Alex Kirk 4:12 pm on December 12, 2023
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X-post: Update on Matrix Migration: Pausing the Transition

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Felipe Santos 5:01 pm on December 2, 2023  

Join the Plugin Review team!

The application period is now closed. We appreciate the interest of everyone who applied. Expect to hear from our team by January 31, 2024 February 17, 2024.

Edit: We had more than 70 applications, which delayed the whole process, so we will publish the announcement in a few weeks.

We’re happy to announce the reopening of applications for 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 Review team!

Our team is looking for new members who believe in our mission of guiding plugin authors in responsibly transforming their innovative ideas into reality and ensuring a great WordPress plugin experience for end users.

Given the significant level of access and responsibility within the community, we plan to add only three new members in this round. This path helps us address long-term challenges associated with team expansion.

Our goals

The primary goal of adding new members is really to improve the state of our plugin review queue — our hiring and onboarding procedures have been undergoing restructuring, and we had to finish the onboarding for new team members before restarting the process.

Besides improving the queue, we’re focused on creating a diverse and inclusive team. If you feel underrepresented in the community, we want you to know that we not only accept you, we embrace you!

We believe that having a team with different experiences and backgrounds is important for more creativity and inclusivity in the WordPress world. If you belong to a group that’s not well-represented in tech, your unique view is really important and wanted in our team.

Main tasks and expectations

Your tasks would look like this:

  • Dive into plugin reviews, ensuring they meet our high standards. This is crucial for maintaining the quality and security of WordPress plugins.
  • Review the mailbox for questions and requests from plugin authors and users.
  • Work with the team on process improvement — we’re always looking to do things better.
  • Get involved in developing tools that help us and the WordPress community, like the Plugin Check Plugin (PCP).

We also expect you to pledge at least 4 hours per week to be part of the team.

We would like team members to have a deep understanding of PHPPHP PHP (recursive acronym for PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor) is a widely-used open source general-purpose scripting language that is especially suited for web development and can be embedded into HTML. https://www.php.net/manual/en/preface.php., JavaScriptJavaScript JavaScript or JS is an object-oriented computer programming language commonly used to create interactive effects within web browsers. WordPress makes extensive use of JS for a better user experience. While PHP is executed on the server, JS executes within a user’s browser. https://www.javascript.com/./ReactReact React is a JavaScript library that makes it easy to reason about, construct, and maintain stateless and stateful user interfaces. https://reactjs.org/. (for the blockBlock Block is the abstract term used to describe units of markup that, composed together, form the content or layout of a webpage using the WordPress editor. The idea combines concepts of what in the past may have achieved with shortcodes, custom HTML, and embed discovery into a single consistent API and user experience. editor), a solid understanding of the WordPress coreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress./plugin architecture, and skills in SQL/database management. We have some folks focused on security issues, but general web security practices are relevant as well.

However, it’s important to highlight that the ability to contribute to the team in different ways is valued, so not having a specific skill shouldn’t be a blocker.

Timeline

Our onboarding timeline:

  • November 2023: Finalization of new aspects of our process.
  • December 2023: The application form reopens for 30 days.
  • January 2024: Announcement of three new team members, chosen for their alignment with our team’s needs.

We plan to close the application form on 31 December 2023.

Apply now

You can apply using the button below:

[The application form is now closed.]

PS: If you have already applied in the last 12 months and would like to apply again, please share any new relevant skills and contributions to the community that make you a better fit now.

Questions or Feedback

Feel free to ask questions or share any feedback in the comments or email plugins at 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/.

Special thanks to @annezazu, @coachbirgit, @chanthaboune, @properlypurple, @jordesign, the DEIB working group, and all the members of our team — we appreciate the great feedback on restructuring our hiring and onboarding.

Edit: We clarified the technical expectations a bit more.

Alex Kirk 6:50 pm on December 1, 2023
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X-post: Embracing Matrix for Enhanced Communication

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Courtney Robertson 1:39 pm on November 30, 2023
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X-post: Create Tours for Make P2s

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Nick Diego 9:24 pm on November 22, 2023
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X-post: Redesigning Developer Resources and a call for testing

X-post from +make.wordpress.org/meta: Redesigning Developer Resources and a call for testing

Courtney Robertson 11:12 am on November 22, 2023
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X-post: Plugin Directory: Preview button revisited

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Francisco Torres 4:17 pm on October 30, 2023  

Plugin updates to SVN issues

tl;dr – There was a delay when updating plugins in the repository, everything seems to work fine again.

