Toolset Blocks 1.4 Brings Dynamic Sources and Inline Fields to Popular Block Plugins

   Amir

Announcements

January 25, 2021
61

Toolset Blocks 1.4. allows you to use dynamic sources in WordPress core blocks and popular block plugins. You can also display dynamic sources inside any text blocks. Finally, this release introduces the new Divi module for Views.

1. Dynamic Sources for All Gutenberg Block Plugins

Toolset Blocks 1.4 lets you use the magic of Dynamic Sources with blocks that come from WordPress core and from other plugins. This means that you can use any block that you like to design templates, Views and archives.

Our new integration covers:

For full details, see the table of Dynamic Sources in Popular Block Plugins.

See how Dynamic Sources in all Gutenberg blocks work in the following video:

No Glue Plugins and No Configuration Needed

The only thing you need is to run the recent version of Toolset Blocks (1.4 and newer) and one of the block plugins that we’ve integrated. Toolset takes care of the magic behind the scenes. You will notice the new Dynamic Sources inputs on the block inspector.

Dynamic Sources controls on non-Toolset blocks

New Design Opportunities

Masonry View displaying testimonials via the Image and Pullquote WordPress Core blocks inside the TwentyTwenty theme
View displaying events using the Card block from Stackable blocks
View displaying latest posts using WordPress Core blocks: Cover block with gradients, Heading and Button
Content Template for single-speaker pages using Ultimate Addons for Gutenberg blocks: Team, Blockquote, and Advanced Heading
View listing upcoming events using Ultimate Addons for Gutenberg blocks: Notice and Advanced Heading
View listing upcoming events using Ultimate Addons for Gutenberg blocks: Info Box and Advanced Heading

New reference sites using block integrations

To show you the power of using popular blocks with Dynamic Sources, we created two separate reference sites.

Photographers – site built using Toolset and Stackable blocks

Therapists – site built using Toolset and Ultimate Addons for Gutenberg (UAG)

You can install these on your own server using the Toolset Framework Installer plugin or use a free sandbox account on our Discover WP site.

What’s next for popular block integrations?

We’re happy to work with authors of other block plugins and hope to add more to our list of compatible blocks.

That being said, we’re already working on integrating Toolset’s Dynamic Sources with Kadence and Otter blocks.

2. Display inline Dynamic Sources inside text blocks

So far, you were able to display Dynamic Sources using separate Toolset blocks. But what if you need to display something dynamic, like a custom field, inline with some other text?

No problem, Toolset now allows you to display Dynamic Sources inside and inline all text blocks. This includes WordPress core blocks, Toolset blocks, and third-party blocks for content like headings, buttons, paragraphs, and more.

Just look for the Toolset Inline Field icon.

Toolset Inline Field button in the dialog of the core Paragraph block
Toolset Inline Field button inside the core Paragraph block

See how Inline Dynamic Sources work in the following video:

3. New Toolset View module for Divi

We’re pleased to announce a brand new Divi module for displaying your Views. Build your custom lists of posts with Block Editor and then display them inside your Divi designs.

There are only two steps:

  1. Create a new page and click Use Default Editor.

You’re now in the Block Editor. Insert the View block and create a new View. If you’re new to Toolset, check out our lesson (video included) about creating a View.

When you’re done, publish/update the page where you just created your View.

  1. Edit the Divi-designed page where you want to display your View.

Insert the Toolset View module into your design and select the View you created in the previous step.

That’s it, your View will automatically load and display just as you designed it.

Using the Toolset View module to display a custom list of posts inside Divi

Of course, the Toolset View module will display any features your View might have, like custom search and pagination.

To learn more be sure to check Divi’s own guide about using Toolset with Divi. Additionally, we also have a dedicated lesson about Toolset-Divi integration.

Bug Fixes

As always, this release also brings some notable bug fixes:

Types

  • Fixed a performance issue when rendering a page containing a large number of Types fields.
  • Fixed a performance issue when selecting existing posts to set up relationships.
  • Fixed a compatibility issue with WPML and WooCommerce that would delete custom fields from translated products.

Blocks & Views

  • Fixed a compatibility issue with WPML when translating Views and WordPress Archives with large loops.
  • Fixed sorting a View by a numeric field.

Forms

  • Fixed the forms notifications set to be sent when the post status changes.
  • Fixed the ability to set the post content and excerpt as required in a form.
  • Fixed some performance issues when editing post and user forms.

Check out the full changelogs here:

Download and Update

We send out the update notifications in batches, so not everyone will see the update notice at once.

To get this update now, in the WordPress admin go to Plugins → Add New and click the Commercial tab. There, click the Check for updates button in the Toolset section.

Feedback? Comments?

