Building a WordPress Settings Page with DataForms
WordPress settings pages have been stuck in the register_setting / add_settings_field era for over a decade. The @wordpress/dataviews package ships a DataForm component that replaces all of that boilerplate with a declarative, React-driven interface — and almost nobody is using it yet. I built wp-dataform-settings-page-demo to show how.
What It Does
The plugin registers a single admin page under Settings → DataForm Settings Demo. Instead of hand-coding HTML form fields and nonce checks, it renders a DataForm component that maps a schema (fields, types, groups) to a fully functional settings UI. A lightweight REST API (GET and POST on /wp-json/dataform-settings-page-demo/v1/settings) handles persistence, so the frontend is a clean separation of data and presentation.
Why It Matters
If you maintain any non-trivial WordPress plugin, you know that settings pages are tedious to build and painful to extend. DataForm gives you grouped sections, typed fields (text, boolean, select), and validation out of the box. Adding a new setting becomes a one-liner in your schema instead of three callbacks and a sanitize function. This pattern also aligns with the direction Gutenberg is heading — the same component is used internally for post editing panels.
Technical Takeaway
The key insight is wiring @wordpress/dataviews into a standalone admin page rather than a block editor sidebar. You register the page with add_options_page, enqueue your bundled JS with wp_enqueue_script, and let React hydrate the root div. The REST controller is a standard WP_REST_Controller subclass — nothing exotic. The result is a settings page that looks and feels native to the block editor, runs outside of it, and takes a fraction of the code to maintain.