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People of WordPress: Thelma Mutete

Posted January 21, 2021 by webcommsat AbhaNonStopNewsUK. Filed under heropress.

WordPress is open source software, maintained by a global network of contributors. There are many examples of how WordPress has changed people’s lives for the better. In this monthly series, we share some of those lesser-known, amazing stories.

Thelma Mutete at a WordCamp

From a young age Thelma was encouraged by her father to ‘work hard, and dream big’. In High School, she pursued a career in Computer Science. She said: “I did not know what I would be doing or how I would get there but I just knew that I was going to pursue a career in information technology.”

She wrote her first line of code at the age of 16 living in Zimbabwe, Africa. This was to mark the beginning of her enthusiasm for computer programming.

When she joined the school’s computer class, Thelma thought she would learn Excel and Word. Instead, the assignment was to write her first program in C. She said: “It was not easy, but it was very exciting. l remember writing up simple code for a Video Club – a check-in/out for VHS tapes and CDs. Thus began my fascination with computers.”

Seven years later, she went on to university to study for a Bachelors in Business Management and Information Technology. Her third year internship was at a local web design and hosting company. Though she had hoped her placement would be at a local bank or telecommunications company, the chance to discover website design turned out to be the best thing that could have happened. 

In 2017, Thelma went on to work for a company designing websites using HTML, CSS, PHP, JavaScript and Joomla. She had heard about WordPress but had not used it. She recalls: “People have this misconception that WordPress is not for real developers and it is not secure and at that time I was one of those people.”

Finding a local community

From a discussion with a member of the local WordPress community, Thabo Tswana, about a striking swag gift from a WordCamp, Thelma’s interest was sparked. 

She started to find out more about WordPress and WooCommerce, and visited her local WordCamp Harare website. She was delighted to find that she could learn more about WordPress without needing any pre-existing knowledge, and wanted to be involved. So instead of just attending the camp, she volunteered too! 

Her response to her first WordPress event mirrors the experience of many others in the community. She said: “I only started using WordPress because of the awesome people that l had met at that WordCamp. Everyone was so welcoming.”

A week later, with help from Thabo, she designed her first website using WordPress.

She soon became more involved with the community and Meetups. Thelma participated in the first-ever ‘Women Who WordPress’ Meetup in 2018, with lots of women getting involved from bloggers to developers. 

She said: “We were free to talk and discuss a lot of things. We had more time to discuss the difference between WordPress.com and WordPress.org, we shared views on how to handle discrimination at work, how to promote your website and a whole lot of other things.”

Establishing roots in WordPress

In 2018, WordCamp Harare had its first-ever female Lead Organizer Tapiwanashe Manhobo. Thelma was part of the organising team that year and was assigned to handle Harare’s first Kids Camp to take place eight months later. You can read more about her experiences of organizing a Kids Camp on her blog.

She said: “After the first Kids Camp, we had several people in the local Zimbabwean WordPress community who were enthusiastic about encouraging young people to embrace ICT. In 2019, we had not planned to have a Kids Camp because of financial constraints but to our surprise, we had some anonymous donations and we managed to have a WordPress Community outreach to a youth centre, Centre for Total Transformation, a week after our WordCamp. It is a non-formal school that caters for underprivileged and vulnerable children. The group were able to share practical skills about using WordPress, computer hardware and software.

Thelma shares that she became hooked on WordPress because of its community. “I enjoy attending WordCamps, meeting new people and just learning new stuff. I have a huge list of WordCamps I would like to attend. Last year I managed to cross WordCamp Johannesburg off my list. When everything is back to normal my plan to travel to WordCamps will proceed (fingers crossed).”

Reaping the fruits of ongoing learning

Thelma is committed to ongoing development training. She said: “Even though I can still cook up code in C and Java, for now, I have also included WordPress PHP functions to the mix. It was not easy to get to this point, daring myself got me to this slightly better stage. I try to do my best where I can and I am happy to say it has paid off so far.”

Thelma has continued her journey working in design and digital marketing last year with Trust Nhokovenzo who works in digital marketing and is active in  the WordPress Community. He came across her name as a developer from talking with others involved in WordPress. She went to work with his team at a marketing agency.

Her interest in the development of WordPress continued and she joined the 5.6 Release Squad in the mid 2020. At the end of 2020, she moved to become a Happiness Engineer working with WordPress.com. Thelma’s fascination with the platform and the community continues to grow and her contributor story is ongoing.

Find out more about the Harare WordPress community in Zimbabwe.

Contributors

Thanks to Nalini Thakor (@nalininonstopnewsuk) and Surendra Thakor (@sthakor), Yvette Sonneveld (@yvettesonneveld), Abha Thakor (@webcommsat), Larissa Murillo (@lmurillom), Meher Bala (@meher), Josepha Haden (@chanthaboune), and Chloé Bringmann (@cbringmann). Thank you to Thelma Mutete (@thelmachido) for sharing her #ContributorStory.