What do you think of the new features and integrations? Which one excites you the most?

Let us know in the comments and we’ll reply!

 

Comments 61 Responses

    • Hi Joel (and Darryl, and Stuart)! 🙂

      Yes, I agree, it makes sense. And we want to do it, we’re definitely up for it. But we do need your help. Please, contact the authors of the GenerateBlocks plugin and tell them this same thing. When users request integration, it shows there’s interest and audience, which is the best incentive for any business. The best part about Toolset’s Dynamic Sources (and you can tell them this), is that it’s really easy to connect with any block plugin. And we will help them do this, of course!

      About Open Source maps… This is on the roadmap and the last information I have from developers is that they hope to have it in late spring, early summer.

  2. I’m relatively new to WordPress and Toolset and am still figuring this all out. So, just to clarify/understand, prior to Blocks 1.4 you could only use dynamic Toolset content/fields within Toolset Blocks, whereas now you can use any dynamic content within any block – be it from raw Gutenberg or any other Gutenberg-compatible plugin/theme?

    And, more generally, Toolset’s choice to integrate deeply with Gutenberg means that the plan is to be be compatible with, and augment, anything Gutenberg related?

    If that’s all correct, that’s fantastic, seems to be the appropriate direction for you to aim, and I look forward to all of the progress that you, the WordPress team, and anyone else Gutenberg-focused will make!

    Thanks!

    • Yes Nick, what you summarized is exactly correct. Now you can use Dynamic Sources with the WordPress blocks and with blocks coming from a number of other plugins. And yes, this also means that everything coming to Gutenberg will be very easy to use/integrate with Toolset. For example, if you’re using a theme that comes with a set of pre-created templates, you can use it right now as your starting point for dynamic sites with Toolset.

      • Wonderful, thanks! I look forward to building out my site with Toolset and other Gutenberg compatible themes and plugins, such as Kadence.

  3. Made my day! So far this looks amazing. Glad you have Kadence on your list! Keep up the good work. THX!

    • I was just trying to make a kadence accordion with a dynamic source in a view, but it looks like I can only place a dynamic inline source. What means I’ll get one accordion each loop. That was probably a little noob of me that I thought it might work;) It looks like the legacy editor is still the only way to get a view with loops in an accordion. But it would be great to have a solution for that in the future. I also tried the kadence row layout, hoping to be able to place a dynamic background image, but unfortunately that wasn’t possible either.

  6. Oh wow. Integration with other block libraries is awesome. On first glance though the superstar here is Displaying inline Dynamic Sources inside text blocks.

    Are there any plans to include GenerateBlocks to the list of integrations?

    • We’ll reach our to Tom, from Generate and see if he’s interested. If you and other of his clients will tell him that you want it, there’s a greater chance that Tom will join.

      • Thanks Amir. Tom has said he’s happy to hear from you so please go ahead…could be a great quick win! Thanks

  7. I tried the Stackable image block as in your release video but the option for dynamic source doesn’t show for me. I tried several other Stackable blocks, but it doesn’t show anywhere. In the WP core blocks, the dynamic source option shows.

    In Stackable I only have the inline dynamic source available. Which is also very nice, but I would like the other option more.

  8. Great feature! The inline Dynamic Source is particularly powerful for customizing pages and views. So it seems often if the Dynamic source is not directly linked up to a field on a 3rd party block, it is also possible to use an inline dynamic source. This really extends the power and customization of Toolset!

    I also support integrating GenerateBlocks from GeneratePress into the dynamic source since that is my main theme I use for my clients. It is lean and mean and works great with Toolset!

    • Great feedback, thanks Martin. The more clients ask GeneratePress to work with us, the faster this will go. From our side, it’s a tiny project. We need a bit of cooperation from their side and we’ll have this integration working.

      • Thanks Amir. Tom, the head guy at GP is keen to get it done:
        “They’re absolutely free to integrate with GenerateBlocks! It should be quite easy/very similar to the other integrations they’ve already done.

        As always, I’m always happy to help if they need to reach out with questions 🙂”

    • This looks like a nested View, which is not yet available with Blocks, so it’s done with the shortcode Views. This is coming to Blocks too. It will take us two more major releases to have full support for users, taxonomy and then nested Views.

  11. Excellent work.

    When you get the filters from Ben (Kadence) how long will it be before you release an update that include Kadence?

    • Not a lot of time. We already built everything, under the assumption that these filters will be in Kadance. We commented out that code because the recent Kadance Blocks release didn’t include the filters that we needed. The purpose of these filters is to allow Toolset to set the right styling for items in a View or archive. Without the filters, things work in templates, where each item appears once. Our filters allow us to add unique IDs to items that appear in a list.

