REST API Team Meeting Notes, 2016-10-17

As a reminder, in just 30 minutes there is a meeting in #core to decide whether the REST API Content Endpoints will be merged as a part of WordPress 4.7! See the ongoing discussion of this proposal here. Note that the OAuth server is no longer proposed for merge at this time, but authentication options will be a primary focus area for the APIAPI An API or Application Programming Interface is a software intermediary that allows programs to interact with each other and share data in limited, clearly defined ways. project during the 4.8 development cycle.

The REST APIREST API The REST API is an acronym for the RESTful Application Program Interface (API) that uses HTTP requests to GET, PUT, POST and DELETE data. It is how the front end of an application (think “phone app” or “website”) can communicate with the data store (think “database” or “file system”) https://developer.wordpress.org/rest-api/. Content Endpoints provide a new foundation upon which the WordPress developer community can build themes, plugins, and coreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress. feature. They represent a common standard and consistent interface across WordPress’s core content data types, and provide robust support for custom post types and metaMeta Meta is a term that refers to the inside workings of a group. For us, this is the team that works on internal WordPress sites like WordCamp Central and Make WordPress. values. These endpoints lay the foundation upon which future releases will add remote authentication options, even deeper querying abilities, and broader endpoint coverage for site management. This iterative approach fits WordPress’s development model and philosophy, advancing the project’s long-term goal of opening WordPress up to a wider developer audience and helping to ensure continued work on the REST API in the release cycles and years to come.

Meeting Notes

At today’s weekly API team meeting in core-restapi (agenda here) the team resolved all outstanding decisions milestoned for the REST API 2.0 / WordPress 4.7 merge candidate:

  • The ?filter query parameter will be removed from the REST API 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 prior to core merge, a breaking change that improves the consistency of querying the API and eliminates a set of parameters that could introduce backwards compatibility issues were they to be committed to WordPress core. A separate plugin will be published to reinstate the `filterFilter Filters are one of the two types of Hooks https://codex.wordpress.org/Plugin_API/Hooks. They provide a way for functions to modify data of other functions. They are the counterpart to Actions. Unlike Actions, filters are meant to work in an isolated manner, and should never have side effects such as affecting global variables and output.` parameter on a strictly opt-in basis.
  • Comments on password-protected posts are being deferred as a future enhancementenhancement Enhancements are simple improvements to WordPress, such as the addition of a hook, a new feature, or an improvement to an existing feature. until a robust solution is proposed that permits the API to adequately mirror existing functionality.
  • The unfiltered_html capability should be respected by the API, and a patchpatch A special text file that describes changes to code, by identifying the files and lines which are added, removed, and altered. It may also be referred to as a diff. A patch can be applied to a codebase for testing. will be submitted to bring the API’s behavior in line with core’s.

There are 29 tickets left in the 2.0 milestone, several of which have open pull requests already. These issues represent a mix of outstanding bugs, documentation needs and improvements that will be moved to tracTrac An open source project by Edgewall Software that serves as a bug tracker and project management tool for WordPress. should the merge proposal be accepted.

The REST API team leads would like to recognize that the content endpoints plugin now has 95 contributors: thank you and welcome to all of the new participants who have joined the project in the past week!

#4-7, #meeting-notes, #rest-api