4.0 is at the release candidate stage, which can be grabbed here.

Our 40th release is going to be a long one. Main changes are the introduction of a new data structure for RichText that will allow building sophisticated interfaces for inline content that we can make portable and relevant to mobile too.

It also has improvements for blocks, a way to set a different color as the overlay for Cover Image, a new font size picker that is clearer to use and scales much better, a cool Pullquote style variation, etc. This crosses a lot of the pending items.

There are also several interface improvements, including the ability to search categories, post locking when multiple people interact with the editor, better handling of floats, and many more.

4.0 🍯

• Add ability to change overlay color in Cover Image.
• Introduce new Font Size Picker with clear labels and size comparison.
• Introduce new RichText data structure to allow better manipulation of inline content.
• Add Pullquote style variation and color palette support.
• Add support for post locking when multiple authors interact with the editor.
• Add an alternative block appender when the container doesn’t support the default block (paragraph).
• Improve the UI and interactions around floats.
• Add option to skip PublishSidebar on publishing.
• Add support for shortcode embeds that enqueue scripts.
• Add a button to exit the Code Editor.
  
• Introduce a reusable ResizableBox component.
• Style nested <ul>s with circles instead of normal bullets.
• Show hierarchical terms sorted by name and allow them to be filterable through search. Hide the filter box if there are fewer than 8 terms.
• Improve messaging around invalid block detection.
• Use text color for links when a paragraph has a color applied.
• Allow extended usage of the controls API in resolvers within data layer.
• Ensure that a default block is inserted (and selected) when all other blocks are removed.
• Enhance the block parser to support multiple type, in accordance with JSON schema.
• Add a larger target area for resize drag handles.
• Add media button to classic block.
• Add control to toggle responsive mechanism on embed blocks.
• Update sidebar design to have a lighter feeling.
• Update resolvers in data layer to rely on controls instead of async generators.
• Set template validity on block reset.
  
• Remove dirty detection from Meta Boxes to reduce false positives of “unsaved changes”.
• Show “Publish: Immediately” for new drafts by inferring floating date.
• Add a slight transition to Full Screen mode.
• Improve spacing setup in Gallery Block.
  
• Remove additional side padding from blocks.
• Improve the reusable blocks “Export as JSON” link.
  
• Enforce a default block icon size to allow flex alignment and fix unaligned labels.
• Consider single unmodified default block as empty content.
• Only display URL input field when “Link To” is set for Image Block.
• Make backspace behavior consistent among Quote, Verse and Preformatted.
• Expose refresh method from Dropdown component.
• Omit style tags when pasting.
• Use best fitting embed aspect ratio if exact match doesn’t exist.
• Avoid dispatching undefined results in promise middleware.
• Change keyboard shortcut for removing a block to access + z.
• Replace the Full Screen mode “x” icon with a back arrow.
• Make drag handle visible on hover while in nested contexts.
• Pass the tab title to the TabPanel component for situations where it may need to be highlighted.
• Allow setting no alignment when a default alignment exists.
• Improve title and appender margin fix.
• Avoid focusing on the close button on modal and try a modal appear animation.
• Change the URL Input label to match Classic.
• Adjust media upload source for RichText.
• Handle edge cases in with-constrained-tabbing and add tests.
• Set a consistent input field width in media placeholders.
• Add a hover state to sidebar panel headers.
• Change settings title from “Writing” to “View”.
• Convert the “tools” menu group into internal plugin.
• Normalize data types and fix default implementation in parser.
• Cleanup CSS specificity issues on Button component for portability.
• Display error when attempting to embed URLs that can’t be embedded and don’t generate a fallback.
• Update some edit and save button labels and styles for consistency.
• Make “Manage Reusable Blocks” a link instead of an icon button.

