WordPress 4.1 will be adding several major improvements for theme developers. Joost de Valk opened a ticket three years ago, requesting a better option for controlling the output of title tags. He proposed a patch that would output the title tag during the run of wp_head, based on whether the current theme has added theme_support.…
One of the feature plugins under development for possible inclusion to WordPress 4.1 is called Focus. Focus enhances the Distraction Free Writing mode in WordPress. Janneke Van Dorpe is the lead developer for the project with Mark Jaquith and Andrew Ozz contributing as well. Unlike DFW mode in WordPress 4.0, Focus keeps the meta boxes,…
Today Matt Mullenweg delivered his annual State of the Word address at WordCamp San Francisco, with roughly 1,000 WordPress enthusiasts and contributors in attendance and hundreds more watching via livestream. Before jumping into the results of the survey, Mullenweg announced that this would be the last event held at Mission Bay conference center. Touch the…
While it’s easy to focus on WordPress core development, there are a handful of satellite projects to keep an eye on. There is so much happening around the WordPress project, it’s tough to keep up. This post highlights some of the satellite projects and initiatives that are being developed concurrently with WordPress. Feature Plugin: Improve…
Matt Mullenweg made waves this past weekend during his Q&A session at WordCamp Europe when he strongly advocated the importance of companies contributing back to WordPress. He offered a rule of thumb for companies that benefit from the software and want to invest in the future of WordPress: I think a good rule of thumb…
Nine years ago, John Blackbourn was stocking shelves at a supermarket 40 hours per week and returning home to do another 20 hours of freelance work on the side. His journey with WordPress started much like many others, when his first patch was accepted seven years ago. This past weekend at WordCamp Europe, Blackbourn was…
If the WordPress community is your only barometer of knowing how an open source community works together, then you might want to explore outside a bit further to gain a broader outlook on other cultures. Some of the differences are worth examining. A few days ago I noticed an interesting observation regarding the relationship between…
Contributors on the WordPress Meta team are responsible for WordPress.org and its associated sites, i.e. wordcamp.org, apps.wordpress.org, etc. The team works on supporting and improving these sites along with the build tools that are used by the other contributor groups. Folks often complain about how the sites work, but did you know that much of…
WordPress 4.0 “Benny” was released today, named for American jazz and swing musician Benny Goodman, also known as the “King of Swing.” Development for 4.0 kicked off at the end of April, led by Helen Hou-Sandí. This release includes hundreds of refinements and a few brand new features, culminating in a more polished media and…
WordPress 4.0 RC 1 is now available for download. Helen Hou-Sandí announced the release candidate today with an update to the project schedule. The official release was targeted for the week of August 25th but will likely be arriving the following week. “We hope to ship WordPress 4.0 next week, but we need your help…
WordPress global usage on the web is now at 23%, and this year marked the first time that non-English downloads surpassed the number of English downloads. Major internationalization improvements coming in 4.0 will open up the platform even more for those publishing in different languages. While discussing the upcoming language-related improvements at WordCamp Seattle this…
WordPress 4.0 release lead Helen Hou-Sandí recently gave an in-depth preview of the upcoming release at the WordPress NYC Meetup. Her presentation gives a complete overview of the new features that you will see in the official release next week. Part of Hou-Sandí’s responsibility as the release lead is to help shape the scope, goals…
The WordPress plugin installer page is about to get more colorful. The upcoming 4.0 release completely revamps the plugin search and installation process with plugin cards arranged in a new grid view. Andrew Nacin announced today that plugins will also have their own icons in the installer. Plugin authors are at liberty to create their…
The folks at WordPress.com VIP are continuing to add to Documattic, a repository dedicated to sharing presentations and resources with the WordPress community. While the repository already contains some solid resources for WordPress in enterprise and government, today’s addition may have the widest reach, as it pertains to user education. The WordPress.com VIP Superuser Training…
Something I’ve wanted to see in WordPress for a long time is the ability to determine which posts an image is being used on. WordPress 4.0 is expected to ship by the end of August and contains two subtle changes to image data in the media library. You’ll be able to view the author who…