It maybe late to be looking for a better Visual Editor given the rapid improvement in both Page Builders like Elementor, Beaver or Divi plus the Gutenberg Block editor. But this developer is still looking for an improvement for the Visual Editor. Kay features sought include drag and drop layout, user CSS styling blocks, insertable templates and easier datatable layout and styling . Think of it as the search for Visual Editor 2.0
Sure, the PageBuilder editors in WordPress, SquareSpace, Wix and Mobirise Offred various combinations of these edit features. But our search was for something closer to the Visual Editor home. And TinyMCE certainly enhances the Classic Editor with some super editing features like text and background coloring, text field find and replace, font-size and font family dropdowns and the major improvements to data table design and layout. And now TinyMCE has bee added as the Classic Edit Block in Gutenberg so that users comfortable with the Visual Editor will have the ability to create Gutenberg blocks using their Visual Editor skills.
So how did Joom United’s Smart Editor addon attract our attention – a screenshot tells the story:
Smart Editor matched TinyMCE’s data table management, CSS custom styles, plus text field find and replace features while adding WP File Download and Placement, Button field edits, Table of Contents creation, Bullet list icon edits, Multiple-columns manager, Hover totltip popups, and Section Templates reuse.
Great promise for Smart Editor with one major drawback, it is badly out of date. The plugin has not been updated in 2 years and the number of active plugin users peaked at 2000. And it shows. The WP File Download light and Datatable Manager light features simply did not work along with Multiple-columns manager and Section templates. Worse deletion
