When inserting ‘HTML Widgets’ into the WYSIWYG editor they become just as susceptible to breakage as all the other markup in the layout. Widgets are currently frustrating to use due to the editing issues of the WYSIWYG and limits of the Widgets themselves, but they have so much potential to be a powerful and flexible solution to editor challenges.
These are some ideas that could make HTML Widgets more user-friendly, safer, and more powerful of a feature:
- Somehow protect/isolate the inserted markup from the rest of the layout so that it becomes its own little editable space. Or at least have a hard, visible border that can’t be edited in WYSIWYG mode.
- When setting up the markup in the widget, allow for editable zones, almost like custom properties with different field types that we can define in the code. Perhaps similar to, or even using the same functionality as the OSE, so that widgets can be safely and easily edited in a controlled way.
- Similar to above, allow defined areas to be duplicatable and sortable (like table rows that can be moved up or down). So we could define in the code if the whole widget could be duplicated, or just a section within it. This would allow us to create HTML patterns like accordions, complex tables, small item lists, or small grid sections that are flexible for different content types that don’t warrant their own full custom module.
I would imagine that the technologies to do these types of things likely come from full drag-and-drop page builders, so there may be a wider implementation here for the whole WYSIWYG editing experience throughout the admin, not just for HTML Widgets.
If anyone has their own or similar experiences with this or further ideas, please share.