Howdy,
We are almost there, Gutenberg 17.6 is the second to last plugin release that will make it into the WordPress 6.5. If you haven’t explored the new features, I recommend reviewing the post Early Opportunities to Test WordPress 6.5 and get acquainted and at the same time contribute to testing the new version, and help find the bugs. You can use the Gutenberg Nightly via WordPress Playground to get your testing site up and running in seconds.
The first Beta is scheduled for February 13th, 2024 and then, you can use the Beta tester plugin to explore the new WordPress version.
Test the Font Library, Template, and Style revisions or the Pattern overrides. All cool features to improve WordPress for designers, side builders and owners. What are you looking forward to?
Well, have fun testing and let me know how I can help.
Yours, 💕
Birgit
Developing Gutenberg and WordPress
Release lead, Carlos Bravo, published What’s new in Gutenberg 17.6? (31 January) post. He wrote: “This release, which includes 264 pull requests (that’s a lot of work!), can be labeled mainly as a ‘code quality’ one, as it includes two important refactors in both Fonts and Interactivity APIs. It also includes some improvements in the new “Data Views” experiment, block hooks improvements, and finally, a feature that all developers have been waiting for: the ability to extend allowed blocks within a parent block.”
Developers also might be interested in the new Interactivity API directives, and that Footnotes are now also available for custom post types (CPTs).
In his latest Design Share: Jan 15-Jan 26, Joen Asmussen lists the great work of the WordPress Design team:
- Improved Lightbox UI – the lightbox toggle is now part of the link settings for the images, as it’s somewhat a link to the resized view and links and lightbox a mutually exclusive.
- Cover Aspect Ratio – applied to the Cover block in various forms.
- Drag & Drop Displacement for moving blocks in the List view
- Scrolling Top Toolbar is an interesting solution to the problem that we run out of real estate for everything to be placed in the Toolbar when tagged to the top.
All features are already available in Gutenberg 17.6, and ready for testing.
WordPress’ extenders and site builders are invited to provide their feedback on the future direction of the Outreach Program (aka FSE-outreach-experiments). Share your insight to help shape the program’s trajectory. The full proposal can be read at What’s next for the Outreach program.
🎙️ The latest episode is Gutenberg Changelog #130 – WordPress 7.0, Gutenberg 22.9 and 23.0, WordCamp Europe, Block Themes and More with Tammie Lister, Chief Product Officer at Convesio
Upcoming Events
Phase 3 Media Meeting: February 7, 2024, at 12:00 UTC, Anthony Burchell wrote: “kick off a round table discussion about some opportunities and challenges ahead in the development of Phase 3. The Media Component Maintainers hope to find areas of focus where contributors can lean in to align efforts with folks working on Phase 3.”
February 8th, 2024 15:00 UTC: Hallway Hangout: Intrinsic Design A discussion on Intrinsic Design and how to use it on real life projects
February 13, 2024, at 16:00 UTC Developer Hours: JavaScript for modern WordPress development
February 26, 2024: WP Publisher Success Week, an online event.
February 27, 2024, at 16:00 UTC Developer Hours: How to build modern web layouts with WordPress blocks
Plugins, Themes, and Tools for #nocode site builders and owners
Earlier this month, Kevin Batdorf updated his Code Block Pro plugin, which provides Syntax highlighting for your code block For version 1.26, he added support for two more fonts: Roboto Mono by Google and Hack font by Source foundry to the beautiful Themes available with the plugin. This latest version also adds a button for readers to copy the code with one click and some controls for the button styling.
You can obtain the latest version from one of the following places.
- from the WordPress repository,
- from the website Code-Block-Pro.com with theme demos and
- via GitHub
Andrea Gandino announced via X (former twitter) that his plugin Advanced columns block is now available from the WordPress repository. Its free version provides users with a drag and drop interface, grid and media query support and a lot more.
Tammie Lister published a few more Editor Tips on her new site:
- Copy a color Copy any color in a palette by clicking ‘copy’ when the palette is open within the site editor.
- Unlink to set one side – Want to just set one side of a border, not all at the same time?
- Add options to tools
Turn on extra options, for example under typography, by checking the option. - Show options
Want to see more at any point in the interface? - View device sizes in site editor
You can quickly check your design on three device sizes in the site editor using the ‘View‘ tool. - Quick revisions for Styles
Clicking the ‘revisions’ icon jumps you straight to revisions. You can do this even in the ‘Style’ browser.
Theme Development for Full Site Editing and Blocks
In case you missed it above, the next WordPress Hallway Hangout will be on Intrinsic Design on February 8th, 2024 at 15:00 UTC – a discussion with agency developer and themes builders on solution to common problems.
For an introduction to the topic, read Justin Tadlock’s post on the Developer Blog: Intrinsic design, theming, and rethinking how to design with WordPress.
Want to add starter page and template patterns to your theme, just like Twenty Twenty-Four does it? Justin Tadlock shared what he learned in his latest post on the WordPress Developer Blog: Adding starter patterns to your WordPress themes. “Similar to page patterns, template patterns give users a starting point when you’re building a new template. The difference is that template patterns work from the Site Editor.” he wrote.
Building Blocks and Tools for the Block editor.
In his latest post on the WordPress Developer Blog, How to disable specific blocks in WordPress, Nick Diego guides readers through the steps necessary to disable certain blocks within the WordPress editor. This can be essential for site admins who wish to simplify the editing experience or enforce a consistent content creation strategy by limiting the available blocks to users. Diego explains the methods to achieve this:
- using functions in the theme’s
functions.phpfile, - employing a plugin that provides a user interface for block management, or
- using the new block JSON configuration.
Each technique will vary in complexity and control, offering solutions for both novice and advanced users.
Need a plugin .zip from Gutenberg’s master branch?
Gutenberg Times provides daily build for testing and review.
Now available via WordPress Playground (no need for a test site)
Have you been using it? Hit reply and let me know.
Questions? Suggestions? Ideas? Don’t hesitate to send them via email or send me a message on WordPress Slack or Twitter @bph.
For questions to be answered on the Gutenberg Changelog, send them to changelog@gutenbergtimes.com