Theme Review Update for July 28, 2014

Currently

  • 108 new tickets are waiting for review.
    • 48 tickets are older than 2 weeks
    • 81 tickets are older than 1 week
    • 96 tickets are older than 3 days
  • 63 tickets are assigned to 35 reviewers.
    • 55 tickets are older than 2 weeks
    • 57 tickets are older than 1 week
    • 59 tickets are older than 3 days

In the past 7 days

  • 93 tickets were opened
  • 59 tickets were closed:
    • 49 tickets were made live.
      • 0 new Themes were made live.
      • 49 Theme updates were made live.
      • 23 more were approved but are waiting to be made live.
    • 9 tickets were not-approved.
    • 1 tickets were closed-newer-version-uploaded.

#themes, #trt

Plugins update for July 24, 2014

Repo stats for the week:

Plugins requested : 192
Plugins rejected : 34
Plugins closed : 15
Plugins approved : 163

30 plugins in the queue, 4 without a reply and 2 older than seven days.

4518 commits to the repository (949987-954505).

Support stats: 20 open tickets with 5 older than a week.

#plugins

Support Team Update for July 24th

Items discussed at today’s #wordpress-sfd meetupMeetup All local/regional gatherings that are officially a part of the WordPress world but are not WordCamps are organized through https://www.meetup.com/. A meetup is typically a chance for local WordPress users to get together and share new ideas and seek help from one another. Searching for ‘WordPress’ on meetup.com will help you find options in your area.:

WordPress 4.0 beta2

The second 4.0 betaBeta A pre-release of software that is given out to a large group of users to trial under real conditions. Beta versions have gone through alpha testing in-house and are generally fairly close in look, feel and function to the final product; however, design changes often occur as part of the process. is going smoothly. All the media related issues have tickets and is being worked on and the two holdouts are considered minor.

There was a question from the week before if the Alpha/Beta sub-forum shows up in no-replies and all topics; it does.

The handbooks for support

The support handbook really is for moderators and the troubleshooting handbook is for everyone. That doesn’t really explain it clearly but at some time soon the troubleshooting handbook will be linked in the blue welcome box when you visit make/support.

Upgrading plugins will protect you. Honest.

In the recent past a certain popular pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party had an exploit that permitted Bad People™ to install code and backdoors onto your WordPress installation. If you were not compromised and upgraded the plugin then you were not impacted by this exploit. If you were exploited prior to the patched version of the plugin being released then you have to clean out your installation.

However if you did not upgrade when the update arrived or continued to run the vulnerable version then your installation was a prime target for bots and most likely was compromised as a result of that.

Please keep your plugins, themes and WordPress versions up to date and patched. It can protect you and save you hours of grief down the line.

Speaking of exploits, there appears to be an uptick in XML-RPC brute force attacks. While some hosts may recommend that the users delete that xmlrpc.php file that will likely break things. The best reply to those topics really is “Please speak with your host.” Real firewalls that can rate limit httpHTTP HTTP is an acronym for Hyper Text Transfer Protocol. HTTP is the underlying protocol used by the World Wide Web and this protocol defines how messages are formatted and transmitted, and what actions Web servers and browsers should take in response to various commands. requests from attack hosts from ever reaching your installation can be the best way to solve it. Using .htaccess won’t really help as 10,000 404 pages will bring down any host.

The transcript for today’s meetup can be read at this link.

#support

Theme Review Update for July 21, 2014

Currently

  • 93 new tickets are waiting for review.
    • 28 tickets are older than 2 weeks
    • 58 tickets are older than 1 week
    • 73 tickets are older than 3 days
  • 57 tickets are assigned to 32 reviewers.
    • 53 tickets are older than 2 weeks
    • 56 tickets are older than 1 week
    • 57 tickets are older than 3 days

In the past 7 days

  • 108 tickets were opened
  • 118 tickets were closed:
    • 101 tickets were made live.
      • 5 new Themes were made live.
      • 96 Theme updates were made live.
      • 27 more were approved but are waiting to be made live.
    • 16 tickets were not-approved.
    • 1 tickets were closed-newer-version-uploaded.

