Vieww Directory

Description

Vieww Directory is the easiest way to put a member directory on your WordPress site. Whether you run an industry association, a local business network, a tradies’ directory, a club or a community marketplace, your members get a clean profile page and your visitors find them in seconds.

You add a member, choose a category, drop a shortcode into a page — and that’s it. No page builder, no extra plugins, no fuss.

What your visitors get:

  • A clean, searchable directory of every member
  • Filter by category, search by name or keyword
  • A profile page for each member with logo, photo gallery, contact details and a map of where to find them
  • A featured-members showcase to spotlight your top supporters

What you get:

  • Add a member in under a minute — name, contact details, photos, done
  • Hierarchical categories so you can organise members the way they actually fit
  • Featured members get a gold badge and the top of the list
  • Pick your own colours, fonts and spacing from a single design panel
  • A grid layout that looks great on phones, tablets and desktops
  • Built-in maps for member locations (or turn maps off site-wide if you’d rather not use them)

Shortcodes you can drop into any page or layout:

  • [viewwdi_directory] — the full directory grid with search and category filters
  • [viewwdi_layout] — directory grid with the category sidebar in a two-column layout
  • [viewwdi_featured] — a row of your featured members
  • [viewwdi_sidebar] — just the category navigation (works in widget areas too)

Requirements:

  • WordPress 5.6 or higher
  • PHP 7.4 or higher

External Services

This plugin connects to a small number of free, optional external services. Each is described below along with when it is used and what data is sent.

Google Fonts API

Used to load web fonts chosen in the Design Settings. Only occurs when a Google Font (as opposed to a system font) is selected in Directory > Design > Typography.

  • URL: https://fonts.googleapis.com
  • When used: Only when a Google Font is selected in Design Settings (off by default — system fonts are the default)
  • Data sent: The names of the selected font families (e.g. “Inter”, “Poppins”). No personal data or site data is transmitted.
  • Privacy policy: https://policies.google.com/privacy
  • Terms of service: https://developers.google.com/terms

If you prefer not to use Google Fonts, simply leave the heading and body font selectors set to a System Font — no external requests will be made.

Nominatim (OpenStreetMap) geocoding

Used to convert a member’s address into latitude/longitude coordinates so the listing can be shown on the directory map. Runs on the server when a member is saved in the WordPress admin, and in the browser when an admin clicks the “Geocode Now” button on a member edit screen.

  • URL: https://nominatim.openstreetmap.org/search
  • When used: Only on the admin side — when a member is saved with a new/changed address, or when the “Geocode Now” button is pressed in the Business Details meta box. No lookups run on the front-end.
  • Data sent: The member’s street address, suburb, state, postcode, and the country string “Australia”. No personal data beyond the business address.
  • Privacy policy: https://osmfoundation.org/wiki/Privacy_Policy
  • Terms of use: https://operations.osmfoundation.org/policies/nominatim/

Leaving the latitude/longitude fields filled manually in the member edit screen prevents any Nominatim request from being sent for that member on save.

Photon (komoot.io) address autocomplete

Used to show a real-time address suggestion dropdown in the admin while typing into the Street Address field. Selecting a suggestion populates the suburb, state, postcode and coordinates at once.

  • URL: https://photon.komoot.io/api/
  • When used: Only on the admin side — while an editor is typing into the Street Address field of a member. Requests stop if the user stops typing or clicks elsewhere. No lookups run on the front-end.
  • Data sent: The partial address text the user is typing, plus a geographic bias toward Australia. No personal data, no site data.
  • Privacy policy: https://www.komoot.com/privacy
  • Service info: https://photon.komoot.io/

If you prefer not to use Photon autocomplete, simply ignore the suggestions and type the address manually — no suggestions will be acted on unless you click or Enter one.

Support

For support, please use the WordPress.org support forums for this plugin.

Installation

  1. Upload the vieww-directory folder to /wp-content/plugins/ directory, or install through the WordPress plugins screen
  2. Activate the plugin through the ‘Plugins’ screen in WordPress
  3. Add members via Directory in the admin sidebar
  4. Manage business categories via Directory > Categories (supports subcategories)
  5. Use shortcodes in your pages to display the directory

FAQ

Do I need any other plugins?

No! The plugin is completely self-contained. It registers its own custom post type and creates native WordPress meta boxes for all member fields.

What shortcodes are available?

Directory Grid:
[viewwdi_directory]

Displays all members in a responsive grid with search and category filtering.

Attributes: columns (2 or 3, default 3), limit (number of members, default -1 for all), featured (true/false), show_search (true/false).

