Dev Chat Summary: June 13th (4.9.7 week 4)

This post summarizes the dev chat meeting from June 13th (agenda, Slack archive).

4.9.7 planning

  • Leads nominated so far: @sergeybiryukov able to help as deputy (e.g., committing, backporting); @danieltj, @desrosj, @tristangemus, @pbiron open to help contribute during 4.9.7
  • Working to communicate with other team reps and component maintainers to increase diversity in release leads by asking for nominations or suggestions in their next meeting/update, please share any ideas you have on this… thanks!
  • For those with interest and availability, please review the Releasing Minor Versions handbook page and the Release leads feedback on 4.9.5 post
  • Release timing for 4.9.7 will be determined after a release leadRelease Lead The community member ultimately responsible for the Release. is named
  • Waiting until after WCEU to confirm release leads and any potential focus for 4.9.7

Updates from focus leads and component maintainers

  • The PHPPHP The web scripting language in which WordPress is primarily architected. WordPress requires PHP 5.6.20 or higher team posted summaries from their last two meetings covering progress and decisions on #43986 and #44350 as well as the approach for #43987. Join them next week on Monday, June 18th at 15:00 UTC in #core-php as they continue the discussion on these two tickets.
  • 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/. team would like a coreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress. committercommitter A developer with commit access. WordPress has five lead developers and four permanent core developers with commit access. Additionally, the project usually has a few guest or component committers - a developer receiving commit access, generally for a single release cycle (sometimes renewed) and/or for a specific component.’s review on #38323, so if you’ve got some time then please help out there.
  • And a reminder for those heading to WCEU that 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/. is tomorrow, Thursday, June 14th. If you’re in town, then please consider attending… thanks!
  • No design lead for Customize focus while @melchoyce is on sabbatical until September 10th

Devchat coordination

  • @jeffpaul will be offline most of July, so we’ll need someone to help coordinate/run devchats.
  • If you’re open to collecting agenda items and publishing an agenda, running the actual devchat meeting, and/or publishing a devchat summary then please comment here or 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.” @jeffpaul if you’re able to help out… thanks!

Next meeting

The next meeting will take place on June 20, 2018 at 20:00 UTC in the #core SlackSlack Slack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. channel. Please feel free to drop in with any updates or questions. If you have items to discuss but cannot make the meeting, please leave a comment on this post so that we can take them into account.

#4-9-7, #core, #core-customize, #core-restapi, #dev-chat, #summary

Customize Meeting Summary: September 25th

This post summarizes the Customize meeting from September 25th in the #core-customize SlackSlack Slack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. channel (Slack archive).

Participants: @westonruter, @melchoyce, @obenland, @sirjonathan, @joemcgill, @sayedwp, @jbpaul17. Misbehaving: @tracbot.

Discussion highlights

Drafting and Scheduling

Gallery widgetWidget A WordPress Widget is a small block that performs a specific function. You can add these widgets in sidebars also known as widget-ready areas on your web page. WordPress widgets were originally created to provide a simple and easy-to-use way of giving design and structure control of the WordPress theme to the user.

CustomizerCustomizer Tool built into WordPress core that hooks into most modern themes. You can use it to preview and modify many of your site’s appearance settings. UXUX User experience for themes

Bug scrub

  • Trac listing of the enhancements and feature requests milestoned for 4.9 for the team
  • #39930: docs changes, so changing this from enhancementenhancement Enhancements are simple improvements to WordPress, such as the addition of a hook, a new feature, or an improvement to an existing feature. task ticketticket Created for both bug reports and feature development on the bug tracker.
  • #28721: related to and will be resolved when #39896 is merged
  • #34843: will be resolved by #37661
  • #35827: no one working on this, so punting to Future Release
  • #40527: punting
  • #40922: punting
  • #37964: will be picked up by @sayedwp when #39896 is done
  • #38707CSSCSS Cascading Style Sheets. highlight part is implemented, but “revisionsRevisions The WordPress revisions system stores a record of each saved draft or published update. The revision system allows you to see what changes were made in each revision by dragging a slider (or using the Next/Previous buttons). The display indicates what has changed in each revision., selection, per-page, pop-out” is not
    • “per-page” aspect has been yanked from consideration in the near future
    • will work on revisions, selection, and pop-out in a feature pluginFeature Plugin A plugin that was created with the intention of eventually being proposed for inclusion in WordPress Core. See Features as Plugins. outside of coreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress.
  • #39275: likely to be resolved in #39896
  • #40104: @bpayton hopes to have 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. up by Friday
  • Topic for future devchat: What is the difference between a feature request and a feature project. It’s not really formalized. Are we deeming “feature requestfeature request A feature request should generally begin the process in the ideas forum, on a mailing list, as a plugin, or brought to the attention of the core team, such as through scope meetings held for each major release. Unsolicited tickets of this variety are typically, therefore, discouraged.” to be the same as “feature project”?

