Enhancement: Restore 'Open in New Tab' or Advanced Options to Link Editor for pages and posts

[mxhassani]

Quick summary

Currently, when adding a link that opens in a new to the content of a page, you need to:

1. Add the link
2. Confirm
3. Click edit
4. Advanced
5. Check "Open New Tab"
6. Save

Adding the link:

Editing the link:

Steps to reproduce

Add a link that opens in a new tab in Guttenberg.

What you expected to happen

1. To have the option to open link in a new tab right when adding the link and not only on the edit screen.
2. To not have the open in a new tab checkbox hidden behind the Advanced menu

What actually happened

The process seemed overcomplicated for what it does.

Impact

Most (> 50%)

Available workarounds?

No and the platform is unusable

Platform (Simple and/or Atomic)

Simple, Atomic

Logs or notes

No response

[cuemarie]

📌 ACTIONS

• Feature request kept

📌 Message to Author

• Thanks for reporting this - I was just looking into this as well! I found some context in /gutenberg that's relevant for where this my go:
  • Equivalent issue in the Gutenberg repo: The new design of the link UI in 16.1.0 has turned one click into four WordPress/gutenberg#52216
  • Some discussion on the prevalence of this type of feedback: Link UI (<LinkControl>) Overview Issue WordPress/gutenberg#49091 (comment)
  • There's a PR that's been suggested that would add "always open in new tab" as an editor preference: Add editor preference for default state of Link UI settings drawer WordPress/gutenberg#52321
  • There's also a larger refresh of the LinkControl happening, that I wanted to link as well: LinkControl Refresh WordPress/gutenberg#50891

[cuemarie]

A recent example of user feedback on this in the forums: https://wordpress.com/forums/topic/open-link-in-a-new-tab-2/

User 1

Originally, the process was

Click “Insert Link”
Paste URL into text box.
Click the “Open link in new tab” checkbox.
Press Enter.

Now, if you want a link to open in a new tab, you have to

Click “Insert Link”
Paste URL into text box.
Press Enter.
Click on the link you just created.
Click the Edit button.
Click on Advanced Settings, which has NOW appeared.
Click the “Open link in new tab” checkbox.

This seems like change for change’s sake, and is time-wasting, especially as ALL the links I use (and there are many hundred, overall, because I still have nearly 300 posts to write) are ones I want opening in a new tab.

User 2

My frustration [...] is that the process just. takes. too. many. clicks. The effective use of links has helped to drive my niche blog to the top of Google search results for my particular subject matter. I’m looking for the most expedient way to add those links.

[cuemarie]

Some internal discussion on this here: p1689240145573219-slack-C0160HSMDQV

[rw-ye]

+1 for this feature request. The original process was much easier:

Click “Insert Link”
Paste URL into text box.
Click the “Open link in new tab” checkbox.
Press Enter.

[wiesenhauss]

This user requested that we relay the same feedback about the new process to set links to open in a new tab: 6560288-zen

[github-actions]

Support References

This comment is automatically generated. Please do not edit it.

• https://wordpress.com/forums/topic/open-link-in-a-new-tab-2
• 6560288-zen
• 6589792-zen
• 6598467-zen
• https://wordpress.com/forums/topic/open-in-new-tab
• 6638341-zen

[zdenys]

Another case 6589792-zd-woothemes

[jp-imagines]

Another frustrated user in 6598467-zd-woothemes (emphasis mine):

this is a bad change. Anything that makes it harder for us to blog is bad. This one really sux. It shouldn't be this hard.

[jerrysarcastic]

Also reported in https://wordpress.com/forums/topic/open-in-new-tab/

[mxhassani]

6638341-zd-woothemes

[annezazu]

Closing this out as the refresh completed WordPress/gutenberg#50891 and some changes were made to ensure that once a user opens the advanced section of link control it will stay open until they close it again: WordPress/gutenberg#52799