Thoughts on Gutenberg (the new WordPress editor)?

[cheat_master30]

It's apparently coming in WordPress 5.0, which in turn is set for release in just a couple of days now:

https://wptavern.com/wordpress-5-0-...mpting-widespread-outcry-ahead-of-wordcamp-us

However, the general reception this editor has got has been mixed to say the least. Some like it and feel it's a step forward for the CMS as a whole. Some really dislike it, to the point a whole WordPress fork called ClassicPress has been released to remove it (and other such functionality).

https://www.classicpress.net/

And some people just feel it's a bit undercooked at the moment. Like, they feel Automattic is kicking it out too early in order to meet their own business deadlines, quality be damned. This is especially true in terms of accessibility, where the team's leader apparently quit:

https://wptavern.com/wordpress-acce...-political-complications-related-to-gutenberg

But what about you? What do you think about this new editor?

My thoughts are in the next post...

 

[cheat_master30]

Personally, I feel it's got promise, but I do wonder whether it's being aimed at the wrong audience about now. It makes a pretty neat page builder if you can learn to work with it, and that's what I'm doing with a company project at the moment. Letting people create their own page layouts with blocks is certainly a step up above some Advanced Custom Fields esque deal with moveable widgets or what not.

So it works well there. It also seems like something that'd work well with certain news sites, since some of them want to have more complicated article layouts with parallax effects and widgets thrown in. For instance, the BBC uses a system like this, and the current interface is apparently a total nightmare to work with for journalists because of it (hundreds of options in an awkward form like interface).

But it doesn't seem like something the average Joe will really need. Seriously, how often do you think your average blogger will need to use blocks in their posts? I'd say the answer is 'rarely, if ever', since most people just want to post a few paragraphs with some pictures or videos in between. For those people, Gutenberg is just overkill, and seems like something that'll just slow down their daily posting habits.

Overall, it's a system with potential (and that'll work well for certain niche audiences), but not one the average Joe will find all that useful.

 

[User37935]

Thanks cheat_master30 - have you used any third party page builders like Elementor, Divi or Beaver and if so, how does it compare to Gutenberg?

 

[Solidus]

Don't like it. I'll use Elementor forever.

 

[kolakube]

It's important to make the distinction between a page builder and a content builder, and its current form, Gutenberg looks to be a positive step forward for writing longform content but no chance at being a complete page builder. The plan seems to evolve into one, but since Gutenberg lives in the backend, I am skeptical that it can turn into a favored solution as the driving force behind popular page builders is that they are visual frontend editors.

In my own themes I had always wanted a more visual way to embed elements like columns, images, videos, and other basic elements into my writing without using HTML in the post editor so I am looking forward to making my themes compatible in that regard.

I agree with cheat_master30 that it does feel completely over engineered in many cases where I just want to write something simple. I suppose this is the mindset to expect from those who write in React (thinking of this great meme).

The thing I can definitively say I do not like about Gutenberg is that it takes over the editing screen in such a way that turns other page settings into an afterthought. There are often critical decisions to make on any given post or page apart from which Blocks to use—think SEO, tracking scripts, and page layout decisions unrelated to content—that were more accessible under the current meta box system.

I'm eager to continue seeing these things improve, but overall it will be an uncomfortable thing to get used to. I hope it will be worth the five minutes of praise they get at WordCamp U.S. where people will no longer misunderstand the why behind the Gutenberg release date.