HeroPress logo

This post is based on an article originally published on HeroPress.com, a community initiative created by Topher DeRosia. HeroPress highlights people in the WordPress community.

#ContributorStory #HeroPress

The Month in WordPress: December 2020

Posted January 5, 2021 by Hari Shanker R. Filed under Month in WordPress.

We bid goodbye to 2020 in style with the release of WordPress 5.6 and the launch of Learn WordPress. But these weren’t the only exciting updates from WordPress in December. Read on to learn more!


WordPress 5.6 is here

The latest major WordPress release, version 5.6 “Simone”, came out on December 8. The release ships with a new default theme called Twenty Twenty One. It offers a host of features, including:

  • Greater layout flexibility
  • More block patterns
  • Video captioning support
  • Auto-updates
  • Beta-compatibility for PHP 8.0
  • Application password support for the REST API
  • Updates to jQuery

In addition, WordPress 5.6 is now available in 55 languages. You can find more information about the release in the field guide, and you can update to the latest version directly from your WordPress dashboard or by downloading it directly from WordPress.org. A total of 605 people hailing from 57 different countries contributed to the development of WordPress 5.6. @audrasjb has compiled many more stats like that, showing what a tremendous group effort this was—they’re well worth a read!

Want to contribute to upcoming WordPress releases? Join the WordPress #core channel on the Make WordPress Slack and follow the Core team blog to learn the latest on WordPress 5.7, which is slated to be out by March 9, 2021. The Core team hosts weekly chats on Wednesdays at 5 a.m. and 8 p.m. UTC.

Watch the State of the Word 2020 recording

State of the Word 2020, the annual keynote address delivered by WordPress co-founder Matt Mullenweg, was streamed online for the first time on December 17. It was followed by a live Q&A from community members all across the world. You can find the stream recording on YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter. The State of the Word video and the Q&A session are also available on WordPress.tv. 

Learn WordPress has launched

Learn WordPress, a new free, on-demand WordPress learning resource, launched officially on December 15. It offers workshops, lesson plans, quizzes, and courses for anyone interested in publishing with, building for, or contributing to WordPress. WordPress enthusiasts can also participate in discussion groups focused on specific topics to learn with and from each other.

Want to participate in Learn WordPress? Here are four ways you can do so! Additionally, contributors have launched a discussion on the future of Learn WordPress—feel free to share your thoughts in the comments. To help promote Learn WordPress, check out the Marketing Team’s materials, which detail a range of fun and creative ways to share this new resource.

Give feedback on the Full Site Editing project

Contributor teams have kicked off the Full Site Editing (FSE) outreach program for anyone who is building or maintaining a WordPress site so that they can give feedback on the upcoming FSE feature that will be part of Gutenberg Phase 2. Your feedback will go a long way in improving FSE user flows. To participate, check out the initial testing call on the Make/Test blog and join the #fse-outreach-experiment Slack channel.

Want to follow updates on the FSE project? Check out this blog post. You can find 2020 updates to the FSE project in the Make/Core blog.

BuddyPress 7.0 “Filippi” and 7.10 are now available

BuddyPress version 7.0 went live on December 9. Its features include: 

  • New administration screens to manage Member and Group Types
  • New BP blocks for posts and pages
  • A default profile image for network sites
  • Improved BuddyPress Noveau support for the Twenty Twenty One theme. 

A BuddyPress maintenance release (version 7.1) launched on December 21. 

Want to provide feedback or suggestions for BuddyPress? Share your comments on the announcement posts for 7.0 or 7.1. If you find a bug, please report it in the support forums

Gutenberg 9.5 and 9.6 released

The Core team launched version 9.5 and 9.6 of Gutenberg last month. Both versions include several improvements to FSE flows, bug fixes, and feature upgrades. Version 9.5 introduces features like full height alignment and support for font sizes in the code block. Version 9.6 includes features like the ability to drag blocks from the inserter and a vertical layout for buttons. 

Want to get involved in building Gutenberg? Follow the Core team blog, contribute to Gutenberg on GitHub, and join the #core-editor channel in the Making WordPress Slack group.


Further Reading


Have a story that we should include in the next “Month in WordPress” post? Please submit it using this form.

Introducing Learn WordPress

Posted December 15, 2020 by Hugh Lashbrooke. Filed under Updates.

Learn WordPress is a learning resource providing workshops, quizzes, courses, lesson plans, and discussion groups so that anyone, from beginners to advanced users, can learn to do more with WordPress. Learning how to use, build for, and contribute to WordPress is essential for anyone wanting to dive deeper into the software and its community. 

This cross-team initiative is part of the WordPress.org network and features content from contributors from the global community. It will be updated weekly and will help connect new and existing WordPress users with the broader community while they learn.

What can you learn about WordPress?

On Learn WordPress you can find a range of material and opportunities to use at the time which works for you.

