WPCampus, a conference focused on WordPress in higher-education takes place this week between July 12-14 at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. If you’re unable to attend in-person or would like to watch the event from home, visit the WPCampus Stream page. Beginning July 13th at 9AM CDT, all general sessions will be streamed live…
Gutenberg development continues along the roadmap Matt Mullenweg announced at WordCamp Europe with WordPress 4.9.8 set to introduce a “Try Gutenberg” prompt to increase usage and testing. Core design contributors are currently working on a few new iterations of the callout. They are also considering including a section inside the prompt with an option to…
Junko Nukaga began her journey into the world of WordPress in 2011, just after her hometown in Fukushima prefecture was hit by the 9.0 magnitude Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. The catastrophic event, referred to in Japan as the Great East Japan Earthquake, devastated the region’s infrastructure and took more than 15,000 lives. It also caused…
Paul Biron and Joshua Wold are leading the upcoming WordPress 4.9.8 release, which was originally announced as 4.9.7. WordPress core contributors met yesterday to decide the general focus and set the release schedule. In the meantime, the 4.9.7 security and maintenance release was rolled out to fix an authenticated arbitrary file deletion vulnerability, along with…
WordPress developer Jason Bobich has created an open source client-side React app called Just Write that provides a decoupled editing experience for WordPress. Bobich said he built the app in 10 days to explore the possibilities of React and the WP REST API. Although it’s still a work in progress, the app has a demo…
The WordCamp Incubator Program has selected Montevideo, Uruguay and Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia to host WordCamps in 2018. The program provides a jump start for new WordPress communities where meetups have not yet been well-established. Montevideo and Kota Kinabalu were selected from a short list of 14 communities that had been whittled down from 104 applications…
ThemeBeans founder Rich Tabor has released a new plugin called Block Unit Test for Gutenberg that helps theme authors test their themes for Gutenberg-readiness. It is similar to the Theme Unit Test but is limited to testing Gutenberg blocks. After installing and activating both Gutenberg and sBlock Unit Test, the plugin creates a new page…
Progressive themes was a hot topic at WordCamp Europe 2018. During the event I had the opportunity to set up a panel with four experts who are working to integrate progressive web development practices more deeply in WordPress core, plugins, and themes. These practices make it possible for a website (or app) to work offline,…
In this episode, John James Jacoby and I spend the first half of the show discussing WP Engine’s acquisition of StudioPress. We share reactions from social media, debate on whether it’s a good or bad thing for the WordPress ecosystem, and webhosts being at the top of the food chain. We also talk about a…
If you’re writing all your posts in the new Gutenberg editor but don’t want to give up convenient access to your fancy gifs and stock images, the new Drop It plugin has you covered. Riad Benguella, one of the engineers who is working on Gutenberg, created the plugin to offer one-click image insertion/upload from Unsplash.com.…
StudioPress, founded by Brian Gardner in 2007, has been acquired by managed WordPress hosting company WP Engine, for an undisclosed amount. In 2007, Gardner created the Revolution theme which took the WordPress world by storm. According to some people, it ignited the WordPress Premium theme market. In the midst of a GPL debate regarding themes…
Zac Gordon is hosting a “JavaScript for WordPress Conference” with two tracks on Friday, June 29, from 9:30 AM – 5:30 PM EDT. The free conference, sponsored by 10up and WP Buffs, includes a full day of online talks from JavaScript professionals who work in the WordPress ecosystem. Gordon will be streaming the talks live…
Gutenberg 3.1 added a tips interface that supports and guides new users who are learning to navigate the editor’s blocks and settings. The tips appear when a new user opens Gutenberg, highlighting useful items on the page. Although the tips may seem cluttered and intrusive to users who already know what they are doing, they…
TaxJar, a company that offers automated sales tax software, is hosting a free webinar June 27 at 11:30 AM CDT to answer questions regarding the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision on South Dakota v. Wayfair. The court ruled in favor of South Dakota on June 21st, 2018, allowing any state to require online sellers to collect…
At WordCamp Europe I had the opportunity to sit down with Matías Ventura, the technical lead for Gutenberg. Ventura, who has been responsible for building the vision for Gutenberg (in addition to building the actual product), shared a few things the team might have done differently in the earlier days to improve its reception in…