Kau-Boys

When developing projects, I often use Custom Post Types (CPT). In a new project, the content of the entries were build completely with core blocks. In the past, I typically used custom meta fields and a fixed page template. But as creating such a complex content of a CPT is quite a lot of work and error-prone, I wanted to use a template for new entries.

Creating a block pattern

The easiest way to create a pattern for a post type is by creating the content first using the block editor and then exporting the HTML markup using the “Copy all content” option:

Now you can use this markup to register a block pattern with the default content of new entries:

function cpt_register_block_pattern() {
	register_block_pattern(
		'my-cpt/my-cpt-pattern',
		array(
			'title'       => __( 'My CPT pattern', 'my-cpt' ),
			'description' => _x( 'The custom template for my_cpt', 'Block pattern description', 'my-cpt' ),
			'content'     => '
<!-- wp:paragraph {"placeholder":"Custom Post Type ..."} -->
<p></p>
<!-- /wp:paragraph -->

<!-- wp:columns -->
<div class="wp-block-columns"><!-- wp:column -->
<div class="wp-block-column"><!-- wp:image -->
<figure class="wp-block-image"><img alt=""/></figure>
<!-- /wp:image --></div>
<!-- /wp:column -->

<!-- wp:column -->
<div class="wp-block-column"><!-- wp:heading {"placeholder":"Name ..."} -->
<h2></h2>
<!-- /wp:heading -->

<!-- wp:paragraph {"placeholder":"Phone ..."} -->
<p></p>
<!-- /wp:paragraph --></div>
<!-- /wp:column --></div>
<!-- /wp:columns -->',
		)
	);
}
add_action( 'init', 'cpt_register_block_pattern' );

Creating a template for new entries

When registering a new CPT, you can can also create default content by passing a template argument with a multidimensional array defining the template:

function cpt_register_post_type() {
	register_post_type(
		'my_cpt',
		array(
			'label'                 => __( 'Custom Post Type', 'my-cpt' ),
			'supports'              => array( 'title', 'editor' ),
			'public'                => true,
			'show_ui'               => true,
			// ... other settings
			'has_archive'           => true,
			'show_in_rest'          => true,
			'template'              => array(
				array(
					'core/paragraph',
					array(
						'placeholder' => __( 'Custom Post Type ...', 'my-cpt' ),
					),
				),
				array(
					'core/columns',
					array(),
					array(
						array(
							'core/column',
							array(),
							array(
								array(
									'core/image',
								),
							),
						),
						array(
							'core/column',
							array(),
							array(
								array(
									'core/heading',
									array(
										'level'       => 2,
										'placeholder' => __( 'Name ...', 'my-cpt' ),
									),
								),
								array(
									'core/paragraph',
									array(
										'placeholder' => __( 'Phone ...', 'my-cpt' ),
									),
								),
							),
						),
					),
				),
			),
		)
	);
}
add_action( 'init', 'cpt_register_post_type' );

As you can see in this little example, the array can get very complex, unreadable and hard to maintain. You would also have to convert the Block Pattern HTML to this PHP array format. So any change to the pattern would require you to do the work twice, trying not to make any mistake.

Combining Block Patterns and Custom Post Types templates

As the solution with the PHP array was not really something I wanted to use (the actual template was a lot more complex than the one shown in the example), I first tried the following:

// ...
'template'              => array(
	array(
		'my-cpt/my-cpt-pattern',
	),
),
// ...

I thought, that maybe the template can also use Block Patterns in the array and not only blocks. But this didn’t work. When searching for a solution, I found multiple issues on GitHub. There I found the core/pattern block, which makes the task very easy:

'template'              => array(
	array(
		'core/pattern',
		array(
			'slug' => 'my-cpt/my-cpt-pattern',
		),
	),
),

Unfortunately, the core/pattern block is not available in WordPress 5.8, but you can already use it with the Gutenberg plugin installed and activated. I really hope that it’s going to be available with WordPress 5.9 expected next month.

Conclusion

Both Block Patterns and templates for new Custom Post Type entries are really helpful. Combining them with the new core/pattern block can really increase usability a lot.

In a previous blog post, I wrote about how I used Gravity Forms to register users. This was done on a static page and not on the default WordPress registration page. When you want users to register using a different form, you should link to this page on many different places. In this blog post I want to show you how you can link to your own registration page from the login page.

The WordPress login page

In the “General Settings” you can activate the “Membership” option “Anyone can register” so that anyone can find a link on the login page that links to the default registration page:

Change the URL of the “Register” link

If you just want to overwrite the URL of that link, you can use a filter. This get passed the HTML code of the link, which you can overwrite like this:

function custom_register_link( $link ) {
	return sprintf(
		'<a href="%s">%s</a>',
		esc_url( '/register/' ),
		esc_html__( 'Register' )
	);
}
add_filter( 'register', 'custom_register_link' );

This will set the link to the static URL /register/ using the default link text.

Add another link, if registration is disabled

This approach only work then you have activated the registrations in the settings. But this would also make the default registration form available. If you haven’t activated the registration, you can still use Gravity Forms (or probably other plugins) to register users. But as the “Register” link is completely removes, you cannot simply overwrite its URL. In this case, we can also place a link on a different place using the following code:

function custom_login_site_html_link( $home_link ) {
	$register_link = sprintf(
		'<a href="%s">%s</a>',
		esc_url( '/register/' ),
		esc_html__( 'Register' )
	);

	return sprintf(
		'%s<br /><br />%s',
		$register_link,
		$home_link
	);
}
add_filter( 'login_site_html_link', 'custom_login_site_html_link' );

This filter is usually used to hook into the “← Go to <sitename>” link. This is the only place we can insert a custom link into. The result would look like this:

This link might even be a bit more visible than the link on the default position, just before the “Lost your password?” link.

Conclusion

Allowing users to register themselves with your own registration form can really be beneficial. If you use a custom form, then make sure to always link users to this form.