This post is the nineteenth call for testing as part of the Full Site Editing Outreach Program. For more information about this experimental program, please review this FAQ for helpful details. To properly join the fun, please head to #fse-outreach-experiment in Make Slack for future testing announcements, helpful posts, and more will be shared there.
Important notes: There’s a current call for volunteers to use Replay.io, a tool with a comprehensive way of capturing bugs. Respond by December 28th, 2022 to get involved. Separately, the FSE Outreach Program is always looking for volunteers to help run these calls for testing for the community.
Overview
With work deeply underway to refine and wrap up numerous aspects of phase 2, this call for testing centers numerous changes in progress to put them to the test (get it) and find the edges of what’s being worked on. At a high level, this test covers the following:
- Reorganizing the Site Editor to introduce browse mode, offering an easier way to navigate between content in the site editing experience.
- Introduce a new UX for the navigation block where changes (adding new menu items, creating a new menu, etc) can be made from within the block settings sidebar.
- Split block tools between “settings” and “appearance” to make blocks with numerous controls easier to configure and customize.
- Offer a way to view a document containing all blocks and styles with the Stylebook allowing for changes to Styles to be seen more broadly.
- Colorizing template parts and reusable blocks to make them easier to identify and make the changes you want.
- Bonus: Add a block preview component in global styles to see how your changes will impact an individual block.
- Bonus: Add an input for custom CSS to global styles to allow for an integrated, in editor way to add additional styling.
Taken together, these changes make it easier to navigate between the content you want to edit, see changes at scale when working with Styles in a few ways, create an easier navigation editing/creation experience, and have a more intuitive experience when editing individual blocks.
Framing: Refining a client’s site
To ground this experience a tiny bit more, let’s pretend you’re doing some refinements to a client’s site to finetune their branding and, as a result, homepage and navigation. The aim is to go from a more complex navigation structure to a simplified one, with two different options to choose from for the client (edit current menu and create a new option). Tied to this, the homepage will shift the focus of content in the Query Loop block with more of an emphasis on images (and whatever else you’d like). Finally, you will update the overall styling as you see fit, with bonus ideas for those who have extra capacity and interest!
Testing Instructions
To use a prebuilt test site:
- Open this link only once: https://app.instawp.io/launch?t=fse-call-for-testing-19
- Please do not repeatedly open this link as it creates a new site each time and there’s a limit of 50 sites that can be created.
- This will launch a site for you to use for up to 24 hours. Select “WP Admin Login” and use the information provided to log in.
- Save the link to your site so you can access it again during the test.
To set up your own test site (skip if using the above):
- Have a test site using the latest version of WordPress. It’s important this is not a production/live site.
- Install and activate the Twenty Twenty Three theme by going to Appearances > Themes.
- Install and activate Gutenberg 14.8.4 RC1 by downloading the release > going to Plugins > Add New > Installing. From there, head to Gutenberg > Experiments and turn on “Off canvas navigation editor” and “Block inspector tabs” experiments.
- Head to Tools > Import and import this file (click “Download” in the upper right hand corner first) to have access to the same content as above.
If you have any issues with manual setup, just comment on the post or ping me (@annezazu) in WordPress.org slack.
Explore browse mode
- Head to Appearance > Editor (beta). This will bring you to a reorganized view of the site editor.
- Click Templates and notice the list of templates now shown in the sidebar. Click through various templates to quickly view them.
- Select “Home” from the templates and then select “Edit” in the open sidebar to directly alter the template.
Editing navigation
- Select the Header of your site before selecting the navigation block. Within the navigation block, select the page list block and choose “edit” from the block toolbar. This will open a prompt explaining that a step must be taken before you can customize your menu. Select “Customize”. You can also select the option to “Customize” from the block settings sidebar.
- Open your block settings and notice that each menu item is now listed in the sidebar.
- Spend some time condensing the menu down as you see fit to just three top level menu items. You can do this by dragging and dropping the menu items in the sidebar, deleting items, and renaming them. For example, you can list “Press” under “About” and “Resources” under “Getting Started”.
- Explore the additional tabs in the block settings (Styles, Settings) to customize further to your liking. For example, you can change the typography, block spacing, or how it appears on mobile. When done, click “Save”.
- Afterwards, select the navigation block once more and, in the list view tab of the block settings, select the menu name and choose the option to “Create new menu” in the dropdown.
- Select the + button in the same tab to add in simply the “Contact”, “About”, and “Getting Started” page.
- Head to the Settings tab and open the “Advanced” section to rename the menu to something like “Simplified main menu”. When done, click “Save”.
- Heading back to the List View tab in the block settings section, click on the menu name to open a drop down and select which menu you’d like to display from there.
Redesigning the homepage
- Select the Query Loop block and, from the block toolbar, select the “Replace” option.
- This will open up a modal where you can pick a different pattern to display the posts. Choose a different pattern.
- Customize the pattern you chose further. For example, change the featured image size, add a duotone filter, remove or add blocks, change the size of the titles of posts, etc. When done, click “Save”.
Changing Styles
- Open Styles and either choose “Browse Styles” to pick a different style variation or make adjustments as you see fit using the Styles system. For example, you can customize the appearance of individual blocks with the “Blocks” section using the new preview option or change overall options with Typography, Color, and Layout.
- When done, select the icon that looks like an eye from the main Styles interface. Here’s a screenshot in case it’s helpful. This will open up an interface called the “stylebook” where you can see the styles for every block displayed. You can click that icon to toggle this option on/off.
- Tweak anything you’d like further while using the stylebook before, when done, clicking “Save”.
Bonus: Customize further as you see fit
What follows are various ways you can take this test further. Feel free to try all or none, depending on how much time you have:
- Add custom CSS using the Styles > Custom field as part of the input for custom CSS work in Global Styles.
- Explore browse mode more by switching between and editing different templates or template parts.
- Add or edit more blocks and explore the split settings options within.
- Make more changes to the Styling of individual blocks, taking advantage of the new preview options for individual block styles and the overall stylebook.
What to notice:
- Did the experience crash at any point?
- Did the saving experience work properly?
- What did you find particularly confusing or frustrating about the experience?
- What did you especially enjoy or appreciate about the experience?
- What would have made this experience easier?
- Did you find that what you created matched what you saw on your site?
- Did it work using Keyboard only?
- Did it work using a screen reader?