Bug Fixes

• Fix issue with Enter and the Read More block.
• Fix menu item hover colors.
• Fix issue with editor styles and fullscreen mode.
• Fix popover link repositioning.
• Fix Space Block layout issues on small screens.
• Fix custom classNames for dynamic blocks.
• Fix spacing of post-publish close button in other languages.
• Fix Async Generator resolvers resolution.
• Fix issue with Spacer Block not being resizable when using unified toolbar and spotlight mode.
• Fix grammar.md manifest entry and update data docs.
• Fix issue with region focus on the header area on IE11.
• Fix reusable block broken button dimensions on IE11.
• Fix issues with dropping blocks after dragging when calculating new block index.
• Fix InnerBlock templates sync conditions to avoid a forced locking.
• Fix typo in @wordpress/api-fetch README.md.
• Fix regression with Button Block placeholder text.
• Fix dropzone issue in Edge (event.dataTransfer.types not being an array).
• Fix documentation for registerBlockStyle arguments and clarify getSaveElement filter.
• Fix raw transforms not working in Edge when pasting content.
• Fix a regression where wide images would cause horizontal scrollbars.
• Fix issue with gallery margin while typing a caption.
• Fix Block alignment CSS rules affecting nested blocks.
• Fix CSS issue with nested paragraph placeholder.
• Fix links in docs and add documentation for isPublishSidebarEnabled.
• Fix shortcode package dependencies.
• Fix overscroll issues locking scroll up on long pages.
• Fix reference to SVG component in docs.
• Fix Table Block header and body column misalignment.
• Fix an issue where inserting like breaks would throw an error.
• Fix regressions with placeholder text color (Cover Image, captions).
• Fix Editor Styles regression.
• Fix faulty Jed state after setLocaleData.
• Fix small line-height issue in editor style.
• Fix Pullquote margin regressions.
• Fix issues with File Block and new RichText structures.
• Fix Writing Flow E2E test.
• Fix issues with “tips” popup margins.
• Fix issue with mentions after rich text value merge.
• Fix clipping issue with Instagram embed.
• Fix ESNext example code.
• Fix usage of tabs / spaces in parser code.
• Fix Classic Block toolbar regression.
• Fix issues with Table Block alignments.
• Fix inserter misalignment regression.

Other Changes

• Minor i18n fixes after deprecations were removed.
• Rename parameter from mapStateToProps to mapSelectToProps in withSelect.
• Rename AccessibleSVG to SVG and make it work with React Native.
• Change createObjectUrl to createBlobURL.
• Clean up Sass variables, comments, reduce complexity.
• Move Classic Block to packages.
• Move HTML Block into the blocks library package.
• Move embed scripts into the body in preview documents.
• Ensure that the return value of apiFetch is always a valid Promise object in Firefox.
• Allow negative numbers in order field for Page Attributes.
• Make sure the demo page loads without marking itself as having changes.
• Refactor MediaUpload, MediaPlaceholder, and mediaUpload to support arrays with multiple supported types.
• Add new icons to dashicons package.
• Add link to “add_theme_support” docs.
• Remove glob and just include necessary files.
  
• Remove unused isButton prop.
• Remove Vine embed.
• Replace length check with RichText.isEmpty in Image Block.
• Replace TinyMCE function to decode entities with existing Gutenberg package.
• Extract the edit-post module as a reusable package.
• Pass editor initial settings as direct argument.
• Pass feature image ID to media upload component.
• Pass all available properties in the media object.
• Replace element-closest with registered vendor script.
  
• Add new handbook introduction and docs about “blocks as the interface”.
• Add utils to the wp-data script dependencies.
• Disable alternate diff drivers in setup script.
• Clarify RichText.Content readme docs.
• Document isDefault option for block styles.
• Update Panel component documentation.
• Update full post content test fixtures.
• Add ESLint rule about not allowing string literals in IDs.
• Add a test for the new Code → Preformatted transform and use snapshots.
• Add E2E test to visit demo page and verify errors.
• Add E2E tests for list creation.
• Update Redux to the latest version.

