This plugin hasn’t been tested with the latest 3 major releases of WordPress. It may no longer be maintained or supported and may have compatibility issues when used with more recent versions of WordPress.

Oxford Debate

Description

Oxford Debate is a plugin to create Oxford-Style Debates on your WordPress website.

An Oxford-Style debate is a communication process in which participants argue for and against a given topic. According to Wikipedia, physical Oxford-Style debate is a competitive debate format featuring a sharply framed motion that is proposed by one side and opposed by another. A winner is declared in an Oxford-Style debate either by the majority or by which team has swayed more audience members between the two votes.

The online version of the Oxford-style debates adaptes the physical model and makes it possible to expand the capabilities of both speakers and audience:

  • Moderator propose a topic with two opposite views and stimulate the debate.
  • Speakers defense their proposal with argument using web connectivity and multimedia.
  • Community can vote the proposals and comment fixing its position on the proposals of the speakers or raising their own alternatives.

There is a brief introductory video to how to create your first debate:

For further information:

Screenshots

  • Example of a debate page.

Installation

  1. Download the Oxford Debate plugin archive and extract the files.
  2. Copy the resulting oxd directory into /wp-content/plugins/ with FTP. Or
    go to WP admin > Plugins > Add New
  3. Type Oxford Debate in search box and hit enter and install plugin from there.
  4. Activate the plugin through the ‘Plugins’ menu of WordPress.

FAQ

What is the shortcode to use for listing all the debates ?

[debates_q]

How to link proposals with the debate ?

Once you have the debate, go to “Proposals” in the admin menu to create two proposals. There you can add the autor and custom the color of each proposal.
Then, go back to the debate and link with the proposals you created.

How to add the image and description of each speaker ?

All the speakers must be WordPress users so the image and description will be took from the Gravatar of their account.

How to add authors for the proposals ?

If the author of a proposal or different from the admin, you should go to the WordPress admin menu and add a new user. Then, back to the proposal, you just have to link with the author created.

What is the role for proposal user ?

All WordPress users. The differences between each role are: an Administrator can manage all the settings of the plugin; an editor can edit, delete and customize all the debates and proposals on the site; an author can only edit and customize its proposals or debates, but cannot delete them.

How to share the debate on social media ?

To share the debate, set the options on the OxD Settings. You should go to the WordPress admin menu> Settings > OxD Settings. There you have to select where you want to share: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, WhatsApp, Telegram, Email.

What is Insight Oxford-Style Debate ?

Insight Oxford-Style Debate enriches your debate site with information about your audience. You will display the vote evolution in your site and collect data about countries, sessions, comments, etc.

How to add Insight Oxford-Style Debate to my WordPress debate ?
  1. Subscribe to http://www.oxfordsytledebate.com
  2. Add the WordPress portal to Insights. You will need the name and URL of your website.
  3. Copy the Product Key and paste it on the OxD Settings of the WordPress admin page.
  4. Create a new debate on your WordPress site and enjoy all the features.
  5. Go to http://insight.oxfordstyledebate.com to know the evolution of you debate.

Reviews

Abril 27, 2017
I’ve received errors, posted them in the support page and got an initial response, but I haven’t received any note about it in a long time (weeks, even months). The problem has not been resolved, and I can’t wait for an update any longer.
Setyembre 3, 2016
Nice plugin! I like the idea of a plugin to wordpress debates.It seams to be a start so I am curious about how they enrich with new functionalities. At the moment, it works well. 🙂
Read all 5 reviews

Contributors & Developers

“Oxford Debate” is open source software. The following people have contributed to this plugin.

Contributors

Translate “Oxford Debate” into your language.

Interested in development?

Browse the code, check out the SVN repository, or subscribe to the development log by RSS.

Changelog

New update of Oxford-style Debate!
Lately, we have worked to add new features to enrich your experience. We look forward to testing it. Happy debating!  

2.1.3

  • Added: Layout options
  • Added: Shortcode options
  • Fixed: Minor CSS Styles
  • Fixed: Minor bugs

2.1.2

  • Added: Plugin and Debates colours
  • Fixed: Minor CSS Styles
  • Fixed: Minor bugs

2.1.1

  • Fixed: PHP functions

2.1.0

  • Added: Linked with Insight Oxford-Style Debate
  • Added: Enhanced Settings Page
  • Fixed: Debate duration bug
  • Fixed: CSS styles

2.0.4

  • Fixed: Capabilities bug
  • Fixed: Debates and Proposals tags list

2.0.3

  • Added: Social media sharing features for debate page
  • Added: Optional register user for voting
  • Added: Control for linked proposals before publishing
  • Fixed: New author role capabilities for Debates and Proposals custom post type
  • Fixed: Debate duration styles
  • Fixed: Minor bugs
  • Fixed: CSS styles
  • Removed: Feature image on proposal post
  • Removed: Back button

2.0.2

  • Fixed: ColorPicker wrong loading
  • Fixed: Vote button cursor type
  • Fixed: Debate duration styles
  • Added: New author role capabilities for Debates and Proposals custom post type
  • Removed: Datetimepicker mouse wheel scroll in Debates edit page

2.0.1

  • Removed: Bootstrap load option
  • Fixed: Responsive style

2.0.0

  • Added: Proposal Custom Post Type
  • Added: Colour Option
  • Added: Optional Bootstrap
  • Added: Settings Page
  • Added: DateTime Picker in Debate Edit Page
  • Added: Custom Post Type Debates now are linked to Custom Post Type Proposals
  • Added: Days Counter
  • Added: “Closed Debate” and “Days to begin:” indications
  • Added: Limited votes per session
  • Added: Mobile responsive debate
  • Added: Speaker’s profile pictures
  • Added: Multilanguage compatibility
  • Fixed: Improvement in the editing area
  • Fixed: Start Date cannot be later than End Date
  • Fixed: Shortcode
  • Removed: “Permanent” option
  • Removed: Votes Control from debate edit page
  • Fixed: Minor bug

1.0.3

  • Fixed: CSS and JS not found
  • Fixed: Minor bug

1.0.2

  • Added: All user roles included
  • Fixed: Added Bootstrap framework into single-debate.php

1.0.1

  • Fixed: single-debate.php bug

1.0.0

  • Added: Init date and end date
  • Added: CSS Bootstrap dependencies
  • Fixed: Refactored source code
  • Fixed: Minor bug

0.7.1

  • Fixed: Improvement in the editing area

0.7.0

  • Added: Multilanguage compatibility

0.6.0

  • Added: Comments area
  • Fixed: HTML bug
  • Added: Improved voting system
  • Fixed: Minor bug

0.5.2

  • Fixed: Minor bug

0.5.1

  • Beta new version