In chatting with the kids while running evening errands and driving to and from kids activities, one of the 5yos asked why the library wasn’t called the book jackpot. ???? Good question kid. I’m now referring to the library as the Book Jackpot™️.
Category: Asides
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Happy 7th Birthday Gutenberg!
Just over 7 years ago, Gutenberg was “born“. Congrats to Matías Ventura for that initial commit and the 1,099 contributors for achieving this milestone. Hopefully the new Props Bot will bring significantly more credited contributors over the next year such that we’re celebrating and even more successful 8th birthday next year!
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Matt + 40 = Bloganuary
Earlier this year (I know, AGES ago right?) Matt Mullenweg shared that as part of his 40th birthday he wanted more folks blogging. None of my 27 draft posts felt worthwhile and then realized the Bloganuary prompts might be a good place to go. So here we go with today’s prompt: Describe an item you were incredibly attached to as a youth. What became of it?
The first thing that came to mind was baseball cards. Going to baseball card shows with my dad, collecting and trading with friends, being obsessed with box scores in the local paper and attempting to create a fantasy baseball league all based on printed stats all while flipping baseball cards against a wall, and the worst offender of all was putting baseball cards in the spokes of our bike tires because “it made a cool sound”. That all faded away probably about the same time the original Nintendo Entertainment System came into my life, but that’s a post for another day.
A couple years ago my parents moved out of my childhood home and in that move came across large caches of baseball cards; unfortunately they were not the retirement fund a 10yo version of myself had dreamed of. However, a couple storage bins made their way back home with me and during 2020 became a good way to spend time at night sorting through to see faces and names that I hadn’t seen in decades. Some ended up actually being worth something and has become a bit of a small side hobby of pairing down my childhood collection to a truly valuable few and some others that I otherwise enjoy.
I’ve even got some of my kids into modern day trading card collecting, or at least enjoying time opening packs together like I did with my dad almost 40 years ago.
And I’ve even gotten back, albeit a little, into collecting modern day cards.
And in a bit of a “burying the lede” let’s get back to wishing Matt a happy birthday, shall we? ;)
Shoutout to Aaron Jorbin and Jonathan Desrosiers who joined me in funding this video. Click on their name, they both shared this video with their own birthday greeting. It’s like an old-school blog-ring. If you send me a pingback with this video on your site, I’ll add you to this post.
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Are your WordPress plugins GPL compatible?
A little over two months ago I spoke at WordCamp US on the topic of “[u]sing a GitHub Action to ensure your plugins are GPL compatible.” The primary concern was ensuring that WordPress plugins focus on more than just first-party code being properly licensed and expanding that to ensure that all third-party libraries (aka dependencies) are also properly licensed. So that folks don’t need to continually check for that in every pull request, using a GitHub Action to help automate the process can give immediate comfort that this is no longer a concern for plugin developers.
Last week I met with Doc Pop on the Press This podcast to talk a bit more on the topic to give folks additional context beyond my WCUS lightning talk. You can listen via the Press This RedCircle episode page or via the Spotify embed below (the only service that embeds nicely).
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????️???? Happy Pride Month! ????️????
May this month bring greater acceptance for all our LGBTQIA+ friends and where public acceptance is lacking may allies step in to show their support.
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Hire Jorbin, a totally standard and normal internet person
If you’ve got a digital org looking for someone to help scale while truly caring about how his team grows and performs, then go check out my friend the purveyor of bowties.
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Feed My Starving Children
This morning Finley, Gavin, and I went to Feed My Starving Children (FMSC) and volunteered by packing bags and boxes of their Manna Rice product that is specifically designed to assist in reversing and preventing undernutrition worldwide.
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How you can contribute to WordPress (yes, ???? YOU!)
Me: Do you regularly use WordPress? ????
You: Yes, I love it, it’s fantastic! ????
Me: Have you ever thought about helping contribute to WordPress? ????
You: No, I am not a developer. ????
Me: Well, good news, you do not have to be! ????
You: Ok, tell me more… ????
Whether you have considered it or not, I am absolutely certain that you CAN contribute to WordPress that I will personally offer to help you find a way to do so. I will outline some options below, but feel free to reach out to me directly and I promise to do the best I can to help!
Note that this post is an update and refresh of a prior post on make.xwp.co.
But first, a little background on me… ????️
I graduated from college in 2001 with a degree in Computer Science, but have not spent any significant time coding since then. I have held roles in project management, product management, and team and customer management. The way I tell it, no one would realistically hire me these days for fine-crafted engineering. And yet, there has been a fantastic opportunity for me to help contribute to WordPress starting as a deputy release lead on WordPress 4.7. While this was a significant time commitment for me, there are many ways you can contribute with minimal time commitment.
