Synced Patterns for Themes

A theme pattern is usually two things at once: a design, and the words that happen to be sitting in it. Reuse the design and you copy the words with it — so a theme that wants five hero sections ships five near-identical patterns. This plugin separates the two. A pattern marks the parts of itself that are meant to be filled in, and any other pattern — or template, or post — can then use that design and say what goes in it: <!-- wp:pattern {"slug":"mytheme/hero","content":{"headline":{"content":"Built for the long haul"}}} /--> One design pattern. As many uses as you like, each with its own content, all expressed in theme files. The content attribute here is not new: it is the same attribute WordPress already puts on a synced pattern when you edit one of its fields. All this plugin does is let a theme pattern accept it too. Marking the parts to fill in In the design pattern, give each block you want filled a name and mark it as a slot. This is core's Pattern Overrides syntax, unchanged: ` Headline goes here metadata.namenames the slot.__default` opens up every attribute the block supports, and is the form to reach for: it is the only one WordPress will let someone type into inside a synced pattern. Naming attributes one by one instead — {"content":{"source":"core/pattern-overrides"}} — also works when the content comes from markup, and is worth using when you want to fill exactly one attribute and leave the rest alone. Filling them in Anywhere a pattern can be used, content supplies the values — keyed by slot name, then by attribute name: ` ` Any slot you leave out keeps the design pattern's own content, so a pattern's defaults double as its documentation. Keeping a pattern linked By default a pattern is a starting point: insert it and you get ordinary blocks you are free to change. Add Synced: yes to a pattern's header and it behaves like a synced pattern instead: ` ` Inserting it stores a reference rather than a copy. The design is rendered from the theme file and cannot be edited on the page — only the content slots can. Edit the file and every notice on the site changes with it, keeping whatever content each one was given. The block toolbar offers Reset, which puts the pattern's own content back, and Detach, which breaks the link and leaves ordinary editable blocks with the instance's content baked in. Unlike version 1, nothing is copied into the database to make this work: the theme file stays the only source of truth. Slots in a synced pattern have to bind with __default. WordPress renders any other binding read-only inside an instance — that is its rule, not this plugin's. Where it works Patterns, templates, template parts, post content, and patterns inside other patterns, to any depth. Inserting an ordinary pattern that fills another gives you plain editable blocks with the right content already in them. Inserting one marked Synced: yes gives you a live instance instead, still linked to its file. What can be filled The blocks and attributes WordPress supports for Pattern Overrides:

• Paragraph and Heading — content
• Image — url, alt, title, id
• Button — text, url, linkTarget, rel
• List Item — content (WordPress 7.1 and later)

The list is core's, not this plugin's, so it grows as core's does.

1. Install and activate the plugin.
2. Add metadata.name and a core/pattern-overrides binding to each block in a theme pattern you want to fill in.
3. Use that pattern from another pattern, template or post, passing a content attribute on the pattern block.
4. Optionally add Synced: yes to the design pattern's header, so inserting it keeps it linked to the file rather than copying it.

No settings, no admin screen. Nothing is written to the database.

2.0.1

• Does not load when Pattern Builder 2.0+ is active.
• The cached synced-pattern lookup is flushed when the theme is switched.

2.0.0

• A pattern block can carry a content attribute, so one pattern supplies the words for another pattern's design. Works in patterns, templates, template parts and post content, and through patterns nested in patterns.
• Synced: yes in a pattern header keeps a pattern linked when someone inserts it: the page stores a reference, the design renders from the theme file and cannot be edited there, and editing the file reaches every instance.
• Nothing is copied into the database any more. The pb_block post type version 1 created, the twelve capabilities it granted, the writes it made on every request, and the REST filters that made those posts look like reusable blocks are all gone.
• Patterns come from wherever WordPress registers them — parent themes, child themes, .php and .html files, and plugins — instead of a glob over the active theme's patterns/*.php.
• Added the synced_patterns_for_themes_synced_patterns filter, so patterns registered by a plugin can be synced too.
• Slots in a synced pattern must bind with __default; WordPress renders any other binding read-only inside an instance.
• Requires WordPress 6.8 and PHP 7.4.

1.2.0

• Added block bindings support for pattern content.

1.0.0

• Initial release.