


<p>[00:23:48] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> Yeah. So let&#8217;s use a parallel with another technological revolution. Let&#8217;s think about the Industrial Revolution and Agra Revolution. There used to be a time in Europe where 9 out of 10 people needed to be farming the land or breeding animals. Before the Industrial Revolution, 9 people had to work in a farm to feed 10, and those 10 were themselves, and then one. So that gave one person the possibility of doing something else. And then we invented more tools, and mechanical tools, and we invented engines, and we automated all that. Today, 250 years later, maybe one person, every thousand, needs to be a farmer to feed everyone.</p>



<p>Now, there&#8217;s two things that are interesting here. First of all, it has taken a long time. It hasn&#8217;t happened overnight. Also, still today, we need farmers. So my point is to say AI, as an entity, is not going to take your job. Another developer using AI might be taking your job though, because they&#8217;re going to become a lot more efficient. But the reassuring part in that is that now becomes accessible to everyone. If I am afraid that AI is going to take my job, how can I compete with a machine? But if I&#8217;m looking at another person using a tool that I can also use, now it&#8217;s up to me to say, well, if I want to keep doing this job, I can use the tools, they&#8217;re available to me.</p>



<p>Now what&#8217;s going to happen, like in every previous technology revolution, is that it&#8217;s going to also create a ton of new opportunities. So there might be people that would&#8217;ve been developers without AI, and now will be something else. The same way as, there were 9 out of 10 people farming the land 250 years ago, now it&#8217;s 1 every 1000. We are way more people on Earth, and still almost everyone has a job.</p>



<p>[00:25:43] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, those 999, they have things to do.</p>



<p>[00:25:46] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> They have things to do. Even just the last 50 years, like we look at the computers have removed a ton of jobs that are now useless, because they were so easy to automate that we didn&#8217;t need AI. I remember, for example, when I was a kid, a friend of my parents, I remember I was impressed because I visited the place and I was impressed. They were working in one of those central telephone station, where you would connect people.</p>



<p>[00:26:12] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Oh yeah. Literally the wires plugged into the wall.</p>



<p>[00:26:15] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> That&#8217;s now completely automated. But those people, like they did something else. So AI is a tool. As a tool it&#8217;s going to accelerate the work we do in some areas. Create new opportunities in others, but it&#8217;s just a tool. And like any other tool, if it&#8217;s just laying down there, is not going to do anything.</p>



<p>[00:26:33] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, I think the thing that maybe causes people concern is, a, the fact that it all seems to be happening so quickly. So, you know, the farming analogy, it probably took many hundreds of years for the, slowly the technology became better, incrementally. It wasn&#8217;t like we went from 1000 farmers to 1 farmer, because somebody invented the combine harvester, and the motorised tractor overnight. So I think we&#8217;re living through that, potentially quite scary bit, because it&#8217;s all happening so quickly.</p>



<p>But I do like your analogy of the developer armed with AI, is likely to be a better developer. Given two equal developers, who&#8217;ve got the same experience. You know, if you could literally clone a developer and have an identical one, but put AI with this one, and this one is not allowed to use AI, you can imagine that the AI version of that developer is going to get to a different result, possibly quicker, more efficient, and what have you. And I like that. That kind of makes the AI a partner in a way, feels nicer.</p>



<p>[00:27:34] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> Yeah, definitely. And I would add one thing that feels even more nice, which is that, if you could clone this developer just for the sake of the experiment, and one has AI and the other doesn&#8217;t. It&#8217;s not just that the one with AI is going to deliver faster. Fast forward six months, they&#8217;re not the same developer anymore, because the one with AI, in those six months, has been able to remove from their plate a lot of the tasks that are not really creative, where they don&#8217;t grow, and focus on the ones that are really hard.</p>



<p>So that&#8217;s when I was mentioning, I used the term tedious in my presentation a lot yesterday, because I was saying the AI can remove the tedious part of your work. Typically in the work of a developer, there is time spent thinking. By the way, most people overestimate the time a developer spends writing code on a keyboard. Most of the time you spend thinking. And then there&#8217;s the time spent writing on the keyboard. And a lot of that time is spent writing the same things over and over, because there are elements that are needed.</p>



<p>Whenever you start a new plugin for WordPress, for example, there&#8217;s a whole file structure that you have to put in place. Whenever you do this and these things, you will have to add all those sanitising functions, and you will have to add those unit tests, and that is not really creative. This is stuff you have done 20 times, 100 times, 1000 times. You just do them automatically.</p>



<p>If you can save all that time to focus on the pieces that you have never done before, that&#8217;s where you grow. You challenge yourself. So six months in, those two developers have a very different trajectory, that&#8217;s the more important point. It&#8217;s not just the acceleration, it&#8217;s that the learning experience is accelerated by removing those pieces.</p>



<p>[00:29:15] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> It feels like you are definitely reassuring me, because I think there is a part of me which sits on the worried side when it comes to AI, but every time you say a little bit more, I feel a worry going away, so this is good.</p>



<p>Let&#8217;s keep going down that track. Can you become better at using AI? Is it possible? In the same way that two people who can write PHP code, somebody is going to, you can just become better at it. There&#8217;s certain things that you can learn. Can you do the same with AI? Are there interesting novel ways to improve? Because I keep hearing in the media, that learning how to prompt AI is going to be a valuable skill of its own in the future.</p>



<p>[00:29:54] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> I think so. Definitely yes now. I would add that it&#8217;s imaginable that, as those tools become more and more sophisticated, the difference between abilities to prompt might fade. Because part of the skill today is in understanding the limitations, and leveraging, or working around those limitations to get the result you want. So it&#8217;s possible that as we go forward, those limitations disappear, and more sophisticated tools require less precision.</p>



<p>So what&#8217;s important today, I would say is training, testing, trying. I think that there is nothing like wanting a result, and trying in 20 different ways to get to that result, and see what works best. If you ask a question to, let&#8217;s use ChatGPT as an example, as the most popular. You ask a question to ChatGPT, it&#8217;s going to give an answer. There&#8217;s many ways to improve that answer. You can go back to your question, and you can say, my question might be a bit vague, maybe I have to specify the context.</p>



