WordPress is planning on getting rid of their classic editor box, the one I used from the first time I posted a blog. It was easy for a neophyte-blogger me to learn because it was so much like an email editor box, with everything right there that I would need.
I’ve been hesitant about using the new block editor, which is what they call the new blog editor, because it’s based on various blocks or boxes, for example, a box for images, one for text, one that combines both, one that uses a collage format for images, an embedded calendar, and all sorts of other “blocks” I will probably never use. The new format isn’t as intuitive as the old way, so I thought for the first few days of blogging with the new editor, all I’d be able to post is a few words with bizarre formatting, especially since, like most new applications and programs, the directions leave a lot to be desired. To be honest, even the original editor didn’t explain things very well, so I had developed my own tutorial to teach people how to blog.
For the past couple of days, I’ve been playing around with the new format, trying to figure out how to do things so I can keep my current and future blogs more or less in line with my previous posts. There’s virtually no help from any site that claims to explain how to do things (mostly they just say that the block editor is easy to use, all you have to do is pick the block you want to use), but that didn’t work for my basic needs.
But yay! I figured it out, as you can see from my past few posts. Today, I even learned how to use a couple of the blocks, such as this tiled image gallery:
And this block for recent posts:
I would have preferred smaller images, but the gallery is dependent on the width of the blog itself, and apparently, I have a wider blog than most. (For now. I dread the day when they retire this theme, which they do occasionally.)
As fun as all this learning was, the new way seems too distracting for a simple blog post.
Eventually, I’m sure, I’ll find this new blog experience as satisfying as the old one, but for now, it feels clunky. Even worse, it feels as if my words don’t count — that the look of the thing is more important than what is said. But that seems to be the way of the world.
Still, it’s something new for me to play with, so that has to count for something!
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Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One. “Grief: The Inside Story is perfect and that is not hyperbole! It is exactly what folk who are grieving need to read.” –Leesa Healy, RN, GDAS GDAT, Emotional/Mental Health Therapist & Educator
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