Update: There have been some changes from the time the Orion idea has originated. I would highly suggest reading our newest edition of Developer Diary #8! 🙂
It’s been almost a month since we kicked off the Orion Developer Diary. It’s crunch time in the ManageWP HQ, and we’ve got some great news for you.
You Were Promised Backups In The Previous Diary
Initially the Dev Diary #2 was intended to give you a tour of the new backup system we planned to release into Orion Beta by then, but the beta tester feedback was so overwhelming that we needed to pause further development and sort out the fundamentals.
So before I go over these changes I’ll just drop a small teaser of the new backup system that will DEFINITELY be in the next dev diary (the design is still a bit off, don’t hold this against us) 🙂
Pictured: a concept of pure awesomeness
This Is Why Your Feedback Matters
You gave us a lot of food for thought, so a lot of the dashboard elements were sent back to the To Do list. The first one on the chopping block was the Overview tab in the Statistics widget:
Originally intended as a feel-good part of screen real estate, it did not strike a chord with you so we replaced it with more useful information; instead of getting a quick numerical overview of the available updates that was in the initial Orion Beta, the new Overview tab content is of much higher quality: you’ve got an overview of backups, updates, uptime and traffic all in one place.
We also took a shot at redesigning our most important widget that handles the plugin, theme and core updates:
You haven’t sent us negative feedback regarding this widget, we felt we need to go above and beyond, so we added the Ignore and the Automated Update buttons to this widget, reducing the number of clicks you need to make in order to manage the available updates. There are also bracket numbers you know the exact number of plugins, themes and core updates in each category, for your convenience.
We’re also close to locking down the uptime monitoring widget design:
You’ll notice that we’ve made some improvements over the current version of ManageWP – there are more stats, better error logging, and the uptime can be included in the client report.
Other Major Improvements
- You are now able to add websites that are fully behind HTTP authentication
- You are now able to manage websites with the altered wp-admin URL
- Whenever a website is added, it will automatically be linked to the correct Google Analytics website if your Google Analytics account has been connected
- You are now able to add the website on a server with a self-signed SSL certificate
- The Refresh IP button has been removed. An algorithm now checks if your website IP has changed and updates it for you
- There are now inspirational quotes on our loading screen 🙂
Got any questions or suggestions, or want in on the beta? Let me know in the comment section and I’ll be happy to write back. Good times ahead!
Want more info? Check out the Orion Developer Diary #1
Update: ManageWP Orion Developer Diary #3 is out with a detailed rundown of our new backup system!
chrisjohns03
I’d like to test the Orion beta!
Nemanja Aleksic
Invites for everyone! So excited about the new Developer Diary next week 🙂
mads
Please add me to the beta!
contact
Please add me to the beta. Thank you!
Liz
I’d love access to the beta as well, please! 🙂
mike
We’d love to have our staff beta test Orion as well. How can our account be added to the list?
Nemanja Aleksic
You’ve been sent an invitation email with the code you can use to create an Orion account 🙂
mordavia1982
would love to become a beta tester
andrew
Yeah sign me up have a bunch of multisite so should look good
webmaster
I would like to join the beta 😀
Nemanja Aleksic
natuurlijk!
Corinne
I would love to join the beta if there is still room
Nemanja Aleksic
You got it, Corinne! Check your inbox 🙂
Nemanja Aleksic
You’ve all been added to the Orion closed beta. If you can’t find the invitation in your inbox or spam folder, let me know!
brandi.abbey
I haven’t been sent an invite. Please send.
Nemanja Aleksic
Sent, have fun!
alexbangle
I would like to try out the new beta. Thanks!
msgliniewicz
Hi, I am new to the plugin and like what I see.. I would like to see more info with the reports.. Such as: as baseline report when a new site comes online showing, WP Version, Plugin Version, broken links, last virus scan, number and names of ADMIN users, SEO errors, etc) then be able to track this info over time. This is critical for my clients and my ROI.
Thanks
Nemanja Aleksic
I’m interested in hearing more about this idea – I’ve sent you an email, looking forward to your reply.
permakitalo
I would like to try the beta, thanks.
admin
hi, id like to sign up for beta testing if possible! 😀
Terence
I have a couple of sites I where I would be interested to try out the new beta. One is an established multsite network and the other a new single site in development. The development site is SSL only, both are on different DigitalOcean VPS, on NginX/Apache2 servers and both are behind CloudFlare’s reverse proxy.
I mean, how hard can it be? Not much could go wrong there, right?
Terence.
jamesbarlo
i want to beta test this
Michael
Please add me to the beta. Can’t wait to restrict out.
Nemanja Aleksic
Everyone up until now has been added to the beta list. If you don’t see the invite by the end of the week, please check your spam filter.
Looking forward to letting you all test Orion!
zach
Would love to be a part of this beta!