#themes, #trt

Support Team Update for July 17th

Items discussed at the #wordpress-sfd meetupMeetup All local/regional gatherings that are officially a part of the WordPress world but are not WordCamps are organized through https://www.meetup.com/. A meetup is typically a chance for local WordPress users to get together and share new ideas and seek help from one another. Searching for ‘WordPress’ on meetup.com will help you find options in your area.:

Status of the handbooks (not just the Troubleshooting one)

@samuelsidler (sams) asked about the difference between the handbooks and the organization of them. He was at WCKC and there was some confusion when trying to locate items in the handbooks.

The Support Handbook really is for moderators and people providing support in that role. For example many of the pre-defined replies in that handbook deal with managing topics. That’s for solving forum problems. It’s written for moderators.

The Troubleshooting Handbook in development is for people who want to assist others with WordPress problems. It’s a different audience and is definitely needed.

This item neatly segued into the next topic of

The Troubleshooting Handbook status

It’s looking good and parts of the new handbook are fleshed out. It still needs content but as @Ipstenu reminded me release and iterate also applies to documentation too. Contributions don’t have to be perfect but they have to be started or things will never get done.

That last sentence was more of a note to myself but all contributions to the handbook are welcomed. 😉 If you want to contribute but don’t have access then contact me via the comments and we’ll figure something out.

There was discussion of how and what belongs on the new handbook and the consensus was to keep it basic and inviting to new users.

Portions of the new Troubleshooting Handbook that do a deep dive into setting up things like WAMP, LAMPLAMP LAMP is an acronym for Linux, Apache, MySql, PHP – a stack of free software programs that can function as the environment for running WordPress., MAMP, VVV, etc. will be directed to other more technical resources. Their will be technical details there (see the break/fix examples) but the goal is to get users started and invite them to provide support.

We all want to get more people helping and keeping it basic may get that started.

Section topic titles

The sections and examples were obtained from @Ipstenu‘s Break/Fix site. The titles work with the content of the article but some of them may be unclear when people are looking around. Those titles are fun though and when you get into the examples you’ll understand Mika’s gift for titles. 😉

If you have a suggestion for modifying a title in the handbook please pingPing The act of sending a very small amount of data to an end point. Ping is used in computer science to illicit a response from a target server to test it’s connection. Ping is also a term used by Slack users to @ someone or send them a direct message (DM). Users might say something along the lines of “Ping me when the meeting starts.” the gang here.

BETABeta A pre-release of software that is given out to a large group of users to trial under real conditions. Beta versions have gone through alpha testing in-house and are generally fairly close in look, feel and function to the final product; however, design changes often occur as part of the process.!

I couldn’t figure out a good way to type that title with a Kirk “KHHAANNN!!!” effect.

The WordPress 4.0 beta1 is out and please test and beat up. There are some nice enchantments (the media library made me yell “Oh that’s cool!”) and feed back is needed and bugs should be reported to the Alpha/Beta sub-forum. For a good status or progress on the beta consider subscribing to make/core.

When you see topics in the Alpha/Beta sub-forum that have a ticket assigned and posted in that topic please mark that topic resolved. Don’t close the topic unless it becomes a run-away train or off topic in a bad way. Then the usual applies and that topic can be closed.

The transcript for this meetup can be read at this link.

#support

Theme Review Update for July 14, 2014

Currently

  • 112 new tickets are waiting for review.
    • 21 tickets are older than 2 weeks
    • 46 tickets are older than 1 week
    • 85 tickets are older than 3 days
  • 67 tickets are assigned to 34 reviewers.
    • 61 tickets are older than 2 weeks
    • 64 tickets are older than 1 week
    • 67 tickets are older than 3 days

In the past 7 days

  • 111 tickets were opened
  • 113 tickets were closed:
    • 89 tickets were made live.
      • 14 new Themes were made live.
      • 75 Theme updates were made live.
      • 22 more were approved but are waiting to be made live.
    • 23 tickets were not-approved.
    • 1 tickets were closed-newer-version-uploaded.