Category Sidebar:
[viewwdi_sidebar]

Renders a hierarchical category list. Clicking a category filters the directory.

Attributes: title (heading text), show_counts (true/false), show_all (true/false).

Featured Members:
[viewwdi_featured limit=”6″ columns=”3″]

Quick shortcode for a featured members block.

All-in-One Layout:
[viewwdi_layout]

Renders the sidebar and directory grid in a responsive two-column layout. No page builder columns needed.

Attributes: all [viewwdi_directory] attributes plus show_sidebar (true/false), sidebar_title (heading text), show_counts (true/false).

How do I set up a two-column directory page?

The easiest way is to use [viewwdi_layout] — it renders the sidebar and grid side by side automatically.

Alternatively, place [viewwdi_sidebar] in a 30% left column and [viewwdi_directory] in a 70% right column using your page builder or theme layout. The sidebar links update the URL and the directory reads the URL parameter to filter automatically.

Can I customise the appearance?

Yes! Go to Directory > Design in the WordPress admin to customise colours, typography, and spacing. Changes apply to all directory pages, cards, and profiles.

How do featured members work?

Edit any member and check the “Mark as Featured Member” checkbox in the sidebar. Featured members appear first in the directory with a gold badge.

Does the plugin support subcategories?

Yes! Go to Directory > Categories, add a parent category (e.g. “Food & Beverage”), then add child categories (e.g. “Cafes”, “Restaurants”) with the parent set. The sidebar renders parent > children with an expand/collapse arrow.

Reviews

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Contributors & Developers

“Vieww Directory” is open source software. The following people have contributed to this plugin.

Contributors

Translate “Vieww Directory” into your language.

Interested in development?

Browse the code, check out the SVN repository, or subscribe to the development log by RSS.

Changelog

1.4.1

  • IMPROVEMENT: Plugin description and listing rewritten to focus on what site owners and visitors get out of the directory, rather than internal architecture.
  • NEW: Plugin icon added.

1.4.0

  • IMPROVEMENT: Single-member Location section now renders as a matching teal-headed card alongside Contact Details, instead of a flush, unstyled map below the contact panel.
  • IMPROVEMENT: Member cards in the directory grid now align their “View Profile” button to the bottom regardless of contact-detail length, so cards in the same row sit flush.
  • IMPROVEMENT: Empty-state copy across the directory archive is more conversational (“No members match your filters” / “Browse all members”) with a heading + body + CTA layout.
  • FIX: Addresses with both a unit keyword AND a slash (e.g. Unit 5/123 Main St) no longer lose the street number during geocoding — the unit-prefix stripper now stops at the slash, so the trailing house number survives and Nominatim resolves to the actual street rather than the suburb centroid.

1.3.2

  • Fix: Business Name was not syncing to the post title/slug in the block editor, leaving new members saved as “No title” with a numeric slug. The sync-to-title JavaScript was registered via wp_add_inline_script() on a hook callback that fired before the target script handle was registered, so the inline code was silently dropped. Bumped the inline-script callback priority so it runs after the main admin enqueue.
  • Fix: Hardened the save_post handler’s recursion guard against the edge case where an anonymous-closure callback could not be unhooked via remove_action() — now uses a static re-entrancy flag.
  • Enhancement: Members saved with a numeric fallback slug (e.g. 9887) now get a proper slug generated from the Business Name on the next save.
  • New: Added Directory Settings admin page with an “Enable maps” toggle. When disabled, Leaflet, MarkerCluster, Nominatim geocoding, Photon address autocomplete, the map container, the admin-side map assets, and the Latitude/Longitude meta-box fields are all suppressed. Default is enabled for backward compatibility. Existing coordinate data is preserved when maps are disabled and restored if re-enabled.

1.3.1

  • Internal release — superseded by 1.3.2.

1.3.0

  • Rebranded from Next Point Directory to Vieww Directory
  • All shortcodes renamed: np_sidebar to viewwdi_sidebar, np_directory to viewwdi_directory, np_featured to viewwdi_featured
  • Automatic database migration from old plugin naming
  • Added Design Settings admin page for visual colour/typography customisation
  • Added featured member backfill on upgrade
  • Full internationalization support
  • WordPress.org coding standards compliance
  • Security: proper nonce verification, input sanitisation, and output escaping throughout

1.1.0

  • Initial release (as Next Point Directory)
  • Custom post type for directory members with full business detail fields
  • Hierarchical business categories with parent/child support
  • Three shortcodes: sidebar, directory grid, featured members
  • Logo and photo gallery uploads
  • Search and category filtering via URL parameters
  • Responsive grid layout
  • Featured member highlighting with gold badge