Design Meeting Notes for 4 December 2019

These are the weekly notes for the design meeting that happens on Wednesdays. You can read the full transcript on our Slack channel and find the meeting’s agenda here.

Housekeeping

No housekeeping today.

GutenbergGutenberg The Gutenberg project is the new Editor Interface for WordPress. The editor improves the process and experience of creating new content, making writing rich content much simpler. It uses ‘blocks’ to add richness rather than shortcodes, custom HTML etc. https://wordpress.org/gutenberg/

@mapk shared the What’s next in Gutenberg? (December) post that highlights what we’re focusing on for this month.

He also mentioned that usability testing for the Navigation blockBlock Block is the abstract term used to describe units of markup that, composed together, form the content or layout of a webpage using the WordPress editor. The idea combines concepts of what in the past may have achieved with shortcodes, custom HTML, and embed discovery into a single consistent API and user experience. is starting today. Monthly tests can be found here.

He also highlighted the work being done for the Block Pattern and a recent PR that provides some insight into block-bases themes.

Discussion

Advancing the Block Interface

@joen shared an issue created by @matveb that looks at the block’s UIUI UI is an acronym for User Interface - the layout of the page the user interacts with. Think ‘how are they doing that’ and less about what they are doing. and how it has had to grow to support new features and paradigms that we couldn’t have anticipated when the current UI was designed. The issue also explores some refinements and updates to the block’s UI that will serve us better going forward. Feedback and comments are welcome on the issue and @pablohoneyhoney also shared the Figma file where some of those explorations, components and assets are being worked on.

@itsjonq shared a prototype he created to help explore the new UI and interactions. Everyone is welcome to fork it and play around with it.

The team had a great discussion about the current state of the block’s toolbar, it’s shortcomings and how we can improve the experience for mobile.

State of the CustomizerCustomizer Tool built into WordPress core that hooks into most modern themes. You can use it to preview and modify many of your site’s appearance settings.

@garrett-eclipse brought up a recent question from a bug scrub about the state of the Customizer and if we’re to continue working on it. Folks are welcome to leave any thoughts on the agenda’s comment.

Consensus on a radius for inputs

@johnjamesjacoby recently raised an issue about inconsistent border radius on inputs and buttons. The team agreed that aside from personal preferences, we should settle on a single value for consistency. There’s a Trac ticket for follow up work and feedback.

WP Notify

@mapk brought up the WP admin notifications project and how it’s a great opportunity for members of the design team to get involved.

Open Floor

@michael-arestad shared that he’s going to start documenting common flows for Full Site Editing. The goal is for these flows to help us start understanding the needs and expectations. Anyone interested is welcome to collaborate and provide feedback.

#meeting-notes