We have been receiving reports from 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 authors indicating that updates to their plugins made to SVNSVN Short for "SubVersioN", it's the code management system used to maintain the plugins hosted on WordPress.org. It's similar to git. are not reflecting the changes on the plugin page.

We understand that this situation is frustrating for plugin authors, as it’s challenging to determine whether the problem lies with an incorrect “Stable tag”, an incorrect “Version”, a mess with the folders or a combination of all of these.

Besides those cases, as far as we know, this seems to be a technical issue in the repository, so it’s on 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. team.

We have already escalated this issue to them and are waiting for it. Please wait patiently with us.

We will update this post as soon as we have more information. To help us manage other tasks within the repository, please refrain from sending us emails about this matter, as the updates provided here will contain all available information.

Updates:

  • October 30, 2023, at 7:26 UTC: First report of the issue by a plugin author.
  • October 30, 2023, at 10:45 UTC: Issue escalated.
  • October 30, 2023, at 20:50 UTC: Meta team has detected the process in charge and is manually triggering it. They are still working on make the automation work again. In the meantime, expect delays of several hours when updating a plugin to see changes on the plugin page.
  • October 30, 2023, at 21:00 UTC. This appears to fixed, and we will keep monitoring the situation.

Fortunately, this issue is not affecting the initial plugin reviews, which will allow us to continue working to reduce the backlog.

Felipe Santos 1:42 am on October 20, 2023
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X-post: Team Coordination for Plugin Directory Updates

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Julia Golomb 8:52 pm on September 21, 2023
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X-post: Community Summit 2023: Your Role in What’s Next

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Alvaro Gómez 4:09 pm on September 19, 2023
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Update: Turning the Tide

Currently there are 1,241 plugins awaiting review.

We are painstakingly aware of this. We check that number every day and realise how this delay is affecting 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 authors. We are sharing an update to let you know what we are doing, not just to fix the current situation, but also to prevent a similar scenario in the future.

New Team Members

We have three new people in the team: Gustavo Bordoni, Gagan Deep Singh & Rob Rawley (thank you!) and we are still reviewing submissions. The experience we have gained onboarding two rounds of new team members, added to the fact that we now have a system in place, means that it will be a lot easier to repeat this process in the future.

Since we have 40+ submissions at this point, we are planning to close the “Apply to join the team” form at the end of September. If you are planning to apply to join the team, please do so before Oct 1st. We would like to extend our gratitude to all those how have taken a step forward and volunteered to join the team.

Self-reviews

We have also started emailing plugin authors whose plugins are currently in the queue and asked them to self-check their plugins to ensure they meet basic security standards. We find ourselves correcting the same three or four errors on +95% of plugins and this is not a good use of our time. Once authors confirm that their plugins meet these basic requirements, we will proceed with the review.

We want to thank those of you who are receiving these emails for your collaboration, as it will allow us to tackle the current backlog a lot faster.

Plugin Check plugin

In the same vein, we are just about to release have just released a Plugin Check plugin (PCP) to the WP.org as a regular plugin. This plugin will allow authors to self-review their plugins automatically and will provide them with feedback and links to fix common errors.

Once the PCP is merged with this other plugin that the Performance team has been working on, it will provide checks for a lot of other things. When this is completed, we will be in a better spot to take in feedback and make improvements.

In the short term, we are going to ask authors to test their plugins using the PCP before submitting them, but our goal is to integrate the plugin as part of the submission process and run automated checks.

The Plugin Check plugin is about to be released has been released as a regular repo plugin. Running it will become requirement soon, please take a look now.

Security Reports

We have made significant progress with the security reports backlog, and we are hoping to clear that queue in a matter of days. This will mean more hands available to focus on new plugin reviews and other tasks. We have also made some progress regarding the methods and formats in which researchers submit their reports which, in turns reduces the amount of time required to process these reports.

Bailing Water Vs Fixing the Leak

If you indulge me to share a sailing metaphor: When your boat has a leak, it is more effective to prioritize fixing the source of the leak rather than solely focusing on bailing out water, even though to external observers, it might appear as if no progress is being made. Bailing water can provide temporary relief and may give the appearance of actively addressing the issue, but it is essentially a band-aid solution that requires continuous effort.

During the last 6 months, the Plugin review team has worked on documenting its processes, training new members and improving its tools. Now, thanks to your patience and support, the tide is about to turn.

#update