Quick Inserter: push to "explore" option when searching for patterns

[annezazu]

What problem does this address?

In the FSE Outreach Program's usability testing, one participant tried searching for "patterns" in the quick inserter but nothing appeared:

This feels like an oversight, especially with recent work done to prioritize patterns in #38709

What is your proposed solution?

Since we don't know what patterns someone might want to use, I think it makes sense to push someone to the "explore" section from here or to open the Pattern tab of the Inserter. Here's a very rough and loose idea:

Need input from @WordPress/gutenberg-design either way as the above is just a quick idea.

cc @jorgefilipecosta since you've worked on this feature!

[annezazu]

This came up with an additional participants for usability testing: "Having to go to the + sign and then browse all and that’s the only way I know how to get to patterns is super cumbersome”

[jameskoster]

Since we don't know what patterns someone might want to use

We can potentially use context to make a decent guess? E.g.

• In a header template part – show header patterns
• At the root of the 404 template – show 404 patterns
• At the root of a singular template – show post content patterns
• At the root of an archive template – show loop patterns
• At the root of an empty page – show full page patterns
• At the root of a non-empty page – show general content patterns

And so on.

[jorgefilipecosta]

The problem comes from patterns having names and are not named "pattern" so when we search by name description etc "pattern" is not found. When we search for block some blocks appear just because they have "block" in their description.

I'm not sure the best solution here. Should we hardcode a special case for "pattern" search? In that case we should also hardcode for substrings like "patter"? If yes it feels a little bit strange to show that special case for a string like "pat".

We can potentially use context to make a decent guess? E.g.

These decent guesses should probably be the default when the inserter opens. In that case, can we just show everything as if the search was empty if the user searches for "pattern" and no results exist?

[jameskoster]

These decent guesses should probably be the default when the inserter opens.

That potentially seems a bit heavy-handed. A user might not want patterns depending on the task at hand. Anecdotally I find it kind of annoying how the root-level quick inserter sometimes doesn't show me blocks despite searching for it explicitly.

If there was a way to make the guesses appear when someone searches explicitly for 'pattern' that could be good, but it might be simpler to just redirect them to the pattern explorer. Kind of like Anne's suggestion :)

[paaljoachim]

Instead of the "No results found." (which is not helpful) adding some kind of general guide to help the user along the next step can help.

This would mean any time the "No results found." shows up we can have a specific guide show up.
Like a general placeholder that can mention blocks, patterns etc.

I am thinking something along the lines of this:

[gleysen]

Perhaps something similar with using "/" to get a list of blocks, we could extend this feature to typing "//" to get a list of patterns?!