Workshops are practical, skills-based videos that show viewers how to do new things with WordPress, whether you publish, manage, develop with, or contribute to WordPress. Most workshops include quizzes for you to test your newly gained knowledge.

Discussion groups provide an opportunity for further collaborative learning with participants meeting together to discuss the workshop content – they take place online, either in video calls or Slack and accommodate all time zones.

Lesson plans are guides for facilitators to use while presenting at events or within educational environments. Facilitators will find learning objectives (telling people what they are going to learn), any prerequisite skills, assets such as screenshots and slide decks, and learning assessments. 

Courses are a series of interconnected lesson plans to be presented by a facilitator that will strategically focus on defined learning outcomes. Participants can go through these courses individually or as part of a group. After completing the learning, attendees should be able to apply their skills in the real world.

In addition to the wealth of valuable content available on Learn WordPress, the platform provides an opportunity for individuals to learn alongside other community members and become connected with a global network of WordPress users, developers, and contributors.

Why you should use Learn WordPress – videos from our community.

How can you get involved?

Learn WordPress is an open-source platform available for anyone to contribute content in any areas mentioned above. Find out more about how you can get involved with this initiative.

Take part in our fun promotion campaigns on social and with your local community.

Hundreds of people spanning a number of years have contributed to the development of learning materials. Thanks to everyone who worked so hard to make Learn WordPress a reality. 

Particular thanks to:

Training: @courane01, @azhiyadev, @geheren, @webtechpooja, @jessecowens, @onealtr, @rastaban, @evarlese, @manzwebdesigns
Meta: @coreymckrill, @dufresnesteven, @jonoaldersonwp
Community: @hlashbrooke, @camikaos, @harishanker, @angelasjin, @nao, @courtneypk, @andreamiddleton, @rmarks, @sippis
Marketing: @webcommsat@oglekler, @lmurillom, @yvettesonneveld, @meher, @nalininonstopnewsuk, @megphillips91, @marks99, @marybaum, @antialiasfactory, @herculespekkas, @chaion07
Design: @melchoyce 

For a fuller list of the contributors who have been involved in training and Learn WordPress, visit the initial beta launch post. Thanks to everyone who has been involved to date and will be in the future. 

#LearnWordPress #LearnWP

WordPress 5.6 “Simone”

Posted December 8, 2020 by Josepha. Filed under Releases.

Meet Simone, our latest and greatest WordPress release. Named for the legendary performer Nina Simone, who is known for tunes like “Feeling Good”, “Young, Gifted and Black”, and “Four Women”. Fire up a playlist with her best work and read on to discover what we have in store for you.

WordPress 5.6 Simone with a photo of Nina Simone

Welcome to WordPress 5.6

Sharing your stories has never been easier.

WordPress 5.6 brings you countless ways to set your ideas free and bring them to life. With a brand-new default theme as your canvas, it supports an ever-growing collection of blocks as your brushes. Paint with words. Pictures. Sound. Or rich embedded media.

colored circles

Greater layout flexibility

Bring your stories to life with more tools that let you edit your layout with or without code. Single column blocks, designs using mixed widths and columns, full-width headers, and gradients in your cover block—make small changes or big statements with equal ease!

More block patterns

In some themes, preconfigured block patterns make setting up standard pages on your site a breeze. Let the power of patterns streamline your workflow and save you clicks. Plus, share these features with clients, editors, and more.

Better video captioning

To help you add subtitles or captions to your videos, you can now upload them within your post or page. This makes it easier than ever to make your videos accessible for anyone who needs or prefers to use subtitles.

black vertical line

Twenty Twenty-One is here!

Examples of block patterns available in Twenty Twenty-One.

Twenty Twenty-One is a blank canvas for your ideas, and the block editor is the best brush. It is built for the block editor and packed with brand-new block patterns you can only get in the default themes. Try different layouts in a matter of seconds, and let the theme’s eye-catching, yet timeless design make your work shine. 

What’s more, this default theme puts accessibility at the heart of your website. It conforms to the WordPress accessibility-ready guidelines and addresses several more specialized standards from the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1 at level AAA. It will help you meet the highest level of international accessibility standards when you create accessible content and choose plugins which are accessible too!

A rainbow of soft pastels

A mobile screenshot of each included color palette in Twenty Twenty-One, going in ROYGBIV order.

Perfect for a new year, Twenty Twenty-One gives you a range of pre-selected color palettes in pastel, all of which conform to AAA standards for contrast. You can also choose your own background color for the theme, and the theme chooses accessibility-conscious text colors for you — automatically!

Need more flexibility than that? You can also choose your own color palette from the color picker.

colored circles

Improvements for everyone

Expanding auto-updates

For years, only developers have been able to update WordPress automatically. But now you have that option, right in your dashboard. If this is your first site, you have auto-updates ready to go, right now! Upgrading an existing site? No problem! Everything is the same as it was before.

Accessibility Statement 

Even if you’re not an expert, you can start letting others know about your site’s commitment to accessibility! The new feature plugin includes template copy for you to edit and publish, and it’s written to support different contexts and jurisdictions.  

