Summary, Dev Chat, June 5, 2024

Announcements

• WordPress 6.6 Beta 1 was released Tuesday, June 4! Thanks to all the contributors for a smooth and successful release. Please help test and report any issues you find.
• WordPress 6.5.4 was released on June 5 and is now available for download. Thanks to all the contributors who worked on this release too! @jorbin noted that there is now a 6.5.5 milestone in tracTrac An open source project by Edgewall Software that serves as a bug tracker and project management tool for WordPress., but suggests that we enter a holding pattern for ~2 weeks before deciding if it’s necessary.
• GutenbergGutenberg The Gutenberg project is the new Editor Interface for WordPress. The editor improves the process and experience of creating new content, making writing rich content much simpler. It uses ‘blocks’ to add richness rather than shortcodes, custom HTML etc. https://wordpress.org/gutenberg/ 18.5 was scheduled for release on June 5 (completed after the meeting). This is the final release going into WordPress 6.6, and from this point only bugbug A bug is an error or unexpected result. Performance improvements, code optimization, and are considered enhancements, not defects. After feature freeze, only bugs are dealt with, with regressions (adverse changes from the previous version) being the highest priority. fixes will be cherry-picked into the 6.6 branchbranch A directory in Subversion. WordPress uses branches to store the latest development code for each major release (3.9, 4.0, etc.). Branches are then updated with code for any minor releases of that branch. Sometimes, a major version of WordPress and its minor versions are collectively referred to as a "branch", such as "the 4.0 branch"..

Forthcoming Releases

Next major releasemajor release A release, identified by the first two numbers (3.6), which is the focus of a full release cycle and feature development. WordPress uses decimaling count for major release versions, so 2.8, 2.9, 3.0, and 3.1 are sequential and comparable in scope.: 6.6

We are currently in the WordPress 6.6 release cycle. See the Roadmap Post for details about what is planned for this release.

Discussion

As we’re in the middle of the 6.6 cycle, we used the discussion time to check in on priority items for this release. Noting that an early look of the 6.6 source of truth has been published recently by @annezazu. This is usually particularly helpful for marketing, training, and docs at this stage. Feedback, questions, comments welcomed! Expect a finalized version in line with RCrelease candidate One of the final stages in the version release cycle, this version signals the potential to be a final release to the public. Also see alpha (beta). 2 on July 2nd.

@colorful-tones raised concern about whether pattern shuffling is suitable for 6.6 and identified a few items that came up right after 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 that are on the WordPress 6.6 Editor Tasks board:

• Don’t expose pattern shuffle feature when content has been edited #62288
• The pattern shuffle feature includes synced patterns but they are inserted unsynced #62294

@joemcgill advised that if these are bugs, it is fine to fix during the beta period, but that they will need to be prioritized:

“…folks basically have the next 3 weeks do decide if these bugs should be fixed, if the feature should be removed, or if these are minor issues that don’t need to make the release. But punting the bugs is essentially committing to shipping the feature with known issues, so I would try to avoid punting them without discussion with folks closest to the features.”

@joemcgill also raised concern about the fact that we only have 3 weeks until RC1, which overlaps time that many contributors will be traveling and attending WCEU.

@marybaum requested that if we drop a feature, it would be fabulous to know that a week or so before RC 1 in order to update the About page prior to the RC 1 string freeze.

Open Floor

@apedog asked for someone to review #58932, which @joemcgill followed up on after the meeting.

@kkmuffme requested more attention to the following issues:

• #55999
• #55856
• #22239
• #60886
• #60190

@joemcgill had reviewed these ahead of the meeting and mentioned that several were already too late to make this release. Specifically, the enhancementenhancement Enhancements are simple improvements to WordPress, such as the addition of a hook, a new feature, or an improvement to an existing feature. tickets and one marked early. @hellofromtonya noticed that at least one needs deeper review because of a potential back-compat break.