<p>Typically a lot of the early work was about saying, well, you have to tell ChatGPT who they represent. What is the role they&#8217;re playing? I remember, for example, reading, this was a blog post from the people who built Copilot at GitHub, and they were explaining a principle. It wasn&#8217;t exactly how they did it, but more the principle. They were saying, imagine you are configuring an assistant to be a support agent.</p>



<p>Now, you could tell the assistant, you are a support agent, and you are helping a customer fix their cable connection, whatever. The customer is angry, they want to watch their football game, you have to fix that fast. And maybe you can even say, oh, and here&#8217;s the documentation where you need to find information. But then what they were saying was, you can be more subtle and say, for example, you are an excellent support engineer, best of your class, and you work at this company where you support clients, and there&#8217;s these clients, there&#8217;s this case study of a client that had this problem.</p>



<p>And as it happens, you open your briefcase, and you look for the documentation of this case study, and the case study explains how you fix the problem. And this is the text that is on the page. And that&#8217;s where the AI takes over. And so that&#8217;s a way to say to the AI, you are an expert support agent, doesn&#8217;t mean much for the machine because the machine is not a being, sentient, these are just words.</p>



<p>So if you set the stage for the text they are supposed to be produced in the highest quality, which is, here&#8217;s an intervention where we help a customer, and it was so good that it&#8217;s a case study. And now you still give the documentation and everything, but you have set the stage for the AI assistant to actually continue that conversation properly.</p>



<p>This is one type of example. There&#8217;s another example of breaking down into step-by-step reasoning, chain of thought. You ask a question and you say, for example, you asked to write a function that does something. You get the output, and then you can ask the AI, can you explain me, step-by-step, how you got to this result? And now what&#8217;s interesting is that, by redoing the same work but step-by-step, the AI will develop each step and make corrections along the way. Because suddenly, where the first output was the result of this probabilistic analysis, the second output changes because, once the first point is laid down, oh, suddenly the second point that is more likely is not what was there before.</p>



<p>Because before it was seen as one thing. And now, step by step, the AI, there are people that say, this is not something I really have, I mean, I&#8217;ve tested, but just very briefly. There are people that say that you get better answers if you&#8217;re polite. And the idea behind that would be that, in the training data, conversations where people were polite were more likely to be constructive and helpful. Whereas conversation where people were rude, were probably less likely to be constructive and helpful, and therefore you direct the AI to use one area of the training data as a support.</p>



<p>But there&#8217;s other people that say that, actually it&#8217;s better to be direct and ask for the thing, as opposed to, can you do this and that? Because if you say, can you do this to a human, they&#8217;ll do it for you. But if you say, can you do this to a machine, they might sound like the sarcastic human that answers, yes I can, and then doesn&#8217;t do it. There&#8217;s people who have experimented with tipping, which you cannot actually do, but you can promise. You can say, hey, I&#8217;ll give you £100 if you do this and that for me. And apparently they say that the result would be better. Which, it&#8217;s hard to understand there what is the truth.</p>



<p>Recently something very interesting happened. There&#8217;s Anthropic launched Claude 3. It&#8217;s supposedly better than GPT 4. It has three levels of quality, based on how much you&#8217;re ready to pay for the responses. They started testing it. And now there&#8217;s a number of tests that are run on these LLMs to evaluate their performance.</p>



<p>The test that they ran was funny. It&#8217;s called the needle in a haystack test. So the idea is that you give a lot of content to the assistant, and then in that content you put one paragraph about a subject is completely unrelated to the rest of the content. And then you ask a question about that specific point. Previous versions of LLMs had a tendency to not be able to answer, because the fact that that content was very short, compared to the mass of other content, it was kind of overlooked.</p>



<p>On top of that, apparently LLMs had a tendency to over index on the beginning of the provided content, and the end, and less the middle, which by the way is very much similar to humans.</p>



<p>[00:35:50] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Absolutely.</p>



<p>[00:35:51] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> But in that context, so there was, I can&#8217;t remember, the 200,000 tokens were about some subject, I can&#8217;t remember what. But the one paragraph that was the needle in the hay stack was about pizza toppings. And then they asked a question about pizza toppings. Claude 3 replied the right answer, so it got the reference.</p>



<p>But then added, it&#8217;s odd that there is content about pizza toppings in this text that is very long, and has no relationship with the subject. It&#8217;s almost as if this was a test for me to see if I&#8217;m paying attention.</p>



<p>Which is very funny because the first reaction is, oh my god, this thing is sentient. When the reality is very likely elsewhere. I think that the reality is much more that there might be in the training data mention of this type of text, because it&#8217;s hard now to isolate the data and say, oh, we shouldn&#8217;t train AI with anything that talks about AI. It&#8217;s almost impossible.</p>



<p>[00:36:45] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Oh, so the AI may have picked up on a piece of text describing an equivalent AI test.</p>



<p>[00:36:50] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> I think that&#8217;s very likely, that it might have picked up on a paper, a research paper, or something like that. Now, is there a possibility that I am completely wrong, and these things have been sentient for a couple of years already, and they&#8217;re just telling us bit by bit? Yes. I don&#8217;t have a way of being 100% sure, but I would say I think that everything that, I think it&#8217;s, what is, Hanlon&#8217;s razor?</p>



<p>[00:37:14] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Oh, Occam&#8217;s razor.</p>



<p>[00:37:16] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> Occam&#8217;s razor is that, the most simple explanation is very often the right one. And so I&#8217;d be tempted to still think they are tools. They use mathematics to figure out language, and so they are able to produce those answers that make a lot of sense.</p>



<p>[00:37:31] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> But I guess the thing that&#8217;s interesting there is it&#8217;s so surprising. And it presents us with things which are well within its own capabilities, but they&#8217;re beyond the bounds of a typical human. So it seems like there&#8217;s something else going on. But it&#8217;s more plausible that it&#8217;s just a function of the data that&#8217;s been given. But because we can&#8217;t hold onto that much data, it seems like a god-like quality, but it&#8217;s not.</p>



<p>[00:37:53] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> No. Yeah, and we have other examples of things like that, that we got used to over time. I mean. If you recall, you probably have seen, I mean, neither of us were alive back then, but we probably have seen the images. When the Lumiere brothers showed the first movie of the train arriving in the station, everybody ran away. It&#8217;s very similar. If you think today, like the quality of that black and white movie, how can you imagine that being realistic? But it is.</p>



