Blocks on Plone 6 Frontpage

arky · February 28, 2022, 5:08pm

How do you enable blocks on Plone 6 volto frontpage?

Volto 15.0.0-alpha.0
Plone 6.0.0a2
plone.restapi 8.16.2
CMF 2.5.4
Zope 5.3
Python 3.9.10 (main, Jan 29 2022, 04:19:45) [GCC 10.2.1 20210110]
PIL 8.3.1 (Pillow)

tiberiuichim · February 28, 2022, 5:48pm

The screenshot you're showing has the blocks enabled. The problem is that you're on the Title block, which doesn't provide a sidebar setting.

tisto · February 28, 2022, 8:35pm

I have to admit this is a recurring theme, that I see across first-time Volto users. Users are confused by the empty sidebar and the icon in the sidebar. cc @sneridagh

JeffersonBledsoe · February 28, 2022, 11:08pm

I got a little confused around this too when using Volto for the first time (and it still gets me occasionally now). It isn't really clear that you have a block selected just from looking at the sidebar.

arky · March 1, 2022, 4:36am

Thank you for clearing that up.

I realize that some of these things are not very intuitive for my exhausted brain. Perhaps they could be improved in the long term.

fredvd · March 1, 2022, 10:46am

github.com/plone/volto

UX: Make "+" more obvious (was: Volto editor first time use, adding images is difficult)

opened 02:55PM - 15 Mar 19 UTC

fredvd

99 tag: UX

I tested the Volto editor last week as a complete newbie: I didn't look at any s…creencasts the last few months or documentation so I was as 'blank as possible'. I first played around on the Volto demo site and later installed Volto with locally because I really thought at first something was wrong with the online demo site. This is a 'curse of knowledge' issue: once you know how it works, the problem is gone. And you want to forget as soon as possible that you didn't understand something so obvious and simple from the start.... Inserting an image is not logical: I couldn't figure out 'when' the (+) sign appears next to text. At first I tried to to modify an existing page (the homepage) and couldn't insert any image, but you have to know you first have to go into the last text block at the end and then press enter to create a new empty text block and only on an empty block there's the option to convert it to other media. duh. From just visually inspecting the page, checking menu's or typing text in existing blocks you get no visual feedback at all this is "the way". ![add_image](https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/394784/54439581-5a960580-4739-11e9-9c41-55d529f2000f.png) One easy way to fix this would be to always keep an empty block with the (+) symbol once you are in editing mode. If you create a new page first instead of modifying the homepage, the (+) symbol is there, but even then I succeeded in wandering around Volto for 10 more minutes because my first response was to fill the element with text and feeling silly wondering where the (+) button went. Having an insert something option at the bottom of the editor would also have made the next task easier: Once I add an image block, I couldn't start a new text block below it, except for: * first creating an empty text block above the image, * then first type some text in it because otherwise there's no drag handle * and then dragging it below the image * now delete or replace the text. which feels like a work around. ![Add_text_below_image](https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/394784/54440057-43a3e300-473a-11e9-8843-389cb735bd2c.png)

arky · March 1, 2022, 4:50pm

Thank you @fredvd , you captured most of the feedback I had in mind.