One of the most powerful aspects of Gutenberg is the ability to create pre-made layouts and reuse them in several places on your website. Currently, there are two main ways of doing this in Gutenberg – reusable blocks and block patterns. However, both of these methods have their own problems. But today, I found a free plugin that solves both of these problems – BlockMeister.
Imagine this scenario – you have a sale on your website and you want to create a block of content that you can reuse in multiple posts or pages. To create a reusable block, I just click on the three dots in my toolbar and go to “Create Reusable Block.” I give it a name – in this case, I’ll call it “Summer Sale.” This creates a reusable block that I can use in different places on my website.
However, there is a problem with this approach. If I create a brand new page and add my reusable block to it, I may want to make changes to it later. If I do that, it seems to change all instances of the block without me actually selecting it. This can be confusing and create chaos if I inadvertently edit a reusable block and change it everywhere it’s used. There’s no central place to manage these blocks either, or if there is, it’s not easy to find.
Block patterns are a much cleaner approach, especially if you’re giving the site to clients. You can add a block pattern to your site, edit it, and it won’t change the original block pattern. However, if you want to make these block patterns accessible to your customers, you need to do it through code.
BlockMeister, the Block Pattern Builder, makes it really easy to create your own block patterns and make them available to your customers or people using the website without any code. It has lots of five-star reviews and I think it should be part of core WordPress. It has only a thousand active installations, so we need to spread the word about it.
The plugin is very simple to use. If I have a layout that I want to save as a block pattern, I just go to the three dots, click on “Add to Block Patterns,” give it a name – in this case, “Summer Sale” – and create the pattern. This pattern is now available for me and all users on the website, and any changes I make to it won’t affect anything else on the site. If I want to make changes to the block pattern later, I can just go to my dashboard and edit it. This plugin is an absolutely fantastic solution to the problems with reusable blocks and block patterns in Gutenberg.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the BlockMeister plugin appears to solve the two main problems faced by reusable blocks and block patterns in Gutenberg by offering an easier and more intuitive way to create and manage custom block patterns.
The plugin is free and easy to use, and it provides a much clearer separation between the creation of block patterns and their actual usage. With good reviews and a low number of active installations, it may be worth spreading the word about this plugin for those looking for a simpler solution to the challenges faced by reusable blocks and block patterns in Gutenberg.
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