<p>I grew up with small TVs and black and white images, and it felt surreal. And now, of course when I look back at those things, I&#8217;m like, how is that even possible? You know, we talk about impossible things for humans, but I came here on a plane. I try to fly by myself, doesn&#8217;t work.</p>



<p>[00:38:38] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> I never get over plane journeys. It&#8217;s always remarkable.</p>



<p>[00:38:41] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> How incredible is that? And so, yeah, this one is new and so we have this moment of reaction. At the beginning you said something, or we going to talk about AI 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 years from now. I think AI is going to stay. I don&#8217;t think we&#8217;re going talk about AI as much, as we don&#8217;t talk about electricity as much.</p>



<p>[00:39:01] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, or the film, or the aeroplane.</p>



<p>[00:39:03] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> It becomes part of the landscape. It&#8217;s there, but the novelty is we have all those images. On top of that, you were mentioning before that the, at the moment of the Agricultural Revolution, people weren&#8217;t scared about what was happening, because it didn&#8217;t happen overnight. I would also argue, they didn&#8217;t have a ton of movies and TV shows showing them a future with no farmers.</p>



<p>We do have that, and so the moment we hear AI we&#8217;re like, oh my god, Sarah Connor, where is she? She has to save us. But these are movies.</p>



<p>[00:39:34] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> That&#8217;s a really good point. So the fact that we&#8217;re in this 24/7, plugged in, media fed ecosystem, you know, where you just pull out your iPhone and you&#8217;ve got data coming in about the news. Yeah, that&#8217;s a good point. I hadn&#8217;t really thought about that. And so if you were the farmer in the, 1500&#8217;s, nobody was telling you, this is a concern, this tractor. So you&#8217;re not going to be concerned. Yeah, it&#8217;s a really good point.</p>



<p>Do you trust AI with your code? Do you get it to generate code and find that it&#8217;s largely error free? I was saying to you before we hit record that, if you create an image with AI, and it&#8217;s slightly incorrect, it doesn&#8217;t really matter, because the fingers look strange, or the ear lobes look a bit weird, but we can forgive it.</p>



<p>And in the same way that if we create text for our blog post, we can modify that, or we may be happy with it at the beginning, and just accept that it&#8217;s got a few errors in it, and we&#8217;ll publish it anyway. But with code, I think we could be introducing security problems, or just simple errors. How confident are you writing code with AI, and how much do you have to go back and check every line?</p>



<p>[00:40:36] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> So this is a really good question. And I will use my specific context to answer it, because I haven&#8217;t been writing code that goes into production for a living since 1998. At Jetpack I am head of product, and I&#8217;ve been working with engineers for the last 26 years. So my code, I do still for fun, do stuff on my own, but is not critical at all. It&#8217;s little plugins that I&#8217;m the only user of. So it&#8217;s not really a concern for me.</p>



<p>But what I would say is, this is an area where it&#8217;s really interesting. And that&#8217;s where the dimension of AI as a tool really is important. If you are a really good developer, you won&#8217;t have that problem because the AI is going to make you save time. It is going to make you move faster, but you&#8217;ll be able to recognise the problem in an instant. The same as if I am writing either blog posts for my blog, or if I&#8217;m writing internally at Automattic for our P2, you know, about Jetpack, about the blog, about any of the things I work on.</p>



<p>I know the field I&#8217;m writing about. And so, if at some point in the process, and the back and forth I use AI for, it introduces something dumb, I see it instantly. My point basically, because it&#8217;s a tool, and it&#8217;s not sentient, and it&#8217;s not intelligent, use it to help you in area you have expertise. In the areas where you are an expert, you can use it to accelerate your work. In the areas you are just interested in, you can use it if it&#8217;s not critical work.</p>



<p>But please don&#8217;t go near it in areas where you have no knowledge, and or critical. As an example, I would say, a surgeon using AI to go through papers faster might make sense, because they can spot the mistake. Me using AI to diagnose symptoms that I have, maybe I found a rash on my arm, and I&#8217;m going to ask AI, very bad idea.</p>



<p>So I think in that scale, if you imagine that as a two by two matrix, am I the expert or am I a total newbie in this area? And then on the other axis, is this critical or is this completely safe? If we are on the safe side where there&#8217;s no consequences, it&#8217;s like a little plugin I&#8217;m writing for myself, or I&#8217;m asking AI about five things I could visit in Taipei, great. I can use it and just take the answer. Worst case scenario, it doesn&#8217;t work. If it&#8217;s critical, then I have to be the expert, and the AI is a tool that helps me be better at my job. But is not a tool that helps me do a job I&#8217;m not an expert of.</p>



<p>[00:43:17] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, that&#8217;s a good answer. So moving on, I&#8217;ve got a few more questions. We&#8217;ll try to be as quick as we can. The first question was, there seem to be a few companies which are dominating the AI space. So you&#8217;ve mentioned already Google, I think we could throw Open AI into that, and Anthropic, and there&#8217;s probably some more, but they&#8217;re the only three that come into my mind.</p>



<p>Does that part of the jigsaw puzzle concern you? That we&#8217;re increasingly reliant on three or four, maybe there&#8217;s more five, six large language models. And I just wondered if, given that we&#8217;re WordPress and we love open source, if there&#8217;s a platform, a project, which is trying to do something, but more in the open. Even though it&#8217;s called Open AI, it doesn&#8217;t feel particularly open.</p>



<p>[00:43:58] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> Yeah. So the interesting thing in the last year or so is that there has been a lot of movement on the open source side. It&#8217;s a bit ironic that the biggest advances on the open source side come from Meta, which is yet another very large company. But it doesn&#8217;t really matter because that&#8217;s the power of open source is that, once it&#8217;s in the open. So one thing with AI, and LLM&#8217;s, and open source is that it&#8217;s really important to understand what is actually open. Because an LLM, in terms of code, there isn&#8217;t like that much code.</p>



<p>If I give you an LLM post-training, it&#8217;s great to have it, and to be able to read the code and everything, but you can&#8217;t really modify much on it. If I give you the training data, then it&#8217;s a lot more interesting, because then you can reproduce. Now, keep in mind I&#8217;m not at that level technically. I am very much out of my comfort zone. But so my point is that, what has happened is that the first few foray to open source, or kind of open, but only the tail end of it. And so, okay, you get a tool that you can use, but you can&#8217;t really modify it, or you can&#8217;t really understand how it works.</p>



