Welcome to "What the Wix??" where we bring you the latest and greatest news, updates, tips and tricks for the Wix Ecosystem.
How it works -
There are 5 sections in each edition covering gradually more complex topics.
No Code
Possibly the biggest update of the year so far for web designers and developers on Wix is Custom Templates! These templates first surfaced a few months back allowing you to use your sites as a template for new sites in your own account (so let's be honest not much of a jump from site duplication). The real breakthrough came with the recent announcement that you can now SHARE those templates by downloading a zip file containing an html page and instructions for how to copy the template into one's account. This opens up a whole new market of template sales in the Wix Ecosystem!
Now instead of having to collect payment then manually duplicate your site and transfer it to the customer - you can just list templates as digital products in your Wix Store (like we did here). Templates can be created for both Classic Wix Editor sites and Wix Studio sites and they can include custom code! Wix partners can also submit templates to a curated Template Marketplace but note that there are some guidelines and restrictions by Wix so read up first :)
Two more notable Mentions:
There is now a search bar in the elements menu in Wix Studio!
You can bulk turn of site notifications (useful if you are collaborator on more than 400 sites ;)
Low Code
Something that can be useful for those who like to be daring but not enough to turn on Dev Mode is the new CMS Expressions. This allows you to manipulate text connected to a dataset combining multiple fields and logic.
Check out our tutorial here:
Code Mode
Wix just announced a new Hackathon hosted by merge (which I think they created 🤔). With $20,000 in prizes it is definitely lucrative! To participate you will need to create a reusable Wix Studio template or Wix Block. There are a bunch of other criteria so read up before you start building in a frenzy :)
I'm currently brainstorming some ideas as I usually try to build something that will serve a purpose outside the hackathon. If you have any suggestions you can let me know by emailing newsletter@thewixwiz.com. Anybody who makes a suggestion will get a free copy/ use of whatever I end up building!
Another notable mention:
There is a new Velo developer certification which is part of the Wix Studio Certification suite. If you aren't Velo certified yet, this is your chance to join the pack! Certified developers can flaunt their certification bling across the web and their marketplace listing.
Cynicism aside, it's a good chance to make sure you're up to standard and build a project in Wix Studio which will be reviewed by the Wix team. Just like the previous Velo certification it comprises of a 30 question quiz and a practical project. I'm still mid project but so far based on my impression both the quiz and project are more challenging than the previous certification. I would say you should plan to spend 10-20 hours on the project.
Soo Code
Wix has started really pushing the 'new-ish' Plugins feature. Plugins are a unique type of Wix Block which can be installed in predefined slots in Wix App pages (which are notoriously hard to customize). In the plugin you can create a custom UI and logic based on the page it is installed on. One important thing to note is that this communication is one directional, meaning your Plugin knows where it is but the app doesn't know it's there and can't receive data or instructions from it (yet (hopefully)).
These plugins have been around for a short while in various stages of Beta (all Wix products are somewhere on the Beta spectrum) but a new addition is the ability to create Product Page Plugins. Once you create a plugin you can choose to use it internally on any of your sites and/or publish it to the Wix App market and monetize it.
If you want to learn more about creating your first Product Page Plugin, you can check out our tutorial (will be open to the general public August 5th):
Wow Code
Those of you who spend most of the week with your heads buried in the Velo documentation probably noticed that over the past half a year or so we have been seeing many duplicate versions of the same APIs. For example:
wix-bookings-frontend
wix-bookings.v1
wix-bookings.v2
wix-bookings-backend
If you are also finding it a bit hard to navigate and are looking for the light at the end of the tunnel - or at least some rationale - you may find this article interesting. In it the Wix Engineering team covers the philosophy behind the rewriting of 100's of services which is likely the cause for the above.
It's a wrap!
Thanks for reading! If you are thirsty for more, you can join us for the What the Wix?? Livestream next week where we will be chatting about these updates and taking questions from the community.
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If you found any mistakes in this article or want to share suggestions for the next edition, please don't hesitate to reach out to newsletter@thewixwiz.com.
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