Site Editor (Full Site Editing)

Respira 8.0 "Canopy" makes the native WordPress Site Editor a first-class target. Before 8.0, a block theme was a blind spot: Respira could read and write a page's blocks, but the things that actually define a block theme site, the templates, the template parts, the patterns, the navigation and the global styles, were not addressable.

That gap is closed. The positioning line for 8.0 is 16 page builders plus the native Site Editor.

What is addressable

Block templates and template parts

wp_template and wp_template_part are readable and writable, with template hierarchy and source discovery. Source discovery matters on a block theme: a template can come from the theme's files, from a plugin, or from the database once a user has customised it, and the three behave differently. Respira reports which one you are looking at instead of guessing.

• respira_list_site_templates, respira_get_site_template
• respira_create_site_template, respira_update_site_template, respira_reset_site_template

Resetting a customised template returns it to the theme-provided version, which is the Site Editor's own "clear customisations" behaviour.

Synced and unsynced patterns

Patterns (wp_block) are readable and writable, including their synced or unsynced state.

• Registered theme and plugin patterns stay read-only. They live in code, not in the database, and Respira will not pretend otherwise.

• Editable user patterns support the synced/unsynced distinction. A synced pattern changes every place it is used. An unsynced pattern is a starting point that gets copied.

• respira_list_site_patterns, respira_get_site_pattern

• respira_create_site_pattern, respira_update_site_pattern, respira_delete_site_pattern

Block navigation

Block navigation (wp_navigation) is edited by exact block path, not by rewriting the navigation document. This is the difference between changing one link and re-serialising a menu.

Two refusals protect that:

• A guessed path is refused. If the path does not resolve to a block that is actually there, the write does not happen.

• A stale revision is refused. If the navigation changed since the agent read it, the write does not happen.

• respira_list_site_navigations, respira_get_site_navigation

• respira_create_site_navigation, respira_update_site_navigation, respira_delete_site_navigation

Global styles and design tokens

Gutenberg design tokens and global styles (the theme.json layer as WordPress resolves it at runtime) are readable and writable, so colours, typography and spacing can be changed at the source rather than patched per block.

• respira_list_design_tokens
• respira_create_design_token, respira_update_design_token, respira_delete_design_token

The safety contract for structural writes

A page is one document. A template, a template part, a synced pattern and a navigation are shared objects: one write reaches every page that uses them. Structural writes are held to a stricter contract because of that.

Every structural write is:

1. Fingerprint-guarded against a stale base. The agent's read is fingerprinted. If the object moved underneath it, the write is refused rather than applied on top of someone else's change.
2. Snapshotted before the change, so it is reversible.
3. Read back through WordPress after the change, rather than trusting the write call's return value.
4. Server-render verified. The result is only reported as verified once WordPress has actually rendered it.

Mutation-result contract

Every structural mutation returns one of these, and they mean different things:

Structural proposals

A structural write can be staged for human approval instead of applied. The write returns pending_approval, the proposed change waits, and a person decides. This is the site-level equivalent of duplicate-before-edit: the agent does the work, you keep the last move.

Activity history

8.0 adds an agent-facing activity history that links audit entries to the snapshots, proposals, approvals and rollbacks they belong to, so the trail of a change is one query rather than a reconstruction.

• respira_list_activity, respira_get_activity

Beta gate: structural writes are off by default

This is deliberate. A bad page edit costs you one page. A bad template edit costs you every page that uses the template. The gate stays on until the write path has more live mileage.

What to ask for

Read-only, available on any site with a block theme:

List the block templates on this site and tell me which ones
are theme-provided and which ones have been customised.

Show me the header template part and the navigation inside it.
Do not change anything.

List the synced patterns on this site and tell me which pages use them.

With structural writes enabled on the site:

Change the third link in the primary navigation to point to /pricing.
Edit it by block path, do not rewrite the whole menu. Show me a dry run first.

Stage a change to the footer template part that adds the new address block.
I want to approve it before it goes live.

Limits worth knowing

• Registered theme and plugin patterns cannot be edited. They are code. Copy one into a user pattern if you want to change it.
• A navigation write needs a real block path. Asking an agent to "fix the menu" without reading it first will get a refusal, not a guess.
• stored_unverified means the render check did not confirm. Check it by hand.
• The beta gate is per site. Turning it on for one site does not turn it on for the rest.

See also

• Gutenberg (Block Editor) Reference for block-level page editing
• Safety Philosophy for the duplicate-before-edit workflow
• Page Builder Support for the full builder matrix
• WooCommerce Add-on for FSE-first storefront analysis