The modernization of WordPress enters the next phase. "Collaboration" is now on the agenda. In this article, I will give you an initial overview of the planned new and improved functions. A redesign of the backend is also planned.

The WordPress "Gutenberg" project consists of a total of four phases, two of which are considered so advanced that the next one is now starting. As a brief reminder: Phase 1 was entitled "Easier Editing" and essentially consisted of the Block Editor, which was introduced as the new standard with WordPress 5.0. Of course, work on this is not finished. But the time of massive changes is over for now.

The same applies to phase 2 ("customization"). It began with WordPress 5.8, where site editing was a major innovation. Since then, blocks can also be used outside of content to customize the design and functions of a website, as long as your own theme plays along. Block patterns, the block directory and block themes also belong to this phase.

Now that blocks have been introduced in many places, the third step is to improve workflows. This phase 3 is entitled "Collaboration". This mainly affects teams that previously had to rely on plugins or third-party services to organize and coordinate their work. It's about time, because WordPress has long been used on large websites with numerous internal and external contributors. Until now, many functions that facilitate or even enable such collaboration have been missing.

Phase 3 will also bring improvements for individual users, as you will see in a moment.

In a series of posts on the "Make WordPress Core" blog, the team has presented where the journey should go and would like feedback from developers. 

Here is an overview of some key ideas and concepts:

Collaboration in real time

At the moment, WordPress is always putting obstacles in the way when more than one person is working on the content of a page. For example, a post is locked and therefore inaccessible to others as soon as someone edits it. Another person can only "take it over" and thus unlock it. However, two or more people cannot edit at the same time, as is the case with Google Docs and similar services. Gutenberg's third phase is now intended to resolve this issue.

The team responsible makes it clear that these functions should be available to as many users as possible. All solutions that require complex server setups are therefore excluded. As Matias Ventura writes in the "Make WordPress Core" blog, they want to use open web standards such as WebRTC as a basis. 

At the same time, the system should ultimately be flexible enough to be supplemented and adapted for individual solutions. For example, plugins could allow more users to work on a piece of content at the same time than is possible using the standard implementation.

An important point for these functionalities is conflict resolution, i.e. dealing with contradictory, simultaneous changes made by different users. Or situations in which a person is offline while continuing to work on a piece of content. This is probably where Yjs will come into play.

The team's wish list also includes making it visible to everyone involved who is currently active and editing content ("presence"). This is also familiar from services such as Google Docs, which visually display who is viewing or editing content.

In all of this, the team wants to implement these new functions via the existing block API. In this way, they want to ensure that it works without further adjustments to the blocks. 

Better cooperation

Another focus is on improving workflows and publishing processes. The aim is to seamlessly support the entire editorial workflow from the first draft to publication. For example, users should be able to add comments, suggestions for changes and feedback directly within the editor. It should also be possible to tag another person, for example to draw a colleague's attention to a task.

Customizable review processes could then also be used to define which steps must be completed before a contribution can even be published. For example, one person could mark outstanding media blocks for another team member to complete. This is enormously helpful when text and images come from different employees or even departments, as is often the case with larger projects. It is also conceivable to create further conditions before content can be published. The official post mentions a certain number of words or fields that must be filled in as examples. Integrating this functionality directly into the system could simplify coordination processes and ensure that employees do not forget important information.

Sharing content drafts or design changes should also become easier, with detailed access control and adjustable permissions. I would personally like to be able to easily share designs with external people who do not have access to the WordPress backend. 

The idea of extending the preview function so that plugins can use it in more diverse ways sounds interesting. For example, a membership plugin could show what content looks like for members and non-members. Other examples are previews with advertisements in the post and without or how a post looks in the RSS feed or newsletter.

And last but not least: If several people are working on a piece of content, it should ideally be possible to display this externally. WordPress can only display one author per piece of content without additional plugins.

Despite these new functions, the user interface should remain clear for writers and editors. This is likely to be quite a challenge.

More functions for versioning

Another important component for the collaboration workflows are the versions and the version history of the content. Extensive improvements are planned here to make changes more clearly visible.

Up to now, WordPress has shown the difference between two versions. However, this is often not meaningful enough for the content of blocks and is difficult for laypeople to understand. The team wants to develop a better visual representation of the changes that is easier to grasp.

Another new feature is that in future not only complete content will be versioned, but also individual blocks. This means that the previous version of an image block can be restored without changing the rest of the content.

