As @BD3D notes, there are now mappings between attributes and vertex groups
abbot is painted by a Random Attribute node
costello is a hand-weight-painted blob
abbot - costello
The node tree
This mapping has the nice side effect of turning the vertex group list into a listing of attributes. Also, the contents of attributes are now less opaque; I can inspect them as a vertex group - if I had the foresight to set up the mapping.
Maybe when an attribute is created by a node it can be added to the list, and you have the option to
add them manually and access them with the corresponding node later.
Unfortunately, this side effect doesn’t address this, because I had to manually assure the mapping by creating the vertex groups and making sure their names were spelled the same way as the attributes. That is subject to spelling errors; I can still name an attribute in the node tree, and if there isn’t an identically named vertex group, I don’t get to see what the attribute ‘looks like’. If I’m in a hurry, I could easily miss the mis-naming.
I share @JuanGea 's cautionary that this is the time to get the node-based workflow right. This mapping is nice but it is not complete and maybe, perhaps, a little haphazard? And it is a terrible thing when haphazardness becomes ingrained.