Mobile

• Add the React Native entry point to more packages.
• Need to define isRichTextValueEmpty for mobile.
• Have Travis run mobile tests that use the parent code.
• Wire onEnter to requestHTMLWithCursor command in RichText.

Deprecations removed with this version.

#core-editor, #editor, #gutenberg

This new release completes some cool additions to the editor. It includes the ability to create reusable templates by selecting multiple blocks in the editor. It then allows exporting and importing these templates using a JSON file transport. There’s also a visual diff mechanism for comparing options when a block was detected as invalid (which could scale in the future to improved UX for revisions as a whole), toolbar groups can be defined as collapsible into a dropdown to better organize available block controls.

There’s also the addition of a much clearer drag handle for drag and drop block operations next to the block arrow controls. It’s also possible to convert an image into a cover image and back, retaining the caption as the main text among many other small improvements and fixes.

3.9 🍒

• 🏗 Add support for creating reusable blocks out of multi-selected groups of blocks not just individual blocks. This means the ability to easily save templates out of an existing set of blocks.
• 🚀 Add support for importing and exporting reusable blocks (using a JSON file transport). Note that locality of resources can be a problem if importing on a separate WordPress site.
• 🔍 Allow to visually show differences between conversion options when a block is detected as invalid.
• Add a clear drag handle next to the block arrow controls to drag and move a block. Also further polishes the drag and drop experience.
• Instrument collapsible groups for the block toolbar. It allows to display groups of options as a dropdown and reduce the length and imposition of the toolbar as a whole.
• Allow conversion from Cover Image to Image and back, using caption if it exists as the main text.
• Move the reusable block UI options to the top of the block or block group.
• Focus the title when loading the editor if it’s empty.
• Adjust margin rules for nested blocks.
• Preserve aspect ratio on embedded content at different alignments and widths.
• Unselect blocks and disable inserter when switching to Code Editor.
• Add new default block icon (used when no icon is defined).
• Avoid showing stacked icon group on parent blocks if all of its children are meant to be hidden from the inserter.
• Add dark editor style support.
• Add a figure wrapper to Pullquote block.
• Add needed attributes to kses allowed tags for the Gallery block.
• Improve visual display of Classic block toolbar.
• Adjust unified block toolbar padding at medium breakpoints.
• Better align the close, chevrons, and ellipsis icons in the sidebar panel.
• Improve cropping of galleries in IE11.
• Adjust gallery caption flex alignment.
• Include Caption Styles in Video Block.
• Update RichText usage to avoid inline elements.
• Add shortcut aria label for unreadable shortcuts.
• Avoid triggering invalid block mechanisms on empty HTML content.
• Rename the Speaker block to Speaker Deck.
• Disable inserter on Column block and avoid showing stacked icon on columns.
• Send post_id to the REST API in the ServerSideRender component within the editor. This ensures the global $post object is set properly.
• Use pseudo element to prevent inspector tab width from changing when selected.
• Apply consistent spacing on the post visibility menu.
• Fix notice styling regression.
• Fix ability to select small table cells.
• Fix issue with drag and drop in Chrome when the document has iframes.
• Fix HTML validation issues.
• Fix parser to output freeform content before void blocks.
• Fix margin style regression with block appender.
• Fix link source for outreach/articles.
• Fix Archives block alignment and issue with custom classes.
• Fix error when a taxonomy has no attached post type.
• Fix invalid block scrim overflowing toolbar on mobile.
• Fix block settings menu appearance in non wp-admin contexts.
• Fix incorrect unlink shortcut.
• Fix placeholder text contrast.
• Fix issue with shortcut inserter on invalid paragraphs.
• Fix camelCase and cross-component class name.
  
