Page version history

[sodesign]

Hi everyone,

I saw a forum post back in 2023 about a new PagesVersionsPro module which could provide page version history.

Anyone know what the status is of this module? If you've used it, does it behave anything like the revisions feature in Wordpress and Craft? 

Thanks!

[zilli]

Yeah. I feel that a tutorial is missing about it. Maybe @FireWire can save us here 😅

[FireWire]

@zilli This is a complete coincidence and the only reason I can speak to anything on this topic is that was just tinkering with PagesVersionsPro a week or two ago on a site that I'm building. Some interesting timing!

@sodesign Here are a few comparisons. I'm not familiar with Craft, but hopefully the info will help your comparison with that.

Differences from WP

• Versions are manually performed, there currently isn't an autosave feature, however this may change in the future if/when PVP replaces or supplants ProDrafts (that's a Q for Ryan)
• WP's style is more of a timeline "snapshot" method whereas PVP works with true page versions that are completely separate instances related only to the live page or version you created it from. You can manage and switch between versions based on a name and content first approach.
• You can create versions and then pick any one of them to edit or restore at any time without the "restore and edit" process that WP requires, so no "version stacking" by replicating when you may not need/want it.
• Because versions are manual, all versions are always named which is helpful for picking out specific states of a page or intent of edits rather than by timestamp like in WP.
• Where WP shows you HTML/markup comparisons between versions, PWP's compare feature shows you changes for each field as fully rendered field values, including image fields, so that you can see the changes side by side which is a much better end user experience.
• PVP allows you to fully load a version of a page in the browser and see it as visitors would see it for a visual comparison.

It's worth noting that while you can create versions from any version whether live or not, comparisons are always made between a given version and the live page. I personally think this is a better approach because end users pretty much only care about what a version looks like compared to the live version.

Please feel free to correct me if I got anything wrong with WP's implementation, I've seldom found it useful (if not outright frustrating) and may not be up to speed with more recent features.

Also, I believe PVP is still in beta. I don't have enough experience to know what that means for real world use. If you have access to PagesVersionsPro I recommend installing it and taking it for a spin. You'll get the gist quickly and be able to decide how it works out for your needs.

I'm looking forward to spending more time with PVP. For my current project I had to stick with ProDrafts as it's a carryover feature from their last PW site and it's not compatible with PVP.

There was a post somewhere by @ryan about the status of PVP and a potential new release at some point in the first half of 2025 but he would be able to better speak on the status and plans for the module.

Hope that was helpful!

[sodesign]

Thanks for taking the time to write this out, that's a really useful summary!

Look forward to hearing about the release.