Next week’s meeting

The next meeting will take place on Monday, October 2, 17:00 UTC in the #core-customize Slack channel. Please feel free to drop in with any updates, questions, or tickets you’d like to discuss. If you have items to discuss but cannot make the meeting, please leave a comment on this post so that we can take them into account.

#core-customize, #summary

Customize Meeting Summary: September 18th

This post summarizes the Customize meeting from September 18th in the #core-customize SlackSlack Slack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. channel (Slack archive).

Participants: @westonruter, @jbpaul17, @melchoyce.

Discussion highlights

CodeMirror (“Better Code Editing“)

  • @melchoyce to review three assigned tickets, #41872 being most urgent and other tickets with @mentions
  • @westonruter: working on ensuring the new CodeMirror-enhanced Custom CSSCSS Cascading Style Sheets. is compatible with Jetpack
    • Created a reusable “code editor” customizerCustomizer Tool built into WordPress core that hooks into most modern themes. You can use it to preview and modify many of your site’s appearance settings. control so that Jetpack can extend it, also for other plugins to add their own code editor controls easily
    • Need support from the Jetpack team to review and finish off the initial PR that I opened
    • @melchoyce: I’ll 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.” Jetpack folks this week once we’re all back from the Automattic Grand 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. (most should be back by Wednesday)

Drafting and Scheduling

  • Best to wrap UXUX User experience work, as @sayedwp has gotten started on that this week
  • @westonruter to get latest code pushed up to the test environment for review
  • @melchoyce: realized earlier this week that the apps have a similar draft/publish flow
    • @jbpaul17: Are we aligned with the flow there and if not should we align with what they have or open an Issue for them to update to what we’re working on for coreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress.?
    • @melchoyce: We are pretty close, I’ll compare side by side this week

Widgets

  • @westonruter: hoping to get the Core Media Widgets 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 updated with the new Gallery widgetWidget A WordPress Widget is a small block that performs a specific function. You can add these widgets in sidebars also known as widget-ready areas on your web page. WordPress widgets were originally created to provide a simple and easy-to-use way of giving design and structure control of the WordPress theme to the user. today for user testing so we can get it merged into core next week (#41914)

Bug scrub

  • #21492patchpatch 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. needs refresh but it needs a different approach as well, @westonruter to handle
  • #34843 and related #37661: threaded conversation in Slack around path for parts/all of these to land in time for 4.9
  • #39275: related to what we’re working on for drafting/scheduling, @westonruter to handle
  • #39461: needs testing
  • #37964: aiming for @sayedwp to handle this after the scheduling/drafting work
  • #39634: punting

Next week’s meeting

The next meeting will take place on Monday, September 25, 17:00 UTC in the #core-customize Slack channel. Please feel free to drop in with any updates, questions, or tickets you’d like to discuss. If you have items to discuss but cannot make the meeting, please leave a comment on this post so that we can take them into account.

#core-customize, #summary

Customize Meeting Summary: September 11th

This post summarizes the Customize meeting from September 11th in the #core-customize SlackSlack Slack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. channel (Slack archive).

Participants: @westonruter, @jbpaul17, @joemcgill. @melchoyce and other Automatticians travelling today for this week’s Automattic Grand 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. (“annual company meeting”) and thus not in attendance.

Discussion highlights

Notification area

  • @westonruter: working on drafting design and dependencies we have (see: #35210)
  • @westonruter: Designs should get finalized today and work can get going on that piece quickly
  • @jbpaul17: I should be able to have work start on that shortly

CodeMirror (“Better Code Editing“)

  • @westonruter: aiming to get the coreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress. 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. committed today
  • @westonruter: opportunity for a contributor to learn and get experience is integrating a PHP linter ahead of 4.9 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 (October 4th)

Widgets

  • @westonruter: Gallery widgetWidget A WordPress Widget is a small block that performs a specific function. You can add these widgets in sidebars also known as widget-ready areas on your web page. WordPress widgets were originally created to provide a simple and easy-to-use way of giving design and structure control of the WordPress theme to the user. needs follow up from @joemcgill on Update the gallery widget preview design
  • @westonruter: Supporting Embeds in the Text widget will need support from @swissspidy in #34115

Other updates

  • @jbpaul17: chasing down potential contributors to help with other items for 4.9, no updates as of now
  • Plan to start 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. scrubs after weekly meeting leading up to 4.9 Beta 1

Next week’s meeting

The next meeting will take place on Monday, September 18, 17:00 UTC in the #core-customize Slack channel. Please feel free to drop in with any updates, questions, or tickets you’d like to discuss. If you items to discuss about this but cannot make the meeting, please leave a comment on this post so that we can take them into account.