• Fix qs dependency typo.
• Pluralize “kind” to fix typo.
• Remove isButton prop.
• Remove wrapper div from Categories block.
• Remove prop-type-like check in Popover component.
• Remove unnecessary duplicated class from Embed placeholder.
• Flatten BlockListLayout into base BlockList.
• Add isEmptyElement utility function under wp.Element.
• Use HTML Document for finding iframe in embed previews.
• Add wp-polyfill as central polyfill.
• Update docke-compose setup order to create MySQL container before WordPress container.
• Improve comments in transforms object of Quote block.
• Do not assume that singular form in _n() is used just for single item.
  
• Update examples for components to look according to guidelines.
• Update release docs to include process for RC.
• Add simplified block grammar spec to the handbook.
• Add lint rule for path on Lodash property functions.
• Add user for cli image in docker-compose.
• Show lint errors when there are lint problems.
• Minor updates and improvements to documents and code references.
• Improve docs build to consider memoized selectors.
  

Mobile Native

• Add Heading toolbar for changing heading sizes.
• Save level to heading block attributes for parsing.
• Add onEnter callback and function placeholder to RichText implementation.
• Add Image block placeholder.
• Avoid propagating eventCount to components.

Deprecations removed with this version.

#core-editor, #editor, #gutenberg

Our final update for August aims to add further clarity to some core interactions, as well as fixing many issues. Notably, we are expanding on the previously called “Fixed Toolbar” mode — now named Unified Toolbar — as an optional mode for a more traditional writing environment. In our testing, this mode tends to be preferred by more experienced users who don’t mind the disconnect between the tools and the content blocks. There’s also an additional setting which focuses the editing experience on a single block at a time, as well as de-emphasizing some of the block boundaries. These tools can be combined at will to better suit personal preferences and creative workflows.

There are many improvements to individual blocks, conversions, templates, and interactions. We want to say thank you again to everyone who is engaging, raising concerns or making suggestions, and collaborating in making the project better with each release.

3.7 🛵

• New “Spotlight Mode” that focuses on a single block at a time and an updated “Unified Toolbar” design. Both can be combined.
• Refactor to how image floats are handled.
  
• Improve visual clarity of block switcher menu.
• Add a delay to the block type label when hovering.
• Allow converting a multiline-paragraph into a list with corresponding items.
• Position caret at end of previous block for any type of block removal.
• Automatically create an Audio block when drag-and-dropping an audio file.
• Update icons used for Paragraph, Heading, and Subheading blocks for added clarity.
  
• Adhere to OS guidelines when showing keyboard shortcuts (icons for Mac).
• Improve link insertion by continuing to show highlighted text when URL input is toggled.
• Automatically create a link when selected text is a URL.
• Expand on capabilities of invalid block actions by adding an ellipsis menu and an option to convert to classic block.
• Ignore leading slash when searching blocks in the inserter.
• Pass the title attribute when uploading an image.
• Allow blocks which support alignments to have a default option.
• Add poster image support for Video Block.
• Add support for preload attribute in Video Block.
• Add description for Reusable Blocks, show in the inspector.
• Update Heading Block description for clarity.
• Small design update to the editor fixed toolbar.
• Improve visual display of post visibility settings.
• Apply enhancements to the coloring mechanism and the exposed components (withColors).
• Only show transforms for blocks that can be inserted on the root block. Also orders them by frequency / use.
• Remove margin-bottom from the last element on panel body.
• Store and restore the global post object around dynamic block callbacks to allow for loops.
  
• Move first editor tip about inserter to the toolbar.
• Use double quotes in all NUX tips.
• Use sentence case for text in Tooltips.
• Only request embed preview if there is a URL.
• Change keyboard shortcut for remove block to Cmd+Shift+X / Ctrl+Shift+X.
• Reset value of RangeControl when setting it to empty.
• Add Text Columns → Columns transform.
  
• Add Code → Preformatted transform.
  
