Justin Tadlock

  • Need to Smile Today? Stay WordPress Strong

    Need to Smile Today? Stay WordPress Strong

    For the first time, at least 19 people from the WordPress community can literally call themselves WordPress rock stars without it sounding like an outdated marketing gimmick. GravityView dropped a community music video and website named WordPress Strong earlier today. It is fun. It is inspirational. It will leave a smile on your face. The…

  • The Future of WordPress: The Block Editor Is Here to Stay

    The Future of WordPress: The Block Editor Is Here to Stay

    It is inevitable that when we publish a story on the Tavern that is remotely related to the block editor or the Gutenberg project, we receive negative comments. Despite sprinting along in its second year as part of core WordPress, there are still those who liken posts on the editor to Soviet-style mind manipulation and…

  • Block Lab Team Joins WP Engine, Looks to the Future of Block Building

    Block Lab Team Joins WP Engine, Looks to the Future of Block Building

    The three-person Block Lab team of Luke Carbis, Ryan Kienstra, and Rob Stinson is joining WP Engine to work on the company’s block editor projects. WP Engine approached the team members after seeing how successful the Block Lab project had grown and made them an offer. The team will be able to continue building projects…

  • Gutenberg 8.0 Merges Block and Pattern Inserter, Adds Inline Formats, and Updates Code Editor

    Gutenberg 8.0 Merges Block and Pattern Inserter, Adds Inline Formats, and Updates Code Editor

    The team behind the Gutenberg plugin shipped version 8.0 yesterday. The update adds some nice user-facing changes, including a merged block and pattern inserter, new inline formatting options, and visual changes to the code editor. Over two dozen bug fixes were included in the release, along with several enhancements. Designers on the project updated the…

  • WordPress 5.4.1 Addresses 7 Security Issues and Fixes Several Bugs

    WordPress 5.4.1 Addresses 7 Security Issues and Fixes Several Bugs

    WordPress 5.4.1, a security and maintenance release, dropped today. The release addresses seven security issues, which were all responsibly disclosed to the WordPress security team. Core developers also included several fixes for code regressions in the previous version 5.4 release and ported bug fixes to the block editor from the Gutenberg plugin. End-users with automatic…

  • David Vongries Takes Over as New Owner of the Kirki Customizer Framework

    David Vongries Takes Over as New Owner of the Kirki Customizer Framework

    Ari Stathopoulos sold Kirki, his 6-year-old customizer framework, last week. The plugin is a widely-used tool for theme authors and currently has over 400,000 installations. It is also bundled as a drop-in package within an unknown number of themes, likely numbering in the hundreds. David Vongries, the owner of the Page Builder Framework theme, has…

  • Should the Block Editor Have a Grid System?

    Should the Block Editor Have a Grid System?

    Laying out a webpage design and getting every element aligned perfectly can be a tough job. Even many developers rely on CSS grid frameworks. Granted, with the introduction of the flexbox and grid systems in the CSS language, such frameworks are becoming unnecessary. Whether it is getting the vertical and horizontal rhythm down or simply…

  • WP Feedback Kicks off Free Virtual Summit for WordPress Professionals on April 27

    WP Feedback Kicks off Free Virtual Summit for WordPress Professionals on April 27

    WP Feedback is running a virtual event from April 27 – May 1. The event is primarily geared toward WordPress professionals who are looking to scale their business. It will feature CEOs, designers, freelancers, and more from the WordPress space. Between five and seven video sessions will be available each new day of the event.…

  • You Deserve to Wear Sweatpants; Don’t Let Anyone Tell You Any Different

    You Deserve to Wear Sweatpants; Don’t Let Anyone Tell You Any Different

    Lounge in your Baby Yoda sweats. Break out those knee-high Santa socks that you love to wear during the holidays. Slide into your Rocket City Trash Pandas tee and pretend the baseball season is going to happen this year. Sure, you can wear a suit and tie when you’re working from home. However, I invite…

  • Gutenberg Hub Launches Online Block Template Builder

    Gutenberg Hub Launches Online Block Template Builder

    Gutenberg Hub launched the first version of its block template builder last week. The template builder allows users to select from the team’s existing library of nearly 200 templates. It is essentially an online builder that allows users to craft a full page layout by mixing and matching various sections. They can then copy the…

  • On Digital Gardens, Blogs, Personal Spaces, and the Future

    On Digital Gardens, Blogs, Personal Spaces, and the Future

    The concept of digital gardens is not new. It predates the modern blog, but there may be a resurgence, albeit small, of the sort of curated content that grows within a digital garden. The term “digital garden” is not well-defined. In general, it is a collection of thoughts, unfinished projects, links, and much more. However,…

  • GitHub Opens Free Plan to Unlimited Collaborators on Private Repositories

    GitHub Opens Free Plan to Unlimited Collaborators on Private Repositories

    On Tuesday, GitHub announced a change to its plans that would make collaboration between developers much cheaper. Free, in fact. Anyone can launch an organization for at no charge with unlimited public and private repositories. The change also includes an unlimited number of collaborators. This will be good news for small WordPress development teams without…

  • Gutenberg 7.9 Adds Gradients to More Blocks, Extra Typography Controls, and New Patterns

    Gutenberg 7.9 Adds Gradients to More Blocks, Extra Typography Controls, and New Patterns

    For Gutenberg junkies, the three-week wait between major releases has been rough, especially during this time when many are looking for new things to fill the gaps in our social calendars. Not to fret, the team dropped version 7.9 of the plugin earlier today. This release includes several goodies such as new typography-related controls for…

  • Block-a-saurus Embeds a Side-Scrolling T-Rex Game via the Block Editor

    Block-a-saurus Embeds a Side-Scrolling T-Rex Game via the Block Editor

    It is no secret that I love testing out the sort of fun WordPress blocks that hark back to my early days of the web. I have written on the subject once or twice. Imagine my surprise when I came across a side-scrolling dinosaur game that users could simply plop into the block editor and…

  • The Road Ahead: What’s in Store for WordPress for the Rest of 2020?

    The Road Ahead: What’s in Store for WordPress for the Rest of 2020?

    Josepha Haden, executive director of WordPress, provided a progress update on the 2020 goals in early March. As always, the timeline to hit certain goals can change based on roadblocks the development team hits and other factors. On the whole, the tentative roadmap looks feasible. Currently, WordPress 5.5 is set to ship on August 11,…