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Screenshot of the telex WordPress AI interface. Showing a new block created.

I saw a link to Telex – AI-Assisted Authoring Environment for WordPress Blocks this week and thought I would give it a try.

A few (eek, 10) years ago I tried to make a plug-in for WordPress that would take a gif url and an audio url, it would then, on the fly, make a static version of the gif. Clicking that would play the gif and loop the audio. I did get it working, eventually adding a dialogue to search for gifs on giphy & audio on freesound. I even managed to incorporate it into the tinyMCE editor in WordPress. It never got finished, but it was fun. I didn’t see any make a site for it: GifMovie.

Making that plug-in involved a big effort on my part, and a ton of searching. I’ve occasionally thought it might make a WordPress block, but didn’t know where to start. I have baby steps, php, JavaScript and css. I’ve occasionally manages to add something to WordPress that I’ve needed mostly through creating shortcode. Simple stuff far short of creating a block.

Test Telex, I thought something similar might be an idea. I simplified a bit leaving out the freesound and giphy searches.

Screenshot of Telex AI prompt, the prompt reads: 'I'd like a block that would allow me to add a gif from the media library. It would allow me to choose a sound from the media library. When the block loads it would show a static image from the gif, generated on the fly with JavaScript with a play button. Clicking the static image would show the gif and loop the audio file.'

On opening Telex you are shown a typical ai prompt box. But behind that is a WordPress site. I am presuming this is WordPress playground, everything in the browser? I am not familiar enough with playground to be sure. I put in the prompt:

I’d like a block that would allow me to add a gif from the media library. It would allow me to choose a sound from the media library. When the block loads it would show a static image from the gif, generated on the fly with JavaScript with a play button. Clicking the static image would show the gif and loop the audio file.

And off the ai went, showing me some codes scrolling past and telling me how many lines of code it had written. After a while I had the block in the editor in front of me!

I could upload a gif and a mp3 to the block and it showed a preview. All looking good, I could preview the block right in the page. When I went to look at the published page, it looked ok, clicking the image started the sound, but the image vanished.

So I reported this and the ai offered a fix. At that point things went a bit wrong. The page stopped loading and restarting the whole thing failed to load the editor. After a few tries I gave up as I’d run out of time.

This evening I thought I’d try again, but a on a desktop rather than my now aging, 8th gen iPad. As this is all linked to my WordPress account I just opened the project. Getting the same problem I reported it to the ai and it fixed it again. To no avail. I repeated this a couple of times and tested each iteration. After a few goes everything just worked.

I downloaded the plug-in, uploaded it to a test site and it worked fine there too.

I also ran the plugin check plugin and almost no few errors. Presumably because this sort of plugin has fewer opportunities to make mistakes.

I guess this is as near to pure vibe coding as you get? I didn’t see any code at all in the process or discuss it with the ai. I just reported the problem. There is a code view where you can see all of the files created. They look as if they are very well organised and commented. I am sure if I was learning to make blocks this would help a lot.

The few times I’ve asked Claude.ai or chatGPT to do some coding I’ve had more of a view and understanding of what is going on. I’ve also noticed that if chatGPT tried to fix something it either manages straightaway or just repeatedly fails. Telex made a better job of fixing things on at least this one off.

I wonder if this will eventually make its way in to WordPress itself? What sort of overhead would having a bunch of extra block plugins added?

I guess that this could be a good learning tool, but that might require a bit more discipline in reading the code produced and other tutorials on creating blocks. I do feel I’ve learnt something when I’ve DIYed some simple stuff. Not that I’ve retained a lot, that would need more frequent application on my behalf.

I am looking forward to watching the progress with Telex and see where it goes if it gets out of the experimental phase.

Gif my own creation, ripped from video years ago. Sound from https://samplefocus.com

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Likes Learning WordPress All Over Again – And He Blogs by Andy Rush.

I’m finding that the simpler approach of FSE and the block editor is better. It may have had a bad start, but it has noticeably improved over the last few years. It may never please folks who will only use the “classic” editor. I understand. I’m going to be VERY conscious of those folks as I advocate for the “new” WordPress in the days to come. My hope is to demonstrate why it’s better in coming posts

I am looking forward to seeing these posts pop up in my reader.

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Likes It’s really simple by Dave Winer.

The name Really Simple Syndication is supposed to make you smile, while most techie formats make you want to pull your hair out. RSS reads pretty well even if you know nothing about feeds and XML. I wish the browser people hadn’t insisted on masking it with ugly CSS style sheets. I like lifting the hood of a car to see what’s there even though I don’t know what many of the things in there do. I learn by doing it

RSS continues to make me smile, thanks Dave.

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Fox on a Grassy Slope, looking intently into grass.
Fox on a grassy slope, looking straight at camera.

Walking down from Ben Reoch, l notice a ginger bundle off to the right, not quite bracken. Looking at it through my camera’s zoom and it is a fox, head buried in the grass. After a moment or two its head comes up and stares intently into the grass. After a couple of moments, and photos, the fox turns and looks at me. A few more moments while we look at each other then it turns and runs off. As I move down the slope I can see over the ridge the fox went over. A few sheep stand around, moving off when they see me. They don’t look to have been worried about the fox.