Frappe Local Bench: A Local Workspace for Frappe
Lately, we have been thinking deeply about the developer experience around Frappe.
Frappe already has Bench, the powerful command-line tool at the center of the ecosystem. It manages apps, sites, updates, deployments, and much more. The more we used it internally, the more we appreciated how much it enables. At the same time, we kept coming back to the local development experience around it.
In the WordPress ecosystem, tools like Local and WordPress Studio changed how people approach local development. They reduced setup friction, made experimentation easier, and helped people go from “I want to try this” to actually building much faster.
That became an interesting reference point for us. What would a simpler, more approachable local workspace for Frappe look like? Local Bench started from that question.
The goal is not to replace Bench. In many ways, it is built around respecting what already exists. We are simply trying to create a cleaner local layer around it something that makes it easier to spin up projects, manage multiple sites, switch environments, and explore the ecosystem without constantly fighting setup. For us, this is really about improving the starting experience.
Frappe is already incredibly capable. We just want the first few steps to feel lighter and more welcoming, especially for developers, tinkerers, and teams working across multiple local projects. It is still early and highly experimental, but the direction feels promising.
We are currently looking for early testers who want to try it, break it, share feedback, and help shape the first version alongside us.
Filament Builder: Exploring a Visual Way to Build Schemas
Around a year and a half ago, we started discussing a simple idea: what if building Filament schemas felt more visual? At the time, it was just a thought in the background while working across Laravel and Filament projects.
Most schema work still happened directly in code, which offers flexibility and control. But as projects grow, schemas become harder to structure. Forms, tables, infolists, layouts, actions, and nested components all require planning. Often, the challenge is not writing the code. It is understanding how everything should fit together before writing it.
That idea stayed with us. At Lubus, our approach has always been simple: if the same problem keeps appearing in daily work, it is worth improving the experience around it. Filament Builder came from that mindset.
Having spent years working with the WordPress Block Editor, Gutenberg naturally influenced our thinking. The visual workflow of inserting components, adjusting settings, rearranging layouts, and understanding structure while building felt useful beyond WordPress itself. We started exploring whether a similar approach could make Filament schema planning easier.
The goal is not to replace code. Filament already provides a strong foundation for building admin panels, forms, tables, and resources in Laravel. Filament Builder is simply an attempt to make the composition and planning process more visual. The current direction includes a component palette, inspector-based configuration, live structure previews, and exporting clean Filament PHP schemas.
It is still experimental, but it solves a workflow problem we know well from our own projects. Seeing the structure visually before writing everything in code can speed up how ideas come together.
Color Palette Block v2: A Better Way to Showcase Brand Colors
Color Palette Block started as a simple Gutenberg experiment during client work.
We needed an easier way to create and share color palettes directly inside WordPress without relying on static images or rebuilding layouts every time. The first version was intentionally small, but the need kept showing up across projects.
Brand pages, design systems, case studies, and internal documentation all require a clean, reusable way to present colors. Without a dedicated workflow, teams often recreate the same sections repeatedly or rely on screenshots that quickly become outdated. That led us to build v2.
The updated block makes palette creation more flexible while keeping the experience simple. It supports multiple swatches, different display styles, theme color integration, and copyable formats including HEX, RGB, HSL, and CSS variables.
The goal was never to turn WordPress into a design tool. We just wanted to improve a common workflow for teams working with brands and design systems. Color Palette Block v2 is now available on WordPress.org and GitHub, and we’ll continue refining it through our own projects.
Tools we use. Tools we build.
Gymie: Waitlist Is Now Open
Last month, we shared that the new Gymie website was getting closer to launch. Since then, we’ve focused on refining the message, sharpening the design, and making sure the site reflects where Gymie is heading after v3.
Now, the refreshed site is live, and the Gymie waitlist is officially open. This is an important milestone in Gymie’s early access journey.
The goal was never just to launch a better-looking website. We wanted to create a clearer starting point for people discovering Gymie for the first time, a place to understand the product, follow the journey, and stay connected as we continue to build.
Gymie is still in pre-launch, with plenty more ahead. But opening the waitlist gives us a practical way to build early interest, gather feedback, and learn which users and businesses connect most with our direction.
Sometimes small steps make the journey feel real.
A clearer message. A more focused website. And now, a simple way for early users to join us as Gymie takes shape.
What We’re Learning and Applying
Each month, we take a step back and look at what’s happening around the industry and ecosystem, picking a few ideas and tools that we can learn from and bring into our own work.
A few things stood out this month:
- Google Search & I/O: Search is becoming more action-oriented. AI summaries, agents, and guided experiences are shifting the focus from finding information to helping users complete tasks. Discoverability and workflow design are increasingly overlapping.
- OpenAI Codex: Updates like mobile access, remote SSH support, and hooks push Codex closer to real development workflows. The bigger shift is AI becoming embedded directly into everyday tooling instead of existing separately.
- Claude Opus 4.8: Improvements around coding workflows, long-running tasks, and reasoning controls continue the trend toward more practical AI assistance for software teams.
- WordPress 7.0 & WordPress.com: WordPress 7.0 “Armstrong” brought upgrades across editing, accessibility, performance, and developer tooling. WordPress.com experiments like Workspace for Mac, Easy Site Editor, and Lately point toward simpler, more flexible publishing workflows.
- Frappe CRM: The new Sales Hierarchy update improves how visibility maps to real sales structures. A smaller update, but the kind of operational detail that makes business software more usable over time.
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