Company A sells its plugin. Company B picks it up and moves forward with an overhauled version that looks and feels much different than the original. Users are outraged by the changes. It seems to be a repeating theme in 2021, almost as a rule rather than an exception. Last month, Termly announced its acquisition of the GDPR/CCPA Cookie Consent …
Identify and Select Blocks via the Wayfinder WordPress Plugin
Christopher John, a Seattle-based designer and UX engineer, released his first project to the plugin directory yesterday. Announced via Twitter to high praise, Wayfinder is a block outline solution for the WordPress editor. Like similar plugins, the goal is to make it easier for end-users to select nested blocks, which can sometimes be tough to pin down. Wayfinder outlines each …
Query Loop: The Ins and Outs of One of WordPress 5.8’s Most Powerful Features
WordPress 5.8 is on deck for July 20, just a mere 10 days from now. The release is geared up to be the most feature-packed update the community has seen in a while. Block-based widgets, the pattern directory, WebP image support, template-editing mode, and many more tools are nearly ready to ship to the masses. However, one of the most …
Awesome Motive Acquires SearchWP
Awesome Motive, the company behind MonsterInsights, OptinMonster, WPForms, and several other popular products, has acquired SearchWP, a commercial plugin that enhances WordPress’ search functionality. No changes have been announced for the plugin and Awesome Motive CEO Syed Balkhi says it will be “business as usual” for current customers. “We have built a lot of internal tools to improve our website …
Private Note-Taking and Journaling With the Hypernotes WordPress Plugin
Ella van Durpe, a core WordPress contributor and software engineer at Automattic, released a note-taking plugin earlier today. Hypernotes is a simple custom post type that allows end-users to take private notes or serve as a journaling tool. I have seen similar plugins in the past. I even began building one years ago before ultimately abandoning it for a simple …
Taking the Leap: Building My First WordPress Block Plugin
Like most years, I spent this U.S. Independence Day cooped up with my furry friends. I closed all the windows, shuttered the blinds, switched on a couple of fans for white noise, and clicked the television on. My cats and I relaxed. It is my job to keep them calm while my — usually drunken — compatriots burn hundreds of …
Gutenberg 10.9 Renames the Query Block, Adds Collapsible List View Items, and Rolls Out Rich URL Previews
Yesterday, Gutenberg 10.9 landed in the WordPress plugin directory. The update overhauls the Query and Query Loop blocks, allows users to expand or collapse items in the editor list view, and introduces rich URL preview cards for links. The new version also packs in an updated template-mode creation modal and moves the blocks manager. This update ships several enhancements, particularly …
Extendify Adopts EditorsKit, Increasing Its Block Plugin Collection
Extendify has been scooping up some successful block-related plugins in recent months. It acquired the Redux Framework in November 2020 and followed it up with a purchase of Editor Plus and Gutenberg Hub in December. Its latest pickup? EditorsKit. This ownership change was an adoption rather than an acquisition. The company is compensating Jeffrey Carandang, EditorsKit’s creator, for helping during …
Toolbelt Tidies WordPress Plugin and Theme Admin Notifications
It’s a tale as old as, well, WordPress. Ben Gillbanks noticed a conversation where someone thought that admin notices were getting out of hand. Enter another developer’s attempt to address this problem. With a few code additions to his Toolbelt plugin, he had a working solution to stop the madness: the Tidy Notifications module. Despite the early promise of the …
Gutenberg 10.8 Adds New Typography Controls and Block Previews
On Wednesday, Gutenberg 10.8 landed in the WordPress plugin directory. The release includes new typography options for controlling the Heading block’s font-weight and the List block’s font family. The Audio and File blocks now show preview content in the inserter. Gutenberg 10.7 felt like it introduced flashier features than 10.8. But, this was still a solid release. Sometimes the things …