Built-in Patterns

If you’ve not had the chance to play with block patterns yet, all default themes now feature a range of block patterns that let you master complex layouts with minimal effort. Customize the patterns to your liking with the copy, images, and colors that fit your story or brand. 

colored and textured rectangles

For developers

REST API authentication with Application Passwords

Thanks to the API’s new Application Passwords authorization feature, third-party apps can connect to your site seamlessly and securely. This new REST API feature lets you see what apps are connecting to your site and control what they do. 

More PHP 8 support

5.6 marks the first steps toward WordPress Core support for PHP 8. Now is a great time to start planning how your WordPress products, services, and sites can support the latest PHP version. For more information about what to expect next, read the PHP 8 developer note.

jQuery

Updates to jQuery in WordPress take place across three releases 5.5, 5.6, and 5.7. As we reach the mid-point of this process, run the update test plugin to check your sites for errors ahead of time.    

If you find issues with the way your site looks ( e.g. a slider doesn’t work, a button is stuck — that sort of thing), install the jQuery Migrate plugin.

Check out the Field Guide

Read about the latest version of WordPress in this guide. It highlights developer notes for each change in the release. 

“It’s a new day, it’s a new life for me….and I’m feeling good.”

~Nina Simone

The Squad

The WordPress 5.6 release comes to you from an all-women and non-binary identifying release squad:  

As always, this release reflects the hard work of 605 generous volunteer contributors. They collaborated on nearly 350 tickets on Trac and over 1,000 pull requests on GitHub.