<p>And now there are versions that are open source from A to Z, including the dataset. Now, they&#8217;re not as big dataset, they&#8217;re not as powerful as the ones from the big names you mentioned. But what it appears is that it&#8217;s actually evolving very fast, because of course, being open source, once you put that in the hands of thousands of developers, in conjunction with the fact that we live at a time where computers can actually run that stuff locally. And so developers on a MacBook Pro, M3 can actually work, which wasn&#8217;t the case not that long ago. I think that this is going to catch up very fast.</p>



<p>Now, I believe, frankly, that is going to resemble software, where you know, you have WordPress that is the leader, CMS, like 43% of the websites and everything. That doesn&#8217;t stop closed platforms from existing. The two systems are probably going to be side by side. What we see now, for the moment, but again, we are super early stage, is we&#8217;re still at a moment where the closed platforms are moving faster. Because the kind of means that Open AI, or Google, or Anthropic have, open source takes a bit of a longer time to set up.</p>



<p>Like it&#8217;s very fragmented. A lot of people are doing different things. There isn&#8217;t like a strong coordination. And also they have then the infrastructure to run those models at scale, and to provide answer very quickly at a cheap price. I don&#8217;t expect them to be shadowed by open source anytime soon. But I do think that we have definitely hope that, going forward, we&#8217;ll have open solutions.</p>



<p>[00:46:50] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah. It feels like that would be a nice outcome, if that did happen.</p>



<p>[00:46:54] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> One thing that is also important is that, for example, today the approach of Open AI, and Google, and Anthropic is very monolithic. It&#8217;s saying, we have this gigantic thing that knows everything and can help you. Whereas the open source approach is, because we cannot run such large models locally on laptops, it&#8217;s more to focus on simpler agents, that are more specialised at given tasks. And that then more complex task would be a collection of simpler agents, maybe orchestrated by another simple one.</p>



<p>So it&#8217;s interesting because we have seen the approach in the industry in general, right? You have monolithic industries that will build like a car. And every piece that goes in it, and every little part, they will have factories doing everything. And then you&#8217;ll have other type of industries where the same car is built by buying the tires here, the battery there, the engine there, the windshield there, and then assembling all that. And I think that both models can work. I don&#8217;t see a future where there&#8217;s going to be either only one, or only the other.</p>



<p>[00:48:00] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> I think that&#8217;s good. That makes me feel better about it all, because it does feel that, at the moment, it&#8217;s all about Open AI, and they really are sort of dominating. I would like to think of a future where there are different alternatives.</p>



<p>Okay, couple of questions. We&#8217;ll be very brief about these one, because I&#8217;ve used up lots of your time, but I&#8217;ve enjoyed it, I have to say.</p>



<p>[00:48:18] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> No worries.</p>



<p>[00:48:18] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> In your presentation, you make the point that AI offers you the possibility, and I&#8217;ll just quote here, AI removes all the tedious parts of our work so that we can hone our craft, and there&#8217;s more but that&#8217;ll do for now. I had this intuition when I read that, and I just thought, maybe tedium, tedious, boring is an important part of the human condition. And I don&#8217;t really have a question around that, but is life spoiled a little bit, if there&#8217;s no boredom anymore, if everything&#8217;s quick and rapid? From a business perspective, that&#8217;s a dumb question. But from a sort of psychological perspective, and just a human nature perspective, I wondered if you had any thoughts on that.</p>



<p>[00:48:58] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> Yeah, I actually don&#8217;t think it&#8217;s a dumb question, even from a business perspective. I just listen to a little snippet from Rory Sutherland, who talks about, of course he&#8217;s in the advertising market, and he&#8217;s talking about using AI to remove all those steps and create a visual for a campaign, for example. And he was saying, we have to be careful, because in some of those jobs, the end result is not that important. It&#8217;s everything we learn along the way that is important. It&#8217;s the questions we ask to our users, to our vendors, to our sales people to get to that result that are really important.</p>



<p>And I would say, I think that is very clear, that if we consider AI like a black box, in which I input an order, and I want a result on the other side, it&#8217;s not a good way to use it. It&#8217;s not progress. It&#8217;s not going to help us learn. So I go back to the example of me writing a blog post. If I tell the AI, write me a blog post about this subject. And even if I add, oh by the way, in Taipei, day one I did this, day two three, here&#8217;s five things I did, write me a blog post.</p>



<p>The blog post at the other side is not going to be great. I won&#8217;t have learned anything. I won&#8217;t have grown in any way. But if I use AI as a partner to write this post, and so what I do often is start by writing a draft that is really raw, really stream of consciousness, as it comes. Then I go to the AI and I say, can you, out of this draft, create an outline, and highlight the main ideas I&#8217;m talking about?</p>



<p>And that first step already allowed me to do something critical, which is that I have a natural tendency of holding too many ideas in my head, and then writing blog posts where I talk about too many things. And then I lose people, and then people don&#8217;t really know what it&#8217;s about. Or then there&#8217;s no conversation after with my readers, because there&#8217;s so many subjects they don&#8217;t know what to talk about.</p>



<p>But by giving the AI the draft, and asking for an outline, and the main ideas, now I have much more clarity about what I was writing. So now I can reorganise this outline and I can say, actually, okay these go in that order, and these actually go in this order but out of this post, this is another post. So let&#8217;s move that aside.</p>



<p>And so now I can go back to the AI, and have my simplified outline and I say, using my original draft, and using this modified outline, reorganise my original draft please, and write a new draft that fits this outline. And then I read that. And then I fix a lot of things. I correct, I remove any word that I wouldn&#8217;t use, and I put my way of speaking in it. But then I can go back to the AI and say, what is missing here? Am I missing an obvious point, or how am I wrong in this? And I sort of get the AI to challenge me a bit.</p>



<p>This is one of the things I mentioned in my presentation is that, it&#8217;s not just about accelerating, it&#8217;s also that the AI provides us with a partner that can give us feedback about our content. There&#8217;s the basic grammar, typos, and things like that, but also feedback about the quality, the clarity. But also a challenging partner that doesn&#8217;t belong to our own intellectual bubble.</p>



