Things to Know about Latest WordPress 5 and the Block-Based Editor

Whenever an updated version of WordPress hits the market, we are excited about exploring its new features and use them to upgrade our websites. However, there are not many versions released in the past garnered as much of hype than WordPress 5. The major reason why people are enthusiastic about 5.0 is for a single reason ‘Gutenberg‘ – a block-based editor.

If you are a WordPress user for the time being, then you know how this platform changed over time from a basic blog builder to a completing web builder. Even the basic updates brought in significant advantages for developers and site owners. Say, for example, the previous WP 4.9 update of ‘Tipton‘ enabled scheduling of design changes by the developer using the WP Customizer so what you can build for features dates and schedule releases beforehand.

The previous version of WP 4.8 had brought in many updates in terms of the widget. Previously, if you wanted to put images on to your widgets, it had to be done manually. With 4.8 came three media widgets dedicated to images, audio, and video, etc. Another major feature of 4.8 was its option to check on the WordPress events from the dashboard itself.

For WP 5.0, Gutenberg is a top-to-bottom redesign of the erstwhile WordPress editor, which can really make your dreams come true. With this latest version of WordPress 5.0, this block-based editor will come as a default with which people can easily bring in radical changes in WordPress content development.

However, even though advantageous, big changes coming up with your favourite platforms may be a bit difficult to accept initially with a need to upgrade your skills and approach. In fact, even the massive and most user-friendly platforms like WordPress also need to adapt to the need of the times in order to hold a fair market share. Project Gutenberg is a big leap forward towards this goal, but this is not the only update in this version. Before getting into it, let’s first explore the WordPress database essential for the beginners.

WordPress database

All your WP content including the user info and structure are stored at the database. This approach makes WordPress sites dynamic with HTML getting generated real-time unlike the static websites featuring pre-written HTML. Each time when a user accesses a WordPress website, the site content gets fetched from the database through SQL queries.

All the pertaining to your WP site is stored in a database. The tables in the DB can be considered as storage containers for a particular category of data and all the incoming data in the structured form is kept in different tables. The default WordPress tables are:

• To sore the post contents, media attachments, and menu data of WordPress sites.
• wp_postmeta – Storing metadata for WP posts. When you add some custom fields to your pages, the metadata gets stored in this table.
• wp_comments – Comments by the users for your web pages and posts are stored here along with the author, date of the comment, and e-mail, etc.
• wp_commentmeta – Storing the comment metadata.
• wp_users – Storing various usernames, and encrypted passwords.
• wp_usermeta – Storing the metadata of users.
• wp_options – to store the general settings of WordPress sites.
• wp_links – to store blogroll links, but it is not used for many sites nowadays.
• wp_terms – store tags and categories of WP posts.
• wp_termmeta – category metadata.

These remain the primary tables for WP 5.0 also, but you can have more based-on purpose with the help of additional themes and plug-ins to use. The default prefix of ‘wp_’ must also be changed for security reasons.

As specified by RemoteDBA.com, each of the database tables consists of different fields. Say, for instance, wp_users has fields like:

user_login, user_pass, user_email, user_url, user_status, user_registered, user_display_name, and user_activation_key etc.

By using the SQL queries, it is also possible to edit, view, or delete the fields on databases.

Using SQL Commands

WordPress PHP codes itself contain needed SQL commands for database communications, but you can also carry out database operations manually and raise SQL commands. WordPress has MySQL as default DBMS. MySQL doesn’t have a graphical UI but needs to be managed through the command line. However, there are many graphical UIs available for MySQL, and one of the best to use is phpMyAdmin. The users can easily access the phpMyAdmin interface from the hosting control panel.

Further, in this article, we will discuss a few unique updates on WordPress 5.0 in comparison with its older releases.

What can we expect in WordPress 5.0?

• WP platform is now moving to a more creative website building experience. By improving all site building functions, WP team now aims at holding a major market share by putting a tough competition to the other hosted website builders.

• Significant enhancements to Rest API. WordPress Rest API will help the site builder to bring in feature-rich elements to make pulling and sending data from your website easier. With this update, web developers can easily create applications by using the platform as a framework.

• The building of custom themes has also made easier WordPress 5.0. Previously, the WordPress site builders needed to have at least some basic developmental knowledge or experience to put together the themes. However, with the Gutenberg update, block-based theme creation has made it more universal for anyone without developmental knowledge also to try successfully.

• The old plug-ins as page builder may lose their relevance. Many fantastic and flexible page-building tools are made available with WordPress 5.0, many of which will are capable of challenging the most professional platforms too. Even though Gutenberg may be a rival to the initial, the ease of use and comfort will dissuade the users from going for the complicated professional platform in the long run.

The launch of new WordPress 5.0 with Gutenberg will demand you as a WP developer to get acquainted with brand new development experience. However, there is no need to panic at all about the Gutenberg Editor. If you don’t want to start with it right away, it is also possible to continue with the classic editor you are comfortable with by installing it as a plugin.

By Guest Author:
Andrew Thompson