Özgür KARALAR, 1naveengiri, A5hleyRich, Aaron D. Campbell, Aaron Jorbin, aaronrobertshaw, abderrahman, Abha Thakor, Abhijit Rakas, Abhishek Pokhriyal, acosmin, Adam Silverstein, Adam Zielinski, Addie, Adrián de Grafreak, Adrianti Rusli, Afshana Diya, Ahmed Chaion, Ahmed Elgameel, ajensen, Ajit Bohra, Akira Tachibana, aktasfatih, Albert Juhé Lluveras, albertomake, Alex Concha, Alex Kirk, Alex Kozack, Alex Lende, Alex Mills, Alex Standiford, alexstine, allancole, Allie Nimmons, ambienthack, Amit Dudhat, Amol Vhankalas, Amy Kamala, Anand Upadhyay, Anchen le Roux, Anders Norén, André Maneiro, Andrea Fercia, Andrea Middleton, Andrei Baicus, Andrei Draganescu, Andrew Duthie, Andrew Nacin, Andrew Ozz, Andrey "Rarst" Savchenko, Andy Fragen, Andy Peatling, Andy Skelton, Andy Stitt, Angel Hess, Angela Jin, Ankit Gade, Ankit Panchal, Anne McCarthy, Anthony Burchell, Anthony Hortin, Anton Lukin, Antonis Lilis, anuj2, Anyssa Ferreira, apedog, Apermo, archduck, archon810, Ari Stathopoulos, arippberger, arjendejong, ArnaudBan, Arpit G Shah, Arslan Ahmed, Arslan Ahmed Kalwar, Asvin Balloo, Atharva Dhekne, Austin Passy, austin880625, avixansa, ayesh, Ayesh Karunaratne, BackuPs, Barry, Bart Czyz, bduclos, Beatriz Fialho, Ben Meredith, Bernhard Kau, Bernhard Reiter, Bet Hannon, Beth Soderberg, bgermann, Bhagvan Mangukiya, bhautikvirani, Billy S, Birgir Erlendsson (birgire), Birgit Pauli-Haack, bobbingwide, BoldGrid, Boone Gorges, Boy Witthaya, Brady Vercher, Brandon Kraft, Brandon Payton, Breann McDede, Brent Miller, Brent Swisher, Brian Henry, Brian Hogg, Bridget Willard, brijeshb42, Burhan Nasir, Caleb Burks, Calin Don, Cameron Voell, campusboy, Carike, Carolina Nymark, Caroline, ceyhun0, Chad Reitsma, Chandrika Guntur, Charalampos Papazoglou, Chetan Prajapati, chexwarrior, Chintan hingrajiya, Chip Snyder, Chloé Bringmann, Chouby, Chris Alexander, Chris Van Patten, chriscct7, Christian Martin, Christoph Herr, Christopher Churchill, chunkysteveo, Claudiu Lodromanean, Clayton Collie, Collins Agbonghama, Commeuneimage, Copons, Corey Salzano, cranewest, Csaba (LittleBigThings), ctmartin, Dávid Szabó, Daisy Olsen, Dan Farrow, Daniel Bachhuber, Daniel Richards, Daniele Scasciafratte, danieltj, dantahoua, Darin Kotter, Dave McHale, David Aguilera, David Anderson, David Baumwald, David Gwyer, David Herrera, David Shanske, David Smith, David Wolfpaw, david.binda, Davis Shaver, dd32, Dean, Debabrata Karfa, Dee Teal, Deepak Lalwani, dekervit, demetris (Demetris Kikizas), Denis de Bernardy, Derek Herman, Designer023, dfenton, Dharmesh Patel, Dharmin Shah, Dhruvin, Dhul Wells, dietpawel, Dilip Bheda, dingo-d, DjZoNe, dogwithblog, Dominik Schilling, donmhico, donsony, Dossy Shiobara, dpacks, Dr. Ronny Harbich, dratwas, Drew Jaynes, dsifford, dushakov, dushanthi, dyrer, Earle Davies, Ebonie Butler, Edi Amin, Ella van Durpe, Ellen Bauer, Enej Bajgorić, Enrique Sánchez, epiqueras, Erik Betshammar, erikjandelange, Erin 'Folletto' Casali, eringoblog, eroraghav, Estela Rueda, etoledom, EugeneBos, Evan Mullins, Fabian, Fabian Kägy, Fabian Todt, Felipe Elia, Felix Arntz, Ferenc Forgacs, Florian TIAR, flymike, Francesca Marano, Frank Klein, Frankie Jarrett, fullofcaffeine, Gan Eng Chin, Garrett Hyder, Gary Cao, Gary Jones, Gary Pendergast, gchtr, Gennady Kovshenin, George, George Stephanis, geriux, Glauber Mota, glendaviesnz, goldenapples, Greg Ziółkowski, guidooffermans, gumacahin, H-var, hakre, happiryu, Hareesh, Haris Zulfiqar, harrym, harshbarach, Hauwa Abashiya, Haz, Helen Hou-Sandí, Henry Wright, Herre Groen, HoaSi, Hong Nga Nguyen, Howdy_McGee, Hugh Lashbrooke, Ian Dunn, Igor Radovanov, Imran Sayed, ingereck, Ipstenu (Mika Epstein), iqbalbary, Irene Strikkers, Isabel Brison, jagirbaheshwp, Jake Spurlock, Jake Whiteley, James Collins, James Koster, James Nylen, James Rosado, jameslnewell, Jan Thiel, Janvo Aldred, Jared Cobb, Jason Caldwell, Jason LeMahieu (MadtownLems), javorszky, Jaydip Rami, Jean-Baptiste Audras, Jeff Matson, Jeff Ong, Jeff Paul, jeffikus, jellypixel, Jeremy Felt, Jeremy Scott, Jeremy Yip, Jeroen Rotty, jeryj, Jeslen Bucci, Jessica Lyschik, jfoulquier, jimyaghi, Jip Moors, Joe Dolson, Joe McGill, Joel Yoder, joelclimbsthings, Joen Asmussen, Johanna de Vos, John Blackbourn, John Godley, John James Jacoby, Jon Brown, Jonathan Bossenger, Jonathan Desrosiers, Jonathan Stegall, Jonny Harris, Jono Alderson, Joost de Valk, jordesign, Jorge