<p>Because when I ask feedback to my friends, I&#8217;m asking feedback to people that kind of think similar to me. I mean, we&#8217;re friends. What I&#8217;m saying basically is that, when I say removing the tedious part, I&#8217;m not saying shorten the path. It&#8217;s more about saying, remove the things I&#8217;ve done 20 times, 50 times, 1000 times in my life already, that don&#8217;t teach me anything anymore. And allow me to improve the quality, by challenging me, by giving me feedback, by doing those things that normally I wouldn&#8217;t have access to. Because, I mean, I&#8217;ve occasionally asked for feedback on a piece to friends or family, but I can do that once a year. I can&#8217;t bother people around me all the time like that.</p>



<p>[00:52:54] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, the AI is good, it doesn&#8217;t get bored.</p>



<p>[00:52:56] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> I want to be very clear with that, that it&#8217;s not about shortening the journey itself, as much as it is increasing vastly the density of the enriching steps.</p>



<p>[00:53:06] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, you said, at some point towards the beginning of your answer, you encapsulated it as, something along the lines of, it should allow you to grow, you&#8217;ll grow from it. That seems to be a nice place to sort of round it off.</p>



<p>So the idea of AI, if I&#8217;m getting you correct, is that it&#8217;s kind of a partnership. It&#8217;s not something you should use in isolation. It&#8217;s certainly not something that you should use if you don&#8217;t possess some capacity already, especially with code. And so use it as a partner. Enable it to speed things up. Enable it to teach you in the same way that you might go to the library and read a book. You&#8217;re going to learn something from it.</p>



<p>So it&#8217;s not something to be feared, it&#8217;s something to be used. But it&#8217;s also, I guess this conversation is, be mindful. Don&#8217;t fall into those pitfalls. Don&#8217;t just use it blindly to create those articles that the audience is going to be zero, because it&#8217;s going to be so anodyne and uninteresting.</p>



<p>That&#8217;s interesting. I was definitely more on the, not the terrified side, but the nervous side when we began this conversation. And you&#8217;ve definitely taken me off the ledge a little bit. So thank you so much, Paolo, for chatting to today. I really appreciate it.</p>



<p>[00:54:14] <strong>Paolo Belcastro:</strong> Oh, it&#8217;s my pleasure. It was really nice to have a conversation with you and nice to meet you.</p>
</div>



<p>On the podcast today we have <a href="https://paolo.blog/">Paolo Belcastro</a>.</p>



<p>Paolo works at Automattic, where he’s focused on Jetpack and .blog products. He’s been working remotely since 1994 and managing distributed teams since 1998.</p>



<p>He’s on the podcast today to talk about AI, and he certainly brings a wealth of knowledge and experience in integrating AI with web development.</p>



<p>Paolo provides detailed insights into how they’re making decisions about what to develop in Jetpack AI. This is to take it beyond simple tasks like typo corrections and grammar adjustments, to more sophisticated functions such as content translation, tone adjustments, and even complex text summarisation, all done directly within the WordPress editor. The focus isn&#8217;t just on the functionality AI brings, but also on the efficiencies it introduces for developers and content creators alike, allowing them to shift their focus from tedious tasks to more creative and challenging aspects of web development.</p>



<p>We also tackle the broader implications of AI in the tech industry, discussing potential risks, the ongoing concern about AI&#8217;s impact on jobs, and the ethical considerations of AI in creative roles. We get into an exploration of the balance between AI’s utility and the indispensable value of the human touch in crafting meaningful digital experiences.</p>



<p>With Paolo’s insights into the recent advancements in open source AI models and the collaborative efforts within the AI community to keep platforms accessible but innovative, you’ll gain a comprehensive view of where AI in web development stands today and where it might head tomorrow.</p>



<p>If you&#8217;re a developer, a tech enthusiast, or anyone interested in the intersection of AI and creative processes, this episode is for you.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Useful links</h2>



<p><a href="https://automattic.com/">Automattic</a></p>



<p><a href="https://wordpress.com/">WordPress.com</a></p>



<p><a href="https://jetpack.com/">Jetpack</a></p>



<p><a href="https://woocommerce.com/">WooCommerce</a></p>



<p><a href="https://jetpack.com/ai/">Jetpack AI</a></p>



<p><a href="https://asia.wordcamp.org/2024/speaker/paolo-belcastro/">Paolo&#8217;s presentation at WordCamp Asia 2024</a></p>



<p><a href="https://chat.openai.com/domain_migration?next=https%3A%2F%2Fchatgpt.com%2F">ChatGPT</a></p>



<p><a href="https://gemini.google.com/app">Gemini</a></p>



<p><a href="https://jetpack.com/forms/">Jetpack Forms</a></p>



<p><a href="https://wordpress.com/logo-maker/">Logo Creator</a></p>



<p><a href="https://claude.ai/login">Claude 3</a></p>";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:7:"pubDate";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:31:"Wed, 08 May 2024 14:00:00 +0000";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}s:32:"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/";a:1:{s:7:"creator";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:14:"Nathan Wrigley";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}}}i:33;a:6:{s:4:"data";s:13:"
	
	
	
	
	
	
";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";s:5:"child";a:2:{s:0:"";a:5:{s:5:"title";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:55:"WordPress.org blog: WordPress 6.5.3 Maintenance Release";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"guid";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:35:"https://wordpress.org/news/?p=17246";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"link";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:71:"https://wordpress.org/news/2024/05/wordpress-6-5-3-maintenance-release/";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:11:"description";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:7633:"<h2 class="wp-block-heading">WordPress 6.5.3 is now available!</h2>



<p>This minor release features <a href="https://core.trac.wordpress.org/query?status=closed&milestone=6.5.3&group=status&col=id&col=summary&col=owner&col=type&col=priority&col=component&col=version&col=keywords&order=priority">12 bug fixes in Core</a> and <a href="https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/pull/61299">9 bug fixes for the block editor</a>. You can review a summary of the maintenance updates in this release by reading the <a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/05/02/wordpress-6-5-3-rc1-is-now-available/">Release Candidate announcement</a>.</p>



<p>WordPress 6.5.3 is a short-cycle release. The next major release will be <a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/6-6/">version 6.6</a> planned for July 2024.</p>



<p>If you have sites that support automatic background updates, the update process will begin automatically.</p>



<p>You can <a href="https://wordpress.org/wordpress-6.5.3.zip">download WordPress 6.5.3 from WordPress.org</a>, or visit your WordPress Dashboard, click “Updates”, and then click “Update Now”.</p>



<p>For more information on this release, please <a href="https://wordpress.org/support/wordpress-version/version-6-5-3">visit the HelpHub site</a>.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Thank you to these WordPress contributors</h2>



<p class="is-style-default">This release was led by <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/jorbin">Aaron Jorbin</a> and <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/grantmkin/">Grant M. Kinney</a>.</p>



<p class="is-style-default">WordPress 6.5.3 would not have been possible without the contributions of the following people. Their asynchronous coordination to deliver maintenance fixes into a stable release is a testament to the power and capability of the WordPress community.</p>



<p class="is-style-wporg-props-long"><a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/jorbin">Aaron Jorbin</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/adamsilverstein">Adam Silverstein</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/adrianduffell">adrianduffell</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/wildworks">Aki Hamano</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/alanfuller">Alan Fuller</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/anlino">Anders Norén</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/oandregal">André</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/afercia">Andrea Fercia</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/azaozz">Andrew Ozz</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/andrewserong">Andrew Serong</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/afragen">Andy Fragen</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/annezazu">annezazu</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/dextorlobo">Arun Sharma</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/aslamdoctor">Aslam Doctor</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/benlk">Ben Keith</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/britner">Ben Ritner &#8211; Kadence WP</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/bernhard-reiter">bernhard-reiter</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/ironprogrammer">Brian Alexander</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/poena">Carolina Nymark</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/costdev">Colin Stewart</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/CookiesForDevo">CookiesForDevo</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/colorful-tones">Damon Cook</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/talldanwp">Daniel Richards</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/darerodz">darerodz</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/davecpage">Dave Page</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/davidbaumwald">David Baumwald</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/justlevine">David Levine</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/DrewAPicture">Drew Jaynes</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/ellatrix">Ella</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/kebbet">Erik</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/evanltd">evanltd</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/flixos90">Felix Arntz</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/mamaduka">George Mamadashvili</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/grantmkin">Grant M. Kinney</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/gziolo">Greg Ziółkowski</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/isabel_brison">Isabel Brison</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/macmanx">James Huff</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/jason_the_adams">Jason Adams</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/audrasjb">Jb Audras</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/JeffPaul">Jeffrey Paul</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/jeherve">Jeremy Herve</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/luminuu">Jessica Lyschik</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/joedolson">Joe Dolson</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/joemcgill">Joe McGill</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/jordesign">jordesign</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/jorgefilipecosta">Jorge Costa</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/verygoode">Joshua Goode</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/kevin940726">Kai Hao</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/kevinwhoffman">Kevin Hoffman</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/khokansardar">Khokan Sardar</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/luisherranz">luisherranz</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/mmaattiiaass">Matias Benedetto</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/webdevmattcrom">Matt Cromwell</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/devsahadat">Md Sahadat Husain</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/mukesh27">Mukesh Panchal</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/narenin">Narendra Sishodiya</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/ntsekouras">Nik Tsekouras</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/swissspidy">Pascal Birchler</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/peterwilsoncc">Peter Wilson</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/ramonopoly">ramonopoly</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/roytanck">Roy Tanck</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/salcode">Sal Ferrarello</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/mikachan">Sarah Norris</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/SergeyBiryukov">Sergey Biryukov</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/sabernhardt">Stephen Bernhardt</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/stevejonesdev">Steve Jones</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/tomjcafferkey">Tom Cafferkey</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/nestea29950">WilliamG</a>, <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/yguyon">Yannis Guyon</a></p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">How to contribute</h2>



<p>To get involved in WordPress core development, head over to Trac, <a href="https://core.trac.wordpress.org/report/6">pick a ticket</a>, and join the conversation in the <a href="https://wordpress.slack.com/archives/C02RQBWTW">#core</a> and <a href="https://wordpress.slack.com/archives/C06U06K50Q5">#6-6-release-leads</a> channels. Need help? Check out the <a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/">Core Contributor Handbook</a>.</p>



<p class="has-text-align-right"><em>Thanks to <a href="https://wordpress.slack.com/team/UGP7D7TBP">@grantmkin</a>, </em><a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/angelasjin/" class="mention"><span class="mentions-prefix">@</span>angelasjin</a><em>, </em>and <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/jeffpaul/" class="mention"><span class="mentions-prefix">@</span>jeffpaul</a><em> for proofreading.</em></p>";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:7:"pubDate";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:31:"Tue, 07 May 2024 16:42:58 +0000";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}s:32:"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/";a:1:{s:7:"creator";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:12:"Aaron Jorbin";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}}}i:34;a:6:{s:4:"data";s:13:"
	
	
	
	
	
	
";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";s:5:"child";a:2:{s:0:"";a:5:{s:5:"title";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:22:"Matt: Mouth Biohacking";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"guid";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:23:"https://ma.tt/?p=114162";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"link";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:39:"https://ma.tt/2024/05/mouth-biohacking/";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:11:"description";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:1698:"<p>I&#8217;m not one to shy away from random things I find on the internet, so when I came across <a href="https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/defying-cavity-lantern-bioworks-faq">the Scott Alexander article on a discovery in the 80s about people who don&#8217;t get cavities</a>, my first thought was &#8220;how far is Honduras from Houston?&#8221;</p>



<p>So on February 28<sup>th</sup>, my friend Rene and I became the 50<sup>th</sup> and 51<sup>st</sup> people to get our normal mouth bacteria scrubbed away and hopefully replaced by a genetically modified strain of <em>Streptococcus mutans</em> that doesn&#8217;t turn sugar into lactic acid. A nice sabbatical jaunt.</p>



<p>In the 9 weeks since, no teeth have fallen out, I haven&#8217;t gotten any cavities, really the only noticeable change is that I seem to have less bad morning breath, though I still wholeheartedly recommend <a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07DX1G5YM?tag=photomatt08-20">SmartMouth mouthwash</a> and <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01IADXVUY/?tag=photomatt08-20">travel packets</a>.</p>



<p>The <a href="https://www.luminaprobiotic.com/">company is working on making it more widely available</a> without travel to another country, and if that works it will be interesting to see how long this takes to spread. Will it be adopted quickly or be like <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-37320399">the lemon juice cure for scurvy that took 42 years to become policy</a>? In the meantime, the weather in Roatán is warm!</p>



<p>If you&#8217;d like to learn more <a href="https://www.cremieux.xyz/p/the-rise-and-impending-fall-of-the">Cremiux Recueil also has a pretty good deep-dive</a>. </p>";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:7:"pubDate";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:31:"Tue, 07 May 2024 13:49:32 +0000";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}s:32:"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/";a:1:{s:7:"creator";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:4:"Matt";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}}}i:35;a:6:{s:4:"data";s:13:"
	
	
	
	
	
	
";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";s:5:"child";a:2:{s:0:"";a:5:{s:5:"title";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:86:"Do The Woo Community: eCommerce, SEO and Agency Life with Justin Sainton and Alex Moss";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"guid";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:28:"https://dothewoo.io/?p=83387";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"link";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:85:"https://dothewoo.io/ecommerce-seo-and-agency-life-with-justin-sainton-and-alex-mills/";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:11:"description";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:134:"This episode features Justin Sainton and Alex Moss discussing career paths, AI impact, e-commerce evolution, and future tech projects.";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:7:"pubDate";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:31:"Tue, 07 May 2024 13:33:23 +0000";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}s:32:"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/";a:1:{s:7:"creator";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:5:"BobWP";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}}}i:36;a:6:{s:4:"data";s:13:"
	
	
	
	
	
	
";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";s:5:"child";a:2:{s:0:"";a:5:{s:5:"title";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:79:"Do The Woo Community: The Marketer’s Guide to WooCommerce with Paul Halfpenny";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"guid";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:28:"https://dothewoo.io/?p=83363";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"link";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:73:"https://dothewoo.io/a-marketers-guide-to-woocommerce-with-paul-halfpenny/";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:11:"description";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:152:"Katie and Paul have a conversation about marketing a WooCommerce site, touching on optimization, marketing strategies, and the power of personalization.";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:7:"pubDate";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:31:"Mon, 06 May 2024 12:59:51 +0000";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}s:32:"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/";a:1:{s:7:"creator";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:5:"BobWP";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}}}i:37;a:6:{s:4:"data";s:13:"
	
	
	
	
	
	
";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";s:5:"child";a:2:{s:0:"";a:5:{s:5:"title";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:90:"Gutenberg Times: Seven talks about blocks, block themes and beyond at WordCamp Europe 2024";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"guid";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:35:"https://gutenbergtimes.com/?p=28259";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"link";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:100:"https://gutenbergtimes.com/seven-talks-about-blocks-block-themes-and-beyond-at-wordcamp-europe-2024/";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:11:"description";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:9867:"<p>Every WordCamp Europe also comes with a Live Stream on YouTube so people who can&#8217;t make it still get to experience the talks.  Here is a list of block related talks and workshops and when they are scheduled.  </p>



<p>Once the WordCamp Europe ended, this page will be updated with the links to the recording, and if available to the slide decks. </p>



<div class="wp-block-group has-light-background-background-color has-background is-nowrap is-layout-flex wp-container-core-group-is-layout-3 wp-block-group-is-layout-flex"><div class="wp-block-image">
<img src="https://abs-0.twimg.com/emoji/v2/svg/1f5d3.svg" alt="?️" title="Spiral calendar pad" /></div>


<p>Making plans to be at WordCamp Europe in Torino? I would love to meet you and chat! Please share Your calendar link via X (formerly known as Twitter) DM  or private message on WP Slack . <strong><a href="https://bit.ly/WCEUMeetBirgit">My calendar is public</a>. </strong> Just grab a day/time slot if that works better for you.</p>
</div>



<div class="wp-block-buttons is-content-justification-center is-layout-flex wp-container-core-buttons-is-layout-1 wp-block-buttons-is-layout-flex">
<div class="wp-block-button has-custom-width wp-block-button__width-50"><a class="wp-block-button__link wp-element-button" href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/live-streaming">Live Stream</a></div>



<div class="wp-block-button has-custom-width wp-block-button__width-50 is-style-outline"><a class="wp-block-button__link wp-element-button" href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/schedule/">Click here for the full schedule</a></div>
</div>



<div class="wp-block-buttons is-layout-flex wp-block-buttons-is-layout-flex"></div>



<p><strong><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/session/interactivity-api-the-new-standard-way-to-build-modern-wordpress-frontends/">Interactivity API: the new standard way to build modern WordPress frontends</a> </strong>with <strong><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/speaker/micha-czapliski/">Michał Czapliński</a></strong></p>



<p>The Interactivity API is designed to seamlessly integrate with the existing block editor and aims to become the standard way to build interactive web experiences with WordPress. Attendees will gain insights into how this API simplifies creating interactive blocks like carts, checkouts, forms, or galleries. We will explore the API’s surface, demonstrating its ease of use and compatibility with existing WordPress standards. Practical examples will illustrate how developers can leverage this API to bring their creative visions to life, enhancing user engagement and website functionality.</p>



<p><code>June 14 - 8:15 UTC Track 2</code></p>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p><strong><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/session/twenty-twenty-four-pushing-default-themes-forward/">Twenty Twenty-Four: Pushing Default Themes Forward</a> </strong><br />with <strong><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/speaker/jessica-lyschik/">Jessica Lyschik</a></strong></p>



<p>As the Default Theme Lead, Jessica Lyschik will take the audience behind the scenes, sharing the vision that sets Twenty Twenty-Four apart from its predecessors. She will explore the evolution of default themes and how Twenty Twenty-Four is poised to make a significant impact, showcasing how different audiences can use the theme.</p>



<p><code>June 14 - 9:15 UTC - Track 1</code></p>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p><strong><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/session/legacy-to-block-an-indepth-look-at-migrating-a-legacy-website-to-gutenberg/">Legacy to Block: an in-depth look at migrating a legacy website to Gutenberg</a> </strong>with <a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/speaker/erika-gili/"><strong>Erika Gili</strong> </a>and <strong><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/speaker/luis-rosales/">Luis Rosales</a></strong></p>



<p>A reflective journey of a successful migration, from a legacy Content Management System (CMS) to WordPress, enhanced by Gutenberg and custom blocks. Speakers will unveil the different approaches they considered, shedding light on the diverse strategies that seamlessly transitioned  from the old to the new. You learn about the challenges and the decisions they had to embrace of such a complex project</p>