#themes, #trt

Accessibility Team Update: July 9, 2014

WordPress 4.0 BetaBeta A pre-release of software that is given out to a large group of users to trial under real conditions. Beta versions have gone through alpha testing in-house and are generally fairly close in look, feel and function to the final product; however, design changes often occur as part of the process. 1

In our meeting this week, Sam Sidler gave us the heads-up that 4.0 Beta 1 was about to be released and told us that it is “incredibly important that you test it and all of its new features.” In her post WordPress 4.0 Beta 1, Helen Hou-Sandi announces the release and talks about new features.

Testing

This Saturday, July 12, some of us will be testing 4.0 Beta 1 for accessibilityAccessibility Accessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) and other issues. If you want to get involved the start time is 15:00 UTC. Log in to the #wordpress-ui IRC channel. Also refer back to and update the Make WordPress Accessible page for information about what has been tested and what needs to be tested.

Test Environment

Remember, we’re testing 4.0 Beta 1 so you’ll need an installation of WordPress with the WordPress Beta Tester pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party set to download and install “bleeding edge nightlies.” You don’t want to do this on your live site, so use a tool like DesktopServer by ServerPress to create a virtual server on your desktop computer.

Support Team Update for July 10th

Items discussed at today’s #wordpress-sfd meetupMeetup All local/regional gatherings that are officially a part of the WordPress world but are not WordCamps are organized through https://www.meetup.com/. A meetup is typically a chance for local WordPress users to get together and share new ideas and seek help from one another. Searching for ‘WordPress’ on meetup.com will help you find options in your area.:

WordPress 4.0 Beta1 has dropped this morning

Early today the release announcement for the next beta was posted. Please test and report any issues. You can install the WordPress Beta Tester plugin to do that easily.

Forum moderators: if you see a topic in the Alpha/BetaBeta A pre-release of software that is given out to a large group of users to trial under real conditions. Beta versions have gone through alpha testing in-house and are generally fairly close in look, feel and function to the final product; however, design changes often occur as part of the process. sub-forum and a ticket has been created in tracTrac Trac is the place where contributors create issues for bugs or feature requests much like GitHub.https://core.trac.wordpress.org/. then please mark that topic as “resolved” and post that link.

Contributing to the Troubleshooting Handbook

The troubleshooting handbook needs contributions and the topic was raised for how that can be accomplished. There’s not really a method to grant that access in a good way. If someone has some content they would like to contribute then perhaps posting it on their own site first may be how to get started.

It’s easy to grant access to someone who has been collaborating with the different teams for years but granting that access to new people is delicate. It’s an idea that needs working on.

Status of the Troubleshooting handbook

@jerrysarcastic has generously offered to post a separate status update on that topic. 😉

The transcript of today’s meetup can be read via this link.

#support

Plugin Team Update for July 10, 2014

Repository stats this week:

Plugins requested : 194
Plugins rejected : 55
Plugins closed : 12
Plugins approved : 133

93 plugins currently in the queue, 70 without a reply and 3 older than a week.

4116 commits to the repo (942513-946629)

Support stats: 20 open tickets, with 4 older than a week.

#plugins

Theme Review Update for July 7, 2014

Currently

  • 98 new tickets are waiting for review.
    • 15 tickets are older than 2 weeks
    • 40 tickets are older than 1 week
    • 74 tickets are older than 3 days
  • 69 tickets are assigned to 40 reviewers.
    • 62 tickets are older than 2 weeks
    • 66 tickets are older than 1 week
    • 68 tickets are older than 3 days

In the past 7 days

  • 96 tickets were opened
  • 90 tickets were closed:
    • 70 tickets were made live.
      • 0 new Themes were made live.
      • 70 Theme updates were made live.
      • 36 more were approved but are waiting to be made live.
    • 18 tickets were not-approved.
    • 2 tickets were closed-newer-version-uploaded.

#themes, #trt