  12. In your original post you listed this new feature as being Kadence compatible and included Kadence on the table list – however I note that in the table of compatible block plugins, Kadence is no longer featured. Do you have an ETA for compatibility with Kadence? Thanks and great update.

    • Yes. We were hoping to include support for Kadance in this release. We’re waiting on them to add a few filters. Once this happens, we’ll update Toolset to include full support for both Kadance theme and blocks. From our end, the work is done and is waiting for their update.

      • Hi Amir,

        Any further update in your Kadence integration? Is there anything we can do to help nudge them towards completion?

        Thanks!

        • We are working on this together with the developers from Kadence team. It’s a priority for us and we hope that it remains a priority for them as well. If you’re using both Toolset and Kadence, it’s good that you’re reminding us and it can only help if clients keep reminding them. We know that everyone is busy and has many projects.

  13. Excellent update. Such a simple addition with a lot of value. I also am glad to see the Dvi Toolset module. Much appreciated but I you are tempting me to make a site exclusively with Blocks. I discovered the Kadence theme yesterday and took it for a spin. It is feature rich and seems to be lightweight. Only quibble is having to configure in the custromiser, but not a deal breaker.

  15. Hello,
    This is a great addition! Thank you for the great work.

    Two questions,
    Will there also be created a Divi module to insert content templates?
    Will / are there options to add parameters to the view selected in the Divi module?

    Keep up the great work!

  17. These sound like great features!!!

    Can i ask about a few questions about the Divi module / feature request?
    – Will there also be a module to add content templates?
    – Is there a way to add parameters to the views (and maybe content template) module in an input field?

    • Hi there!

      We do not have any current plan to include a Divi module for Content Templates, as our main goal and focus right now is to enhance the main usage for those which is designing full pages for single posts.

      Also, our Divi module adds the ability to dispay a View in a Divi-designed page. We did not include the ability to pass parameters to it. I am taing a note and creating a feature request for us to evaluate whether we can include this easily.

      Hope it helps. Regards!

  18. Great leap ahead! I am transferring more and more to blocks.
    With the new views block you only can choose post types. I miss the ability to choose user. Will this be permanent? Or will it be possible to query user data in the future?

    • In the near future, we are going to add a feature that will auto-copy users to a post-type that you select. This will allow to do everything with users including templates, Views, searches and archives. I don’t have a schedule yet, but it will come in one of the next two releases.

      • Thank you Amir for your fast reply. That would be great! It would be very nice if together with this auto-copy the user can be made the author of the post-type. In this way they can be owner of their data and change it in a cred form. And what will happen if they change their data, will it be changed in the user data too?

        • There will be complete sync between the user and the post. When either the user or the post change, the other will get updated. We’ll check your idea to set the users as the authors for the posts. I think that it depends on the user’s role.

  19. Hi Amir,

    Although dynamic inline feature with popular block integrations without a doubt, a smart move.

    Because of continuous improvement and development of WordPress Gutenberg which sets to the end of page builder era, the smarter way is for Toolset Blocks to be FREE plugin for all WordPress user and add Toolset Blocks Pro version for Toolset members.

    The main reason for this move to increase Toolset revenue from new sign up members and not to rely on other blocks solutions like what has happened in the past with Toolset and themes integrations.

    Thanks,

  20. This is a great new feature but as arabsw said above, you should be building your own fully featured design block collection. Of course I also recommended this a long time ago.

    I took at look at Kadence Blocks pro and they want $60/yr and GenerateBlocks pro wants $70-100/yr for multi-site… Why don’t you create a similar block collection and earn that money for yourselves instead of relying on other block collections? You clearly already have the people with the skills necessary to do so. Correct me if I’m wrong, but it seems like design blocks/features would actually be easier for you to develop than the dynamic features, no?

    Then you could serve a much broader audience. You could draw in new customers who don’t need all the dynamic features of Toolset by offering a design block package. Then up-sell them eventually to blocks with dynamic features.

    As far as designing all aspects of a page, including headers, footers, menus, templates etc and filling all those items with dynamic data… Toolset should be a one-stop solution!

    As more and more sites begin to switch to the Block Editor, there’s still time for Toolset to become the biggest player in that space. To become the Divi, Elementor etc of block builders.

    We can dream.

    • Thank you Peter. Actually, Toolset has a pretty robust blocks library:
      https://toolset.com/block-item/

      It’s included in Toolset, so you can build rich sites without paying for anything else.

      In this release, we integrated with a number of block plugins, so that if you prefer to use them, they are now compatible with dynamic content.

      We are not aiming to have our own Toolset theme. We had this in the past and we didn’t do a very good job maintaining that theme. Instead, we are working very closely with the authors of great themes. Some are free and some are paid.

      Does this help?