Wordpress

In June 2021, @beafialho in collaboration with @pablohoney floated the idea of giving WordPress News a new look. Today, those ideas become a reality—we’re excited to share that redesign of WordPress News is live! The new design leans on the aesthetics of jazz, intrinsically connected to WordPress and which ultimately translates its uniqueness, historic significance and future potential. Among other improvements, the new design leaves more space for content and includes new typefaces for better readability. It also uses a color palette intended to reflect the evolving Gutenberg language. The revamp of the WordPress News page includes the header and footer of the page. We also shipped those two global elements to all pages of WordPress.org. However, there’s more work to do within the header to improve the information architecture. This new design is just the first, small step to modernize and improve the site iteratively. Any further discussion on future redesigns will occur in the #design channel on Slack. Take a look around and subscribe to WordPress News if you haven’t already. If you see something in the design that doesn’t look right, please submit an issue on GitHub. View the full article

In episode 24 of the WordPress Briefing, the Project’s Executive Director reviews three big-picture goals for the year: Increased Gutenberg adoption, support of all open source alternatives, and stewarding the open source ethos. Have a question you’d like answered? You can submit them to wpbriefing@wordpress.org, either written or as a voice recording. Credits Editor: Dustin HartzlerLogo: Beatriz FialhoProduction: Chloé BringmannSong: Fearless First by Kevin MacLeod References Big Picture Goals 2022Preliminary Roadmap for 6.0 (Gutenberg Phase 2)A New News DesignMaking WordPress: Unofficial aggregator for all Making WordPress blogs Transcript Episode 24 Josepha Haden Chomphosy 00:00 Hello everyone, and welcome to the WordPress Briefing, the podcast where you can catch quick explanations of the ideas behind the WordPress open source project. Some insight into the community that supports it and get a small list of big things coming up in the next two weeks. I’m your host, Josepha Haden Chomphosy. Here we go! Josepha Haden Chomphosy 01:07 A couple of weeks ago, I published a post about the big picture goals for the WordPress project in 2022. As I was thinking through our planned releases for the year and looking out toward what would spell success for WordPress over the next three years, three things really lined up in both sets of answers for me. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 01:23 I provided some detail on how we can work toward these goals in the post, which I will link for you in the show notes, but I also wanted to take some time to explain why I feel we have to work toward these goals this year. So these all build on one another. To refresh your memory of the three big focuses, they are one to drive adoption of the new editor in WordPress, support open source alternatives for site building necessities, and three, open source stewardship. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 01:52 So the first one; is driving the adoption of the new WordPress editor. Early on in the start of the Gutenberg Project, folks could not go two days without hearing me talk about the phases of adoption and how those line up with the phases of Gutenberg, and who would need our support the most in each of those phases. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 02:09 I have always believed that what we would be shipping at this point in our project would prove the plausible promise of what we were doing in phase one. That’s definitely what I’m seeing from what was shipped in 5.9, as well as what we plan to ship in May with 6.0. And the people who need the most support right now are absolutely our users, your clients, no matter whether they were not keeping up with WordPress developments or simply were waiting to see what all the fuss was about. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 02:37 There will be people who look to you as someone who has been here a while to help them make sense of what they’re seeing. And what I find so exciting about this adoption, sort of, work in the WordPress project is that this is the time when we as practitioners of WordPress, no matter whether you are a designer or a developer or builder, business coach. This is the time when we get to guide others through the hardest parts of our learning processes. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 03:07 The process of helping people to learn new technologies relies not only on your hard-won expertise but also on the belief that the future is worth fighting for. Enabling someone’s success is an investment in the future and investment for that person or for WordPress or your community. All investments are welcome here. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 03:28 Fortunately, table stakes are just that you care. And speaking of future investments, the second focus is open source alternatives for site building necessities. So things like images, forms, stores, themes, etc. It literally just things you need to build a site. I would like to start by saying that I am completely aware of the fact that 99% of WordPress users will never care about open source freedoms and philosophies in the same way that WordPress maintainers and contributors care about open source freedoms and philosophies. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 04:04 You could substitute the name of any other open source project right there, and the statement would still be true. And yet, I will always believe that people should have the rights and freedoms that open source brings to them even if they do not know they are there. And so it makes all the sense in the world to me that as a project and open source community, we should strive to make choosing Open Source as easy as possible. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 04:33 And finally, open source stewardship is one of the focuses for this year. This one is obviously about supporting open source as a concept and maintaining WordPress as a project. But I also think that it is relevant to our current global circumstances. Open Source suddenly became very visible to the public eye last year following the Log4J vulnerability, and ever since then, I’ve been hearing consistent concern over how We make sure that WordPress is sustainable moving into the future. Fortunately, this is a topic that’s near and dear to my heart. And I have been delighted to see so many community members bringing that conversation to the forefront. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 05:14 There is a lot that is done in the WordPress project to keep us from the tragedy of the commons. But that work honestly never ends. Not only does it not end, but as we get bigger, there is more and more that we can and should be doing to keep us around for the long term. And, of course, for the keen readers of my posts, there’s a bonus focus. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 05:39 The bonus focus is, of course, that WordPress turns 20 years old next year. This year, we will also be seeing some preparatory work for that major milestone as well. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 05:56 So that brings us today to our small list of big things. There is a redesign of the News Page coming. We’ve been talking about this over on make.wordpress.org/design for a bit since like June of last year or something. But it’s coming in the next few weeks. I’ll share a link to the GitHub repo in case anyone has any specific things that they see as they are reading through all of our many news stories that come out on that particular page. I think it’s beautiful, and I’m very excited to take a look at it. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 06:30 The second thing is that planning is underway for WordPress 6.0; that release that we’re doing in May. I’ll add the project page link to the show notes. I’ve had a few raised hands for that release squad. But if you’re interested in participating in the release, I encourage you to keep an eye out on make.wordpress.org/core for updates and any news about how to get involved. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 06:53 And my third thing is actually that, in general, there are a lot of opportunities to contribute right now. There are discussions about projects, goals, and dreams happening all over the place. I’ll link in the show notes below the unofficial project “firehose” where you can see all the headlines and quickly find discussions that might be interesting to you. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 07:18 And that, my friends, is your small list of big things. Thank you for tuning in today for the WordPress Briefing. I’m your host Josepha Haden Chomphosy, and I’ll see you again in a couple of weeks. View the full article

There are a few significant moments in the history of the WordPress project. January 2022 is one of them, with the release of WordPress 5.9! But that’s not all. Read on to learn more about the latest updates and achievements from the community. WordPress 5.9 Joséphine is here Meet WordPress 5.9 Joséphine. Named in honor of the acclaimed jazz singer, Joséphine Baker, this is one of the much-awaited releases. Version 5.9 brings full site editing to WordPress, among other exciting updates! Download WordPress 5.9 and try the new features! Check out the WordPress 5.9 Field Guide to learn more. Lastly, everyone’s invited to participate in a retrospective of the WordPress 5.9 Joséphine release! Are you interested in contributing to WordPress core? Join the #core channel, follow the Core Team blog, and check out the team handbook. Also, don’t miss the Core Team’s weekly developer chat on Wednesdays at 8 PM UTC. Gutenberg releases: Versions 12.3, 12.4, and 12.5 are here The Core Team launched three new versions of Gutenberg since last month’s edition of the Month in WordPress. Gutenberg 12.5 brings global styles variations and Query Loop block enhancements, along with the Code Editor view to the Side Editor. Moreover, inserting new buttons is now easier than ever!Gutenberg 12.4 was released on January 19, 2022. This version includes accessibility improvements, suggestions for assigning categories, keyboard shortcuts for the Site Editor, and more. Gutenberg 12.3 was released on January 5, 2022. This release brings new blocks, like the Author Name, Comments Next Page, and Comments Previous Page blocks, and many other cool updates! Want to get involved in developing Gutenberg? Follow the Core Team blog, contribute to Gutenberg on GitHub, and join the #core-editor channel in the Make WordPress Slack. Follow the #gutenberg-new tag for details on the latest updates. Team updates: Proposals, announcements, and more for 2022 Executive Director Josepha Haden shared a proposal on 2022 major release timing. The Core Team made a proposal regarding proper attributions for contributions to WordPress on GitHub, but it has since then been withdrawn. Check out the preliminary roadmap for WordPress 6.0 (Gutenberg Phase Two). Core Team members proposed improvements to the Core Editor chat agenda and format. The Accessibility Team made some major goal proposals for WordPress 6.0.The Polyglots Team shared a proposal for a milestone template for polyglots locale teams.The January 2022 edition of the Polyglots monthly newsletter is out!The Community Team shared an open invitation for the Diverse Speaker Training group Zoom call.Although the WordPress Photo Directory hasn’t fully launched yet, you can now submit your images. You can also contribute in other ways, as there’s currently a call for volunteers.The Community Team will be hosting open discussion sessions to collaborate on the Community Team goals for 2022. The January 2022 edition of the Meetup Organizer Newsletter was published.The Community Team shared a proposal for mandatory safety measures for in-person WordPress events this year. Openverse has now a redesigned user interface and includes support for audio files. Check out this post to learn what’s new.The Training Team published its February 2022 Team Sprint. Take the course on Learn WordPress to learn about the full site editing features in WordPress 5.9! Also, help spread the word about social learning spaces on Twitter! Feedback/Testing requests: Share your thoughts on WordPress 5.9 Joséphine There’s currently a call for testing WordPress for Android 19.1 and iOS 19.1, along with Android 19.0 and iOS 19.0. Share your feedback on the release of WordPress 5.9 Joséphine. WordCamp Europe 2022 wants volunteers, photographers and media partners WordCamp Birmingham, Alabama has been postponed until spring. The WordPress Foundation published a post explaining more about the nonprofit’s mission and why it exists.Don’t miss the following upcoming WordCamps: WordCamp Prague, Switzerland on February 26, 2022 (online) WordCamp Genève, Switzerland on April 9, 2022 (in-person) WordCamp Athens, Greece between April 9 and 10, 2022 (in person) WordCamp Vienna, Austria from April 23 to 24, 2022 (in person) WordCamp Europe in Porto, Portugal from June 2 to 4, 2022 (in person) WordCamp US in San Diego, CA USA from September 9-11, 200 (in person) WordCamp Europe 2022 opened a new call for volunteers, photographers, and media partners! Have a story that we could include in the next ‘Month in WordPress’ post? Let us know by filling out this form. The following folks contributed to January 2022’s Month in WordPress: @anjanavasan @harishanker @rmartinezduque @lmurillom View the full article

Welcome to Joséphine! Introducing 5.9, ‘Joséphine’. Named in honor of acclaimed international jazz singer Joséphine Baker, this latest, most versatile WordPress release is here: download it or update it directly from your dashboard. As a lifelong civil rights campaigner, Joséphine Baker believed that all people could live in harmony together, just as different instruments in a jazz band blend together to make a whole piece. Turn on a playlist from your favorite music service and enjoy her famous renditions of “You are the greatest love”, “Sans Amour”, and “Love is a Dreamer” as you discover all the features of this brand-new WordPress release. Full site editing is here. It puts you in control of your whole site, right in the WordPress Admin. Say hello to Twenty Twenty-Two. And say hello to the first default block theme in the history of WordPress. This is more than just a new default theme. It’s a brand-new way to work with WordPress themes. Block themes put a wide array of visual choices directly in your hands, from color schemes and font combinations to page templates and image filters, all from the Site Editor. So in one place, you can give Twenty Twenty-Two the same look and feel as your organization’s other materials—or take your site’s look in another direction. You already have the Twenty Twenty-Two theme—it came installed with WordPress 5.9. You will find it with your other installed themes. Your personal paintbox awaits Twenty Twenty-Two is not the only theme built for full site editing. More block themes are in the Themes directory, and the number will grow. When you use any of those new themes, you no longer need the Customizer. Instead, you have all the power of the Styles interface inside the Site Editor. Just as in Twenty Twenty-Two, you build your site’s look and feel there, with the tools you need for the job in a fluid interface that practically comes alive in your hands. The Navigation block Blocks come to site navigation, the heart of user experience. The new Navigation block gives you the power to choose: an always-on responsive menu or one that adapts to your user’s screen size. And your choices are remembered! In 5.9, the block saves menus as custom post types, which get saved to the database. More improvements and updates Do you love to blog? New tweaks to the publishing flow help you say more, faster. Better block controls WordPress 5.9 features new typography tools, flexible layout controls, and finer control of details like spacing, borders, and more—to help you get not just the look, but the polish that says you care about details. The power of patterns The WordPress Pattern Directory is the home of a wide range of block patterns built to save you time and add to your site’s functionality. And you can edit them as you see fit. Need something different in the header or footer for your theme? Swap it out with a new one in a few clicks. With a nearly full-screen view that draws you in to see fine details, the Pattern Explorer makes it easy to compare patterns and choose the one your users need. A revamped List View In 5.9, the List View lets you drag and drop your content exactly where you want it. Managing complex documents is easier, too: simple controls let you expand and collapse sections as you build your site—and add HTML anchors to your blocks to help users get around the page. A better Gallery block Treat every image in a Gallery Block the same way you would treat it in the Image Block. Style every image in your gallery differently, or make them all the same, except for one or two. Or change the layout with drag-and-drop. WordPress 5.9 for developers Theme.json for child themes In 5.9, theme.json supports child themes. That means your users can build a child theme right in the WordPress Admin, without writing a single line of code. This dev note has all the details. Take a look! Block-level locking Now you can lock any block (or a few of them) in a pattern, just by adding a lock attribute to its settings in block.json—leaving the rest of the pattern free for users to adapt to their content. Multiple stylesheets in a block Now you can register more than one stylesheet per block, which lets a given block load only the styles its markup requests, and not a whole sheet. Read the details in this dev note. A refactored Gallery Block The changes to the Gallery Block listed above are the result of near-complete refactor. Have you built a plugin or theme on the Gallery Block functionality? Be sure you read this dev note. It tells you what you need to do for compatibility. Learn more about the new features in 5.9 Want to dive into 5.9 but don’t know where to start? Check out this free course about Simple Site Design from Learn WordPress. There are a variety of learning materials including short how-to video tutorials and resources on new features in WordPress 5.9, with much more planned. Check the Field Guide for more! Check out the latest version of the WordPress Field Guide. It has lots of useful information with links to detailed developer notes to support you building in WordPress for everyone you serve. WordPress 5.9 Field Guide. The Squad The WordPress 5.9 release was led by Matt Mullenweg, and supported by this highly enthusiastic release squad: Release Lead: Matt MullenwegCore Tech and Release Coordinator: Tonya MorkTriage Leads: Jb Audras and Ahmed ChaionEditor Tech: Robert Anderson and George MamadashviliTheme Leads: Kjell Reigstad and Jeff OngTechnical Writer: Jonathan BossengerDocumentation Leads: Marcus Kazmierczak and Milana CapMarketing & Communications Leads: Mary Baum, Abha Thakor, and Josepha Haden ChomphosyTest Leads: Piotrek Boniu and Anne McCarthy WordPress 5.9 also reflects the hard work of 624 generous volunteer contributors. Collaboration occurred on 370 tickets on Trac and more than 1900 pull requests on GitHub. [credits 5.9] By release day, 71 locales had translated 90 percent or more of WordPress 5.9 in their language. Community translators are hard at work ensuring more translations are on their way. Thank you to everyone who helps to make WordPress available in 205 languages. Many thanks to all of the community volunteers who contribute in the support forums. They help to answer questions from people across the world. The success of releases from the first one in 2003 owes much to the efforts of the support contributors. If contributing to WordPress appeals to you, it’s easy to learn more and get involved. Discover the different teams that come together to Make WordPress website and find out the latest plans on the core development blog. View the full article

The third Release Candidate (RC3) for WordPress 5.9 is here! Thank you to everyone who has contributed thus far toward testing and filing bugs to help make WordPress 5.9 a great release. WordPress 5.9 is slated to land in just one week—on January 25, 2022. You still have time to help! Since RC2 arrived last week, testers have found and fixed two bugs, 14 fixes from Gutenberg. There has been one additional Gutenberg fix today. Testing the release You can test the WordPress 5.9 release candidate in three ways: Option 1: Install and activate the WordPress Beta Tester plugin (select the “Bleeding edge” channel and “Beta/RC Only” stream). Option 2: Download the beta version here (zip). Option 3: When using WP-CLI to upgrade from Beta 1, 2, 3, 4, RC1, or RC2 on a case-insensitive filesystem, please use the following command sequence: Command One: wp core update --version=5.9-RC3 Command Two: wp core update --version=5.9-RC3 --force Your help to test the third Release Candidate is vital: the more testing that happens, the more stable the release, and the better the experience for users, developers, and the WordPress community. Thank you to all contributors who tested the RC2 release and gave feedback. Testing for bugs is a critical part of polishing every release and is a great way to contribute to WordPress. How to help Help test WordPress 5.9 features – this post provides a guide to set up your testing environment, a list of testable features, and information about how to submit feedback you find as you go. Skilled in languages other than English? Help translate WordPress into more than 100 languages! Thanks to every locale that is working on translations. Developers and those interested in more background to the features can find more in the Field Guide. You can also follow the 5.9 development cycle and timeline. If you have found a bug, you can post the details to the Alpha/Beta area in the support forums. If you are comfortable writing a reproducible bug report, you can file one on WordPress Trac, where you can also check the issue against a list of known bugs. For their help in compiling this post, props to @cbringmann, @webcommsat, @psykro,@marybaum, @chanthaboune, @davidbaumwald, and @hellofromtonya. View the full article

As we greet a new year, WordPress’ Executive Director writes a letter to the project and community that speaks to the hopes of the year ahead. Have a question you’d like answered? You can submit them to wpbriefing@wordpress.org, either written or as a voice recording. Credits Editor: Dustin HartzlerLogo: Beatriz FialhoProduction: Chloé BringmannSong: Fearless First by Kevin MacLeod Transcript Josepha Haden Chomphosy 00:10 Hello, everyone, and welcome to the WordPress Briefing. The podcast where you can catch quick explanations of the ideas behind the WordPress open source project, some insight into the community that supports it, and get a small list of big things coming up in the next two weeks. I’m your host, Josepha Haden Chomphosy. Here we go! Josepha Haden Chomphosy 00:40 Yesterday marked three years since the WordPress project welcomed me as their executive director. As I start my fourth year, I’ve spent a bit of time considering what the next five years will bring us. WordPress will turn 19 this year, which means that we will soon be a whopping 20 years old; for some of the people who have been with the project since the beginning, that can represent two-thirds of their whole life. And even if you were not that young when you got here, two decades as an open source project is really a cause for celebration. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 01:10 I am not in that group that has been here forever. I showed up for the first time in 2009, as a community organizer, self-sponsored, and I learned so much about myself as a person and as a leader while I was doing that. So when I arrived as a sponsored contributor in 2015, I already knew exactly what made this work so fulfilling for me was these three things: Josepha Haden Chomphosy 01:34 First, the ability to lend a hand in those moments where I wish someone had lent a hand. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 01:40 Second is the delight of seeing people’s first successes and the joy of watching them grow over time. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 01:48 And the third was a chance to be part of something great, which turned out to be something greater; greater than me or you or a CMS. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 01:58 This list is still at the heart of what I feel I get out of the WordPress project. But it has also grown substantially in my seven years as a sponsored contributor. I now also love how we as a community of contributors get to foster a better way to lead and a better way to collaborate. And through those things help people find a way to have a better life. Not just through WordPress, the CMS, but through WordPress, the people, and WordPress, the project. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 02:25 And so when I think of what I want for WordPress in its 19th year, so that we can head with confidence and dignity into our 20th year, it is this: Josepha Haden Chomphosy 02:35 I want you to remember that you are not alone here. People come together in the world often because of a shared location. But WordPress fosters this beautiful experience of bringing us together because of what we care about. Whether you care about PHP standards, diversity in technology, helping people with their first big wins, making WordPress more secure. I mean, if what you care about is being able to write the most arcane and complex apps on top of WordPress that the world has ever seen. Then there are others out there who want to do that with you, too. We have so many things to connect about. And fortunately, we support a great piece of software for getting our thoughts out in the world. Take some time to see who else shares your thoughts and potentially learn a bit about the view from the other side. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 03:26 And speaking of the other side, I also want us to approach our discussions as the US versus the Problem TM. WordPress may be 20 years old, and we may stand on the shoulders of giants, but right now, the people who are here you, you are explorers and creators and guides toward the best possible future for WordPress. The tension that we witness between teams is always about the best possible answers for the people who use our software. It is about securing the freedoms of the open web for everyone who comes after us whether they know they need those freedoms or not. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 04:04 And finally, I want us to expand our reasons for doing this at all. If you are a member of the community of contributors, We frequently talk about how we give back because WordPress gave to us. Or if you are part of a Five for the Future group. You have heard that companies who have experienced success because of WordPress should commit 5% of their resources back to the project to ensure WordPress’ long-term success. But the reason that I keep doing this, and hopefully a new reason for you to keep doing this is that we can take part in securing opportunities for future users of WordPress. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 04:42 Yes, I want WordPress to be the best CMS. Yes, I want this community to be vibrant and engaged. Yes, I want WordPress to be a shining beacon of how to work remotely. And I want all of that because I know it is our careful and tireless stewardship of this project that lets us continue to lend a hand in those moments where people wish for someone to lend a hand. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 05:11 Those are my hopes for WordPress in 2022 to move us forward into WordPress of the future. I hope you all will come with me and we can continue our journey together. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 05:23 Thanks again for listening. I’m Josepha Haden and this is the WP Briefing. See you again in a couple of weeks. View the full article

The second Release Candidate (RC2) for WordPress 5.9 is now available! “Release Candidate” means the new version of the software is ready for release. It helps the community check that nothing is missed, given the thousands of plugins and themes and differences in how millions of people use the software. Thank you to everyone who has contributed thus far towards testing and filing bugs to help make WordPress 5.9 a great release. WordPress 5.9 is slated for release in just two weeks on January 25, 2022. There’s still time to help! Since RC1 was released, six bugs have been found and fixed. There were 13 bug fixes backported from Gutenberg. Testing the release You can test the WordPress 5.9 release candidate in three ways: Option 1: Install and activate the WordPress Beta Tester plugin (select the “Bleeding edge” channel and “Beta/RC Only” stream). Option 2: Direct download the beta version here (zip). Option 3: When using WP-CLI to upgrade from Beta 1, 2, 3, 4, or RC1, on a case-insensitive filesystem, please use the following command sequence: Command One: wp core update --version=5.9-RC2 Command Two: wp core update --version=5.9-RC2 --force Your help to test the second Release Candidate is vital: the more testing that happens, the more stable the release, and the better the experience for users and developers—and the entire WordPress community. Thank you to all of the contributors who tested the RC1 release and gave feedback. Testing for bugs is not just a critical part of polishing every release, it is also a great way to contribute to WordPress. How to Help Help test WordPress 5.9 features – a guide to how you can take part. Can you write in another language other than English? You can help translate WordPress into more than 100 languages! Release Candidate 1 marked the hard string freeze point of the 5.9 release schedule. Thanks to every locale that is already involved with translations. Developers and those interested in more of the background to the features can find more in the Field Notes. More developer notes will be added as the release progresses to its final stage. You can also follow the 5.9 development cycle and timeline. If you think you have found a bug, you can post the details to the Alpha/Beta area in the support forums. If you are comfortable writing a reproducible bug report, you can file one on WordPress Trac, where you can also check the issue against a list of known bugs. Props to: @psykro and @webcommsat, and @hellofromtonya, @audrasjb, @cbringmann and @marybaum for final review. View the full article

This security release features four security fixes. Because this is a security release, it is recommended that you update your sites immediately. All versions since WordPress 3.7 have also been updated. WordPress 5.8.3 is a short-cycle security release. The next major release will be version 5.9, which is already in the Release Candidate stage. You can update to WordPress 5.8.3 by downloading from WordPress.org or visiting your Dashboard → Updates and clicking Update Now. If you have sites that support automatic background updates, they’ve already started the update process. Security Updates Four security issues affect WordPress versions between 3.7 and 5.8. If you haven’t yet updated to 5.8, all WordPress versions since 3.7 have also been updated to fix the following security issue (except where noted otherwise): Props to Karim El Ouerghemmi and Simon Scannell of SonarSource for disclosing an issue with stored XSS through post slugs.Props to Simon Scannell of SonarSource for reporting an issue with Object injection in some multisite installations.Props to ngocnb and khuyenn from GiaoHangTietKiem JSC for working with Trend Micro Zero Day Initiative on reporting a SQL injection vulnerability in WP_Query.Props to Ben Bidner from the WordPress security team for reporting a SQL injection vulnerability in WP_Meta_Query (only relevant to versions 4.1-5.8). Thank you to all of the reporters above for privately disclosing the vulnerabilities. This gave the security team time to fix the vulnerabilities before WordPress sites could be attacked. Thank you to the members of the WordPress security team for implementing these fixes in WordPress. For more information, check out the 5.8.3 HelpHub documentation page. Thanks and props! The 5.8.3 release was led by @desrosj and @circlecube. In addition to the security researchers and release squad members mentioned above, thank you to everyone who helped make WordPress 5.8.3 happen: Alex Concha, Dion Hulse, Dominik Schilling, ehtis, Evan Mullins, Jake Spurlock, Jb Audras, Jonathan Desrosiers, Ian Dunn, Peter Wilson, Sergey Biryukov, vortfu, and zieladam. View the full article

December was a busy month for the WordPress community. In the latest episode of the WP Briefing podcast, WordPress Executive Director Josepha Haden Chomphosy shares a carol of thanks and shows her gratitude to all the people who make the WordPress project a success. (…) I know that we have gotten so much done together in the last few years. And I am equally sure that we’re going to get so much done in the years to come. And so thank you all so much for your continued work with WordPress and the way that you just bring your best at all times. Josepha Haden, Executive Director of the WordPress project We said goodbye to 2021 with the annual State of the Word, along with the release of WordPress 5.9 Beta 4, among many other exciting updates. Read on to learn more about the latest community achievements. WordPress 5.9: The first release candidate just landed Following the Beta 3 and Beta 4 releases in December, the first release candidate for WordPress 5.9 is now out and available for testing.With less than three weeks to go until the final release, this version continues the work from last year and marks the hard string freeze point of the 5.9 release schedule.Follow the 5.9 developer notes to learn more about the changes and updates coming with this release. Are you interested in contributing to WordPress core? Join the #core channel, follow the Core Team blog, and check out the team handbook. Also, don’t miss the Core Team’s weekly developer chat on Wednesdays at 8 PM UTC. Gutenberg releases: Versions 12.1 and 12.2 are here The Core Team launched two new versions of Gutenberg last month. Both come with new features, code quality improvements, and bug fixes. Gutenberg 12.1 marks the return of the template List View and includes several Navigation block enhancements, new global styles features, an improved developer experience for block themes, and more.The Gutenberg 12.2 release focuses on user experience improvements and brings the block styles preview to the Widgets Editor, among other new features. Want to get involved in developing Gutenberg? Follow the Core Team blog, contribute to Gutenberg on GitHub, and join the #core-editor channel in the Make WordPress Slack. Follow the #gutenberg-new tag for details on the latest updates. Highlights from State of the Word 2021 State of the Word 2021, the annual keynote address delivered by WordPress co-founder Matt Mullenweg, was livestreamed from New York City on December 14, 2021. The event gathered WordPress enthusiasts at 29 watch parties around the world.Matt shared his thoughts on the progress of the WordPress project and made announcements regarding its future in 2022. The presentation was followed by a Question and Answer session. If you missed the event’s livestream, you could watch the State of the Word recording and the Q&A session on WordPress.tv. Team updates: 2022 major release timings, new team rep announcements, and more The Core Team opened a discussion on the release dates for 2022 and the possibility of having four major WordPress releases this year.The following teams announced their team representatives for 2022: Themes, Support, Polyglots, and Community.In 2021, 2572 people contributed to WordPress source code using Trac, including 305 first-timers. Check out A Year in Core – 2021 for more interesting stats on WordPress Core contributions.The Diverse Speaker Training Group (#WPDiversity) shared its accomplishments from last year in this 2021 year-end report.The Training Team planned a sprint to audit and revisit the Learn WordPress content for the WordPress 5.9 release.The Design Team summarized some of the key changes behind the Openverse redesign.The December 2021 editions of the Polyglots Monthly Newsletter and the Meetup Organizer Newsletter are out.The latest edition of People of WordPress features Collins Agbonghama from Nigeria.The Core Team announced a proposal to change the JavaScript coding standards for complete Prettier compatibility. Are you looking for some 5.9 resources to share with your local community? Check out the WordPress 5.9 Talking Points for Meetup Organizers post. Feedback/Testing requests: Contribute by testing or translating WordPress 5.9 Your feedback on WordPress 5.9 release candidates is still needed and appreciated! If you haven’t tried this version yet, you can find instructions on testing 5.9 features in this post.Do you speak a language other than English? The Polyglots Team announced that WordPress 5.9 is also ready to be translated.Version 18.9 of WordPress for Android is available for testing. Share your feedback on WordPress 5.9. Apply to speak or host a workshop at WordCamp Europe 2022 WordCamp US 2022 is currently looking for organizers.The WordPress community celebrated its first in-person WordCamp after 21 months in Sevilla (Spain) on December 11-12, 2021. WordCamp Taiwan was held online the same weekend.The Test Team organized the Hallway Hangout titled Let’s talk about WordPress 6.0 on December 21, 2021. The team also shared a wrap-up of the Site Editing Safari as part of the FSE Outreach Program.The Training Team hosted several WordPress Social Learning Meetups last month, and there will be many more in January 2022.Last year the WordPress Foundation made significant progress in its mission to educate the public about open source software. Learn more about it in this 2021 recap. Don’t miss the following upcoming WordCamps: WordCamp Birmingham, Alabama 2022, WordCamp Genève 2022, WordCamp Vienna 2022, and WordCamp Europe 2022. The Call For Sponsors and Call For Speakers for WordCamp Europe 2022 are open! Read this post to learn more about the Organizing Team’s plans for the first in-person WordCamp Europe in three years. Have a story that we could include in the next ‘Month in WordPress’ post? Let us know by filling out this form. The following folks contributed to December 2021’s Month in WordPress: @anjanavasan, @harishanker @lmurillom @meher @nalininonstopnewsuk @webcommsat View the full article

The first Release Candidate (RC1) for WordPress 5.9 is now available! Thank you to everyone who has contributed to reach this important milestone in the community’s progress towards a WordPress 5.9 release. “Release Candidate” means the new version of the software is ready for release. It helps the community check that nothing is missed, given the thousands of plugins and themes and differences in how millions of people use the software. WordPress 5.9 is slated for release on January 25, 2022. This is just three weeks to go – and there’s still time to help! Testing the release You can test the WordPress 5.9 release candidate in three ways: Option 1: Install and activate the WordPress Beta Tester plugin (select the “Bleeding edge” channel and “Beta/RC Only” stream). Option 2: Direct download the beta version here (zip). Option 3: When using WP-CLI to upgrade from Beta 1, 2, 3 or 4 on a case-insensitive filesystem, please use the following command sequence: Command One: wp core update --version=5.9-RC1 Command Two: wp core update --version=5.9-RC1 --force Your help to test the RC1 is vital: the more testing that happens, the more stable the release, and the better the experience for users and developers—and the entire WordPress community. Thank you to all of the contributors who tested the Beta releases and gave feedback. Testing for bugs is not just a critical part of polishing every release; it is also a great way to contribute to WordPress. Help test WordPress 5.9 features – a guide to how you can take part. What is in WordPress 5.9 release candidate? This will be the first release of 2022 and continues the work towards 5.9 from last year. It features the latest advances of the block editor and is the first version of full site editing in Core. WordPress 5.9 also brings more refinements to the developer experience. To keep up with the latest updates and discover more about how the community works to continually improve the software, please subscribe to the Make WordPress Core blog. In particular, the developer notes tag will keep you up to date on changes that might affect your products or how you use the software. Plugin and Theme Developers Please test your plugins and themes against WordPress 5.9 and update the Tested up to version to 5.9 in your readme file. If you find compatibility problems, please post to the support forums, so volunteers and developers can help you figure them out before the final release. The WordPress 5.9 Field Guide will be out very shortly. It will give you a deeper dive into the major changes. How to Help Do you speak a language that is not English? You can help translate WordPress into more than 100 languages! Release Candidate 1 marks the hard string freeze point of the 5.9 release schedule. Thanks to every locale that is already involved with translations. If you think you have found a bug, you can post to the Alpha/Beta area in the support forums. If you are comfortable writing a reproducible bug report, you can file one on WordPress Trac, where you can also check the issue against a list of known bugs. Props to @webcommsat for the post and to @marybaum @hellofromtonya @audrasjb @davidbaumwald @estelaris @cbringmann for final review. View the full article

In this series, we share some of the inspiring stories of how WordPress and its global network of contributors can change people’s lives for the better. This month we feature a website builder from Nigeria, who uses the open source WordPress platform to support his family and to share learning with others in his home country and beyond. Creating a life in the WordPress Ecosystem Collins Agbonghama started his journey to becoming a web developer by reading the football news headlines on a friend’s mobile phone. His fascination with development and learning continued to grow, and he now makes a living using WordPress and the web. Read on to discover his story, which shows with creativity and determination you can create products and make a living using WordPress. Starting web building on a phone Collins began his exploration of the internet while attending Secondary School in Nigeria, or High School as it is known in some other countries. A friend at the school had a simple mobile phone which could browse the internet. Collins had his first introduction to the World Wide Web through access to this device. He became hooked by reading headlines on a sports site about a famous English Premier League Football Club, Chelsea, a soccer team which he has long supported. “Being a very inquisitive person, I wanted to learn how the web works as well as have my own website. I was able to buy a classic mobile phone through the menial jobs I did after school,” he said. His first website was a wapsite or Wireless Application Protocol site optimized for mobile devices. He took to Google to learn how to actually build a site. He discovered he needed something called an ‘email address’ to sign-up for site builders. Google Search came to the rescue again, and he created the first email account for his first website. A desire for a website was the catalyst for further learning, starting with HTML and CSS from an online provider. His interest in building sites with more advanced tools grew, and then he came across WordPress. Using his savings, he bought the cheapest hosting plan from a local Nigerian web host. He installed WordPress and started writing tutorials for a mobile device platform. He built the site, created the lessons, and started his entry into WordPress all on a mobile phone. This led to him having the confidence to start building sites for others, and he was able to earn a small income from that. Collins said: “I couldn’t go to the university because of my precarious financial situation. I continued to do menial jobs during the day and started learning PHP in the evenings and at night using my mobile phone via online learning platforms.” He was later able to get an old laptop, which helped him access ebooks to learn more and practice his coding. Keen to share this learning, he started blogging about what he was learning on his website. Collins said: “I later took up a job teaching children at a school primarily because I got tired of the menial jobs and wanted to earn enough to take care of my internet data plan. After a while, I became fairly proficient in PHP and even took up a job to build a school management system.” Using WordPress to make a living Collins’ blog wasn’t making money through advertisements, but he discovered opportunities to write tutorials for other platforms. “I started writing PHP and WordPress development tutorials and got paid a few hundred dollars per article. In Nigeria, that’s quite a lot of money. I was able to improve the life and wellbeing of my family and myself,” he said. After getting into a higher education program to study computer science, his life dramatically changed. He decided to stop writing and began to focus on building and selling WordPress plugins. His first one was a user and profile plugin for WordPress sites. “Thankfully, after a year, it started making enough revenue for me to live pretty comfortably here in Nigeria because the cost of living here is relatively low,” he said Today, Collins has several plugins which have given him a sustainable source of income. He’s also a Core and Translation volunteer contributor to the WordPress.org Open Source project. I am thankful for WordPress because without it, I’m really not sure I would have been able to live a decent quality life. Who knows what would have become of me? Collins Agbonghama “I am also thankful for the community. I have made lots of friends that have been very supportive and helpful in my journey.” He added: “I tell people, life won’t give you what you want. You demand from life what you want. You make these demands by being determined and never giving up on your dreams and aspirations. “If you are poor, perhaps because you came from a humble and poor background, it is not your fault. You can’t go back in time to change things. I implore you to be strong, determined, and work hard.” Meet more WordPress community members in our People of WordPress series. Contributors Thanks to Michael Geheren (@geheren), Abha Thakor (@webcommsat), for writing this feature, to @MeherBala (@meher) for follow-ups and photo-editing, and to Chloe Bringmann (@cbringmann) and Nalini Thakor (@nalininonstopnewsuk) for the final proofing. Thank you to Collins Agbonghama (@collizo4sky) for sharing his Contributor Story. Thanks to Josepha Haden Chomphosy (@chanthaboune), Topher DeRosia (@topher1kenobe) and others for their support of this initiative. The People of WordPress feature is inspired by an essay originally published on HeroPress.com, a community initiative created by Topher DeRosia, which highlights people in the WordPress community who have overcome barriers. #HeroPress #ContributorStory View the full article

