Summary, Dev Chat, June 12, 2024

Announcements

• WordPress 6.6 Beta 2 was released on June 11. Thanks to everyone who was involved in getting that release. Please keep testing!

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.

WordPress 6.6 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. 3 is scheduled for next Tuesday, June 18, and is the last scheduled beta before 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). 1. See the release schedule here.

@marybaum noted that the About page is currently in progress.

@joemcgill reminded everyone that we should be working on getting dev notesdev note Each important change in WordPress Core is documented in a developers note, (usually called dev note). Good dev notes generally include a description of the change, the decision that led to this change, and a description of how developers are supposed to work with that change. Dev notes are published on Make/Core blog during the beta phase of WordPress release cycle. Publishing dev notes is particularly important when plugin/theme authors and WordPress developers need to be aware of those changes.In general, all dev notes are compiled into a Field Guide at the beginning of the release candidate phase. published in the next 2 weeks before the field guideField guide The field guide is a type of blogpost published on Make/Core during the release candidate phase of the WordPress release cycle. The field guide generally lists all the dev notes published during the beta cycle. This guide is linked in the about page of the corresponding version of WordPress, in the release post and in the HelpHub version page. is finalized.

Next 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/ release: 18.6

Gutenberg 18.6 is scheduled for June 19 and will include these issues. This version will NOT be included in the WordPress 6.6 release.

Discussion

We didn’t have anything specific for discussion for this chat, as many folks were at WCEU.

We discussed how best to stay up to date with UIUI User interface changes in the Editor. @joemcgill noted that changes to the editor UI happen in the gutenberg repo, and are released first in the Gutenberg 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 so they can be tested before being included in a WordPress major release. Discussion about those changes generally happen in issues and PRs on that repo.

Additionally, plans for WordPress 6.6 were summarized in this Roadmap post, which may be a good way to see what else is changing so you can test and provide feedback before the final release.

@hellofromtonya also mentioned the #core-editor channel, which is helpful for when you’re looking for where to start and if a feature or change is in the works.

@colorful-tones added: Another means to keep up to date on the latest updates is to check out (and consider subscribing to updates in the sidebarSidebar A sidebar in WordPress is referred to a widget-ready area used by WordPress themes to display information that is not a part of the main content. It is not always a vertical column on the side. It can be a horizontal rectangle below or above the content area, footer, header, or any where in the theme.) the WordPress Developer Blog. For example, the latest post: What’s new for developers? (June 2024) mentions this newer feature here.

@joemcgill also raised @dmsnell‘s excellently written proposal — Proposal: Bits as dynamic tokens — and recommended taking time to read it and provide feedback or ask questions in the comments of that post.

Open Floor

@oglekler kindly offered to help support Contributor DayContributor Day Contributor Days are standalone days, frequently held before or after WordCamps but they can also happen at any time. They are events where people get together to work on various areas of https://make.wordpress.org/ There are many teams that people can participate in, each with a different focus. https://2017.us.wordcamp.org/contributor-day/ https://make.wordpress.org/support/handbook/getting-started/getting-started-at-a-contributor-day/. at WCEU remotely, and contributors on the day were encouraged to join the #core Slack channel for help both on the day and going forward.

We also discussed not pinning the 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. scrub post, since it’s so long, and instead just link to it from the release page.

@ironprogrammer suggested posting a short signpost message pointing to the scrub, close comments, pin it. Or a sidebar update.

@joemcgill suggested exploring the excerptExcerpt An excerpt is the description of the blog post or page that will by default show on the blog archive page, in search results (SERPs), and on social media. With an SEO plugin, the excerpt may also be in that plugin’s metabox. feature on the Make team blogs.