Matt2012
Brand new to managewp and still in my trial but would love to try out the beta looks very nice.
kevin
Yes please to beta if possible.
boydstonmarketing
Would love to be added to Beta!
dan
Can’t wait to try this out. Would still like to be considered for the beta
andymarkle
Please add me to the beta!
webproducer
Please include me in the beta program – thanks
info
beta please
info
Still possible to be switched to the Orion beta ?
atjuch
can you add me to the beta? 🙂
Stein
Looks great! Count me in on the beta, please.
wesleyellismusic
Beta – add me for sure. I’ll give feedback.
DT Media
Please add us to the beta!
acmanage
BETA PLEASE!
apwebdev
Would love to be part of the beta.
Nemanja Aleksic
All of the people who asked for beta in the comment section so far have been added to the beta list; some of you already received the invite. Have fun and make sure you break as much as you can! 🙂
thetouchstudios
I want in on the beta. Can’t wait to see it.
daniel
When do you think Orion will be released? Summer? end of the year? I don’t need a specific time-frame, just a general idea. We’re considering switching services, but I would like to give Orion a try before.
Nemanja Aleksic
We’re aiming for summer, but there’s no set date because we want this new release to be nothing less than rock solid. Our current ManageWP version is available until then, and when the time comes we’ll give all of our users the option of migrating to Orion with one click.
Ken Westgaard
Don’t know if this has been asked before, but will there be possible to run scheduled security scans? And get some kind of notification if something is wrong?
developer
I really like this idea.
Nemanja Aleksic
Yes, you’ll be able to set up scheduled scans and have the report logs.
And after the release we plan much, much more 🙂
Ken Westgaard
Awesome! ManageWP is just getting better and better! 🙂
cmundell
I’m up for beta testing!
craig
We’d love to participate in the Beta!
DT Media
Please add us a beta tester
pvdochtend
It would be great to be a beta tester and test this new enviroment !!!
trent
Can’t wait to see this go live. Please as me as a Beta Tester.
tontonweb
hello, looks great !
i’d love to be in the beta too!
thx
tontonweb
in french is possible …
info
Looking good. I would be interested in participating in the beta.
ghc
I’d like to beta test
mlaasri
I would to be a beta-tester.
jmazza
Would love to beta
Nemanja Aleksic
You got your invite over a month ago, can you check?
Website Creatives
Wow, Orion is looking pretty good, can’t wait to have a go at it! Any chance I could get a beta invite?
sales
beta please. 🙂
pal
I would love to be a beta-tester.
spencertaylor
I would love to be a Beta tester. I use ManagerWP everyday, and I am excited to get to Orion now, not later. Plus, as a developer, I’m really good at breaking stuff 🙂
Nemanja Aleksic
That’s the spirit! Break everything! 😀
anders.b.eriksson
I would like to be a beta tester:)
brac.wardlaw
I would like to be a beta tester.
WP Lab
Those screenshots look awesome! I can’t wait to be able to play with it, so please sign me up for the beta 🙂
accounts
Our Design house would LOVE to be a part of the beta!
managewp
I’d like to join the beta
Daniel Bell
Looks you implemented the design feedback! Looking much better. I can’t tell but are you accounting for retina screens now?
Nemanja Aleksic
Retina compatibility is one of the requirements from the start, everything from icons to layout should look good. If you catch something out of place we’d love to hear about it.
Jillyn
I’m loving Orion and am very excited about the updates you’ve made (especially the update all – yay)! Thank you for a great tool and all of your hard work!
Nemanja Aleksic
Thanks, we try to do our best to give you the tool you deserve 🙂
Brad
Plugin or theme rollback possible? I know updates break things at times-going to previous or earlier version seems like a good idea.
Jillyn
Oooh…yes, please!
Nemanja Aleksic
A rollback is possible even with the current ManageWP version, although our system does a complete restore from a backup archive. If you’ve done only one plugin update, this is not a efficient way to go about it. That’s why were focusing on a backup system that will only roll back the actual changes. Less server resources, faster restore – everyone’s happy 🙂
martin
would love to come onboard and try the beta
Zac Davis
Beta rules! …I am guessing.
modescoo
I would like to be beta tester
cdybenko
This is great stuff. I’d love to get in on the beta!
zarian
I would love to give you feedback on beta
jainlv
would like to beta
ryan
Please include us in your beta. Thanks!
dan
I would like to be considered for the beta program
Thomas
Nice improvementsI would also like to take part in the beta programm. Thanks!
daniel
I hope the current issues have been addressed:
1. You can’t have different backup settings for different websites
2. You lose all your FTP settings if you uncheck the FTP option during a backup
Nemanja Aleksic
You actually can do this now in ManageWP – just set up a different scheduled backup task for each destination 🙂
daniel
Scheduling backups just to have another backup setting is not a good. Option. We run full backups once a month. Full backups fail a lot of times, and that’s why we don’t schedule them. We run them and make sure they finished running.
