If you’re like me, you can never remember the shortcodes you have active on your WordPress site. This inevitably leads you to stop what you’re doing and hunt down the documentation for the feature you’re attempting to use. This is especially true when it’s a shortcode that can be configured with multiple attributes.

What if there was a way to make shortcodes more discoverable in the post editor? That’s exactly what Scott Evans has attempted to do in his Shortcode Suggest plugin. When activated, this plugin adds autosuggest for shortcodes as you type in the visual editor. It also includes a short description of the shortcodes it detects.

As of right now, the plugin is a rough concept that Evans put on github in order to gauge interest and collect feedback. In the future, he plans to improve the design of the suggestions and only load the plugin on the required post types and admin screens. Shortcode Suggest only works on the visual editor but Evans is considering enabling it for the HTML editor, depending on feedback.

If there was a more standard approach to including shortcode attributes within inline docs, Evans says the plugin would be even more useful. As it is, there may be some gaps where the information is incomplete.

Shortcodes are popular because they provide an easy and approachable method for users to embed complex functionality within content. However, there’s no easy way to know what shortcodes are available to your installation. Shortcode Suggest provides a nice solution for this. Download it from github and take it for a test drive. Is this a plugin that you’d like to see further developed? What would make it more useful?