WordPress 5.9 Beta 4 is now available for testing! This software version is still under development. Please do not run this software on a production site; install it on a test site, where you can try out the newest features and get a feel for how they will work on your site. You can test the WordPress 5.9 Beta 4 in three ways: Option 1: Install and activate the WordPress Beta Tester plugin (select the “Bleeding edge” channel and “Beta/RC Only” stream). Option 2: Direct download the beta version here (zip). Option 3: When using WP-CLI to upgrade from Beta 1, 2, or 3 to Beta 4 on a case-insensitive filesystem, please use the following command sequence: Command One: wp core update --version=5.9-beta4 Command Two: wp core update --version=5.9-beta4 --force The current target for the final release of 5.9 is January 25, 2022, which is only five weeks away. Your help testing this beta is vital: the more testing that happens, the more stable the release, and the better the experience for users and developers—and the entire WordPress community. Some Highlights Since Beta 3, 20 bugs have been fixed. Here are a few of the changes you will find in Beta 4: Bundled Theme: Fixed duplicate CSS rules in Twenty Twenty-One theme (#53605).Customizer: It’s possible to switch to a block theme from within Customizer (#54549).Themes: Provide guidance to users seeking to preview block themes on WordPress versions below 5.9 (#54575).REST API: The get_theme_item method should respect fields param (#54595).Editor: Block Patterns: “Featured” category & patterns missing from inserter (#54623).Login and registration: Add a filter to allow to disable the Login screen language dropdown – (#54675). How You Can Help Do some testing! Testing for bugs is vital for polishing the release in the beta stage and a great way to contribute. Please post to the Alpha/Beta area in the support forums if you find a bug. If you’re comfortable writing a reproducible bug report, file one on WordPress Trac, where you can also find a list of known bugs. Got questions? Here are some answers In the coming weeks, follow the Make WordPress Core blog for 5.9-related developer notes that will cover these items in detail. So far, contributors have fixed 326 tickets and 108 new features and enhancements in WordPress 5.9. More bug fixes are on the way with your help through testing. Props to @cbringmann, @psykro, @hellofromtonya, @marybaum, @webcommsat, @audrasjb, @costdev and @meher for contributions to this post. View the full article

In this last episode of 2021, Josepha Haden Chomphosy takes the time to appreciate those who make the WordPress project a success and offers a carol of thanks. Have a question you’d like answered? You can submit them to wpbriefing@wordpress.org, either written or as a voice recording. Credits Editor: Dustin HartzlerLogo: Beatriz FialhoProduction: Chloé BringmannSong: Fearless First by Kevin MacLeod References Have yourself A Merry Little Christmas Transcript Josepha Haden Chomphosy 00:10 Hello everyone, and welcome to the WordPress Briefing. The podcast where you can catch quick explanations of the ideas behind the WordPress open source project. Some insight into the community that supports it and get a small list of big things coming up in the next two weeks. I’m your host Josepha Haden Chomphosy. Here we go! Josepha Haden Chomphosy 00:39 So, ages and ages ago, when I first started this podcast, someone basically requested that Matt and I do a duet for the last podcast of the year. A Christmas carol duet; him on the saxophone and me on voice. I obviously did not get that coordinated I don’t even know why I said obviously. I’ll tell you right now I did not get that coordinated. I was a very busy lady this year. So I don’t have a Matt on saxophone. Still, I did think that maybe it might be nice just for me to sing a teensy little Christmas carol for you all just because it seems especially poignant the words this year, especially after the 2020, 2021 COVID, all the things and trying to get back in person. So I’m going to sing you all one little verse from Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 01:35 Singing Have yourself a merry little Christmas Let your heart be light From now on our troubles Will be out of sight Have yourself a merry little Christmas Make the Yuletide gay From now on our troubles Will be miles away Here we are as in olden days Happy golden days of yore Faithful friends who are dear to us Gather near to us, once more Through the years we all will be together If the fates allow Hang a shining star upon the highest bough And have yourself a merry little Christmas now Here we are as in olden days Happy golden days of yore Faithful friends who are dear to us Gather near to us, once more Through the years we all will be together If the fates allow Hang a shining star upon the highest bough And have yourself a merry little Christmas now Josepha Haden Chomphosy 03:34 Alright, my friends, that was from my heart to yours if you happened to listen. If you skipped a few seconds to get through it, which I would totally understand, that is also fine. But I did want to just kind of wrap up the year to let you all know that I am so incredibly grateful for all of the people who show up for the WordPress project to make it a success. I have made so many friends and wonderful acquaintances throughout my time here with the WordPress project. And especially in my three years as the project’s Executive Director. You all have put a lot of trust in me and a lot of faith. And I know that we have gotten so much done together in the last few years. And I am equally sure that we’re going to get so much done in the years to come. And so thank you all so much for your continued work with WordPress and the way that you just bring your best at all times. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 04:32 One other little thanks I want to give. Over the course of this year, I’ve had an excellent team that works with me on this podcast. I have editing and design folks and people who’ve joined me here and there, folks who helped me with my production. So big thank you to Dustin, Bea, I realize your name is Beatriz in the actual credits, but I call you Bea, and so thank you. Also, a huge thank you to Chloé, who does all of our production and wrangling every couple of weeks. A big round of applause and kudos to that tiny but tough team that helps me get this all done. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 05:10 That’s to go on top of the general thanks to the WordPress project. And if you all are celebrators, I hope you have a wonderful holiday season. If you are not celebrators, I hope that you have a wonderful end to your year and that everything you wanted to get done, you did get done, and that you can start 2022 with a fresh slate. Again, this is the WP Briefing. Thank you so much for listening. I’m your host Josepha Haden Chomphosy, and I’ll see you again in 2022. View the full article

State of the Word 2021, the annual keynote from WordPress co-founder Matt Mullenweg, happened on December 14. The hybrid event took place in New York City with a small audience (proof of vaccination required). As Matt said, “we had people join by plane, train, and automobile.” Those who didn’t make the trek to the live event watched the livestream from wherever they call home, all around the world. It was an exciting moment for the WordPress community which also celebrated its first in-person WordCamp in Sevilla, Spain, after a lengthy hiatus for in-person events. You can view the full recording, complete with captions and transcripts on WordPress.tv. It was thrilling to see so many meetup organizers host watch parties worldwide. Twenty-eight watch parties were held across eleven countries, with more than 300 RSVPs. Similar to past State of the Word events, Matt covered a broad range of topics. This year was no different. WordPress’ past, present, and future were in the spotlight, with highlights on the growth of the contributors, language translations, recent release milestones, and educational initiatives, to name a few. Audience members and livestreamers alike viewed product demos showcasing upcoming features that will be the hallmark of WordPress 5.9, such as full site editing, block patterns, global styling options, and enhanced image controls. Matt took the opportunity to remind everyone of the WordPress roadmap which includes native multi-lingual support and real-time collaborative site editing. He also pointed out that anyone can contribute to WordPress’ progress through a number of different initiatives ranging from creating new features and testing to helping spread the word and educate others. Matt emphasized the way that open source software gets better by reminding everyone that “The more people that use a program like WordPress, the better it gets.” Broader topics covering the tech landscape including web3, merger and acquisition activity, as well as the growth and support of open source software, rounded out the energetic presentation. The one-hour multimedia presentation was followed by an interactive question and answer session where Matt fielded questions that were submitted ahead of the event, as well as questions from the livestream and studio audience. Discover everything that was covered by watching the official event recording and join the ongoing #ILoveWP conversation on Twitter! Special thanks to @dansoschin for review and edits! View the full article

WordPress 5.9 Beta 3 is now available for testing! This software version is still under development. Please do not run this software on a production site; install it on a test site, where you can try out the newest features and get a feel for how they will work on your site. You can test the WordPress 5.9 Beta 3 in three ways: Option 1: Install and activate the WordPress Beta Tester plugin (select the “Bleeding edge” channel and “Beta/RC Only” stream). Option 2: Direct download the beta version. Option 3: If you use WP-CLI to upgrade from Beta 1 or Beta 2 to Beta 3 on a case-insensitive filesystem, please use the following command sequence: Command One: wp core update --version=5.9-beta2 Command Two: wp core update --version=5.9-beta3 --force The current target for the final release of 5.9 is January 25, 2022, which gets closer every minute. Your help testing this beta is vital: the more testing that happens, the more stable the release, and the better the experience for users and developers—and the entire WordPress community. Some Highlights Since Beta 2, 14 bugs have been fixed. Here are a few of the changes you will find in Beta 3: Editor: Add FSE infrastructure from Gutenberg plugin into Core (#54335).Formatting: Allow PDFs to embedded as objects (#54261)Language switcher on the login screen (#43700)REST API: Add navigation areas REST API endpoint from Gutenberg plugin (#54393)Themes: Live Preview button bug (#54578) How You Can Help Do some testing! Testing for bugs is vital for polishing the release in the beta stage and a great way to contribute. If you think you’ve found a bug, please post to the Alpha/Beta area in the support forums. If you’re comfortable writing a reproducible bug report, file one on WordPress Trac. That’s also where you can find a list of known bugs. For even more ways to test, you can also refer to this official Full Site Editing post from @annezazu. Got questions? Here are some answers In the coming weeks, follow the Make WordPress Core blog for 5.9-related developer notes that cover these items in detail. So far, contributors have fixed 316 tickets in WordPress 5.9, including 100 new features and enhancements. More bug fixes are on the way with your help through testing. Props to @psykro, @estelaris, @hellofromtonya, @marybaum, @webcommsat, @cbringmann, @costdev, and @audrasjb for contributions to this post. Filed under #release, #5.9, #beta View the full article

WordPress 5.9 Beta 2 is now available for testing! This software version is still under development. Please do not run this software on a production site. Instead, install it on a test site, where you can try out the newest features to get a feel for how they will work on your site. You can test the WordPress 5.9 Beta 2 in three ways: Option 1: Install and activate the WordPress Beta Tester plugin (select the “Bleeding edge” channel and “Beta/RC Only” stream). Option 2: Direct download the beta version here (zip). Option 3: When using WP-CLI to upgrade from Beta 1 to Beta 2 on a case-insensitive filesystem, please use the following command sequence: Command One: wp core update --version=5.9-beta1 Command Two: wp core update --version=5.9-beta2 --force The current target for the final release of 5.9 is January 25, 2022, which is just seven weeks away. Your help testing this version is a vital part of making this release as good as it can be. Some Highlights Since Beta 1, 24 bugs have been fixed. Here are a few of the changes you will find in Beta 2: Block Editor: Remove navigation areas (#54506)Block Editor: Navigation block view JavaScript error (#54456)Block Editor: Block template theme error related to child themes (#54515)General: Fixing existing links to Customizer when the Site Editor is enabled (#54460)Media: Media library showing only the selected image (#53765)Media: Fatal error uploading media on PHP8 (#54385)REST API: Add Global Styles REST API endpoints from Gutenberg into Core (#54336) Also, note that some users testing 5.9 Beta 1 faced some fatal errors upon upgrade. In turn, these errors revealed the need for some extra work on the filesystem and upgrader. Those fatal errors are no longer a problem, and the enhancements will be part of version 6.0. How You Can Help Do some testing! Testing for bugs is vital for polishing the release in the beta stage and a great way to contribute. If you think you’ve found a bug, please post to the Alpha/Beta area in the support forums. If you’re comfortable writing a reproducible bug report, file one on WordPress Trac. That’s also where you can find a list of known bugs. Where can I get more information? In the coming weeks, follow the Make WordPress Core blog for 5.9-related developer notes that cover these items in detail. So far, contributors have fixed 305 tickets in WordPress 5.9, including 110 new features and enhancements. More bug fixes are on the way with your help through testing. Props to @psykro, @estelaris, @hellofromtonya, @marybaum, @webcommsat, @cbringmann, @davidb, @audrasjb, and @pbiron for contributions to this post. View the full article

Despite the holiday season being around the corner, the WordPress project didn’t slow down. In a recent episode of WP Briefing, Executive Director Josepha Haden shares the first thing she wants people to notice about WordPress, which is also the heart of this open source project: Now, the first thing I want people to see on that site is that WordPress has not only 18 years of learned knowledge that every single new user benefits from, but that it also has thousands of really smart people making sure it works and gets better every day. Josepha Haden, Executive Director of the WordPress project As always, contributors across various teams are working hard to ensure the upcoming release of WordPress 5.9 doesn’t disappoint. With State of the Word 2021 coming up soon, there are many exciting things in the works. Read the November 2021 edition of the Month in WordPress to learn more about what’s happening. WordPress 5.9: Expected to release on January 25, 2022 The Core Team announced the WordPress 5.9 Revised Release Schedule, and the release is now planned for January 25, 2022.WordPress 5.9 Beta 1 was recently released and is available for testing. This version of the WordPress software is under development. Check out the release post to learn more about what’s new in version 5.9 and how you can help testing. Check out “A Look at WordPress 5.9” for a first peek into the exciting features included in this major release.WordPress 5.8.2, a security and maintenance release, was out on November 10, 2021. This release includes two bug fixes and one security fix. Are you interested in contributing to WordPress core? Join the #core channel, follow the Core Team blog, and check out the team handbook. Also, don’t miss the Core Team’s weekly developer chat on Wednesdays at 8 PM UTC. Gutenberg releases: 11.9 and 12.0 are out Two new Gutenberg versions have been released! Version 11.9.0 brings new Gutenberg blocks for working with post comments, a fullscreen pattern explorer modal, further iterations on the Navigation block, and many other improvements.Gutenberg 12.0.0, released on November 24, improves the Block Styles preview and includes featured image block visual enhancements, a site Editor welcome guide, official JSON schema updates, and much more. Want to get involved in developing Gutenberg? Follow the Core Team blog, contribute to Gutenberg on GitHub, and join the #core-editor channel in the Make WordPress Slack. Follow #gutenberg-new for details on the latest updates. State of the Word 2021: Join a watch party in your local community State of the Word 2021, the annual keynote address delivered by the WordPress project’s co-founder, Matt Mullenweg, will be held on December 14, 2021 between 5 and 7 pm ET/10 pm – 12 am (December 15) UTC. The event will be livestreamed from New York City, and include a Question and Answer session. Host or join a State of the Word watch party to enjoy the event with your WordPress friends. Check Meetup to see if a watch party is scheduled to be held in your local community! Add the event to your calendar so you don’t miss State of the Word 2021! Want to ask Matt a question during State of the Word? Please send your questions ahead of time to ask-matt@wordcamp.org or ask them live during the event via YouTube chat. Team updates: Nominations for some team representatives are still underway Requests 2.0.0 has been released. This release is fully compatible with PHP 8.0 and 8.1, indicating that a legacy codebase can be modernized, made more stable and secure without breaking backward-compatibility. The Requests project is a dependency of WordPress core, which was adopted into the WordPress organization earlier this year. The 2020 WordPress Annual Survey results are available to be viewed. The Core Team added six new committers.Last month, the Marketing Team opened its call for team representatives, joining Core, Themes, Accessibility, Support, and Hosting from October 2021.The Core Team announced its new Team Rep for 2022 (and beyond).The Design Team and the Accessibility Team’s meetings will be held bi-weekly moving forward.The Marketing Team published the latest edition of People of WordPress, featuring Devin Maeztri from Indonesia.There’s an open call for suggestions for Global Community Team, Training Team, and Polyglots goals for 2022. Please drop your ideas by December 6, 2021.The Accessibility Team has opened 1-2 volunteer positions for the #diverse-speaker-support channel.The November 2021 edition of the Polyglots monthly newsletter is out. The Marketing Team welcomes any help to promote WordPress Meetups on a weekly basis and thus keep the community connected. We want to hear from you! Suggest your 2022 goals for the Global Community Team by December 6, 2021. Feedback/Testing requests: Test WordPress 5.9 Beta 1; Take the 2021 Annual WordPress Survey to share your experience WordPress 5.9 Beta 1 is now available for testing and we’d like to hear from you! Testing is vital to ensure the release is as good as it can be—it’s also a great way to contribute. Read the comprehensive guide, “Help test WordPress 5.9 Features,” to learn how to test WordPress 5.9 Beta 1 and report any bugs.There’s an open call for testing for WordPress iOS 18.7 and Android 18.7. The 2021 WordPress Annual Survey is out! Please respond to the survey, so your WordPress experience is reflected in the results. Keep an eye out for WordCamp Taiwan and Sevilla, along with several WordPress workshops in December 2021 Several WordPress Social Learning Meetups were held in November by the Training Team, and there will be more in December 2021.Tuesday Training sessions are paused until 2022.WordCamp São Paulo was held online on November 27, 2021.Get excited for WordCamp Sevilla 2021, coming up on December 11-12! Sevilla is the first in-person WordCamp happening in over 18 months, since WordCamps moved online in March 2020 due to COVID-19.Don’t miss the following upcoming WordCamps: WordCamp Taiwan 2021, WordCamp Birmingham 2022, and WordCamp Europe 2022!Check out the latest episodes of WordPress Briefing with Josepha Haden on“All Things Block Themes!”“WordPress=Blogging+”“The People of WordPress” Give back to open source. Please donate to the WordPress Foundation’s mission this holiday season. Have a story that we could include in the next ‘Month in WordPress’ post? Let us know by filling out this form. The following folks contributed to November 2021’s Month in WordPress: @anjanavasan, @harishanker, @rmartinezduque, @callye, @jrf, @webcommsat, and @nalininonstopnewsuk View the full article

WordPress 5.9 Beta 1 is now available for testing! This version of the WordPress software is under development. You don’t want to run this version on a production site. Instead, it is recommended that you run this on a test site. This will allow you to test out the new version. You can test the WordPress 5.9 Beta 1 in three ways: Option 1: Install and activate the WordPress Beta Tester plugin (select the “Bleeding edge” channel and “Beta/RC Only” stream).Option 2: Direct download the beta version here (zip).Option 3: Use WP-CLI to test: wp core update --version=5.9-beta1. Do not use this option if your filesystem is case-insensitive. The current target for the final release is January 25, 2022, which is just eight weeks away. Your help testing this version is vital to make sure the release is as good as it can be. Check the Make WordPress Core blog for 5.9-related developer notes in the coming weeks which will break down all upcoming changes in greater detail. How You Can Help – Testing! Testing for bugs is a critical part of polishing the release in the beta stage. It is also a great way to contribute. If you’ve never tested a beta release before, this detailed guide will help walk you through what and how to test. If you think you’ve found a bug, please report it to the Alpha/Beta area in the support forums. If you’re comfortable writing a reproducible bug report, file one on WordPress Trac. That’s also where you can find a list of known bugs. To see every feature in the Gutenberg releases since WordPress 5.8, check out the What’s New In Gutenberg posts for 10.8, 10.9, 11.0, 11.1, 11.2, 11.3, 11.4, 11.5, 11.6, 11.7, 11.8, and 11.9. Beyond the noted changes, which include 580 enhancements and nearly 450 bug fixes, contributors have fixed 297 tickets for WordPress 5.9, including 110 new features and enhancements. More fixes are on the way. Happy testing! Want to know what’s new in version 5.9? Read on for some highlights. Full Site Editing The Styles Interface Combine all the features that went live in 5.8 with those making their entrance in 5.9, and you get Full Site Editing. Formerly known as Global Styles, the Styles Interface lets you interact directly with your blocks and elements right in the WordPress Admin. From typography to color palettes, this cohesive design interface means a design change—even a dramatic one—can happen without a theme switch. No code needed. Theme.json Introduced in WordPress 5.8, theme.json has been improved to enable features and default styles for your site and its blocks. With 5.9, theme.json can support child themes and the duotone treatment. Coordinate layers of style with theme.json, taking the weight off of your theme’s required CSS. Other features supported by theme.json include: Border: color, style, and width augment the border-radius property that landed in 5.8.Flex layouts: Block Gap support, courtesy of spacing.blockGap.Typography: font families, font style, font weight, text decoration, and text transform.Images: Duotones. A New Navigation Block Welcome to the most intuitive way to build navigation: the Navigation Block. Here are the features that need testing the most: Responsive menu options you can turn off, have always on, or opt to use only for small screens.Built-in keyboard accessibility. For accessibility, for speed, or both.Add extra blocks like Search and Site Icon blocks (and customize them to your liking).Submenu items with styling options.Horizontal or vertical alignment.Reusable navigation? Even across themes? Yes. Because the Navigation Block you build gets saved as a custom post type. A Better Gallery Block What if you could treat single images in your Gallery Block the same way you treat the Image Block? Now you can. Make every image in your gallery different from the next, with inline cropping or a duotone and change layouts with the ease of drag and drop. With the improved gallery block, every image is its own Image block. One thing to note: Have you built a plugin or theme on the Gallery Block functionality? Be sure to review this Dev Note, which details what you need to do for compatibility. Focused Template Part Mode Building template parts can take a level of focus all its own because you’re making decisions for the entire site. So WordPress 5.9 adds a focus mode that shows you only the part you’re working on right now (and you can get back to the regular view with a keystroke). Block Pattern Directory The Pattern Directory offers a range of prebuilt block patterns, from a couple of blocks that show an image and text, to an entire page layout with columns and sections. Since the 5.8 release, the directory has become a hub for exploratory UI and patterns, taking submissions and offering them to the community. So now, your creation can help other people build out their perfect site. Twenty Twenty-Two Default Theme A whole new way of building WordPress themes. WordPress 5.9 introduces features that make Full Site Editing possible, including the first default block theme. Using minimal CSS, theme styles reside in theme.json so that you can configure them in the Styles interface of the WordPress Admin. Make this theme take on its own personality site-wide, with a wide array of color schemes, type combinations, page templates, premade components (forms), and image treatments to choose from. More Improvements and Updates Do you love to blog? New tweaks to the publishing flow let you add new posts just seconds after hitting Publish on your latest post.List View lets you drag and drop content as easily as you could always cruise through it – and collapse entire sections – so you can concentrate on a task or get the bigger picture.The Buttons and Social icons blocks now absorb and display their parent block’s toolbar controls. Choose your language on the login screen.More performance improvements (i.e., speed). Props to @chanthaboune, @priethor, @psykro, @annezazu, @webcommsat, @marybaum, @hellofromtonya, @davidbaumwald, and @rmartinezduque for their research and copy. View the full article

In this series, we share some of the inspiring stories of how WordPress and its global network of contributors can change people’s lives for the better. This month we feature a translator and campaigner who uses WordPress to highlight good causes and helps people in her area benefit from the open source platform. Going to a WordCamp can be a life-changing experience, as Devin Maeztri discovered. Every event she attends is a further step on a journey of discovering the WordPress community and its many opportunities. “It is not that hard to fall for WordPress if you have a chance to experience WordPress. For me, it took a WordCamp.” Devin Maeztri Devin’s first experience with camps came when she volunteered impromptu at an Indonesian event, WordCamp Denpasar, Bali in 2016. Here, she made a profound discovery: “WordCamps can bring people who will give back to the community, even if they don’t get anything from WordPress directly.” With every WordCamp after that first experience, she became more interested in WordPress and the community. Over time, Devin found she wanted to be part of WordPress events more often. She became a regular at Meetups in Ubud and Jakarta, joining as a co-organizer at WordCamp Jakarta in 2017 and 2019. Later, she took on the role of co-organizer for Meetups in Jakarta and Ubud. Smitten by what WordCamps can offer and how they can bring people together across national borders, she joined the organizing team for WordCamp Asia 2020. Sadly, this event was to become the first major WordPress event to be cancelled in the COVID-19 pandemic. Naturally, Devin hopes WordCamp Asia will happen someday very soon. Beyond the expected WordPress learning and sharing that event will promote, she believes its very scale will showcase how WordCamps add international tourism and cultural understanding everywhere they take place. WordCamp Asia 2020 Organizers at WordCamp Europe 2019. Devin is pictured in the front row, second from left. Photo Credit: Abha Thakor Showing how WordPress can be used locally After experiencing several events, Devin had questions: “At WordCamps and Meetups, you hear stories about how WordPress powers the web. How it changes the lives of so many people, how it helps dreams come true. It made me think, considering WordPress is that powerful, why are there not even more people in Indonesia using websites, and more using WordPress? Why aren’t more talented Indonesian WordPress users, developers, designers, and business owners taking part in WordPress.org projects? Language, for me, was the main answer.” The solution Devin felt was to make WordPress available in the main local language. She said: “I believe, the more content translated into Indonesian, the more Indonesian WordPress users see WordPress as more than just a blogging platform or a content management system. They will realize it’s a huge open source community that works together to make the web a better place. The more plugins and themes translated, the easier the work of the developer and designer will be. The more people see how WordPress can enhance their life, the better the ecosystem for business owners becomes.” Encouraging others to translate WordPress After talking with others about how WordPress could be even more useful in Indonesia, Devin felt she had to make a personal commitment to reviving the polyglot project in Indonesia. With another volunteer contributor and through promotion, the local polyglot team got bigger and the interest in translation grew. She also took on the responsibility of a General Translation Editor for the language. Through the efforts of Devin and the other translation editors, Indonesia took part in WordPress Translation Day in 2020, and in 2021 held sprints and learning sessions spanning the whole 30 days of the event. Her enthusiasm and dedication to helping others translate WordPress locally and promoting the global community were recognized in the Polyglot Appreciation Nominations for 2021. Helping to give access to more diverse audiences Through her involvement in translation, Devin noticed there were not many women involved in the WordPress community in Indonesia. Often, she found herself the only woman at an event. So, along with a couple of community members, she started Perempuan WordPress, a local initiative. This group is open for everyone to join, but prioritizes women as event speakers. Devin has gone on to support the work of the Diversity Speaker Training group in the Community Team, translating materials and promoting initiatives in Indonesia. She is keen to encourage others to get involved with this initiative which helps increase the diversity of presenters at Meetups and WordCamps. Organizing at WordCamp Jakarta 2019 In her professional roles, Devin is an advocate for WordPress as a tool for people with a wide variety of skill sets. She does not code, but uses the platform extensively for her projects. In 2014, she signed up for a free account on WordPress.com to keep and share notes about what she saw or was thinking about as she commuted on public transport to work. This site did not turn into a blog, but instead introduced her to other opportunities and the vast capabilities of the platform. WordPress can support your skills and passions With a background in environmental activism, Devin has worked for international development organizations on everything from policymaking to campaigning. Behind the desk, she worked with policymakers and organized conferences and meetings. That meant doing a lot of writing and translating and working with people on the ground who were impacted by the policies. “My work on the ground usually involved researching, movement building and community empowerment,” she noted. Her work with events inspired Devin to get involved in WordCamps and Meetups and share her energy for making things happen. As in her professional work, she felt WordPress was an opportunity to work and share with people about something that can make a positive impact on someone else’s life. “For me, everything comes from the heart. I do things that I feel so strongly about. Things that call me, and things that I am good at but still giving me room to learn and become better at. WordPress can be the perfect place for this.” While she was between jobs, Devin was encouraged to volunteer at WordCamp Denpasar 2016. With some help, she created an online CV. She also learned to manage a WordPress site, navigate the wp-admin, and make the content appeal to potential employers. She eventually got a job as a campaigner to build a movement online and offline. The brainchild of many university friends in America, who used digital campaigns to go global, the campaign used WordPress. Devin worked alongside a digital campaigner and helped shape the content, the call to action, and the user experience. She also had to use the wp-admin to make some amendments. As a global movement, it developed its resources in English, so she also reviewed the work of the translators she worked with. Devin’s cat became a regular on social media posts about #WPTranslationDay 2021 She left her job as a campaigner at the end of 2018 to concentrate on freelancing – and to spend more of her free time contributing to the WordPress community. She also took up the initiative to help street cats in Jakarta. Devin said: “So, I am busy helping these cats but also learning how to fundraise using a website. I’m learning to use online forms, set up a payment service provider, work on SEO, and do other new things I need to learn to grow my initiative. I do have the privilege to learn directly from a personal guru. The same person who convinced me to volunteer at WordCamp Denpasar, and who I married in 2018.” WordPress gives everyone a chance to learn Devin was so enthused by being a contributor for WordPress, she took part in the video shorts following the Translation Day events. Devin talks about translating in this short video (opens in a new tab on YouTube) She is also active in other Contributor Teams and decided to become a Community Team Deputy to support meetups in new cities across Indonesia and perhaps future WordCamps. She said: “One of the things that I like about WordPress is that it is very welcoming and open to people like me, who don’t code at all. At the same time, it shows me a different way of looking at the world.” Devin believes in the power of WordPress to give ‘everyone a chance to learn new things’ and allows her to contribute and share her knowledge and experience. “By contributing, I hope to make a difference in someone’s life. I hope they feel the benefit of using WordPress and want to give back to create a healthier WordPress community.” Contributors Thank you to Abha Thakor (@webcommsat) and Mary Baum (@marybaum) for the interviews and writing this feature, and to Devin Maeztri (@devinmaeztri) for sharing her story. Thanks to Meher Bala (@meher) for work on the images, and to Chloé Bringmann (@cbringmann) and Collieth Clarke (@callye) for proofing. Thanks to Josepha Haden Chomphosy (@chanthaboune) and Topher DeRosia (@topher1kenobe) for their support for the series. This People of WordPress feature is inspired by an essay originally published on HeroPress.com, a community initiative created by Topher DeRosia. It highlights people in the WordPress community who have overcome barriers and whose stories might otherwise go unheard. #HeroPress #ContributorStory View the full article

In episode 21 of the WordPress Briefing, Executive Director, Josepha Haden Chomphosy, talks all things block themes with developers and theme specialists Maggie Cabrera and Jeff Ong. Have a question you’d like answered? You can submit them to wpbriefing@wordpress.org, either written or as a voice recording. Credits Editor: Dustin HartzlerLogo: Beatriz FialhoProduction: Chloé BringmannSong: Fearless First by Kevin MacLeod References 5.9 Beta 1 Delay Announcement 5.9 Revised Release ScheduleWordCamp Sevilla 2021Charitable Giving: WordPress FoundationBig Orange HeartHeroPress (Update: This organization is not a non-profit.) Transcript Josepha Haden Chomphosy 00:11 Hello, everyone, and welcome to the WordPress Briefing, the podcast where you can catch quick explanations of the ideas behind the WordPress open source project, some insight into the community that supports it, and get a small list of big things coming up in the next two weeks. I’m your host, Josepha Haden Chomphosy. See, here we go! Josepha Haden Chomphosy 00:40 Well, today, folks, in our podcast, I am joined by a couple of special guests. I know it’s been a bit since I’ve had a guest, so I’m very excited to introduce you to who I have with me today. Today, I have Maggie Cabrera and Jeff Ong. They both are working on themes, and especially the future of themes as we move into this low code, no code block based experience of editing things in WordPress. And there have been so many questions lately about what does the landscape of being a theme developer turns into once we move fully into this excellent promise of user empowerment for Gutenberg? I figured who best to come and talk to us about that than these two. So welcome, Maggie. Welcome, Jeff. I’m really excited to have this conversation with you today. Jeff Ong 01:39 Thank you for having us. Excited to be here. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 01:45 I’m just gonna hop right in, and we will see what happens. The first thing that I want to chat about, I hear so many questions and so much discussion about patterns in a lot of different places. Like obviously, the work that I helped to steward the most is around like the Block Pattern directory and various other user-facing tools. And so I have never really been able to give a really solid answer about like patterns and how they work inside themes. And so I wondered if you all had anything that you could offer to our listeners to help clarify what is the power of patterns inside themes in the future? Implementation of themes? Jeff Ong 02:34 I can try to start unless, Maggie? Okay. Well, if you take a look at what I’ve been doing for the last couple of months working on Twenty Twenty-Two. And if you look at that theme, it’s mostly just the collection of patterns. Patterns. As you know, if you read the description, the theme, it’s designed to be the most flexible and kind of like flexible theme ever, dare I say ever created. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 03:04 I think you can dare to say it. Jeff Ong 03:03 And, you know, I think a huge part of that is because of the Full Site Editing being launched, introduced in 5.9. And also that theme itself ships with all of these patterns in it that work with the overall design, but really can be configured to your own kind of unique liking and kind of taste and ultimately, what you want to accomplish, whether that’s I want to make a portfolio, I want to make, you know, a single-page website promoting like my podcast, or there are patterns for that kind of shipping with the theme. And they’ve all been kind of designed and tailored to work with the typography choices at a baseline level with the color choices at a baseline level, but can very easily be tweaked. And you can kind of rely on them to work with the editor. And I guess, kind of zooming out for a little bit, not just about Twenty-Twenty Two. Jeff Ong 04:04 But like patterns as this idea that a theme, hopefully, what it is, it’s a collection of different design options or layout options that are ultimately presented as patterns to the user, the patterns are just a really easy way to basically say “I want you this layout, like two columns of text or with like some images here.” Basically, a theme becomes a way of packaging the patterns together in a way that feels like a coherent piece of a coherent website. And I think that’s a pretty powerful idea. I know that the patterns directory is also opening up making those patterns pretty widely available. But I think a theme you could think of as like a curation of those patterns in a way that makes sense. And I think Twenty-Twenty Two is a really good example. I mean, I’m biased. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 05:03 I also think it’s a good example. Maggie, did you have anything that you wanted to add to that? Maggie Cabrera 05:08 Yeah, What I really like about patterns is how it empowers the user, even if they don’t really have like a deep knowledge of code, or they’re not used to the more complex blocks. When the theme developer gives you this pattern about using the query block, for example, it lays out your posts in a very compelling manner. And you can edit it if you want it or just use it out of the box. And you have this dynamic blog that it’s, like, such a big important part of your website. Like if you want to have a page where you have, you have maybe a podcast website, and you want to showcase your podcasts differently than your regular blog posts. So you can use a different gray pattern for that. And it’s like, really, really easy to use, even if you’re not familiar with it. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 06:07 One of the things that I have found compelling about this new version of themes and kind of the way that themes are planning to look in the future; it’s going to be like a super throwback, so everyone get ready for me to sound old, my guests and my listeners alike. It reminds me of my original days of blogging on the web. I was not a developer and even though I had this really short stint of working with JavaScript in my career, at some point. Like no one actually would ever look to me and be like, that one is excellent at design and fixing everything with code, like I was just killer at searching for the right pieces of code, right. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 06:57 And so I remember sitting there on Zynga, which is, of course, now powered by WordPress, I absolutely just went out and found bundles of code that are now what we would consider themes and modified the small pieces that I needed to change in order to like really suit what I wanted to have happen on the site at the time. And they’re like, I knew I could break it all. Really easily. But also, it was, it was not scary to think about breaking it. Like it was clear how I could fix it if I really broke it. The content, like what I had written, was separate from everything to do with the way that it was looking. And so like, I wouldn’t destroy all of my work, just because I didn’t put a semicolon in the right place, or whatever it was in that moment. And so like, this future of themes really reminds me of this a lot where someone has curated how it can look how it should look. And you can just like add in modular pieces that will augment what was already intended, but still kind of work. And if it’s not gonna work, it’s kind of easy to fix too. So like, I’m excited. That was a really exciting time in my learning of the web and certainly was formative in my career, as we all now see. And so yeah, I think that’s really exciting. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 08:20 I did have actually another question that this conversation has kind of brought up for me. I have, obviously just use the term modular, which no one has ever used in the context of themes for WordPress. And I know that there is a lot there are a lot of terms kind of wandering around about themes right now. And especially as we’re moving into what themes can look like in the future. There was block based theme as a term for a while. And now it’s block themes. There was like this floating around the term, universal themes. And now we’re looking at just like block themes forever. And so I wondered if y’all could give us a just like a clear understanding of these terms that had been being used and maybe are going out of fashion? Like, are they important for us to keep knowing? Jeff Ong 09:11 So yes, the history of terms around themes. And obviously, even my knowledge only goes back so far. But it was around when we started doing the block based themes meeting. And trying to I think that’s where that term kind of came from is like, oh, let’s, let’s start talking about this idea that themes can be completely made up out of blocks. And what does that mean? Jeff Ong 09:33 I think over time, it wasn’t just block themes, because, you know, previously, there were themes and even default themes that used and took into account the fact that blocks existed. So there was some confusion there. Enough time has gone on where we focus on this idea that themes whose templates are ultimately made out of blocks are block themes. And to me, it’s kind of as simple as that. Its themes that supply a set of templates that previously in the past were a collection of PHP and various template tags and whatnot is all transitioned to themes made up including other blocks, as well as themes that supply styles through theme.json configuration instead of supplying it in raw CSS. To me this idea is really crystallizing around like this is a block theme, one that is really, at its core, supplying a set of templates, and styles through a language that WordPress understands natively, and can allow it to be configured and customized in a really powerful way. And then maybe someday in the future, they’ll just be called themes again. If we do a good enough they will just be called themes. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 10:57 I’m gonna, I’m gonna take us into a philosophical area now that you’ve just put us in there. You said, someday they’ll be called Themes. Again, I’ve talked about this on this podcast a few times. And for anyone who’s worked with me for any length of time, like you all probably heard this from me as well. But like, adjectives are so frequently the realm of things that are not what you expect, right? Because like you have coffee, and then decaf coffee, no one’s like caffeinated coffee, because that’s what you expect out of it. And so when you’re like themes, and block themes, it makes it look like block themes are secondary, which at the moment, they are, ish. But in the future, I think you’re probably right, there will be a time when the modifier isn’t necessary anymore because it will be hopefully a much better way for people to kind of change the way that their themes work and make it more usable for users and people who are, you know, having to manage their own site without necessarily wanting to or being able to, like, have a Maggie in the room to fix everything that they break. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 12:08 Maggie is nowhere near me. And so she’s never been in the room when I’ve broken anything. But I believe that Maggie on one occasion, at least, has come in and helped me fix something that I definitely broke. I’m an excellent breaker of WordPress things. Maggie, did you have anything you wanted to add to that question? 12:29 Yeah, I guess, maybe clarify a bit, what universal themes are because, yeah, maybe some people have heard about the term but they don’t really know what they are. And maybe just clarify that. The term was born when developing block themes wasn’t something that you could actually do for production websites like you could build them to test some experiments, but they weren’t really ready for users to use. So universal themes want to grasp the power of love themes while still being ready for users. So the way they do it is they are block based, like we used to call them in the sense that the templates are made of blocks. But they are also able to be customized using the customizer, which is the old way of customizing themes, instead of using the site editor. So they can have a balance between two worlds between the worlds of classic themes and block themes. But they are, at heart, a temporary concept. They are bound to be blocked themes in the future, but with maybe a foot in the past, where they can actually serve users who are not ready for full-on site editor. But they are bound to be full block themes in the future. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 14:00 There’s a really interesting concept in there. So universal themes, it sounds like are basically kind of like an on-ramp for people who are not really ready to fully commit to this for any number of reasons. Like we never want to say that we know the reason that people would be a little bit shy to get started with this. But like it’s kind of like an on-ramp, it’s a safe way to get back to something that they do know, in the event that what they don’t know, really hinders their progress makes it hard for them to get the work done. Maggie Cabrera 14:31 I think I wouldn’t say that they are for people shyer to get into new stuff rather than developers who want to embrace the new stuff before it’s even really ready. They really want to embrace the power of the blocks instead of doing things the old way. But even if it’s not fully ready. Jeff Ong 14:54 They still need to support the old way of doing things. Maggie Cabrera 14:58 Like being backward compatible and being ready for any kind of user. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 15:05 So mostly for developers, everyone who heard me just talking about how it was a great thing for users, ignore it. Maggie Cabrera 15:12 It’s also good for users; If they feel secure in using the customizer. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 15:20 Well, I think that there’s something important here that we certainly learned with the adoption of Gutenberg in 5.0. Right, which is that there is certainly one method of helping people to adopt things, which is to go like the art of war style, and kind of smash their rice pots and burn all their boats, like, that’s one way. Which works for a lot of companies in the world, I’m sure. But WordPress has always had kind of a commitment, not even kind of, has always had a commitment to backward compatibility. And like, we know that a lot of the work on Gutenberg is going to represent some breaking changes around the around workflows and around the user experience the interface, especially like, we know that. But the opportunity to like have a thing that gives you an early taste of what’s coming but also the ability to keep kind of working in your old space where you need to, I think it’s an excellent way to bring people forward into the future of things, I have never been a fan of the just like cut off all avenues and hope that they stay with your method because of course, like you can’t cut off all the methods. You can’t cut off all the ways people can get away from you. And even if we could, it wouldn’t be in line with how WordPress hopes to kind of help people through some tough stuff like making your first website is hard. If you are doing it as part of, an overall campaign that’s supposed to bring in leads for you or generate revenue like you don’t want to necessarily play with that in a way that could break things and be risky for you in the long term. So I think all the tools that we offer to help people kind of move forward with the technology move forward with the CMS as it’s moving forward, I think it’s really smart. And so universal themes are one of those things, but also not around to stay. As we move into non modified themes, just the word themes that happen to be based in blocks. If I’ve confused anyone, please email me at wpbriefing@wordpress.org. And tell me how I confused you. And I will do a follow-up to unconfuse everyone. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 17:40 So speaking of the way that we help people kind of move forward with WordPress and with the technology. So much has been done in the CMS in the past 12 months in the past 18 months to be able to move themes into this same future as the rest of the editor. Right. So like, for folks who have not been listening to me for the last five years, you may not know this. So I’m going to tell everybody now, like one of the pain points that Gutenberg overall is solving is the fact that you for a long time had to learn five different editing interfaces to get one thing done in WordPress, right. And so like the advent of blocks and moving it into more and more spaces in the CMS is intended to really flatten the editing experience by making the type of user interaction the type of workflow really similar across all of the editing interfaces in the CMS. And so themes are a natural extension of that, where we can take similar user patterns and workflows, and work them out into themes. So over the last 12 months or so probably a little bit more, there’s been a lot of work on the CMS to move us forward in that that is now enabling the work that we want to be able to do to move things forward ahead. And so, I mean, this is probably our last question. Is there anything that you all want to offer to people who maybe saw themes early on or saw Gutenberg early on and felt like this is just not for me, in that in that context of like, how far it’s moved ahead in the past 12 months or so. Jeff Ong 19:23 So you’re asking like, what in the last 12 months has maybe like really surprised me or like sticks out to me as something that like, Wow, look how far we’ve come? Josepha Haden Chomphosy 19:36 Yeah, yeah. So like, if you’re looking at what is the one thing that you saw in the last 12 months, that changed in the CMS that really enabled something wonderful for themes or from the other side of it. Like if someone had looked at themes or WordPress 18 months ago, and now they’re looking at it and seeing this new and different way to do things with the look and feel of their site, like what is one thing that they should be aware of? On either side of that question, Maggie Cabrera 20:05 I think there’s more than one thing that has really evolved through this last year, year and a half. Like the maturity of some of the blocks is astounding now, like navigation blog, for example, was really bare-bones at the start and now it’s full potential, and it’s really looking really great. I would say the same thing about those days or the features on fire, like how basic it was at the start, was full potential. But now it’s really, really mature in terms of how much you can do with it. Like, I think the example, the perfect example of that is the work that Kjell [Reigstad] has done on Twenty-Twenty Two with the alternative theme.json files, where just changing that file basically feels like a new theme, with just the configuration and the styles. And without writing any CSS without changing any templates. It’s really, really amazing how that can turn into a reality. And it’s so easy for users to tinker with that if they want to. And it’s much easier than having to delve deep into CSS and changing everything in like 2000 lines of code. Jeff Ong 21:23 Yeah, I probably would echo most of that. What the thing that astounds me is global styles and how the UI can be shipping a theme or default theme with basically like, 20 lines of CSS, and have it be one of them. A beautiful, beautiful, like crisp and sharp, like, experience. It’s super fast. And it’s like, what this is a theme, you know, I thought a theme was supposed to supply all the styles like no, like, it’s just yeah. And workers do for you. Exactly. And like that. That’s pretty amazing to think in the last 12 months, we can go from, you know, shipping 1000s of lines of CSS to you none, it’s like, Wow, pretty cool. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 22:10 Well, my friends, thank you so much for joining me today. This has been a really interesting conversation. I hope that all y’all out listening. Also find it interesting. As I mentioned, if you have any follow-up questions, absolutely. Send them to me via email. And I collect all of my questions that I get through the year for answering at the end of the year, mostly because I don’t get lots of questions that people want to be answered on this. Everyone just asked me their questions on Twitter and in Slack, which is fine as well. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 22:41 So, Maggie, Jeff, thank you both for joining me. And I’m sure that we’ll talk to you all again soon. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 22:56 That brings us now to our small list of big things. In the last episode, I got all excited about being in the beta phase. But today, I’m rolling that back a little bit. As part of our usual open source processes, a group of contributors did a deep dive review on the WordPress 5.9 release and found a workflow that needed some refinement. So we are delaying the beta. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 23:19 Since we are in the midst of a major commerce slash/sales season, and of course, a lengthy holiday season, that delay also means that it makes sense to delay WordPress 5.9 final release a little as well. And so we are delaying that all the way into 2022 to January 25. For me, the trade-off works really well there. Every decision that we make in open source, of course, has some balance to it. It’s great for these aspects, it is less great for these aspects over here. But for myself, the opportunity to make sure that we have a really excellent experience for our users and also an opportunity to kind of avoid all of the chaos and hustle and bustle of the end of the year. Really, it seemed like a no-brainer for me. So in case you want to learn a little bit more about why we made the decision and get some insight into the actual milestones and where they have moved now, I’ll include some posts in the show notes below in case you want to read more and of course, if you have any additional questions you can always ask. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 24:33 The second small list of big things is that the first back to people WordCamp. I don’t think that’s what we’re calling it. Our first back to people WordCamp is happening in a couple of weeks actually. WordCamp Sevilla is happening in person on December 11. And I’m so excited I wish I were local, but I’m not so if you are local stop by their website and pick up your ticket. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 24:55 And the third thing on our smallest a big things is that it is, of course, charitable giving season. I don’t know if you do your charitable giving at the end of the year or if that’s even part of your general ways of giving back. But I can think of two or three charitable organizations inside the WordPress ecosystem. There’s of course the WordPress Foundation, but also Big Orange Heart and HeroPress. If there are others out there, I certainly do want to know about them. WordPress Foundation also does additional giving on behalf of just like the open web and open source as a whole. So if you’re the sort of person who does their charitable giving at the end of the year, just a reminder that you have some options inside the WordPress ecosystem if you were trying to figure out some new places to donate to in 2021. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 25:42 And that is your small list of big things. Thank you so much for tuning in today for the WordPress Briefing. Thank you again to our special guests, Maggie and Jeff. I’m your host Josepha Haden Chomphosy, and I’ll see you again in a couple of weeks. View the full article

State of the Word 2021 is just around the corner! Although attending State of the Word in person would be ideal, not all WordPress community members get to enjoy the experience of attending the speech live with friends. This year, as State of the Word is streamed live for the second time, we want to restore that in person camaraderie through State of the Word watch parties for WordPress Community members around the world. We encourage WordPress meetup organizers and community members worldwide to (safely) host State of the Word 2021 watch parties —read this handbook to learn more. Why organize a watch party? If you are a WordPress meetup organizer, many folks in your meetup may be unaware of the State of the Word, and a watch party could be a great opportunity to introduce or remind them.As meetup organizers slowly bid goodbye to a tough year, the watch party could be an excellent opportunity to revitalize your group, especially if you haven’t had many events this year.Along with your Meetup group members, you get a platform to ask questions directly to Matt Mullenweg.And last but not least, even if you are not a Meetup Organizer, a watch party can be the perfect opportunity to reconnect and have a blast with your WordPress friends! How do I organize a State of the Word watch party? You can choose to host a watch party online or in person. Check out our handbook for detailed instructions on how to schedule an event (including event templates). Online The simplest way to organize an online watch party is to schedule an online event for your WordPress group and add the State of the Word YouTube streaming link directly on Meetup.com. Alternatively, you can schedule an online meeting using tools like Zoom and broadcast the live stream over there by screen sharing––thereby facilitating better engagement. Organize an Online Watch Party In Person If your region meets the guidelines for in person events (if vaccines and testing are freely available), you can organize an in person watch party event (for fully vaccinated OR recently tested OR recently recovered folks) for your WordPress Meetup! Group members can hang out together (following local safety guidelines of course) and watch State of the Word live. Plan an In person Watch Party NOTE: If State of the Word is happening at an odd hour in your timezone, you can still organize a watch party by organizing a replay of live stream, at a date/time that is convenient for your group. If your Local WordPress Meetup is organizing an in person watch party, fill out this form so that we can ship some swag for your group to celebrate! Deadline: November 30, 2021 What else do I need to know about organizing a State of the Word watch party? Excited? To help you get started, we’ve put together a few resources: Check out this handbook for detailed instructions on how to organize a watch party, be it online or in person.Looking for a Zoom Pro account to host your online watch party? Request a community zoom pro account for your event right away!We have prepared some email templates that Meetup Organizers can use to spread the word in their Meetup groups.Don’t forget to share on social media about your watch party events using the hashtag #StateOfTheWord so we can join in on the fun! NOTE: The guidelines in this post are primarily aimed at WordPress Meetup organizers. However, you do not need to be a Meetup organizer to schedule a watch party! You can simply hang out together with your friends online or in person (while following local safety guidelines) and catch the event live! Join a State of the Word Watch Party near you! We have compiled a list of State of the Word Watch Parties around the world. If you don’t see a watch party in your region listed here, check this page on Meetup.com to see if your local WordPress group is organizing one. If not, why don’t you consider organizing a watch party on your own? [WordPress NYC Meetup] An In Person MeetUp: The State of the Word 2021 is in Manhattan. [South Jersey WordPress Meetup] JerseyPress: State of the Word 2021 Watch Party [Morris County NJ WordPress Meetup] JerseyPress: State of the Word 2021 Watch Party [WordPress Montclair Meetup] JerseyPress: State of the Word 2021 Watch Party [WordPress Santa Clarita Valley] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party [The Houston WordPress Meetup Group] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [North East Ohio WordPress Meetup] State of Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [Birmingham WordPress Meetup] State of the Word Watch Party [Lehigh Valley WordPress Meetup] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [Metro Detroit WordPress Meetup] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [Greater Milwaukee Area WordPress Meetup] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [The East Bay WordPress Meetup Group] State of the Word 2021 (Online) [Sacramento WordPress Meetup] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [WordPress Louisville] State of the Word Watch Party and Discussion (WP Louisville, KY) [WordPress Medellín] State of the Word 2021: Discurso de Matt & Fiesta de Comunidad (Online) [Port-au-Prince WordPress Meetup Group] Rejoignez-nous le 14 décembre pour regarder State of the Word 2021 (online) [WordPress Coventry Meetup] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [WordPress Exeter] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [WordPress Meetup Torino] State of the Word 2021 Video Party (Online) [Kigali WordPress Meetup] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [Lagos WordPress Community] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [Ijebu WordPress Meetup] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [Jinja WordPress Meetup] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party – WordPress Community Uganda (Online) [Kampala WordPress Meetup] State of the Word Livestream [WordPress Meetups Lahore] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (In-person) [WordPress Bhopal] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (In-person) [Bengaluru WordPress] WordPress Meetup – State of the word -Watch Party [WordPress Singapore] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) If you are planning a watch party for State of the Word, and have questions, please drop us an email to: support@wordcamp.org if you have any questions. We are happy to help you in the best way possible. The following folks contributed to this post: @anjanavasan @eidolonnight @evarlese and @rmartinezduque View the full article