#core-customize, #summary

New Contributors Meeting Recap – July 26

Yesterday our weekly new contributors meeting was held, again with some great questions and insights into contributing to WordPress coreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress.. Here is the recap for the chat, alternatively the full chat log is also available.

Participants: @adamcarter @audunhus @desrosj @dipendahal @flixos90 @hardeepasrani @johnbillion @joyously @jsonm @samikeijonen @stevenkword @welcher @xkon

Discussion Highlights:

  • Working on one of the three focuses (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/, CustomizerCustomizer Tool built into WordPress core that hooks into most modern themes. You can use it to preview and modify many of your site’s appearance settings., 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/.) is preferred, but it’s also as great to contribute to another area of core as development in those components of course has not stopped. Contributions are welcome everywhere, the focuses only gain more traction and attention at this point.
  • VVV is only one way to contribute to WordPress core. It is the recommended way to do so since it has all the tools needed preinstalled and configured, but contributors are free to choose whichever way they like. It might just require more setup work when not using VVV.
  • An easy way to make your IDEIDE Integrated Development Environment. A software package that provides a full suite of functionality to software developers/programmers. Normally an IDE includes a source code editor, code-build tools and debugging functionality. / editor aware of the WordPress coding standardsWordPress Coding Standards The Accessibility, PHP, JavaScript, CSS, HTML, etc. coding standards as published in the WordPress Coding Standards Handbook. May also refer to The collection of PHP_CodeSniffer rules (sniffs) used to format and validate PHP code developed for WordPress according to the PHP coding standards. regarding whitespace usage is to use the .editorconfig file that trunktrunk A directory in Subversion containing the latest development code in preparation for the next major release cycle. If you are running "trunk", then you are on the latest revision. contains. This file uses a common standard, and there are plugins available for almost all popular environments that automatically parse the file and adjust the whitespace settings for the project. Extensions can be found at on the website of the project. Some IDEs like PHPStorm already come with built-in tools for the WordPress coding standards.
  • While every new change in WordPress requires unit tests to verify its correct behavior (except for wording or docs changes, or those that are too complex to test for other reasons), it is not required that the person who writes 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. also needs to provide unit tests for it. It would be nice, but if someone doesn’t feel comfortable enough for the time being or first would like to get the patch reviewed, that’s perfectly fine as well.

Tickets Discussed:

  • #41370 is a good-first-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. ticketticket Created for both bug reports and feature development on the bug tracker. that could use some attention and work. It belongs to the REST API focus, so is likely to get reviewed and also merged quickly once ready. The goal of the ticket is to figure out why creating a term that already exists results in a 500 error, and change that to a more meaningful 400 or 409 error. Please have a look if you are interested in the REST API.
  • #41318 is another ticket that could use some work, particularly unit tests to ensure the existing patch works correctly.

First Props:

From this week on, we’ll highlight new contributors with their first props in this post. Props is what you get when a changeset lands in core where you have significantly helped with, for example through a patch, unit tests or something else. Please let us know about your first props when you get them. You can easily get an overview of your props at this URLURL A specific web address of a website or web page on the Internet, such as a website’s URL www.wordpress.org: https://core.trac.wordpress.org/search?q=props+USERNAME&noquickjump=1&changeset=on (replacing USERNAME with your actual wordpress.orgWordPress.org The community site where WordPress code is created and shared by the users. This is where you can download the source code for WordPress core, plugins and themes as well as the central location for community conversations and organization. https://wordpress.org/ username)

This week, @xkon received his first props. Congrats! 🎉

Next week’s Meeting:

The next meeting will take place in the #core slackSlack Slack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. channel on Wednesday, August 2, 19:00 UTC. Please feel free to drop in with any questions or tickets you’d like to discuss!

Thanks to everyone that attended! As always, please feel free to leave a comment below or reach out to any of the moderators with questions on Slack.

#new-contributors, #summary

Dev Chat Summary: June 28th (4.8.1 week 2)

This post summarizes the dev chat meeting from June 28th (agendaSlack archive).