Bernal, Jorge Costa, joseaneto, Josepha Haden, Josh Levinson, Josh Pollock, joshuatf, JOTAKI, Taisuke, Joy, jsnajdr, Juliette Reinders Folmer, Junaid Bhura, Justin Ahinon, justlevine, K. Adam White, Kai Hao, Kailey (trepmal), Kalpesh Akabari, Karthik Bhat, Kaspars, Kelly Dwan, Kelly Hoffman, Kelly R, kellybleck, kellylawrence, Kevin Hagerty, Kharis Sulistiyono, Kipperlenny, Kiril Zhelyazkov, Kirsty Burgoine, Kishan Jasani, Kite, KittMedia, kjbenk, Kjell Reigstad, Knut Sparhell, komagain, Konstantin Obenland, Krupa, Kyle B. Johnson, landau, Larissa Murillo, latifi, Laura Byrne, Laura Nelson, Laxman Prajapati, leogermani, Lester Chan, Leutrim Husaj, lim3ra, Lionel Pointet, llizard, Louis, Luca Grandicelli, Luigi Cavalieri, Luke Cavanagh, Lumne, mager19, Maggie Cabrera, Mahesh Waghmare, mailnew2ster, Mainul Hassan Main, malinajirka, manzwebdesigns, Marcus Kazmierczak, Marek Hrabe, Marie Comet, Marijn Koopman, Marin Atanasov, Marius Jensen, Mark Jaquith, Mark Parnell, Mark Robson, Mark Smallman, Mark Uraine, Marko Heijnen, markshep, Marty Helmick, Mary Baum, Mateus Machado Luna, Mathieu Viet, Matias Ventura, Matt Cromwell, Matt Gibson, Matt Keys, Matt Mullenweg, Matt Wiebe, mattchowning, Matthias Pfefferle, mattoperry, Mayank Majeji, Meagan Hanes, Meg Phillips, Meher Bala, Mel Choyce-Dwan, mgol, mgrenierfarmmedia, Michael Arestad, Michael Beckwith, Michele Butcher-Jones, Michelle Frechette, Miguel Fonseca, mihdan, Mike Schroder, mikelopez, Mikey Arce, Milan Dinić, Milana Cap, Mitchell Bennis, mmarco9, Mohammad Jangda, Monika Rao, mopsyd, Morgan Estes, Morgan Kay, Morteza Geransayeh, mqudsi, mreishus, mrgrt, mrjoeldean, Mukesh Panchal, munyagu, musicaljoeker, mweichert, n5hzr, Nabil Moqbel, Nalini Thakor, Naoki Ohashi, Naoko Takano, Nate Gay, Nathan Johnson, Navanath Bhosale, Naveen Kharwar, Neil James (lcyh78), nendeb, net, Netravnen, nicomollet, Nidhi Jain, Niels Lange, Nik Tsekouras, Nikola, Nikolay Bachiyski, njbrown, nlpro, Noah Allen, noahshrader, nourma, oakesjosh, oguzkocer, Olga Gleckler, Omar Alshaker, Omar Reiss, oolleegg55, Optimizing Matters, Ov3rfly, ovann86, ovenall, oxyc, Paal Joachim Romdahl, pabloselin, Paddy, Pankaj Mohale, Pascal Birchler, Pascal Casier, Paul Bearne, Paul Biron, Paul Bunkham, Paul Schreiber, Paul Stonier, Paul Von Schrottky, Pedro Mendonça, pentatonicfunk, pepe, Peter Elmered, Peter Smits, Peter Wilson, Phil Johnston, Pierre Gordon, Pilar Mera, Pinar, Piotrek Boniu, pishmishy, pkvillanueva, prashanttholia, Pratik K. Yadav, Presskopp, presstoke, prionkor, psealock, Puneet Sahalot, Q, Rachel Baker, Rajan Vijayan, rajeshsingh520, Rami Yushuvaev, Ravi Vaghela, ravipatel, rebasaurus, redstar504, Regan Khadgi, Rene Hermenau, retlehs, retrofox, riaanlom, Riad Benguella, ribaricplusplus, Rich Tabor, Rnaby, Robert Anderson, Robert Chapin, Rodrigo Arias, rogerlos, roikles, Rolf Siebers, Ronak Ganatra, roo2, rtagliento, Ryan Fredlund, Ryan Kienstra, Ryan McCue, Ryan Welcher, Sören Wrede, Sabrina Zeidan, Saeed Fard, salvoaranzulla, Sam Fullalove, Sam Webster, Samuel Wood (Otto), Sanjeev Aryal, Saqib Ameen, Sarah Ricker, sarayourfriend, sawanoboly, scarolan, Scott Cariss, Scott Reilly, scribu, scruffian, seanpaulrasmussen, Sebastian Pisula, SeBsZ, Senning, Sergey Biryukov, Sergey Yakimov, SergioEstevao, shaunandrews, Shawntelle Coker, Shital Marakana, shramee, Simon Resok, sirreal, smerriman, snapfractalpop, sproutchris, Stéphane Treilhou, Stanko Metodiev, Stefano Garuti, Stephen Bernhardt, Steve Dufresne, Steven Stern (sterndata), stevenlinx, Stoyan Georgiev, sudoshreyansh, Syed Balkhi, szaqal21, Tammie Lister, TeBenachi, techboyg5, Tellyworth, thefarlilacfield, Thelma Mutete, thib3113, thijsvanloef, Thomas M, Thomas Patrick Levy, thomaslhotta, Tim Havinga, Tim Hengeveld, Timi Wahalahti, Timothy Jacobs, TimoTijhof, Tkama, tmdesigned, TobiasBg, tobifjellner (Tor-Bjorn Fjellner), Tonya Mork, Toro_Unit (Hiroshi Urabe), torres126, Torsten Landsiedel, Towhidul I Chowdhury, tracy apps, treibstoff, Trisha Cornelius, Tung Du, tzafrir, Udit Desai, Ulrich, uxkai, Valentin Bora, Varun Sharma, vcanales, vidhiaddweb, Vinayak Anivase, Vinita Tandulkar, Vinny, virgodesign, WebMan Design | Oliver Juhas, Webmigrates Technologies, Weston Ruter, William Earnhardt, williampatton, Winstina Hughes, wittich, worldweb, Y_Kolev, Yan Sern, Yoav Farhi, yscik, Yui, Yvette Sonneveld, and Zebulan Stanphill.

