Hi Melinda214,
I’m sorry that you feel that way about the plugin. I wish you would have contacted me directly through support instead of posting the review, as the timing may indicate that you’re not going to use BD anymore. I take support very seriously with the plugin and aim to make everyone successful with it.
It may interest you to know that the Featured Levels has been a real challenge to get working in a simple way that didn’t make the user experience a problem. That’s been the major delay on this. We’ve only advertised it as Coming Soon since early April. My apologies on the delay. I certainly didn’t anticipate it taking so long to get right.
But with that said, I’m sure you can appreciate the need to not release software that isn’t working well as this would be far worse than making you wait for something that does.
For your other questions, BD is compatible with WP-PageNavi, allowing you to display how many pages of listings you have. We went with that route, since WP-PageNavi is a well-known, stable plugin that people were already using for that feature. Also, the number of listings displayed can be easily changed under Settings->Reading on your site. We use the same setting as your site’s posts/pages displayed.
I would welcome a further conversation on the matter if you want: http://businessdirectoryplugin.com/contact/. I do want you to be successful with it.
And just so you know, Featured levels is releasing early next week. I have a version that is available to Combo Pack buyers now, but it requires you to upgrade to BD 3.1 to use it. Same with ZIP search.
My biggest problem at this stage is that the additional plugins are presented as available when they in fact, are not. Links in the plugin as well on WordPress.org say “buy now,” not “coming soon”. Surely I’m not the first to mention it. I paid money for the base plugin plus an additional plug-in expecting to be able to purchase the add-ons I need within a reasonable amount of time. I intended to purchase a Combo Pack but I can’t spend the money if the software isn’t available. Again that leaves me with the choice of having an irate client or eating what I’ve spent already and buy something else.
I can imagine that Featured Levels is a nightmare to code. Problem is that it’s one of the main add-ons I need.
And while we’re on the subject, a more minor issue I have with the plugin is controlling what is displayed, and how, in the high level listing page. I hoped the Feature Listing would give me more leverage but I don’t know. The high level of listings should allow me to compress the basic information (address, phone number) so that it doesn’t take up so much of the real estate on the page. People do not want to scroll and scroll and scroll down a page to see what’s there. You have to grab them quickly or you’ve lost them. This is an issue with most if not all directory themes and flies in the face of best practices and design principles.
Hi Melinda,
It would probably be more appropriate to continue this conversation in a support thread or a direct email. Can you contact me and we can work this out?
http://businessdirectoryplugin.com/contact/
FYI–the combo pack entitles you to a FREE upgrade of the new modules when they are available. That has been our policy on the plugin since the beginning of the year, to give you an incentive to get the “full pack”.
The display is a challenge to address, regardless of plugin. What you feel is “best practice and design” may differ from someone else’s tastes, so we are forced to approach it from a perspective of how we can integrate most quickly with your theme, letting it do the heavy lifting. If your theme displays things in a spaced out fashion, then you’re left with having to do some customization–all of that is true. We are looking at adding a templating system for BD that is separate from your theme, but this is a ways out.
Again, I welcome contact with you to help resolve it further. I would like to earn a higher rating from you as we aren’t a 1-star plugin IMO. 🙂