4.9 ideas

4.8.1 planning

  • #40951 & #40907 will be coreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress. to the 4.8.1 release being targeted around the last week of July
  • General 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 to be scheduled after the 4th of July holiday on the 4.8.1 milestone
  • Component maintainers please review your 4.8.1 milestone and puntpunt Contributors sometimes use the verb "punt" when talking about a ticket. This means it is being pushed out to a future release. This typically occurs for lower priority tickets near the end of the release cycle that don't "make the cut." In this is colloquial usage of the word, it means to delay or equivocate. (It also describes a play in American football where a team essentially passes up on an opportunity, hoping to put themselves in a better position later to try again.) to Future Release / 4.9 as necessary
  • Reminder that we are “approaching 4.8.1 tickets as more traditional regressionregression A software bug that breaks or degrades something that previously worked. Regressions are often treated as critical bugs or blockers. Recent regressions may be given higher priorities. A "3.6 regression" would be a bug in 3.6 that worked as intended in 3.5. types of issues”

Editor update

Customize update

  • appreciate more people testing 40951.3.diff
  • also appreciate testing of the HTMLHTML HyperText Markup Language. The semantic scripting language primarily used for outputting content in web browsers. widgetWidget A WordPress Widget is a small block that performs a specific function. You can add these widgets in sidebars also known as widget-ready areas on your web page. WordPress widgets were originally created to provide a simple and easy-to-use way of giving design and structure control of the WordPress theme to the user. in trunktrunk A directory in Subversion containing the latest development code in preparation for the next major release cycle. If you are running "trunk", then you are on the latest revision. (see #40907)

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/. update

  • had a lot of new docs contributions at WCEU contributions day
  • have some momentum and hope to build upon it in coming weeks

Dev chat coordination

  • @jbpaul17 looking for 1-2 others out there to help run the weekly dev chats similar to how the Core Weekly Updates are split up
  • A great way for product/project management or otherwise non-engineers to help contribute to WordPress Core
  • 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.” @jbpaul17 if you have interest in helping out!

New contributor bug scrub/open office hours

  • idea is a weekly bug scrub/open office hours focused on new contributors
  • would include tickets tagged good-first-bug and any tickets new contributors wanted to work on
  • Likely to schedule for Wednesdays at 19:00 UTC
  • @adamsilverstein, @welcher, @stevenkword, & @flixos90 to help run the meetings
  • Please ping @adamsilverstein if you have interest in volunteering as well

General announcements

  • @m1tk00: looking for help with the Gallery Widget in the Customizer regarding the edit button
    • need to know how to send the already selected ID’s, when someone wants to edit the gallery
    • will ping @obenland or @timmyc in #core-customize for help
  • @enricosorcinelli: #21676 patched and awaiting review, how to get it more attention?
    • added needs-testing to the ticketticket Created for both bug reports and feature development on the bug tracker., will ping @obenland as Themes component maintainer to review
  • @pbiron: would like to start a “feature plugin” project to work on rewriting the exporter
    • would like to rework ALL of the XML related code in core (e.g., using XMLWriter instead of echo statements, etc)
    • using XMLWriter and with some pretty drastic changes to the WXR markup
    • should be putting the 1st version up on GitHubGitHub GitHub is a website that offers online implementation of git repositories that can easily be shared, copied and modified by other developers. Public repositories are free to host, private repositories require a paid subscription. GitHub introduced the concept of the ‘pull request’ where code changes done in branches by contributors can be reviewed and discussed before being merged be the repository owner. https://github.com/ in few days
    • also written an XML Schema for WXR 1.2
    • will add the feature proposal as a comment to the 4.9 wishlist on last week’s dev chat summary
  • @flixos90: thinking about ways to improve TracTrac An open source project by Edgewall Software that serves as a bug tracker and project management tool for WordPress. workflow
    • wondering whether it would be possible to automatically set a has-patch keyword once 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. is uploaded?
    • It’s a bad experience for new contributors to search through tickets without a patch, but finding ones that already have one
    • will drop by #meta-tracdev to continue the conversation
  • @jnylen0@enricosorcinelli working on #39732 and #39730
    • 39732 is a sanity improvement and a follow-up to work done around 4.7 in 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., should land soon for 4.9, but it would be good to get more eyes on it especially someone who has worked on comments before
    • 39730 may as well land at or around the same time as the above
  • @welcher: would love some eyes on Load word-count and do not allow our wp-utils script to clobber it

#4-8-1, #core, #dev-chat, #summary

Dev Chat Summary: June 7th (4.8 week 6)

This post summarizes the dev chat meeting from June 7th (agendaSlack archive).

