Phase 2: Customization

[mtias]

This supersedes #24551 for tracking upcoming tasks around the main site editing projects. There are a few separate tracking issues for covering some general improvements and then some broader projects:

Main Tasks

Browse

• Re-Introduce Content Editing in the Site Editor #44461
• Finalize site hub elements #50394
• Meta actions on details view #50379
• Details View → Templates #49597
• Update Templates panel #51454
• Details View → Template Part #50392
• Details View → Page #50390
• Details view → Styles #50429
• Template Parts and path towards "library" management #50397
• Navigation on Browse Mode #50396
• Display home / loop icon on the relevant page details view #50582

Editor

• Stabilize the Title Bar #50378
• Introduce "Browser" and surface main navigation UI #36667
• Creation modal for "New Page" #48456
• Add new Template modal #50395
• Command Center: Quick search for jumping to other pages or templates in the editor. #48457
• Editor: expose revisions in the UI for all available post types #49601 (E.g. templates, template parts, patterns, global styles)
• Top Toolbar improvements #40450
• Refine the Site Editor loading state #35503

Patterns

• The wp:pattern block #48458
• Library: enable ability to create & classify a pattern library alongside reusable blocks #50028
• Surface related patterns in the template inspector #44582

Blocks

• Image Block: Surface aspect-ratio tool for custom image dimensions #38990
• Link UI (<LinkControl>) Overview Issue #49091
• Navigation 6.3 Priorities #50165

Styles

• Expose Style Book in Styles details view #50393
• Global Styles/Typography: Managing fonts #45271

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Tasks below were done in WordPress 6.2.

• [Patterns] Pattern Inserter: Next #41379
• [Blocks] Navigation Overview: Phase 2 priorities #41549
• [Blocks] Split block tools between "settings" and "appearance" #40204
• [Patterns] Revisiting / contextualising pattern categories, and default inclusions #44501
• [Editor] Inserter: Add Media tab and explore basic Openverse integration #44496
• [Editor] Move document information and outline to list view panel #44193
• [Editor] Colorise template parts and reusable blocks in the UI #32163
• [Tools] Make it possible to set the width of blocks within Row #44467
• [Tools] Group: Add setup state to allow picking a variant (default/row/stack) #43433
• [Editor] Add a shortcut for template browsing #37001
• [Patterns] Improving intuition of the 'Query' pattern category #43427
• [Blocks] Layout jumps when selecting an image #44359
• [Styles] Global Styles: display inline preview on per-block settings #42919
• [Styles] Add Box Shadow Component #44651
• [Styles] Make it possible to push local block styles to global block styles #44361
• [Styles] Global Styles: an input for custom CSS #30142
• [Styles] Global styles – per-block custom css #44412
• [Tools] Fixed Position Header and Footer Template Parts #30121
• [Styles] Global styles: Offer a way to view a document containing all blocks and styles #44420 ⤵️
• [Blocks] Make it easy to copy (and paste) block styles #44418 ⤵️
• [Templates] Provide a pathway to migrate widgets to block themes #39270

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Editor

The template editor is what powers editing wp_template entries and files.

• Site Editor & Templates Roadmap #41241

Patterns

From directory browsing to placeholder setup to transformations, patterns are a crucial component of the entire site editing scope and the planned improvements are outlined here.

• Building with Patterns #38529

Styling

Includes the global styles project, design tools in specific site editing blocks, and any further work around theme integration (palettes, gradients, content width, etc).

• Design Tools Overview #33447
• Global Styles Ongoing Roadmap #41232

Themes

Flows regarding themes as a whole, from theme switching to theme export.

• Theme switching flows tracking issue #39324
• Visual Theme Building Tracking Issue #39189

Gradual Adoption

While full block themes are at the avant-garde of using blocks everywhere, there's still valuable work to be done to improve how all themes can interact with blocks and make use of the new tools gradually and at their own pace.

• Allow usage of block based "template parts" without using block based "templates" #37943
• Provide a pathway to migrate widgets to block themes #39270
• Global Styles: Allow saving, importing, exporting, copying from another theme without switching to it #45371

[mtias]

They will work once the remaining infrastructure pieces and dependencies (missing blocks) are included even without the theme editor.

[carolinan]

The theme editor is what WordPress calls the built in file editor in the WordPress admin area,. Please help me understand what part that editor plays in whether or not a block theme/ full site editing theme can be activated.

[mtias]

Sorry, I was using "theme editor" to mean "site editor" in the above (the block editor that is able to edit all templates of a theme). The current built in file editor would still be there for any kind of theme, though it remains to be seen if it's de-emphasized in the block theme case given you still hace access to all files, provided it's not mixing php files with html templates.

[mtias]

Update: broke design tools into its sub-tracking issue at #33447.

[mtias]

Update: added "focused template part" mode as a separate item under Template Editor #33926.

[priethor]

Update: added "A lighter Navigation Block Experience" as a complement to the existing Navigation Block Tracking Issue #34041

[mtias]

Update: added "The Global Styles Interface" to the styling milestone #34574.

[gingerling]

Hi, Is there a plan for category pages etc to be fully editable with blocks like any other page? This would be brilliant for woocommerce. There are some hacky ways round it at the moment, using redirects to replace category pages with normal pages etc, or using canonical url and linking from the menu, but it feels like a huge seo risk to start messing with my site structure this way. I'm wondering how much more research and effort i should put into this, with the way wordpress is going maybe this will be resolved in a year or so?

[mtias]

@gingerling with block themes you'd indeed be able to edit category templates, either globally, or for a specific category: