Matt Mullenweg published an appeal to WordPress users over the weekend in a post titled “We Called it Gutenberg for a Reason.” In it he offers a better look at his vision for Gutenberg, which he contends will be as transformative for WordPress’ future as the first movable type printing was for Europe’s printing revolution. Mullenweg identified the new Gutenberg …
Core Team Explores Idea to Automatically Upgrade Sites Running WordPress 3.7 to 3.8
WordPress 3.7 ‘Basie’ was released on October 24, 2013 and introduced automatic updates for minor releases to the masses. Although it’s not labeled as such, WordPress 3.7 has effectively acted as a LTS version or Long-term support. Security updates and crucial bug fixes have been ported back to previous branches up to 3.7. In this week’s WordPress developer chat, Aaron …
Playing the Role of Online Reputation Manager
Over the years, I’ve received requests from people wanting their comments removed from the site. I recently received a request from a reader that I remove a comment they made three years ago because it was showing up in Google search results for their name. Normally, I ignore these requests as it makes me feel like I’m their online reputation …
Morten Rand-Hendriksen on What Gutenberg Means For the Future of WordPress
As work continues on Gutenberg, members of the community are discussing its impacts on WordPress’ future. Morten Rand-Hendriksen considers Gutenberg to be a watershed moment, “This is a revolution,” he said. “This is a watershed moment for WordPress. This is entirely new and fundamentally different from how WordPress works and how we work with it today. I cannot overstate it …
Facebook Isn’t Budging on React’s BSD + Patents License
Last month React users petitioned Facebook to relicense the project (and its other open source projects) after the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) added Facebook’s BSD+Patents license to its Category X list of disallowed licenses for Apache PMC members. Participants and subscribers to the GitHub thread waited weeks for a decision on re-licensing while Facebook’s engineering directors discussed the matter internally. …
WordPress.org to Add New Page Educating Users on Benefits of Upgrading PHP
WordPress’ Core PHP team has created a new GitHub organization for initiatives focused on improving the use of PHP in the project. The first one they are tackling is a new page on WordPress.org dedicated to educating users about the benefits of upgrading PHP. Contributors are collecting third-party articles and tutorials on PHP upgrades to find inspiration for the project, …
WordPress Support Team to Host Free Workshop August 23 on Supporting Themes
Over the past few months the WordPress Support Team has been brainstorming ways to improve support across various aspects of the community. One new idea they are pursuing is hosting workshops where WordPress.org theme and plugin authors can present how they approach supporting their free, open source products that have been released to the community. Some users approach WordPress.org plugins …
WordPress Mobile Apps Updated with a New Login Experience
The WordPress mobile apps are sporting a new login experience that Automattic’s mobile designers and developers released in the latest versions. The login flow has been completely redesigned to provide a more unified experience for connecting both self-hosted and WordPress.com-hosted sites. These flows were completely separate in the past and users were often confused about which one to select. The …
maekit Acquires WP Remote, Plans to Add Cloud-Based Backup Services
maekit, a cloud-based platform that handles the business aspect of web design, has acquired WP Remote from Human Made. Two years after Human Made began searching for a buyer, maekit purchased WP Remote to integrate it with the company’s existing platform that caters to designers managing multiple clients. “WP Remote had remained a much-loved product with its users and despite …
Early Results from NRKbeta’s Comment Quiz Plugin Show Readers Enjoy the Quiz but Rarely Leave a Comment
Earlier this year, NRKbeta, the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation’s media and technology site, open sourced its comment quiz plugin for WordPress. The site’s publishers have been experimenting with requiring their readers to complete a short, three-question quiz before giving access to the comment form on certain articles. The goal of the plugin was to prevent rants and off-topic responses by ensuring …