4.8 timing recap and Pre-Final Release & Dry Run checklist items

  • Beta 1 went out on Friday, May 12th; Beta 2 went out on Monday, May 22nd
  • RC1 went out on Thursday, May 25th; RC2 went out on Thursday, June 1st
  • 4.8 is scheduled for June 1, 2017 at 9am EDT
  • Events widgetWidget A WordPress Widget is a small block that performs a specific function. You can add these widgets in sidebars also known as widget-ready areas on your web page. WordPress widgets were originally created to provide a simple and easy-to-use way of giving design and structure control of the WordPress theme to the user. looks ready
  • Credits 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. to be updated by @ocean90 tomorrow morning
  • About page update for responsive, CDN-hosted images coming from @melchoyce
  • Announcement post draft is ready to go; @jorbin & @ocean90 to help provide contributor & language count as input
  • Announcement email being drafted by @matt
  • Codex page to be updated by @jbpaul17
  • Agreed to remove “partial back to IE8” from Browser support page in Design handbook
  • tinymce/plugins/wpembed to be added to $_old_files by @ocean90
  • No new default theme, so $_new_bundled_files is fine
  • Updates to default themes and submission to repo to be done by @davidakennedy, committed by @ocean90
  • Hosts email to be drafted by @jbpaul17, email to be reviewed & sent by @jorbin
  • Systems to be covered by @vnsavage
  • grunt prerelease check for tests & standards to be run by @jorbin

4.8 Bug Scrub

  • Reviewing four tickets in Defects Awaiting Review, reported against trunk section from Report 40
  • #40929: relates to improved translator docs, punting to next minor releaseMinor Release A set of releases or versions having the same minor version number may be collectively referred to as .x , for example version 5.2.x to refer to versions 5.2, 5.2.1, 5.2.3, and all other versions in the 5.2 (five dot two) branch of that software. Minor Releases often make improvements to existing features and functionality. (4.8.1)
  • #40932: moved to Future Release
  • #40927: not a regressionregression A software bug that breaks or degrades something that previously worked. Regressions are often treated as critical bugs or blockers. Recent regressions may be given higher priorities. A "3.6 regression" would be a bug in 3.6 that worked as intended in 3.5., moved to Future Release
  • #40906: marked as a dupe of #40685, not a blockerblocker A bug which is so severe that it blocks a release. for 4.8

Other News

  • Customize: looking for a new contributor to work on the HTMLHTML HyperText Markup Language. The semantic scripting language primarily used for outputting content in web browsers./Code widget, a good-first-bug, please chat in #core-customize if you’re interested
  • Editor: working to get the 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 in the plugin repo so that more people can review it and provide feedback. Goal is this week.
  • Devchat coordination: will be covered in upcoming devchat

#4-8, #core, #dev-chat, #summary

Dev Chat Summary: February 15th (4.7.3 week 3)

This post summarizes the dev chat meeting from February 15th (agendaSlack archive).

4.7.3 Schedule

  • Completed first pass on all tickets in the 4.7.3 milestone, @jnylen0 is reviewing those that “need” to land in 4.7.3, and identifying a release date for 4.7.3 in the coming week

