file permissions that caused various issues in some cases
• Fixed WPML and better URL handling
• Fixed tag and category list post placeholders
• Fixed locales
• Fixed other small issues, which caused PHP warnings
• Fixed layer transitions if there are no slide background images
• Fixed the starting position of layers with percentage value of width

Changes in version 5.0.0

• New features
  • Build dynamic sliders from WordPress posts and pages
 with advanced filters for finding posts or mixing them with static content
  • Use Google Fonts with built-in search and configuration options
  • Advanced settings like scripts in the footer, conditional script loading etc. to improve performance

  • Parallax Layers - a fancy parallax effect by mouse move
  • New layer transitions: rotateX, rotateY and skew with option to set transformOrigin
  • Added a new skin
  • Easily upload and insert self-hosted HTML5 video & audio
  • Option to restore or permanently delete removed sliders
  • Bulk actions with option to merge sliders together
  • Added “Max-width” option for responsive mode
  • Added “Lazy load” option
• Interface changes
  • Major interface revamp
  • Using CodeMirror at various places for CSS and JS code editing
  • Added timeline view
 to review your transition timings like in a movie editor
  • New image upload boxes with an easier way to load images from external URLs
  • Added a LayerSlider entry under the “New” menu on the admin bar
  • Added LayerSlider helper for page and post editor to include sliders easily
  • Using cleaner language across the plugin and docs
  • New sample sliders included
• Improvements
  • Slides and layers can now animating at the same time
  • Layers can now fade + slide at the same time
  • Super smooth transitions with the Greensock engine
  • Improved some layer transitions like fade, slide (axis-free), scale, etc.
  • Improved crossfading slide transition with semi-transparent PNG files
  • Smarter preloading images with lazy load
  • Considerably cleaner markup
  • Ability to override the default slider settings
  • Added lots of action and filter hooks
  • Uploaded contents are not relying on URLs anymore
  • Using nonces to secure your pages
  • Brand new docs
• Fixes
  • Fixed the '1px slide transition bug'
  • Fixed markup issues such as missing alt attributes in some cases
  • Improved saving to avoid some web server related issues