WordPress.org

Options

The options page allows you to change the Flash movie's dimensions, change the text color as well as the background.

Width of the Flash tag cloud

The movie will scale itself to fit inside whatever dimensions you decide to give it. If you make it really small, chances are people will not be able to read less-used tags that are further away. Anything up from 300 will work fine in most cases.

Height of the Flash tag cloud

Ideally, the height should be something like 3/4 of the width. This will make the rotating cloud fit nicely, while the extra width allows for the tags to be displayed without cropping. Western text is horizontal by nature, which is why the ideal aspect is slightly landscape even though the cloud is circular.

Color of the tags

Type the hexadecimal color value you'd like to use for the tags, but not the '#' that usually precedes those in HTML. Black (000000) will obviously work well with light backgrounds, white (ffffff) is recommended for use on dark backgrounds. Optionally, you can use the second input box to specify a different color. When two colors are available, each tag's color will be from a gradient between the two. This allows you to create a multi-colored tag cloud. The third input box lets you specify a mouseover highlight color.

Background color

The hex value for the background color you'd like to use. This options has no effect when 'Use transparent mode' is selected.

Use transparent mode

Turn on/off background transparency. Enabling this might cause issues with some (mostly older) browsers.

Rotation speed

Allows you to change the speed of the sphere. Options between 25 and 500 work best.

Distribute tags evenly on sphere

When enabled, the movie will attempt to distribute the tags evenly over the surface of the sphere.

Display

Choose whether to show tags only, categories only, or both mixed together. Choosing 'both' can result in 'duplicate tags' if you have categories and tags with the same name. These words will appear twice, with one linking to the tag and the other to the category overview.

wp tag cloud parameters

This setting allows you to pass parameters to the wp_tag_cloud function, which is used to fetch the tag cloud. Use caution with this setting. Everything you enter will be passed to the function. Be sure to read the function's manual. Please also note that these parameters affect tags only. If you've chosen to show categories or both, the category 'tags' will not be affected.

Version history

Version 1.22

• Fixes some minor HTML issues in the 'compatibility mode'.
• Patches a potential XSS vulnerability (thanks to Thomas Scholz for alerting me to this).

Version 1.21

• Adds an option to show the regular tag cloud to non-flash users (used to be hidden through CSS).
• The widget title is now optional.
• Adds support for 'target' attribute to the Flash movie.
• XML path can now be set through a flashvar.
• Fixed markup errors in the compatibility mode.
• Several minor fixes.

Version 1.20

• Adds a 'compatibility mode' which uses a simpler, non-javascript, way of embedding the Flash.
• Adds proper shortcode support (See here for more info)
• Adds Turkish language support to the Flash movie.
• Improves the plugin's default settings.

Version 1.19

• Fixed the mouse pointer not changing to a hand when hovering tags.
• Flash code cleanup

Version 1.18

• Adds the ability to override individual tag colors when using the movie outside of WordPress (since WordPress has no color setting for tags).
• Improves mouse detection in transparent mode
• Fixes a bug affecting blogs with the admin using https.

Version 1.17

• Fixes an issue with localized style sheet point sizes (e.g. 9,55pt instead of 9.55pt)
• Adds an optional highlight color setting

Version 1.16

• Fixes an issue with categories being rendered black when all of them have the same number of posts.
• Reduces the default font size (from the biggest possible to "medium") in that same situation.
• Significantly reduces CPU load when the cloud isn't moving.

Version 1.15

• Adds the possibility to create a multi-colored tag cloud by entering a second tag color.

Version 1.14

• Fixes an issue where no tags are displayed when viewing the movie locally in MSIE.
• Fixes an issue where one random tag would not be displayed.

Version 1.13

• No longer breaks when the wp-content folder is moved to a non-standard location.

Version 1.12

• First version hosted on WordPress.org, and released under GPL license.
• Uses the Arial font to avoid font licensing issues.

Version 1.11

• Restores an earlier fix for IE to force loading of the Flash movie.

Version 1.1

• Complete rewrite of the Flash movie (Actionscript 3, requires Flash Player 9 or better).
• Better mouse detection.
• Adds option to distribute the tags evenly over the sphere.
• Adds support for categories.
• Adds the ability to pass parameters to the WordPress wptagcloud function.
• Several smaller enhancements.

Version 1.05

• Fixes several issues with IE, including an issue where it was impossible to use the regular version and the widget on the same page. Thanks to Fadi for alerting me to these.

Version 1.04

• Fixes the 'it kills my blog' error for people using PHP 5.2 or newer. Thanks to Mujahid for helping me debug this.
• Speed improvements in the Flash code.

Version 1.03

• Removes the wp_head hook in yet another attempt to fix issues with some other plugins and themes.
• Reduces system overhead by storing less options.
• Adds setting for speed.
• Adds a widget with seperate options (size, colors, speeds, etc).
• Attemps to detect when the mouse leaves the movie, reducing the 'spinning, but not out of control' effect.
• Several minor fixes.

Version 1.02

• Fixes issues with sites not loading after activation, reduces server load and fixes lost spaces in tags. Thanks to Dimitry for helping me debug these issues.

Version 1.01

• Fixes an issue where the cloud would spin out of control when the browsers loses focus on OSX.

Version 1.00

• Initial release version.