Command Palette

The Command Palette is a UI element that displays a searchable list of commands. It can be accessed in WordPress.com using the shortcut cmd+k.

This command palette is inspired by Core's implementation used in the Gutenberg editor. We use the same CSS and similar markup, the commands share the same basic props that we extended to support the following differences:

The WordPress.com version supports multisite commands with the sites as second step commands.
Users can go back to root commands with the esc and backspace keys, or the back button.
We change the search placeholder to inform the user about the current command.
In addition to icons, we also support images for the commands.
We support two lines of text for the commands.

These differences were highlighted in https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/issues/55514. We can replace our command palette with the Core one, once we can use all these differences.

Add a command

In order to add a new command to the palette, you can include the command object in useCommands or create a new hook and include it to useCommandPalette hooks.

Command properties

Every command has a set of properties that can be used to customize its behavior. The following properties are available:

name: Type string, used as identifier for the command. It's expected to be unique and camelCase. It's not visible for the user.
label: Type string, used as the label for the command. Visible in the command palette.
subLabel?: Type string, used as a second line for the command. Visible in the command palette.
searchLabel?: Type string, used to match the user search. It's not visible for the user. We recommend adding keywords related to the command, and using _x() to add context to the translators.
callback: Type function, used to execute the command when the user clicks on it or presses enter on that command.
context?: Type string[], a list of URL paths for which the command will have priority when displayed. Example: ['/sites', '/manage/domains'].
icon?: Type JSX.Element, used to display an icon for the command. It's visible in the command palette.
image?: Type JSX.Element, used to display an image for the command, instead of an icon. It's visible in the command palette.
siteSelector?: Type boolean, used to indicate whether the command should display a site selector.
siteSelectorLabel?: Type string, used as a placeholder for the search input displayed above the site selector.
capability?: Type string, used to indicate the required capability for the command to be available.
siteType?: Type string, used to indicate the required site type (Simple, Atomic, Jetpack) for the command to be available.
publicOnly?: Type boolean, used to indicate whether the command should be available on public sites only.
isCustomDomain?: Type boolean, used to indicate whether the command should be available only on sites with a custom domain.
filterP2?: Type boolean, used to indicate whether the command should be excluded from P2 sites.
filterStaging?: Type boolean, used to indicate whether the command should be excluded from staging sites.
filterSelfHosted?: Type boolean, used to indicate whether the command should be excluded from self-hosted sites.
filterNotice?: Type string, used as label shown below the site selector to explain why some sites might not appear.
emptyListNotice?: Type string, used as label shown below the site selector to explain why there are no sites available.

Best practices for defining a command

Please consider carefully before adding a new command to the palette. We aim to avoid incorporating commands that are infrequently used and unlikely to be removed in the future.

Command labels should be short and descriptive and use sentence case. For example, "Add new site" instead of "Add New Site".
Commands should start with a verb. For example, "Add new site" instead of "New site".
Picking the correct verb is important. Open is the more generic verb, if the page has a list of elements, we can use View, if the user is expected to take an action we can use Manage or Change. We prefer specific verbs over generic ones.
We prefer to use Gutenberg icons for root commands. The icon should relate to the object (e.g. "Cache"), not the type of page (e.g. "Settings").
It's important to keep the same terminology and icons used elsewhere in the interace or in core.
We can introduce aliases, and keywords using searchLabel. For example. "Import a site" would be an alias of "Migrate a site" because the navigation it's under Tools → Import.
Most commands navigate to other pages. We can also navigate to a specific section/card inside a page. For example, "Manage cache settings" in addition to "Manage hosting configuration".
Commands that open modals are also allowed. Just be aware that the command palette is visible in most Calypso pages, and we may want to implement an async loading for the modal.

Usage

Embed the command example. This is already done for all WordPress.com pages in client/layout/index.jsx (Calypso) and apps/command-palette-wp-admin/src/index.js (WP Admin).

The CommandPalette component requires the following properties:

navigate: Type function, used to execute the callback of the commands that need to navigate to a different page.
currentRoute: Type string, used to indicate the path of the current page.
useCommands: Type function, used to return the list of commands to register in the command palette.
currentSiteId: Type number, used to indicate the ID of the current site (if any).
useSites: Type function, used to return the list of sites to include in the site selector.
userCapabilities: Type object, used to indicate the capabilities of the user on all the sites.

import CommandPalette, { COMMANDS } from '@automattic/command-palette';
import { useSiteExcerptsSorted } from 'calypso/data/sites/use-site-excerpts-sorted';
import { useSelector } from 'calypso/state';
import { getSelectedSiteId } from 'calypso/state/ui/selectors';

export default function MyComponent() {
    const navigate = ( url, openInNewTab ) => window.open( url, openInNewTab ? '_blank' : '_self' );
    const currentRoute = window.location.pathname;
    const currentSiteId = useSelector( getSelectedSiteId );
    const userCapabilities = useSelector( ( state ) => state.currentUser.capabilities );

    return <CommandPalette
        navigate={ navigate }
        currentRoute={ currentRoute }
        useCommands={ () => COMMANDS }
        currentSiteId={ siteId }
        useSites={ useSiteExcerptsSorted }
        userCapabilities={ userCapabilities }
    />;
}

Command example:

{
    name: 'addNewSite',
    label: __( 'Add new site' ),
    context: [ '/sites' ],
    callback: ( { close }: { close: () => void } ) => {
        close();
        navigate( createSiteUrl );
    },
    icon: addNewSiteIcon,
}