In addition, many thanks to all of the community volunteers who contribute in the support forums. They answer questions from people across the world, whether they are using WordPress for the first time, or they’ve been around since the first release all the way back in 2003. These releases are as successful as they are because of their efforts!

Finally, thanks to all the community translators who helped make WordPress 5.6. available in 38 languages at the time of release. Our community translators are hard at work ensuring more languages are on their way (70 are already at 90%). If contributing to WordPress appeals to you, it’s easy to learn more. Check out Make WordPress or the core development blog.

State of the Word 2020

Posted December 4, 2020 by Josepha. Filed under Events.

State of the Word is an annual keynote address delivered by the project co-founder, Matt Mullenweg. Catch this year’s keynote in the video below!

New to State of the Word?

If this is your first time hearing of this talk, you’re in luck! Check out previous recordings below.

The Month in WordPress: November 2020

Posted December 2, 2020 by Hari Shanker R. Filed under Month in WordPress.

November 2020 saw several updates to the WordPress 5.6 release. Read on to follow all the latest news from the WordPress world!


WordPress 5.6 updates

The Core team released WordPress 5.6 Beta 3 on Nov. 2, Beta 4 on Nov. 12, release candidate 1 on Nov. 17, and release candidate 2 on Dec. 1. You can test the Beta versions and the release candidates by downloading them from WordPress.org or by using the WordPress Beta Tester plugin. Check out the WordPress 5.6 field guide to understand the features of WordPress 5.6 and learn how you can incorporate them into your websites. WordPress 5.6 will be out by Dec. 9, 2020.

But our work is never done: You can submit feature suggestions for WordPress 5.7 by Dec. 15. 

Want to contribute to upcoming WordPress releases? Join the WordPress Core dev chats on Wednesdays at 5 a.m. and 8 p.m. UTC in the #core channel on the Make WordPress Slack, and catch up with recaps on the Core team blog. If you would like to help with WordPress 5.6 outreach, contact the WordPress Marketing team on the #marketing channel.

Gutenberg 9.3 and 9.4 are out

Contributor teams released Gutenberg Version 9.3 on Nov. 4 and Version 9.4 on Nov. 18. Both versions include  several improvements to Full Site Editing (FSE) flows, in addition to bug fixes and feature upgrades. Version 9.3 is the first release that isn’t included entirely in WordPress 5.6; the version automatically enables FSE experiments when a block-based theme is active. Version 9.4 introduces some new features like percentage width for button blocks, block variation transformations, social icon support, and font size support for the list block. You can find out more about the Gutenberg roadmap in the What’s next in Gutenberg blog post.

Want to get involved in building Gutenberg? Follow the Core team blog, contribute to Gutenberg on GitHub, and join the #core-editor channel in the Making WordPress Slack group.

Learn WordPress updates

WordPress contributor teams are all set to launch Learn WordPress in December. Community members can now watch video workshops to learn about various WordPress topics, participate in discussion groups, and use lesson plans for organizing their own workshops. Contributor teams have launched quizzes and are also working on setting standards for workshops.

Want to contribute to Learn WordPress? You can now submit a workshop application (submissions in languages other than English are welcome!), apply to become a discussion group leader, organize discussions for your local WordPress meetup group, or help fix issues with existing lesson plans.

WordPress 5.6 Translations and Polyglots survey

WordPress 5.6 is ready to be translated and is now at hard string freeze. If you would like to contribute, check out these instructions and ensure that your locale is ready for an automated release. The Polyglots team has also kicked off its translator research survey. Please participate in the survey, share the survey link with members of your locale, and help amplify the Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn posts about it.

Want to help WordPress speak your language? Follow the Polyglots team blog and join the #polyglots channel in the Making WordPress Slack group


Further Reading:

Have a story that we should include in the next “Month in WordPress” post? Please submit it here.

WordPress 5.6 Release Candidate 2

Posted December 1, 2020 by Josepha. Filed under Development, Releases.

The second release candidate for WordPress 5.6 is here!

WordPress 5.6 is slated for release on December 8, 2020, and we need your help to get there—if you haven’t tried 5.6 yet, now is the time!

You can test WordPress 5.6 release candidate 2 in two ways:

Thank you to all of the contributors who tested the Beta releases and gave feedback. Testing for bugs is a critical part of polishing every release and a great way to contribute to WordPress.

Plugin and Theme Developers

Please test your plugins and themes against WordPress 5.6 and update the Tested up to version in the readme file to 5.6. If you find compatibility problems, please be sure to post to the support forums. That way, those can be figured out before the final release.

For a more detailed breakdown of the changes included in WordPress 5.6, check out the WordPress 5.6 beta 1 post. The WordPress 5.6 Field Guide is also out! It’s your source for details on all the major changes.

How to Help

Do you speak a language other than English? Help translate WordPress into more than 100 languages!

Think you found a bug? Post it to the Alpha/Beta area in the support forums. We would love to hear from you! If you’re comfortable writing a reproducible bug report you can file one on WordPress Trac. Don’t forget to check the list of known bugs!

WordPress 5.6 Release Candidate

Posted November 17, 2020 by Josepha. Filed under Development, Releases.

The first release candidate for WordPress 5.6 is now available!

This is an important milestone in the community’s progress toward the final release of WordPress 5.6.