Nemanja Aleksic
I agree that it’s not an ideal solution, it will be addressed in Orion.
staff
We would like to be added as a beta test.
randywstevenson
Add me to Beta. I work in Web Hosting support and I recommend ManageWP a lot 🙂 Fantastic tool.!
mwp2
I love MWP! I’d love to be a beta tester.
hi
Would love to help test the beta guys! Thanks
scott.robinson
Would love beta access. This looks great!
jtaylor
Would love to be a beta tester.
J
holotrope
I’m interested in the beta program if still open. Thanks!
Happily Organised
Yes please – sign us up!
straitline
I’ll take beta access, thanks.
vicente
I would love to help testing. Please add me to the Beta :).
tamas.ratkai
A public Trello board would be really nice so we can check the milestones. Frontapp uses it also. Check it out for inspiration: https://trello.com/b/kZsVVrc8/front-product-roadmap
Nemanja Aleksic
We’re big fans of Trello, and a public Trello roadmap has been considered for quite a while. The only thing holding us back is that we want to complete the fundamentals before we before we publish the rest. We don’t just want you to vote on things, we want to give you the option of being involved more actively by putting forward suggestions, but the trick is not to let everything descend into anarchy 🙂
maginleym
I would like to contribute to the Beta if you still users.
post
This looks great. Love to be beta and test this live 🙂
Good work!
ff
Wow, this looks well thought out! I am excited. I just got around working with ManageWP and it’s awesome already. Can’t wait to see what you have build! I’d also like beta access 🙂
BlizzDesign
We would love to try the Beta version!
ivahost1
Will be glad to test the new system
janbear
On the backup system, I’d appreciate more accurate reporting of what has and hasn’t been backed up (to Amazon S3). Sometimes it says the site hasn’t been backed up, but it really has. Sometimes, it says the site has been backed up, but the backup got stick in the server. Backups have to be shepherded every day.
Thanks.
admin
I completely agree. In addition to this, I would love to have some form of backup vetting similar to backup buddy whereas the files are double checked once they arrive at the destination to make sure they aren’t corrupt or missing.
Nemanja Aleksic
Yeah, keeping an eye on the scheduled backups kinda defeats their point. While I can’t go into details yet, the fact that we’re moving a lot of the load from your site server to our infrastructure will allow the backups to run more consistently and reliably. It will also make it much easier to perform consistency checks.
jjsararas
I’m just *really* hoping you decide to keep Amazon S3 as a secondary storage. Otherwise I can no longer say “multiple backup storage locations” in my maintenance terms! I think someone told me that Orion is provisioning S3 anyway, but I’d still like to have multiple locations, and one that I fully control. But doing away with site server storage is a great development. Can’t wait for this all to happen!!!
jatinsapra
really interested in trying the beta 🙂
FMS
does the ‘add websites that are fully behind HTTP authentication’ feature work with wpengine’s Password Protected/Block Traffic feature?
i’d love to be in the beta too!
Nemanja Aleksic
Seems to be the same thing, but I was unable to confirm this in the WPEngine documentation. Tell you what – try adding the password protected site in Orion when you get the invite, and let us know how it goes 🙂
Nemanja Aleksic
I reached out to the WP Engine team, they confirmed that it’s indeed HTTP authentication. This means that in Orion you can lock down your website and still manage it with ManageWP. How cool is that 🙂
Jonathan.downam
Would like to try the beta.
bill
Beta access would be appreciated – thanks!
christian
I’d love beta access.
Also wondering, is there a notification/reporting API on the road map? It would be great to be able to seamlessly import some of the information from the ManageWP dashboard into other, more comprehensive busisness dashboards.
Nemanja Aleksic
We actually already have an API capable of doing this, and much more. The main problem here is security; it’s our number one priority (that’s why we have security experts on staff, run our white hat program, etc.), and we need to be really thorough before we allow public access.
So yeah, it’s on the road map as a part of a much larger API package 🙂
lincetto
Happy to test! 🙂
matt.rutherford
Happy to help Beta test if I can be of use!
ngmatthews
I would love to get on the beta to check out the new system
bob
Beta please? How’s the rank tracking stuff looking? Is there a way to tell the automagic system that its tracking the wrong keywords for the wrong sites?
Nemanja Aleksic
The ranking tracker is still in the early draft stage, but one of it’s main feature improvements is the ability to rank a certain keyword for a selected number of websites, as opposed to ranking all websites on our current ManageWP version.
This is something that we want to debate further with you and anyone else willing to chime in. Your Orion beta invite should have been sent by now – you could use the Feedback button to send us as much detail as possible about this or any other improvement you’d like to see in Orion.
Lara Littlefield
These developer diaries offer so much detailed insight. They’re a really fantastic resource. Thanks for sharing and taking the time to do this!
jjsararas
+1