Comparison views are planned for globally used styles and reusable patterns, in which two versions can be displayed side by side or with an overlay, depending on the application. This should make it easier to recognize differences in the design.

The aim of the improvements is to make changes visible at a glance - whether content, styles or patterns. This would significantly simplify collaborative work and at the same time ensure that individual errors can be corrected quickly.

Of course, these functions have to work well with the other innovations that I presented above. In addition, the team is already thinking about phase 4 of Gutenberg when it comes to internationalization, i.e. websites with multiple language versions. This should also eventually become part of the WordPress core.

You can find further tips and examples in "Revisions" posts.

More modern media library

The media library only changed in small steps during the first Gutenberg phases. However, the teams also had enough other construction sites. In phase 3, a comprehensive modernization is now on the agenda.

Advanced management functions such as categories and tags for media are planned. Views and filters are also on the to-do list: This should make it easier to find the right files. For large and long-term projects with thousands of images, this is an enormous challenge today, which is why specialized plugins are often used.

Another aim is to better combine media editing in the block editor and the individual views for media. The official post mentions standardized crop functions as an example.

The team would also like to change the insertion of media so that users don't always have to open the entire media library. For example, if images have already been uploaded but not yet assigned to a post, WordPress could display them directly when inserting an image block. 

Also on the to-do list are the workflows around published media and post formats that only consist of one media block. There will not only be improvements for images, but also for audio, video and other file formats, as Matias Ventura writes in his post on the topic.

Considering how important multimedia content often is these days, these innovations and improvements are definitely very welcome. Finding a specific file is not always so easy these days, unless everyone in the team is disciplined and names everything sensibly. At the same time, it will be interesting to see how well the new media library works with other new functions such as the workflows for teams.

Better handling for blocks

Since blocks now play such an important role, phase 3 of the Gutenberg project is intended to improve the management of the block library.

The plan is to expand the existing Block Manager into a central administration for blocks, similar to the environment for plugins. WordPress admins will then be able to activate or deactivate individual block types globally for the entire site. Extended authorization controls should also make it possible to define more precisely which blocks are available for which user roles. According to the official plans, individual functions of a block can then also be specifically enabled.

In addition, there is already a hidden function to link post types with blocks, for example. For example, a certain type could always already have an image block instead of an empty text prompt. This function should be easier to find and use in the future.

Installing blocks from the directory should also be more convenient than before. For example, it should be easier to see which custom blocks a plugin adds.

This extensive wish list should appeal to both WordPress admins and users. It addresses many points that are currently not optimally solved because they require additional clicks. And the option to disable certain blocks and block functions for entire user groups in particular should reduce many a headache for website admins.

Backend design and navigation

Last but not least, an important project in phase 3 is the modernization and revision of the backend. After many years, a comprehensive redesign is now underway. The Site Editor will serve as a starting point and inspiration.

One aspect is to make navigation more flexible and modular. The most important menu items could then be freely positioned and arranged, similar to the widgets. A distinction between core functions and plugin areas is also conceivable.

If there are a particularly large number of menu items, a "drill-down" type of navigation should ensure greater clarity. Areas and settings are opened step by step instead of displaying everything on one level. The backend should also be easier to adapt to individual needs. The team is investigating how parts of the admin area can be optionally shown and hidden.

Another goal at this point is to standardize the backend and block editor. Components and design systems from the editor will therefore be used in the admin area. For plugin developers, a library with reusable UI components will be created as part of this. This should help plugins to fit harmoniously into the environment.

Last but not least, the Phase 3 team wants to work closely with the colleagues from WP Feature Notifications so that notifications have a separate and compact place in the future. This would replace the current proliferation at the top of the backend.

Conclusion on Gutenberg Phase 3

I personally can only welcome many of the points on the wish list for phase 3. In my opinion, the functions for collaboration and workflows in general are long overdue. When I manage a WordPress website together with others, I always find it surprisingly cumbersome to organize and coordinate everything externally.

At the same time, I hope that all these functions support the work without pushing the visual and cognitive complexity of WordPress too far. The switch from the simple rich text editor to the block editor was a cautionary tale: the new interface and the additional functions were welcome, but the usability of the editor suffered at the same time. It often takes significantly more clicks to achieve the same effect.

In this respect, I hope that the team will not only add many new features as described, but also fundamentally rethink how the various WordPress users cope with them.