Release Highlights

CMS 8.24 - Release highlights

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Release schedule:

The Pangea CMS 8.24 release is scheduled for June 13th 2023 at the times listed below:

  • Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, Inc.: 06:00 am - 07:30 am Prague time / 00:00 am - 01:30 am DC time
  • Voice of America: 02:30 am - 04:00 am DC time / 08:30 am - 10:00 am Prague time
  • Office of Cuba Broadcasting: 04:00 am - 05:00 am DC time / 10:00 am - 11:00 am Prague time
  • LibertyNet: 07:30 am - 08:30 am Prague time / 01:30 am - 02:30 am DC time


What's new?



Manual Live Stream usability improvements

Manual Live Stream is now quicker and easier to use. After the 8.24 release, you might notice the following changes:

  • (A): Max stream length: It's no longer necessary to manually define the end time for the stream. Instead, simply choose one of the predefined values. If preferred, you can still define the exact time using the 'Custom' option.
  • (B): Prefilled email: Your email address is now prefilled based on user account data.
  • (C): No 'Phone' field: It's no longer necessary to provide a phone number.
  • (D): Information panel: To help resolve common confusions, we've added some help text below the preview.
  • (E): Send stream: The 'Start stream' button is renamed 'Send stream' to better reflect the purpose of this button. After you hit 'Send stream', the stream is sent to social media. However, it does not immediately start. For more information, see the following article:

Also, your service can now customize the default values for the following settings:

  • Max stream length: The global default value is 2 hours. Alternatively, set one of the following default values:
    • 30 mins, 1 hour, 3 hours, 4 hours, Custom
  • Name of channel: Set one default channel name for each supported social media platform.

To set the default values for your service, contact Pangea Customer Care.

For detailed information about using Manual Live Stream, see the following article:




New placeholders for embeds

We're introducing new and improved placeholders for embeds in CKEditor. The main improvements are as follows:

  • The new placeholders are clearly labeled so editors can easily identify the type and size of embed.
  • The new solution uses simplified code to improve the speed and performance of CKEditor.

After the 8.24 release, the new placeholders will be available only for the following content items:

  • FactCheck, Live blog, HTML widget

The new placeholders will not be available for these content items:

  • Article, Backgrounder, Blog, Feature, Feature story, News, Transcript
NOTE: The new placeholders will be introduced for the remaining content items as part of the Article edit redesign project. For more information, go to the following section:

Review further examples of the new placeholders below:

Embedded image

Embedded snippet

Embedded external media

For detailed information about adding embedded content via CKEditor, see the following articles:




External images from AFP

Pangea CMS currently lets you use images from the following external agencies:

  • AP (Associated Press)
  • Reuters

After the 8.24 release, AFP (Agence France-Presse) will be added to this list. To search for external images, select External on the Attach dialog. AFP will be visible under Agencies.




Automatic focus on the widget preview

In the CMS 8.22 release, we introduced the Preview option for widgets.

In the 8.24 release, we've improved the preview by adding automatic focus on the widget you're currently editing.




New Article edit screen for selected services

For the past few months, we've been redesigning and refactoring the edit screen in CMS that is used to create the following content:

  • Article, Backgrounder, Blog, Feature, Feature story, News, Transcript

Our main goal is to improve performance by decreasing load time and stopping the screen from crashing so frequently.

We've also introduced some small design changes to improve the overall usability of the screen. These changes are highlighted in the image below:

  • (A): Reorganization of social media settings
  • (B): New placeholders for embeds
  • (C): New workflow for adding Related content

After the 8.24 release, the new edit screen will be introduced for a small number of services. We will then gather feedback, and bring the new solution for all services in a future release.




New CMS 8 Slide-in widget edit screen

Pangea CMS 8.24 includes an improved workflow for creating Slide-in widgets.

The new Slide-in widget edit screen uses the latest CMS 8 design.

Create a new Slide-in widget via Sections > Slide-In Widgets.

For detailed information and step-by-step instructions, see our dedicated article:




CMS 8 HTML widget edit screen to default

In the CMS 8.22 release, we introduced CMS 8 HTML widget BETA.

