Gutenberg block editor improvements, and integrating plugins

Today’s WordPress Watch has a strong focus on the Gutenberg block editor. Two different tweets prompted me to focus on what you can do with the editor a bit more. We’ll discuss improvements to the editor, as well as useful plugins that integrate with the block editor, so I hope you enjoy this edition. Don’t forget to check out the bonus links!

Block editor keeps on getting better

This December is the one year anniversary of the merge of the Gutenberg project in WordPress core. If you’re still postponing moving to the block editor, it’s good to know that it keeps getting better. Not just better at certain things it does – like speed and settings – but also when it comes to options and possibilities.

Gutenberg plugin improvements

The improvements to the block editor can be noted in the stand-alone Gutenberg plugin. For those of you who are unaware, the Gutenberg plugin sees continuous improvement, with new releases every other week. You can read up on the kinds of improvements that have been made here.

So, if you want to try the latest and greatest version of the block editor, you can install the Gutenberg plugin in your WordPress site. If you’ve tried it before and it didn’t take, I can guarantee you, you’ll now see a much-improved version of the block editor with the latest version of Gutenberg.

Plugins integrating with the block editor

Over the last couple of months, we’ve seen a lot of powerful improvements committed to the Gutenberg plugin, but, we’ve also seen a lot of plugins integrating with the block editor in extremely interesting ways. I’ve already mentioned several of these plugins in some of my previous WordPress Watch posts. Today, I’d like to highlight two specific plugins that have become part of my favorite block editor enhancements. Namely: Editorskit and Atomic Blocks.

Atomic Blocks

Atomic Blocks is one of those plugins that gradually keeps getting better at what it does. This tweet, for example, demonstrates quite nicely what kind of improvements you can find:

Just have a look at what kind of blocks it makes available in the block editor and what you can do with it.

Editorskit

Editorskit, just like Atomic Blocks, adds an array of interesting blocks to the editor, but it has a slightly different focus. Find out what they are and what they do here. Technically, you could use both plugins side by side. Editorskit also shared an interesting tweet last week demonstrating their progress:

If you’re still putting off switching to the block editor and you haven’t played around with it lately, now’s a good time to try again.

Bonus links

• Andrew Lipattsev from Google shared an interesting tweet highlighting two different kinds of AMP integration success stories.
• Justin Tadlock, of Themehybrid fame, announced a sort of farewell.
• Demo Content for Blocks is a plugin that adds blocks with demo/dummy content to your post in one click. This plugin can be used to quickly add blocks with predefined content to your posts.
• BuddyPress 5.0 will introduce the BP REST API.
• While we’re on the topic of the REST API, SiteGround has made a free ebook available, written by Cal Evans, about How to Start Using the WordPress REST API.

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