Customizer team update

  • #23601 (Use ACE Code Editor for Theme and 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 editors) and #12423 (Include Ace (or similar) as default code editor)
    • Topic of discussion is a code editor library to be used in Custom CSSCSS Cascading Style Sheets., WP content editor HTMLHTML HyperText Markup Language. The semantic scripting language primarily used for outputting content in web browsers. view, file editor, and any other place that code is modified
    • Had planned to go ahead with CodeMirror since it is what Jetpack uses in its Custom CSS module, but @afercia pointed out 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) problems
    • So we’re looking for insights into best of breed accessible code editor libraries
    • @afercia: looking to to understand if (1.) there’s consensus about introducing some sort of syntax highlighter library (plus other functionalities) and (2.) if it is going to completely replace the current WP content editor HTML view
    • @jorbin: Once one is decided upon, would like to encourage reaching out to the project maintainers and opening a dialogue about things like security and backwards compatibility
    • @helen: each area (Custom CSS, WP content editor HTML view, file editor) needs individual consideration and rationale
    • Goal is to provide a better user experience for when users edit code in WP
    • Custom CSS:
      • #38707: CustomizerCustomizer Tool built into WordPress core that hooks into most modern themes. You can use it to preview and modify many of your site’s appearance settings.: Additional CSS highlight, revisionsRevisions The WordPress revisions system stores a record of each saved draft or published update. The revision system allows you to see what changes were made in each revision by dragging a slider (or using the Next/Previous buttons). The display indicates what has changed in each revision., selection, per-page, pop-out
      • @westonruter this is what #core-customize is most interested in, but picking a code editor library should be done ensuring that it doesn’t cause headaches if code editors are implemented for HTML view and file editor. i.e. the same library should be used throughout coreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress..
    • WP content editor HTML view:
      • @joemcgill: the text editor now is not technically an HTML view, but is a plain text editor that is parsed into HTML. For instance, breaks are turned into `<p>` tags, shortcodes can be typed, etc., so a “code editor” is something slightly different.
      • @helen: per @iseulde and lots of discussions over time, is a little more complicated in that it’s not an actual HTML editor, so is getting rid of wpautop() is a requirement
      • @mike: I’d love to see code highlighting in the HTML view.
      • @afercia: If both the visual editor and the text editor are going to be replaced by 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/ and some sort of CodeMirror-like, well the level of accessibility for both is still uncertain and there’s the danger to introduce an accessibility barrier for the main scope of WordPress: entering content.
    • File editor:
      • @jorbin: I seem to remember that having been replaced with something fancier than what is in place now, but that having been ripped out
      • @helen: File editors really raise the question of whether users should be made more comfortable in them vs. being encouraged to use something else.
      • @brechtryckaert: security-wise I’m not a fan of the ability to edit files from the backend, people who are comfortable enough to edit code usually have a prefered editor
    • @jorbin: We already have our agreed upon accessibility coding standards that state:
      • All new or updated code released in WordPress must conform with the WCAGWCAG WCAG is an acronym for Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. These guidelines are helping make sure the internet is accessible to all people no matter how they would need to access the internet (screen-reader, keyboard only, etc) https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/. 2.0 guidelines at level AA

    •  @westonruter: if CodeMirror fails this test, as it seems to, then we need input on GPLGPL GNU General Public License. Also see copyright license.-compatible code editors that are accessible.
    • @afercia: I propose to discuss this at the next accessibility meeting on Monday, invite people to do research, and possibly involve the testers group.
  • #38900 (Customize: Add 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/. endpoints for changesets) and #39634 (Customize: Add REST API endpoints for panels, sections, controls, settings, and partials)
    • Thanks to @kadamwhite we have an initial (empty) feature plugin repo for the REST API endpoints for customization
    • Feel free to watch that repo and be apprised of developments
    • Next steps are to design the endpoints, write the failing tests for them, and then  go about writing the endpoint controllers
    • @kadamwhite: this is the first major effort within other areas of core that are turning up inconsistencies like #39805 (Expose featured_media property on post resources in “embed” context) so I’m excited to see what other improvements we can make as this work continues

Editor team update

  • Working full steam on prototypes, notably the Gutenberg UI prototype
  • The related GitHub repo has quickly become wonderfully active
  • Looking to discuss browser support for the new editor
    • @georgestephanis: So long as it can fall back to something that doesn’t utterly die, it should probably be fine.
    • WP Adminadmin (and super admin) currently supports IE 8
    • Current browser market share
    • @jorbin: I would love to see us not drop support for anyone if possible
    • @joemcgill: Alternately, if we’re going to bump the browser requirements at any point, now is probably the time.
    • @joen: flexbox was mentioned as being nice to use in context of editor UIUI User interface
    • flexbox support
  • The agenda for the Editor chat today was to discuss how using the UI prototype felt in the past week, and deciding where to take it next
  • We are looking for people to use and provide feedback the prototype, so please take a look if you can!

REST API team update

  • The REST API team has no significant updates since last week.

#4-7-3, #core, #dev-chat, #summary

Customization in 2017

The editor will endeavour to create a new page and post building experience that makes writing rich posts effortless, and has “blocks” to make it easy what today might take shortcodes, custom HTMLHTML HyperText Markup Language. The semantic scripting language primarily used for outputting content in web browsers., or “mystery meat” embed discovery.

The customizerCustomizer Tool built into WordPress core that hooks into most modern themes. You can use it to preview and modify many of your site’s appearance settings. will help out the editor at first, then shift to bring those fundamental building blocks into something that could allow customization “outside of the box” of post_content, including sidebars and possibly even an entire theme.

Matt

One expectation I want to start with is, customization isn’t just improving the Customizer — our goal is to improve the entire process of setting up a site, from initial installation to something you’re comfortable launching, to making changes to an existing site that has been live for some time. To that end, our goal is to help people accomplish the following:

  • “I want to make a site that I’m proud of that helps me succeed.”
  • “I want to make a site my clients are proud of that helps them succeed.”

