Month: June 2021

  • Block Patterns Will Change Everything, Part 2: Headers and Footers

    Block Patterns Will Change Everything, Part 2: Headers and Footers

    It is hard to believe that it was over a year ago — March 23, 2020, to be exact — that I wrote a post on why block patterns would be the future of WordPress. It has been a slow process as I have patiently waited for the feature to mature into a powerful tool…

  • WP Engine Makes Local Pro Free for All Users

    WP Engine Makes Local Pro Free for All Users

    WP Engine announced today that Local Pro, the commercial upgrade for its local WordPress development product, is now free for all users. Beginning with version 6.0, all features that formerly required a paid subscription are now available with a free Local account. These include Live Links Pro, Instant Reload, Link Checker, and MagicSync. “We believe…

  • Add Editor-Only Notes via the Markdown Comment Block WordPress Plugin

    Add Editor-Only Notes via the Markdown Comment Block WordPress Plugin

    Rich Tabor, the Senior Product Manager of WordPress Experience at GoDaddy, tweeted that he had an idea for a new block at the end of last week. Shortly after, the Markdown Comment Block plugin appeared on WordPress.org. The plugin is a one-off block. It allows users to enter notes directly into the post editor that…

  • Diving Into WordPress 5.8’s New Widgets Screen

    Diving Into WordPress 5.8’s New Widgets Screen

    It has been a while since I have touched widgets. Once the site editor landed in the Gutenberg plugin, I almost exclusively dropped the old sidebar paradigm and moved to block templates. Reactivating old themes and jumping into the widgets screen felt like time-traveling into a bygone era. After months of being deeply embedded within…

  • Major Revamp Coming to GitHub Issues

    Major Revamp Coming to GitHub Issues

    This week GitHub unveiled new features that will be included in a total revamp of GitHub Issues, including project tables that are similar to spreadsheets, custom fields, a keyboard driven command palette, improved task lists, and issue forms. The new project table view is an alternative to project boards, allowing users to filter, sort, and…

  • FSE Outreach Round #8: A Developer-Centric Call for Testing Theme JSON Configuration

    FSE Outreach Round #8: A Developer-Centric Call for Testing Theme JSON Configuration

    Round #8 of the Full Site Editing (FSE) Outreach Program began yesterday. Instead of the user-centric call for testing features from the UI, program lead Anne McCarthy asks that volunteers dive into code. The new adventure is all about testing theme.json files. The twist is likely to limit the pool of usual volunteers. However, it…

  • Jetpack Launches New Mobile App

    Jetpack Launches New Mobile App

    Automattic has launched a new mobile app for Jetpack, available on iOS and Android. The app features an array of Jetpack-specific features, as well as those applicable to users on paid plans, along with core WordPress features. Inside it looks nearly identical to the official WordPress mobile apps, but it is noticeably missing WordPress.com specific…

  • Clove: A Showcase of Block Patterns by Anariel Design

    Clove: A Showcase of Block Patterns by Anariel Design

    Earlier today, Ana Segota tweeted and announced via the Anariel Design blog that her company had submitted its second block-based theme to WordPress.org. Clove is a more well-rounded follow-up to her first such theme, Naledi. It is currently under review for inclusion in the official directory, but anyone can give it a test run by…

  • WordPress Theme Lock-In, Silos, and the Block System

    WordPress Theme Lock-In, Silos, and the Block System

    For many years, I was a hardcore advocate of separating any non-design functionality from themes into their own plugins. I wrote extensively on the issue. Whether it was shortcodes, custom post types, user metadata, and any number of things related to a user’s content/data, I drew a deep line in the sand. This belongs in…

  • WooCommerce Selects Paystack as Preferred Payments Partner in Africa

    WooCommerce Selects Paystack as Preferred Payments Partner in Africa

    WooCommerce has named Paystack its preferred payments partner for WooCommerce in Africa. More than 20,000 merchants are using the free Paystack WooCommerce Payment Gateway plugin but searching for and downloading the plugin separately is no longer required. Store owners can now easily select Paystack as a payment method when inside the WooCommerce dashboard. Paystack has a…

  • A Throwback to the Past: Refreshing Old Twenty* WordPress Themes With Block Patterns

    A Throwback to the Past: Refreshing Old Twenty* WordPress Themes With Block Patterns

    What began as a project in August 2020 has now become a reality. All past Twenty* default WordPress themes now have their own unique block patterns. In recent weeks, Twenty Ten through Twenty Fifteen received updates. Designer Mel Choyce-Dwan kick-started tickets for all previous 10 default themes before the WordPress 5.5 release, the first version…

  • Google Launches Search Console Insights, a User-Friendly Content Performance Overview

    Google Launches Search Console Insights, a User-Friendly Content Performance Overview

    Google Analytics is powerful if you know exactly what kind of metrics you want to investigate, it but can be overwhelming if you just need a simple overview of your traffic and referrals. Search Console Insights is a new tool from the Google Web Creators team that is aimed at making content performance easier to…

  • Getting To Know the Upcoming WordPress 5.8 Template Editor

    Getting To Know the Upcoming WordPress 5.8 Template Editor

    WordPress 5.8 is slated for release on July 20. In just over a month, many users will get their first taste of one of my favorite new features: template-editing mode. The template editor is a new tool that allows end-users to create custom templates without ever leaving the post-editing screen. It exists as a stepping…

Newsletter

Subscribe Via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.