“Release Candidate” means that the new version is ready for release, but with millions of users and thousands of plugins and themes, it’s possible something was missed. WordPress 5.6 is slated for release on December 8, 2020, but we need your help to get there—if you haven’t tried 5.6 yet, now is the time!

You can test the WordPress 5.6 release candidate in two ways:

Thank you to all of the contributors who tested the Beta releases and gave feedback. Testing for bugs is a critical part of polishing every release and a great way to contribute to WordPress.

What’s in WordPress 5.6?

The final release of 2020 continues the annual tradition of a new default theme that is custom built to showcase the new features and functionality of the software. Continued progress on the block editor is especially clear in this release, which brings more blocks to more places, and fewer clicks to implement your layouts.

WordPress 5.6 also has lots of refinements to polish the developer experience. To learn more, subscribe to the Make WordPress Core blog and pay special attention to the developer notes tag for updates on those and other changes that could affect your products.

Plugin and Theme Developers

Please test your plugins and themes against WordPress 5.6 and update the Tested up to version in the readme file to 5.6. If you find compatibility problems, please be sure to post to the support forums, so those can be figured out before the final release.

The WordPress 5.6 Field Guide, due very shortly, will give you a more detailed dive into the major changes.

How to Help

Do you speak a language other than English? Help us translate WordPress into more than 100 languages! This release also marks the hard string freeze point of the 5.6 release schedule.

If you think you’ve found a bug, you can post to the Alpha/Beta area in the support forums. We’d love to hear from you! If you’re comfortable writing a reproducible bug report, file one on WordPress Trac, where you can also find a list of known bugs.

WordPress 5.6 Beta 4

Posted November 12, 2020 by Josepha. Filed under Development, Releases.

WordPress 5.6 Beta 4 is now available for testing!

This software is still in development, so we recommend that you run this version on a test site.

You can test the WordPress 5.6 beta in two ways:

The current target for the final release is December 8, 2020. This is just over three weeks away, so your help is needed to ensure this release is tested properly.

Thank you to all of the contributors that tested the beta 3 development release and provided feedback. Testing for bugs is an important part of polishing each release and a great way to contribute to WordPress.

Some Highlights

Since beta 3, 42 bugs have been fixed. Here is a summary of a few changes included in beta 4:

To see all of the features for each Gutenberg release in detail, check out the release posts: 8.68.78.88.99.09.19.2, and 9.3.

Developer notes

WordPress 5.6 has lots of refinements to the developer experience. To keep up, subscribe to the Make WordPress Core blog and pay special attention to the developers’ notes for updates on those and other changes that could affect your products.

How to Help

If you think you’ve found a bug, you can post to the Alpha/Beta area in the support forums. We’d love to hear from you!

If you’re comfortable writing a reproducible bug report, file one on WordPress Trac, where you can also find a list of known bugs.

Props to @tonyamork, @audrasjb for technical notes and @angelasjin, @yvettesonneveld@cguntur, @cbringmann for final review.

WordPress 5.6 Beta 3

Posted November 2, 2020 by Chloe Bringmann. Filed under Development, Releases.

WordPress 5.6 Beta 3 is now available for testing!

This software is still in development, so we recommend that you run this version on a test site.

You can test the WordPress 5.6 beta in two ways:

The current target for the final release is December 8, 2020. This is just five weeks away, so your help is needed to ensure this release is tested properly.

Thank you to all of the contributors that tested the beta 2 development release and provided feedback. Testing for bugs is an important part of polishing each release and a great way to contribute to WordPress.

Some Highlights

Since beta 2, 20 bugs have been fixed. Here is a summary of a few changes included in beta 3:

  • Added block patterns for Twenty Twenty (see #51098) and Twenty Nineteen (see #51099) themes.
  • Added theme support for navigation-widgets (see #51445).
  • Fixed incorrect slashes in the URL if the parent is empty for REST API (see #44745).
  • Added a test to Site Health to verify that the Authorization header is working as expected for Application Passwords (see #51638).
  • 10 additional bugs fixed in the block editor (see #26588).

To see all of the features for each Gutenberg release in detail, check out the release posts: 8.68.78.88.99.09.1, 9.2, and 9.3.

Developer notes

WordPress 5.6 has lots of refinements to the developer experience as well. To keep up, subscribe to the Make WordPress Core blog and pay special attention to the developers’ notes for updates on those and other changes that could affect your products.

How to Help

If you think you’ve found a bug, you can post to the Alpha/Beta area in the support forums. We’d love to hear from you!

If you’re comfortable writing a reproducible bug report, file one on WordPress Trac, where you can also find a list of known bugs.

Props to @hellofromtonya for help and @chanthaboune  for final review.

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See Also:

Want to follow the code? There’s a development P2 blog and you can track active development in the Trac timeline that often has 20–30 updates per day.

Want to find an event near you? Check out the WordCamp schedule and find your local Meetup group!

For more WordPress news, check out the WordPress Planet.

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