After the 8.24 release, HTML widget BETA will become the default tool for creating and editing HTML widgets. This means:

  • HTML(Beta) is renamed to HTML.
  • The old HTML widget edit screen is no longer available.

For detailed information about creating an HTML widget, see the following article:




CMS 8 User account edit screen to default

In the CMS 8.22 release, we introduced CMS 8 User account BETA.

After the 8.24 release, User account BETA will become the default tool for editing your User account. This means:

  • My account BETA is renamed to My account.
  • The old Edit User edit screen is no longer available.

For detailed information about editing your User account, see the following article:




Canonical URLs for all pages

The Canonical URL is the preferred URL for a particular webpage or piece of content. It is good SEO practice to define the Canonical URL in the metadata for every webpage. This tells search engines which URL to index and include in search results.

An external SEO audit of Pangea sites identified a small number of page types with no defined Canonical URL. We've since performed an in-depth analysis of all identified pages and defined the optimal Canonical URL in each case. After the 8.24 release, a Canonical URL will be defined for all pages on your site.

NOTE: It is not possible for services to customize the Canonical URL for individual pages.




New configuration keys in the SEO settings

After the 8.24 release, the following new configuration keys will be available via the SEO settings in Pangea CMS:

  • Responsive.PageDescription.ProgramPages.ProgramIndexPageRadio
  • Responsive.PageDescription.ProgramPages.ProgramIndexPageTV

These configuration keys define the meta descriptions for the Radio and TV tabs on the Program Index page (shown below).

Access the SEO settings in Pangea CMS via Settings > SEO.


NOTE: We recommend services to complete the new configuration keys. Otherwise, the meta descriptions for these tabs will be empty.



New 'pubdate' attribute

The pubdate attribute is now included in the metadata for all content pages. This clearly communicates to search engines the value that is most relevant for determining the publication time.




Removal of 'meta name' tag

Based on recommendations from the external SEO audit, we have removed the following redundant code from the metadata for all content pages:

  • <meta name="title" content="" />

This code does not add value, as the meta title is defined via the <title></title> tags (present on all content pages). Removing redundant code makes the metadata lighter and more readable for search engines.




New SEO guides on Showcase

We've created some new guides for the Pangea Showcase site to help editors identify the settings in Pangea CMS that are important for SEO. The following new guides are now available:

You can expect more new guides as we make further SEO improvements on Pangea sites.




Retired feature: You Might Also Like widgets

Currently, Pangea CMS offers the following two features that serve very similar purposes:

  • You Might Also Like widget (YMAL widget)
  • You Might Also Like 2.0 (YMAL 2.0)

For simplicity and unification across sites, the YMAL widget will be retired with the 8.24 release. This process will work as follows:

  • All YMAL widgets in Pangea CMS will be converted to YMAL 2.0.
  • There will be no visible changes on public-facing sites.
  • This process will be fully automatic, with no actions required from services.

After the release, You Might Also Like 2.0 will be renamed to You Might Also Like in Pangea CMS.

For detailed information about You Might Also Like (previously You Might Also Like 2.0), see the following article:




Retired feature: Automatic Twitter feed for Live blog

Because Twitter has removed free access to its API, the automatic Twitter feed feature on the Live blog edit screen no longer works. For this reason, we will remove the automatic Twitter feed feature with the 8.24 release.

NOTE: If you want to include Tweets in Live blog posts, you can still embed them manually using the embed external media feature. For detailed information, see the following article:



Retired feature: Embed maps

After the 8.24 release, the embed maps feature (currently available via Insert embedded content > Map) will no longer be available in CMS. This feature has not been used by services for several years.

NOTE: For embedding maps, we recommend using the embed external media feature, which lets you embed maps from Datawrapper or Google Maps. For detailed information, see the following article:



Retired feature: Push notifications

The Push notifications feature (currently available via Sections > Push notifications) will be removed from Pangea CMS during the 8.24 release. This feature is no longer needed, as all services now use the external OneSignal tool to feed push notifications to the mobile app.




Mobile app homepage: New solution for all services

A new method for configuring the mobile app homepage was released on May 18th, and is now available for all services that offer a mobile app. For detailed information about the new solution, see the following article: