Automattic’s Skatepark landed in the WordPress.org theme directory on Monday. It was designed for modern events and organizations, but it should work well for many sites with a small amount of customization. For those keeping count, it is number 52 on the long path toward the 3,000 themes project lead Matt Mullenweg hopes for before…
Earlier today, Mark Root-Wiley published an in-depth proposal around standardized design tokens and CSS for WordPress. The goal is to create a consistent, customizable, and interoperable system around the design tools in core. Essentially, he is proposing a standardized design framework or, as he refers to it, a “shared CSS toolkit” that WordPress, themes, and…
There is not much I miss about the classic editor. It was dead to me when the block system became the new normal. However, there might be a feature or two that I miss. The biggest of those features? The “Add New” button at the top of the post editor. So, when Aurooba Ahmed mentioned…
After being involved in web design for almost 19 years now, there are grinding days where nothing feels fresh. However, there are also moments where you look at another web developer’s approach to problems and feel like there is a whole world of possibilities that you have yet to step into. And, it is rarely…
Gutenberg 12.6 landed in the WordPress plugin directory yesterday. The update includes several transform-related enhancements and new Read More and Post Author Biography blocks. Users can now also show visible labels via the Social Icons block. Nothing seems to be broken with this release, which is always welcome. Gutenberg has not fundamentally wrecked something I…
Stanislav Khromov announced Clarity, a plugin for hiding obtrusive banners, via Twitter and the Advanced WordPress (AWP) Facebook group today. It was first pushed to WordPress.org around a year ago, but the developer seems to be just now publicizing it. The Clarity website describes its mission as: “Ads, upsells, and analytics banners have been running…
Ellen Bauer, developer and co-owner of ElmaStudio, posed the question on Twitter last week that many have been asking. What do we call these new types of WordPress themes made from blocks? She was not the first to ask. The question also came up via the Post Status Slack chat earlier this week. The short…
I have been fascinated by the concept of Carolina Nymark’s Miniblock OOAK theme for a couple of weeks now. It has served as inspiration for a design idea I have been working on, and I am happy to see Nymark pushing boundaries in a space where few pioneers are left. Her design style always dares…
There is a problem. Well, it is not an OMGBBQ problem, but it has the potential to become one. Maybe by calling attention to it, I will set off a landslide of copycats who will see this as another trick of the marketing trade, implementing it in their own projects. I am torn, but it…
Over the weekend, Virgiliu Diaconu asked me to check out his Carousel Slider Block plugin, a project he has maintained for three years. It has slowly garnered more than 5,000 active installs since its release. I get emails like this every day. More often than not, the projects are fundamentally broken or are a bit…
Kevin Batdorf, the Project Lead Developer at Extendify, released the Wavy Divider plugin earlier this week. It is described as “a colorful, fun, lightweight divider block to energize your website with character and pizazz.” As someone who believes every Friday should be officially titled “Fun Friday,” how could I not install and activate it? I…
The FSE Outreach Program is back with another round of testing. Anne McCarthy asks for volunteers to test and provide feedback on media-related features in WordPress. Anyone is welcome to contribute, and feedback is open until February 23. This round of the program includes two tasks. The first has users explore today’s media-related experience. The…
Gutenberg 12.5 landed in the WordPress plugin directory earlier today. I have already been excited about at least one new enhancement, global styles variations. However, this is a beefy update with several developer and user-centric features. With WordPress 5.9 now out into the wild, it looks like all hands are back on deck as we…
One of my favorite tools in the past few days is the Block X-ray Attributes plugin by Sal Ferrarello. It is geared toward developers and shows block attributes in the WordPress editor. After seeing his tweet on Friday, I immediately installed it. The plugin is currently only available via its GitHub repository, and anyone who…
Freelance WordPress developer Aurooba Ahmed released the Super List Block plugin earlier today. Essentially, it is like the core WordPress List block — just supercharged. It is her first publicly-released extension on WordPress.org. The primary use case for the plugin is adding other blocks within the list items. However, its options allow users to take…