Now let us focus on how you could contribute… ????️♂️
I am going to give you some options to describe yourself and then help show how different types of people within the WordPress community can contribute. It is like a choose-your-own-adventure!
Are you a project or product manager? ????️
Wonderful! There are WordPress component maintainers (in most cases, developers) that would love help running their regular meetings, taking actionable notes and publishing them, and tracking work against a roadmap. Read through the different components and reach out to the maintainers on Slack for whichever component is of most interest to you, they’ll be able to tell you how best you could help them. Come help ensure WordPress continues to deliver regular updates to the community!
Do you enjoy testing software and trying to find deficiencies? ????
Fantastic! There are many defect and enhancement tickets that have untested code available that would benefit from being tested appropriately. There are also many platforms that WordPress supports that would benefit from specific, detailed testing and issue logging. Take a look at how you could contribute with testing and then dive in whether it’s with automated testing, beta testing, user testing, or one of many other ways to help with testing. The best team to join is the Test team, so read through their handbook, and follow along via the #core-test channel in Slack. And remember, even something as simple as a well-defined bug report is a beautiful thing!
Do you speak a language other than English? ????
Magnifique! There are many parts of WordPress that have not yet been fully translated into the 192 locales (and growing!) that are supported. Start by reading through the “get involved” portion of the Polyglots’ handbook, then read through how the translation process works with Glotpress, and then start translating. The Polyglots team welcomes you with open arms!
Do you enjoy organizing events? ????
Awesome! The Community team oversees official events (WordCamps), mentorship programs, diversity initiatives, contributor outreach, and other ways of growing the community. These ALL need help coordinating and would love to have your help! Take a look through the various handbooks for the team, read through the active projects to see which interests you most, and then follow along in the #community-team channel in Slack.
Are you a designer? ????
Marvelous! There is a constant need for usability testing, wireframing, prototyping, and visual designing to ensure that the user experience of reading and writing on WordPress is as seamless and graceful as possible. 34.7% (and growing!) of websites on the web need you! If you find interest here, then read through the Design handbook and follow along in the #design channel in Slack.
Are you a developer? ????️
Super! There are defects and enhancements both large and small that await your attention. Start off by reading through the Core handbook on how to “contribute with code” and “fixing bugs”, find a “good first bug” ticket to work on, ensure you’re following the WordPress Coding Standards, and then get to work writing a patch. If WordPress is going to continually deliver updates to the community and march down the roadmap that is constantly evolving, then we need your help to engineer that future!
Are you interested in mobile application development? ????
Brilliant! Then check out the Mobile team and the iOS and Android repos on GitHub and read through their guide on contributing to WordPress apps.
Do you believe in making sure everyone is able to access the web? ????️
Fabulous! Then check out the Accessibility team, read how you can get involved with improving accessibility within WordPress, and then follow along in the #accessibility channel in Slack.
Do you enjoy helping others learn how to use WordPress? ????
Excellent! Then check out the Support team, read their handbook, re-read the “giving good support” section as you will be the face to WordPress users in need, and then follow along in the #forums channel in Slack.
Do you love having beautiful, functional themes in the theme directory? ????
Outstanding! Then check out the Theme Review team, read how you can get started with theme reviews, request a theme to review and run through the review tests, and then follow along in the #themereview channel in Slack.
Do you love having secure, functional plugins in the plugin directory? ????
Terrific! Then check out the Plugins team, read through their handbook with specific focus on the “get involved” section, and then follow along in the #pluginreview channel in Slack.
Do you enjoy ensuring documentation is updated and accurate? ????
Incredible! Then check out the Documentation team, read through their Gutenberg HelpHub documentation, Codex to DevHub migration, and API documentation projects to see which interests you most, and then follow along in the #docs channel in Slack.
Do you enjoy teaching others how to use WordPress? ????
Phenomenal! Then check out the Training team, read through their handbook and then the “getting started” guide, consider whether you want to help with writing, copyediting, testing, auditing, connecting or reviewing, and then follow along in the #training channel in Slack.
Do you just want to build WordPress sites? ????????
Groovy! Then check out the Meta team, read through their handbook, review their list of current and upcoming projects to see which most interest you, and then follow along in the #meta channel in Slack.
Do you enjoy video post-production? ????
Sensational! Then check out the WordPress.tv team, read through their handbook, decide if you’re most interested in helping with video editing or managing subtitles or captions, and then following along in the #wptv channel in Slack.
Are you none of those things I have mentioned above? ????
Perfect! You are unique just like all of us in the WordPress community. Please reach out to me via the Comments section or my contact information below. We will work together to find a way for you to help advance the WordPress community!
WordPress Slack: @jeffpaul
Twitter: @jeffpaul
Email: jeff.paul+help@10up.com