• Add “blockquote” as a keyword for the Quote block.
• Clear the floating element for clearing color values. Update the appearance so that it’s consistent with other button settings.
• Rewrite Table Block to use a simpler RichText value.
• Add RichText.isEmpty API.
• Allow disabling Google Fonts URL by translators.
• Refactor post format block implementation to assign as template setting.
• Improve settings consistency of blocks under widget category.
• Fix issue where pasting malformed HTML into a block the HTML tokenizer could break by wrapping it with an exception handler.
• Restore option to add links within a Verse Block.
• Fix excess whitespace in block style class name.
• Fix issue where hit-area for the inserter between blocks was not perfectly centered.
• Fix incorrect example code for withSelect higher-order component.
• Fix flex-box issue on IE11 for keyboard shortcuts help panel.
• Fix lint issues found in block-serialization-spec-parser packages.
• Fix malformed SVGs for Facebook.
• Fix issue with drag and drop for creating Video blocks.
• Fix small alignment issue with the inserter arrow.
• Fix issue with recent blocks showing on mobile.
• Fix another issue with page publishing.
• Fix issue with string that was not showing up for translation.
• Fix left margin of Archives Block.
• Fix styling issue with block inserter.
• Fix regression with missing SVG roles and attributes.
• Fix script registration of TinyMCE to account for compression.
• Fix embed block pattern mismatch.
• Fix issue with tooltips not being shown on IconButtons with DotTip children.
• Fix some regressions with Table Block and make sure it behaves responsibly.
• Fix regression with textbox spacing and a focus issue.
• Resolve an issue where removing all blocks from a post with a template assigned would reintroduce the template blocks after saving and reloading the editor.
• Switch order of operations so that post content is parsed first regardless of the presence of a template.
• Add doAction when a deprecated feature is encountered.
• Deprecate Subheading block.
• Change title and description of Text Columns to include deprecation notice.
• Remove extra classNames from integration test.
• Make sure property for gallery=multiple is only set when type of media is image.
• Avoid changing the public API of the warning component to avoid potential backwards compatibility issues.
• Check for window in data registry.
• Update FocusableIframe component URL example.
• Drop explicit window reference from withSafeTimeout in compose.
• Prevent case where early editor checks might bail out preventing hidden meta-boxes from being actually hidden.
• Use “post” instead of “page” in the warning when the post contains blocks.
• Make alt text for image in example post translatable.
• Remove TinyMCE paste plugin as it’s absorbed in raw handling modules.
• Extract LinkContainer from FormatToolbar.
• Document how to add block style variations.
• Add mention of Material Design icons to the design docs.
• Update documentation for block controls.
• Extend guidelines for managing packages and publishing them to npm.
• Update contributing guidelines to include local wp dev instructions.
• Update FAQ doc with info about keyboard shortcuts.
• Update package-lock.json to expected values.
• Deprecate onSetup and getSettings as unstable APIs from RichText.
• Some general updates to handbook documents.
• Add documentation about floats.
  
• Add e2e test for font size mechanism.
  
• Make usage of core-data explicit.
• Create new spec-parser package.
• Restores the test URL we should be using for e2e tests.
• Upgrade WP Coding Standards to 1.0.0.
• Update npm-package-json-lint lock to 3.3.1.
• Update stylelint to 9.5.0 and stylelint-config-wordpress to 13.1.0.
• Update lint-staged and docs/manifest.js.

Mobile Native

• Initial implementation of Toolbar.
  
• Add basic text toolbar actions.
  
• Update on the event interface for contentSizeChange on Aztec component.
  
• Fix toolbar status when pressing buttons on Android (and iOS).

3.6.2

• Resolve an issue where a filter responsible for stripping dynamic blocks from excerpts was never properly removed. Causing blocks like “Latest Posts” not rendering under some circumstances.
• Restore min-width to popover menu.
• Fix regression with wide toolbar placement.
• Add e2e test for publishing a page.

3.6.1

• Fix issue with publishing pages.

Deprecations removed with this version.

#core-editor, #editor, #gutenberg