darrinb

Build a better post list.
The Advanced Posts Widget is an enhanced version of the default WordPress Recent Posts widget. It allows for greater customization and stying of your recent content lists.
Make your post lists stand out with this highly customizable recent post widget!
Features
<ul>
<li>Build multiple lists!</li>
<li>Select which post types to display. (You can choose either all types, or a specific type.)</li>
<li>Set the number of posts to show.</li>
<li>Choose how to order your posts: publish date, alphabetically, random, etc.</li>
<li>Set the order for displaying the posts.</li>
<li>Filter by category, tag, or custom taxonomy.</li>
<li>Supports post thumbnails.</li>
<li>Set and preview custom thumbnail sizes, or choose from your site’s registered image sizes.</li>
<li>Show an excerpt of the post.</li>
<li>Set and preview the length of the excerpt.</li>
<li>Select the list format to match your site’s markup. Choose from: <code>ol</code>, <code>ul</code>, or <code>div</code>.</li>
<li>Select the listing format. Choose between <code>html5</code> or <code>xhtml</code>.</li>
<li>Show post date.</li>
<li>Set and preview multiple date formats.</li>
<li>Choose the default (basic) CSS styling or roll your own.</li>
</ul>
Developer Features
This widget was built not only with end-users in mind, but also plugin developers. Almost every aspect of this widget is extensible through filters and action hooks. You can even add your own form fields to the widget form!
<ul>
<li>Need to remove a field from the widget form? Not a problem! Every field is passed through its own filter for easy customization.</li>
<li>Need to modify the output of the widget? Easy! The output is passed through numerous filters, allowing you to customize the post list to meet your project’s requirements.</li>
<li>For a full list of action hooks and filters, please see the plugin documentation: http://darrinb.com/plugins/advanced-posts-widget</li>
</ul>
For sample functions check out this small testing plugin: https://github.com/dboutote/Advanced-Posts-Widget-Testing

Advanced Posts Widget

I tested quite a few different Recent Posts Widgets and they all had bugs or outdated code or lack of flexibility or simple settings for their images and whatnot. This plugin does all the things you need:
* Set your thumbnail size from a list of registered image sizes
* Choose your category
* Choose your post type
* Even works with the Organize Series plugin well
* Order by recency, title, or even random (my favorite)
Combine this with the Display Widgets plugin and you have a powerful and flexible and intuitive sidebar that works great with your theme. 
Well done!



Exactly what my blog needed

A powerful and flexible recent posts widget for WordPress for displaying customized content lists.  Supports all custom post types and taxonomies!

Tajam

Flex Posts is a widget to display posts in various different layouts. It is useful for a news site where you need to display a lot of posts in a page.
The widget is responsive so you can place it in any widget area. The widget content will adapt based on the width of its container. In a narrow area like standard sidebar, posts will be displayed vertically, but in a wider area, posts will be displayed in 2 or 3 columns depends on the container’s width.
<h4>Widget Settings</h4>
<ul>
<li>Title: Set the widget title. Leave it empty to hide the title section.</li>
<li>Title URL: Set the title link url. Leave it empty to disable link in the title.</li>
<li>Layout: Select a widget layout, from layout 1 to 4.</li>
<li>Post type: Select the post type. Options include: Post, Page, custom post types if available, and any.</li>
<li>Category: Select a category for the posts, or choose All Categories to disable this filter.</li>
<li>Tag(s): Set a post tag (using the tag slug). You can also use comma separated value for multiple tags. Prepending a tag with a hyphen will exclude posts matching that tag. Eg, <code>featured, -video</code> will show posts tagged with <code>featured</code> but not <code>video</code>.</li>
<li>Order by: Set the order in which the posts will be displayed. Options include: Newest, Oldest, Most Commented, Alphabetical, Random, Modified Date, Page order.</li>
<li>Number of posts to show: Set the number of posts displayed.</li>
<li>Number of posts to skip: Set the number of posts to displace or pass over.</li>
<li>Exclude current post: Choose to show or hide current post.</li>
<li>Show image on: Select in which posts the image will be displayed. Options include: All posts, First post only, or none.</li>
<li>Image size: Select image size from registered image sizes.</li>
<li>Show post title: Choose to show or hide the post title.</li>
<li>Show categories: Choose to show or hide the categories.</li>
<li>Show author: Choose to show or hide the author.</li>
<li>Show author image: Choose to show or hide the author image.</li>
<li>Show date: Choose to show or hide the date.</li>
<li>Show comments number: Choose to show or hide the comments number.</li>
<li>Show excerpt: Choose to show or hide the excerpt</li>
<li>Excerpt length: Set the number of words for the excerpt.</li>
<li>Show read more link: Choose to show or hide the Read More link.</li>
<li>Read more text: Set the text for the read more link. You can leave it empty to use the default text <code>Read More</code>.</li>
<li>Show pagination: Choose to show or hide the pagination links.</li>
<li>Block title HTML element: Choose the HTML element for the block title. Options include: h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, div, p, span.</li>
<li>Post title HTML element: Choose the HTML element for the post title. Options include: h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, div, p, span.</li>
<li>Additional class(es): Set a custom class for the widget container. You can use spaces to separate multiple classes.</li>
</ul>
<h4>Gutenberg Block</h4>
Since version 1.1.0, Flex Posts also includes a gutenberg block. You can add the widget directly into the post/page content with the WP 5.0 block editor.
<h4>Demo</h4>
Please visit the live demo here: <a href="https://tajam.id/flex-posts-demo/" rel="nofollow ugc">Flex Posts Demo</a>
<h4>Requirements</h4>
This plugin has been tested and works with at least PHP 5.3 installed in your environment. But we strongly recommend you to use the latest PHP version, as using older versions may expose you to security vulnerabilities.

Flex Posts – Widget and Gutenberg Block

I think this plugin has a lot of potential. I am using it in all of my sites. For me there are a few things holding this plugin from being perfect:

- If we could have the option of selecting a few categories on the query instead of having wether all categories or just one, that would be much appreciated.

- The Layout #3 doesn't fill the whole width of its container, like the others do. Can you please fix this. Thanks!

Hands down the most professional post layout block you'll ever find

A widget to display posts with thumbnails in various layouts. Fits nicely in any widget area size.

Advanced Posts Widget vs Flex Posts – Widget and Gutenberg Block