The current customization flow in WordPress doesn’t generally facilitate either of those goals without a great amount of work, prior knowledge, and often a lot of additional development. That’s fine if you’ve hired an agency, or you’re a developer building yourself a website — but not fine if you’re a freelance site builder/implementer (a market I see every day in my local community) or are trying to build something for yourself with limited time and budget. If you can install WordPress, either manually or through a host, we should provide you with the tools to build out a website that accomplishes your personal and business goals.

With these goals in mind, what can we accomplish in the first couple months of the year?

  • Demo content on theme switch for an existing site. [#38624]
  • Pain points with lost widgets and menus when switching themes. [#19912]
  • Exploring a better customization-focused onboarding experience.
  • Adding an media widgetWidget A WordPress Widget is a small block that performs a specific function. You can add these widgets in sidebars also known as widget-ready areas on your web page. WordPress widgets were originally created to provide a simple and easy-to-use way of giving design and structure control of the WordPress theme to the user.. [#32417]
  • Adding formatting options to the text widget. [#35243]
  • Adding a code editor to the Custom CSSCSS Cascading Style Sheets. control, and make additional enhancements. [#12423, #38707]
  • 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/. endpoints. [#39634, #38900]
  • Improving Custom Logos. [#38329, #36191]
  • Some more minor Customizer improvements [#37471, #38953, #39389] and continued bug fixing.
  • What else? Please comment.

Throughout the rest of the year, there’s a lot of larger projects that we’ll collaborate with the editor team on:

  • Content blocks, so we can build a better layout editor that helps people build a site that fits their individual needs. [Post]
  • RevisionsRevisions The WordPress revisions system stores a record of each saved draft or published update. The revision system allows you to see what changes were made in each revision by dragging a slider (or using the Next/Previous buttons). The display indicates what has changed in each revision., so you can visually see the changes you’ve made to your site and revert if you mess up. [#31089, #21666]
  • Drafting, reviewing, publishing, and scheduling changes, so you can get your site looking just right before you push your changes live. [#31089, #28721]

Some of these, like revisions in the Customizer, we can prioritize sooner.

By the end of 2017, we hope you’ll be able to:

  • Have an onboarding experience with smart defaults that guides you towards building the site you want, faster.
  • Build complex, dynamic layouts for your WordPress sites, regardless of your theme.
  • Move any piece of content on your site to a different part of your site, just by dragging and dropping it where you want.
  • Allow you to preview and select page layouts before you create your page.
  • Edit every piece of content where you see it, instead of needing to hunt for it.
  • Set up a basic website without having to jump in and out of multiple adminadmin (and super admin) screens.
  • Live preview any settings that affect how your site looks.
  • Revert changes and see your revision history.
  • Maybe even build your whole site from your phone?

What other customization flows do you think we need to improve? We need your input to help make a better way to build sites with WordPress.

We’ll be doing weekly meetings every Monday. The next meeting is Monday at 1:00PM EST. Join us in #core-customize in SlackSlack Slack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. to get involved!

Dev Chat Summary: October 12 (4.7 week 8)

This post summarizes the dev chat meeting from October 12th (agenda, Slack archive).

