Hello,
As previously announced, the next scheduled updates for Publish.Illinois.edu will take place on the evening of October 1, 2025. During this maintenance cycle, the Publish.Illinois.edu service will be updated to include v3.0.2 of the Illinois WordPress Theme.
The Test-Publish environment has been updated to include the beta for the University of Illinois theme v3.0.2. You can preview these changes, as they will appear in Production-Publish, now by visiting Test.Publish.Illinois.edu (VPN connection required).
You can read more information about v3.0.2 beta of Illinois WordPress Theme below. The open beta period will close at noon on Friday, September 26.
Summary
Version 3.0.2-beta of the Illinois WordPress Theme reorganizes the block files and toolkit import scripts to optimize loading. This release provides new versions of several blocks, as well as accessibility and visual improvements to links and buttons.
What’s Changed
New Features
- Added V3 version of Card Block
Enhancements
- Added text field to allow overriding alt text of selected media in Image Feature Block
- Implemented Block Manifest structure to optimize loading and future development of theme blocks
- Updated WordPress core Buttons block to reflect V3 styling of buttons
- Updated Feature Quote block to V3 version
- Updated Lede block to V3 version
- Replaced aria label text control in Button block with new behavior which auto appends an aria label when “Open in new tab” checkbox is selected
Bug Fixes
- Added CSS to allow YouTube Media Embed Blocks to honor the “Wide” alignment setting
- Added CSS to correct color contrast accessibility issue with File block button
- Added CSS to correct display of Social Icons block
- Added CSS to correct Featured Image display in mobile layouts
- Added CSS to correct link formatting colors and hover states
- Adjusted Image Feature block to load media URL instead of permalink (attachment page)
- Corrected page template conditional logic to remove error log bloat associated with Featured Images
- Embedded Bootstrap files to serve locally
- Implemented block deprecations for Button, Feature Quote, Image Feature, Lede, and Statistic blocks
- Optimized the Toolkit V3 import script loading
- Purged unused files
Upgrade Notes
Card block
The new Card block is separate from existing Clickable Card and Card Deck blocks (both will remain unchanged in this release).
Feature Quote Block
Existing Feature Quote blocks will be updated to the new markup automatically once the page is edited.
Image Feature Block
The Image Feature block was rebuilt in v3.0.0 and will remain visually unchanged in this release. However, the media library selection tool has been updated to pull the direct URL of the selected file instead of the permalink. This is intended to resolve issues for users who are seeing attachment page URLs in the block. Additionally, a text field has been added in the Settings menu to allow users to override the alt text of images passed in from the media library.
Lede Block
Existing Lede blocks will be updated to the new markup automatically once the page is edited. The new version of the Lede Block brings many new options. Please note there is currently a color contrast accessibility issue if you enable “Decoration” on a Lede block with the “Orange” theme. The WIGG components team is working on correcting this in a future update to the V3 toolkit.
Toolkit Loading
This version of the theme implements fixes to the loading of the V3 toolkit. This addresses an issue with conflicting third-party scripts such as Slate form embeds and corrects previous incompatibilities with v3.7 of the toolkit.
The next Publish.Illinois.edu maintenance event is scheduled for October 15, 2025. This update cycle will focus on general service improvements, including plugin updates, potential deprecations, and additional changes to be announced. Additional details will be shared as the date approaches.