WordPress 5.9 is expected to be a ground-breaking release. It will introduce the next generation of themes with Twenty Twenty-Two joining the fun and over 30 theme blocks to build all parts of your site. In anticipation of the January 25th release, we hope you enjoy this sneak peek of 5.9. New design tools will allow you to create exactly what you want, from adding filters to all your images to fine-tuning the border radius on all your buttons. With WordPress 5.9 providing more design control along with streamlined access to patterns, you can easily change the entire look and feel of your site without switching themes. No matter what you’re editing, whether it’s crafting a new post or working on a header, improvements to List View make it simple to navigate content regardless of complexity. More improvements and features for everyone are to come in this release and we can’t wait to see what you create with WordPress 5.9! Stay Tuned Stay tuned for more updates as the date draws near. If you want to help, the best thing you can do is test everything! For all the details, check out this Make Core post. Video props: @annezazu (also co-wrote the post) @michaelpick @matveb @beafialho @javiarce @critterverse @joen. View the full article

As previously announced, State of the Word will be livestreamed from New York City. That means that you can join the fun either online or in person, on December 14, 2021, between 5 and 7 pm EST! To join State of the Word 2021 online, check your Meetup chapter for a local watch party, or simply visit wordpress.org/news, where the livestream will be embedded. If you would like to participate in person in New York City, please request a seat by filling out the registration form by Sunday, November 28. Not all requests will receive a seat due to venue capacity, but everyone who requests one will receive further notification on Tuesday, November 30. In person attendees will be asked to show their COVID vaccination card at the venue entrance, and are expected to follow the safety measures in place. Because of these safety measures, there is a maximum of 50 attendees. Request a seat Whether you participate in person or online, we are so excited to see you on December 14! Don’t forget, State of the Word will be followed by a Question & Answer session. If you have a question for Matt, you can send your question ahead of time to ask-matt@wordcamp.org, or ask during the event in the YouTube chat. View the full article

In this episode, WordPress’s Executive Director, Josepha Haden Chomphosy, answers two recently asked questions. Tune in to hear what those questions were and her response, in addition to this week’s small list of big things. Have a question you’d like answered? You can submit them to wpbriefing@wordpress.org, either written or as a voice recording. Credits Editor: Dustin HartzlerLogo: Beatriz FialhoProduction: Chloé BringmannSong: Fearless First by Kevin MacLeod References W3Techs WordPress Usage Statistics WordPress 5.9 Development Cycle Call for Team Rep Nomination Transcript Josepha Haden Chomphosy 00:10 Hello, everyone, and welcome to the WordPress Briefing, the podcast where you can catch quick explanations of the ideas behind the WordPress open source project, some insight into the community that supports it, and get a small list of big things coming up in the next two weeks. I’m your host, Josepha Haden Chomphosy. Here we go! Josepha Haden Chomphosy 00:40 So I was in a meeting recently, which I realize isn’t saying much for me since I spend a quarter of my time in meetings. But in this particular meeting, I was asked a couple of questions that I absolutely loved. The first question was, “if there were one thing you could change in people’s minds about WordPress, what would it be?” And my answer, predictable though it may be, was that I want to change the idea that WordPress is just a blogging platform. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 01:06 WordPress has grown into a lot more than that. But the idea of a content management system, even now, sometimes gets a mental shorthand where content is a stand-in for the word writing or words. If you’re using WordPress today in an enterprise context, or as part of a governmental agency, or if you use it in a classroom setting, you know that your content cannot be confined that way. And if you’re supporting or building anything to hand off to clients, you know that timely, easy-to-ship changes on a site are considered a vital part of any overarching brand and marketing strategy. And when was the last time that any marketing strategy was literally only about the words? Josepha Haden Chomphosy 01:51 So that was the first question. And also my first answer. There is also this kind of annual, not fear, necessarily, but this annual question that is sort of related that is raised to me and has been asked of me recently, that I’m just going to give you a small answer to. One annual worry that I get every year around November and December is, “What are we going to do about the fact that the term blog and blogging are declining in search popularity?” And I was gonna say it’s been a while since I answered that in any sort of public format. But I think maybe I’ve never answered it in a public format at all. And so I’m just going to answer it here. Because I think maybe a lot of people have that same question. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 02:36 So number one, I think that the way that people search now is different. There’s a lot more semantic cognition. This is not the way to answer this — search engines are smarter now. So like, it used to be the case with early search engines that yeah, there was a lot of just like, individual search terms that were looked for. But now, people are asking full questions; they have, essentially, an entire sentence that they are searching for. And then, search engines are able to parse that information better and get more high-quality answers and information for them. So like, that’s one thing that I’m already not worried about. If people are searching for individual words anymore, it’s so that they can get a definition of that word. So I’m not specifically worried about a decline in search volume for the word blog or blogging for that reason. But the answer to my first question, if there is probably the real reason that I’m not actually super worried about any decline in search volume for the word blog, or blogging, is that WordPress has really moved beyond that. And since we have moved beyond that, then it doesn’t necessarily make sense for WordPress as an entity for WordPress as a project to get overly hung up on the idea that the term blog has gone out of fashion. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 03:52 Okay, now that I did my first question, and the answer, and then an additional question that only ever gets asked in private and is being answered by me for the first time in public, I will tell you now, the second question that I loved, someone asking of me, and that question is this: “What is one thing you’d like people to see or experience, right when they first land on wordpress.org?” Now, I often don’t get asked questions about the wordpress.org website, like administrative tasks, things that we need to update, move around where they should go. Sure. But like, “Josepha, what’s the point and purpose of this site?” Never. I’ve never been asked that, and so I was really excited that someone asked me, and I’m going to give you a heads up. I think some of you might disagree with my answer. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 04:40 So the primary thing that I want people to see or experience when they first get to wordpress.org, the website is the depth of WordPress. Not which audience segment they should belong to or that we believe they should belong to or raw data about the CMS or even how much we care about the freedoms of open source. Now the first thing I want people to see on that site is that WordPress has not only 18 years of learned knowledge that every single new user benefits from, but that it also has 1,000s of really smart people making sure it works and gets better every day, now. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 05:19 WordPress is a Goliath in its field. I know that we cite this bit of context. Frequently, we say that we are 42% of the web. And that is true that is the percentage by usage. But in its field, which is websites that are using a content management system, we actually have a 65% market share. This is very easy to find. It’s on the W3Techs website: I can put a link in the show notes, but you could find it just by searching for it. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 05:46 So WordPress is a Goliath in its field of websites that are run using a CMS. Because we have always brought our learnings forward with us with the understanding that knowledge, when shared grows rather than diminishes. But open source, the heart of what defines this project, open source is not a Goliath; it’s barely even David somedays. Even though the web is built on scads of open source software, there’s a pervasive public perception that it is built by and for hobbyists or that it is inherently risky, and that if there were if it were worth something, then people would pay something. And I just know that if the first impression of WordPress, we’re, “we’ve got 18 years of experience and learning that brought us to today,” the rest of the sale to adopt software that protects other people’s freedoms would take care of itself. And I guess, to quote John Oliver, at this point, “And now this.” Josepha Haden Chomphosy 06:59 Alright, that brings us now to our small list of big things. There are actually quite a few big things on this small list today. So number one, we have reached the beta phase for the year’s final release, which means that WordPress 5.9 beta one is happening tomorrow, Tuesday, November 16. And then seven days later, I believe on the 23rd, if I recall correctly, comes beta two. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 07:24 The second thing on my list is that team rep nominations are happening all over the project right now. I’ve got a post that I will share in the notes below that I believe all the team reps have put their team’s nomination posts on. So if you have had an interest in learning more about that and what it means to help keep teams kind of running in the WordPress project, then this is a great opportunity to check those out. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 07:49 And the third thing, this last thing actually isn’t in the next two weeks, but it is very important, nonetheless. Matt’s annual State of the Word is coming up on December 14. So basically a month from today. It’s going to join the growing list of in-person events that are on the calendar. It will be in New York City but will also be live-streamed across the world as usual. Keep an eye out for additional updates about that for anyone who, like me, really looks forward to this particular presentation from our project co-founder every year. Josepha Haden Chomphosy 08:25 And that is your small list of big things. Thank you for tuning in today for the WordPress briefing. I’m your host, Josepha Haden Chomphosy, and I’ll see you again in a couple of weeks. View the full article

Howdy, World! Mark your calendars; it’s almost time for State of the Word 2021! State of the Word is the annual keynote address delivered by the WordPress project’s co-founder, Matt Mullenweg. Every year, the event allows us to reflect on the project’s progress and the future of open source. This year will include that and more. Due to the pandemic, we moved the State of the Word online for the first time ever in 2020. This year, the event will be livestreamed from New York City. That will enable us to take as many folks as possible along for the ride! Join Matt as he provides a retrospective of 2021, discusses the latest trends he’s seeing, celebrates the community’s amazing wins, and explores the future. Expect to hear about a range of topics, from WordPress 5.9 and Openverse to Web3 and non-fungible tokens (NFTs). What: State of the Word 2021 When: December 14, 2021, between 5 and 7 pm ET/10 – 12 am (December 15) UTC How: If you’re watching from the comfort of your home or local watch party, the livestream will be embedded on wordpress.org/news. Have a question for Matt? State of the Word will be followed by a Question & Answer session. If you want to participate, you can either send your question ahead of time to ask-matt@wordcamp.org, or ask during the event in the livestream chat on YouTube. If you’re new to State of the Word, the previous years’ recordings (below) will help you get a sense of what the event is about. Check them out: State of the Word 2020 (online)State of the Word 2019 – WordCamp US, St. LouisState of the Word 2018 – WordCamp US, NashvilleAll recordings We hope to see you online on December 14th! Join a State of the Word Watch Party near you We have compiled a list of State of the Word Watch Parties around the world. If you don’t see a watch party in your region listed here, check this page on Meetup.com to see if your local WordPress group is organizing one. [WordPress NYC Meetup] An In Person MeetUp: The State of the Word 2021 is in Manhattan. [South Jersey WordPress Meetup] JerseyPress: State of the Word 2021 Watch Party [Morris County NJ WordPress Meetup] JerseyPress: State of the Word 2021 Watch Party [WordPress Montclair Meetup] JerseyPress: State of the Word 2021 Watch Party [WordPress Santa Clarita Valley] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party [The Houston WordPress Meetup Group] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [North East Ohio WordPress Meetup] State of Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [Birmingham WordPress Meetup] State of the Word Watch Party [Lehigh Valley WordPress Meetup] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [Metro Detroit WordPress Meetup] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [Greater Milwaukee Area WordPress Meetup] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [The East Bay WordPress Meetup Group] State of the Word 2021 (Online) [Sacramento WordPress Meetup] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [WordPress Louisville] State of the Word Watch Party and Discussion (WP Louisville, KY) [WordPress Medellín] State of the Word 2021: Discurso de Matt & Fiesta de Comunidad (Online) [Port-au-Prince WordPress Meetup Group] Rejoignez-nous le 14 décembre pour regarder State of the Word 2021 (online) [WordPress Coventry Meetup] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [WordPress Exeter] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [WordPress Meetup Torino] State of the Word 2021 Video Party (Online) [Kigali WordPress Meetup] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [Lagos WordPress Community] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [Ijebu WordPress Meetup] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) [Jinja WordPress Meetup] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party – WordPress Community Uganda (Online) [Kampala WordPress Meetup] State of the Word Livestream [WordPress Meetups Lahore] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (In-person) [WordPress Bhopal] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (In-person) [Bengaluru WordPress] WordPress Meetup – State of the word -Watch Party [WordPress Singapore] State of the Word 2021 Watch Party (Online) If you are planning a watch party for State of the Word, and have questions, please drop us an email to: support@wordcamp.org if you have any questions. We are happy to help you in the best way possible. Thanks to @anjanavasan @eidolonnight @rmartinezduque for their work on this post. The featured image was created by @beafialho. View the full article