Reminders

Feature Proposals for 4.7

  • REST API: Content API (@kadamwhite)
    • REST API Team Update
    • Content 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. endpoints have been stable for some time and now have the missing functionality established at the start of this development cycle
    • We pitched merging in the OAuth 1 server alongside those content endpoints, to simplify the process of authenticating from remote applications
    • The auth method in coreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress. right now is cookie/nonce-based, so it’s available to any code running within the same domain as the main WordPress install and leverages the existing login cookie
    • plugins and themes that utilize JSJS JavaScript, a web scripting language typically executed in the browser. Often used for advanced user interfaces and behaviors. to enhance the editing experience within their adminadmin (and super admin) UIUI User interface have full read/write access, restricted to the capabilities of the authenticated user
    • External applications, e.g. a mobile app, desktop app or external server, would have read-only access
    • readers, aggregators, etc are possible without authentication, and more complex read-write apps can be written by installing one of the available authentication plugins, of which OAuth is but one
    • Reference for options and when/how to use
    • 90 contributors for 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
    • automated test coverage currently at 90.44%
    • 37 more open tickets
    • weekly meeting on Monday at 1400UTC in #core-restapi
  • Discovering and installing themes in the customizer (@celloexpressions)
    • Related Make/Design and Make/Flow posts, but best to post all feedback to the Make/Core feature proposal
    • Working through the 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) feedback, but it’s a bit unclear what’s specific to this feature versus the customizerCustomizer Tool built into WordPress core that hooks into most modern themes. You can use it to preview and modify many of your site’s appearance settings. in general, and which issues are also present in the admin theme installer
    • Haven’t heard anything from polyglots, security (unlikely to have any issues), or docs
    • There is one known i18ni18n Internationalization, or the act of writing and preparing code to be fully translatable into other languages. Also see localization. Often written with a lowercase i so it is not confused with a lowercase L or the numeral 1. Often an acquired skill. concern where we’ll need a compromise until we have JS i18n in core
    • @celloexpressions to do a final iteration to pick up any remaining feedback on Thursday, then pass to @westonruter for the code review process
  • Custom CSS with live previews (@celloexpressions)
    • seems to have decent support as a feature, with the biggest question in the comments being how to store and output the CSSCSS Cascading Style Sheets.
    • CSS is output from the db via a style tagtag A directory in Subversion. WordPress uses tags to store a single snapshot of a version (3.6, 3.6.1, etc.), the common convention of tags in version control systems. (Not to be confused with post tags.), use of `style` tag is key for targeting for `postMessage` live preview
    • Post-based storage allows for revisionsRevisions The WordPress revisions system stores a record of each saved draft or published update. The revision system allows you to see what changes were made in each revision by dragging a slider (or using the Next/Previous buttons). The display indicates what has changed in each revision. built in (ensuring that there are hooksHooks In WordPress theme and development, hooks are functions that can be applied to an action or a Filter in WordPress. Actions are functions performed when a certain event occurs in WordPress. Filters allow you to modify certain functions. Arguments used to hook both filters and actions look the same. for a plugin that wants to write a file would alleviate many concerns)
    • CSS is theme-specific in the proposal for this, with a post object for each theme that has CSS
    • Scheduling a meeting to go through these concerns and make a decision, coordination to occur in #core-customize
  • Customize Changesets (née Transactions) (@westonruter)
    • Technical Post (audience is developers who have extended the customizer significantly, as there may be impacts to any heavy customizer integrations since changesets touches some very low-level stuff in the customizer)
    • Users will be able to bookmark a customizer session since the changeset UUID will be part of the URLURL A specific web address of a website or web page on the Internet, such as a website’s URL www.wordpress.org
    • Theme switches will no longer result in changes being lost (no more AYS dialog)
    • a few other open questions and issues that have been noted

Components

  • Customize (@westonruter, @celloexpressions)
  • Twenty Seventeen (@davidakennedy, @melchoyce)
    • Latest theme update
    • Theme: This week, there has been a lot of testing after the initial design implementation was merged last week. One week to go and the focus is on three specific enhancements to come to a conclusion on: custom colors, SVGs for icons and more use of flexbox.
    • Multi-panel feature: 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. exist, and it’s been iterated on a lot. This is close to being ready for being considered for merge. It needs more code review and a look by other teams (accessibility for one).
    • Video headers feature: we have an mvp defined,  a new patch started and @celloexpressions will work on the Customizer part of it. This is not as far along, but could be ready by the deadline.
    • A lot of issues need to be punted or moved on. Tracking everything toward merge for Twenty Seventeen via GitHub milestone.
    • Will generate a merge proposal for the theme by Monday if not sooner. Will have brief daily check-ins/meetings for the theme until the proposal is posted.
    • @celloexpressions: visual edit icons in the customizer (#27403) are probably happening but won’t need a proposal there since the implementation is straightforward.
    • @helen: will follow up on #38114
    • 29 contributors on Twenty Seventeen
    • Team would appreciate any PR reviews on the theme, eyes on the multi-panel ticketticket Created for both bug reports and feature development on the bug tracker., and testing with all kinds of devices and browsers.
    • Next steps: (1) Focus on feedback/iteration for these big enhancements: custom colors, SVGs for icons and more use of flexbox. (2) Triagetriage The act of evaluating and sorting bug reports, in order to decide priority, severity, and other factors. necessary items into merge milestone. (3) Close as much as possible
    • Next meeting Tuesday, October 18, 2016, 1:00 PM CDT in #themereview
  • Media (@mikeschroder, @joemcgill)
  • i18n (@swissspidy)
  • Editor (@azaozz, @iseulde)
  • HTTPSHTTPS HTTPS is an acronym for Hyper Text Transfer Protocol Secure. HTTPS is the secure version of HTTP, the protocol over which data is sent between your browser and the website that you are connected to. The 'S' at the end of HTTPS stands for 'Secure'. It means all communications between your browser and the website are encrypted. This is especially helpful for protecting sensitive data like banking information. (@johnbillion)
    • Next meeting Friday, October 14, 2016, 11:00 AM CDT in #core-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.

#4-7, #core, #dev-chat, #summary