Comments – EchoThread

Changelog

1.5.2

• Added: a FAQ on the October 2026 PHP security release, explaining that the flaws are in PHP itself and how to check your host has applied the fix. No code changes.

1.5.1

• Fixed: a post whose WordPress comments are closed no longer hides the whole comment area. The discussion already on the post — including an imported archive — stays readable, and the composer is replaced with the usual “comments are closed” notice. Only new comments are stopped, matching what closing comments actually means.
• Fixed: archived discussions on old posts now stay visible even when your site automatically closes comments after a number of days.

1.5.0

• Added: EchoThread: Recent comments / Popular threads, a widget for Appearance → Widgets. Show your newest comments (with avatars, a short excerpt, the post and how long ago) or your busiest threads over the last 1 to 30 days, up to 10 items. It takes your theme’s fonts and link colours.
• Added: the [echothread_recent limit="5"] and [echothread_popular days="7"] shortcodes, for a post, a page or a Shortcode block. Add avatars="false" to hide avatars, and text="..." for what shows if there is nothing to list yet.
• Fixed: deleting the plugin now also removes the sidebar widget’s saved settings, and the uninstall routine no longer defines unprefixed globals.
• The lists need the EchoThread Starter plan or above. On other plans the widget shows its fallback text to readers, never a broken box, and the EchoThread dashboard explains why.

1.4.1

• Fixed: comment counts now follow the Language setting. The count shown by [echothread-count] (and the archive counts) was always English — a Greek or Korean site saw “4 Comments” next to its own translated labels. With Auto it follows each visitor’s browser, exactly like the widget.
• Fixed: a count placed in a dark theme’s post-meta area no longer renders black-on-black. If the colour a count would inherit is unreadable against the background behind it, EchoThread repaints it with a readable one; a colour set by you or your theme is left alone.

1.4.0

• Added: a Language setting. The widget interface ships in English, Korean, Italian, Simplified Chinese and Modern Greek; by default each visitor sees it in their own browser language. Pick one language to show the same one to everyone. Comment text is never translated — only the widget’s own labels and dates.
• Added: a Sign-in buttons setting. Choose “Icons only” to render the social sign-in buttons as compact icon-only buttons for narrow layouts, instead of the full “Continue with …” buttons.
• Fixed: WP Rocket’s “Minify JavaScript files” setting no longer breaks the widget or drops its discussion structured data. As with the delay-JavaScript fix in 1.3.2, the plugin now tells WP Rocket to leave EchoThread’s scripts unminified automatically — no exclusion to add by hand. If you previously added cdn.echothread.io to WP Rocket’s excluded files, it is safe to remove.

1.3.2

• Fixed: the comments widget now works with WP Rocket’s “Delay JavaScript Execution” setting. With it enabled, the comments area stayed empty and the discussion structured data was missing from the page, because WP Rocket postponed the widget script until a visitor clicked or scrolled. EchoThread now tells WP Rocket to leave its scripts alone automatically — no exclusion to add by hand. If you previously added cdn.echothread.io to WP Rocket’s excluded files, it is safe to remove.

1.3.1

• Fixed: the archive comment count no longer replaces your theme’s own text with a version that reveals hidden screen-reader markup (e.g. a post title meant only for assistive technology) when a count hasn’t loaded yet or can’t be reached.
• Fixed: updating from an earlier version no longer turns on Archive comment counts by itself. It stays exactly as it was until you enable it under Settings → EchoThread Comments.

1.3.0

• Added: real comment counts on category, tag, author and home-page listings. WordPress stops updating its own counts once EchoThread takes over, so those teasers showed a number frozen at migration time — or zero. Turn on Archive comment counts in the settings screen. One request fills a whole page, and your theme’s existing markup is left alone if it fails.
• Added: the [echothread-count] shortcode, for placing a count yourself.
• Comment counts now include replies, matching the count shown on the post itself.

1.2.0

• Renamed to “Comments – EchoThread”. Same plugin, same settings, same slug — the old name hid what it actually does. The settings screen now lives under Settings → EchoThread Comments.
• The feature list now mentions the moderation tools that shipped alongside it: a per-site restricted-word list, per-commenter ban/trust, and auto-closing discussions on older posts.

1.1.0

• Fixed: “Replace the theme comments” now works on block themes. Block themes render a comments block instead of calling the classic comments template, so on every default theme since Twenty Twenty-Two the recommended placement silently did nothing and the native comments stayed put.
• Fixed: on classic themes the widget no longer breaks out of the content column. The replacement template re-declares the comment area’s wrapper, so themes that constrain comment width keep constraining it.
• Tested up to WordPress 7.1.

1.0.0

• Initial release: settings page (shortname, API key, placement, theme, accent color), replace/append/shortcode placement, async widget loading, WXR migration guidance, multisite-safe uninstall.