<p><code>June 14 - 12:15 UTC - Track 2</code></p>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p><strong><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/session/block-hooks-a-new-api-to-extend-block-themes/">Block Hooks: A New API to Extend Block Themes</a> </strong><br />with <strong><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/speaker/bernie-reiter/">Bernie Reiter</a></strong></p>



<p>Ever miss Classic Themes and their hooks and filters when it comes to injecting layout elements and functionality into a Block Theme? In this session, Bernie Reiter will teach you how to use the new Block Hooks API (first introduced in WordPress 6.4) to inject a dynamic block into a position of your choosing within a Block Theme!</p>



<p><code>June 14 - 13:45 UTC - Track 2</code></p>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p><strong><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/session/gutenberg-speed-build-challenge/">Gutenberg Speed Build Challenge: A Web Design Duel!</a> </strong><br />with <strong><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/speaker/jamie-marsland/">Jamie Marsland</a></strong></p>



<p>In the Speed Build Challenge, participants have 30 minutes to recreate a famous website, using only the WordPress Block Editor. The challenge tests quick adaptation, creativity, and skill under time pressure, with the website to be recreated revealed only at the start!</p>



<p><code>June 14 - 15:00 UTC - Track 3</code></p>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p><strong><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/session/mastering-wordpress-block-themes-3-key-principles-for-beginners/">Mastering WordPress Block Themes: 3 Key Principles for Beginners</a> </strong><br />with <strong><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/speaker/jamie-marsland/">Jamie Marsland</a></strong></p>



<p>In this beginner-friendly session, dive into the world of WordPress block themes. Learn to utilize Theme Blocks for enhanced customization, understand the advantages over classic themes, and master Styles for a unique website aesthetic. Ideal for those new to WordPress, this talk empowers you with essential tools to create professional and dynamic websites with ease.</p>



<p><code>June 15 - 8:15 UTC - Track 1</code></p>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p><strong><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/session/building-custom-post-types-with-blocks/">Building custom post types with blocks</a> </strong><br />with <strong><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/speaker/magdalena-paciorek/">Magdalena Paciorek</a></strong></p>



<p>In this session, you will learn how to create bespoke WordPress websites that make use of custom post types directly in the site editor.</p>



<p>Magdalena Paciorek will show how to build templates with blocks and examine different ways to extend the editor, including the use of block filters, block formats, custom block styles, block patterns, inner blocks, block locking, interactivity API, building our own blocks, and more.</p>



<p><code>June 15 - 9:15 UTC - Track 2</code></p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Bonus event</h2>



<p><strong><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/session/wordpress-project-summer-update/">WordPress Project Summer Update</a> </strong><br />with <strong><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/speaker/matt-mullenweg/">Matt Mullenweg</a></strong></p>



<p><br />Join WordPress co-founder and Project leader Matt Mullenweg in a review of 2024 accomplishments in the project, showcasing user-centric innovations and the latest features, followed by a live Q&amp;A.</p>



<p><code>June 15 - 14:30 UTC - Track 1,2,3</code></p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Other talks of interest</h2>



<p>While in Torino, I won&#8217;t get to all the talks, but I definitely will follow up on a few talks when I get back home. So this is a list of my anticipated backlog. </p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/session/wordpress-playground-use-wordpress-without-a-server/">WordPress Playground – use WordPress without a server</a><br />with <a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/speaker/adam-zieliski/">Adam Zieliński</a></li>



<li><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/session/the-art-of-product/">The art of product</a><br />with <a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/speaker/tammie-lister/">Tammie Lister</a></li>



<li><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/session/please-leave-a-gap-the-importance-of-white-space-in-web-design/">Please leave a gap. The importance of White Space in Web design.</a><br />with <a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/speaker/ioanna-aravani/">Ioanna Aravani</a></li>
</ul>



<div class="wp-block-group has-light-background-background-color has-background is-nowrap is-layout-flex wp-container-core-group-is-layout-4 wp-block-group-is-layout-flex"><div class="wp-block-image">
<img src="https://abs-0.twimg.com/emoji/v2/svg/1f5d3.svg" alt="?️" title="Spiral calendar pad" /></div>


<p>Making plans to be at WordCamp Europe in Torino? I would love to meet you and chat! Please share Your calendar link via X (formerly known as Twitter) DM  or private message on WP Slack . <strong><a href="https://bit.ly/WCEUMeetBirgit">My calendar is public</a>. </strong> Just grab a day/time slot if that works better for you.</p>
</div>";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:7:"pubDate";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:31:"Mon, 06 May 2024 03:47:00 +0000";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}s:32:"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/";a:1:{s:7:"creator";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:18:"Birgit Pauli-Haack";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}}}i:38;a:6:{s:4:"data";s:13:"
	
	
	
	
	
	
";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";s:5:"child";a:2:{s:0:"";a:5:{s:5:"title";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:84:"Gravatar: Understanding and Choosing Among Various Types of Authentication Protocols";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"guid";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:32:"http://blog.gravatar.com/?p=1370";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"link";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:62:"https://blog.gravatar.com/2024/05/04/authentication-protocols/";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:11:"description";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:24609:"<p>Are you feeling lost among all the types of authentication protocols and struggling to understand the difference between them?&nbsp;</p>



<p>It’s certainly a lot to wrap your head around, which is why we’ve created this in-depth guide. Here, you’ll learn all authentication protocols, their main functionalities, and how they can impact your business.&nbsp;</p>



<p>By the end, you’ll know how to choose the best protocol for your specific use case.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>What are authentication protocols, and why do they matter?</strong></h2>



<p>Authentication protocols are network security rules determining how individuals or systems verify their identities during online communications. They are like online bouncers, checking IDs before letting anyone in. </p>



<p>These protocols are the first defense against unauthorized access, ensuring that sensitive information doesn’t fall into the wrong hands. This can prevent data breaches, substantial financial losses, and reputation damage.</p>



<p>From traditional password-based methods to cutting-edge biometric verification, authentication protocols follow three main steps:&nbsp;</p>



<ol class="wp-block-list">
<li><strong>Identification</strong>, where the user claims an identity.</li>



<li><strong>Authentication</strong>, where they prove their identity.</li>



<li><strong>Authorization</strong>, where they get access to resources.</li>
</ol>



<p>Encryption and decryption are at the heart of these protocols, maintaining the confidentiality and integrity of the data being exchanged. Even if the data is intercepted, it remains unintelligible without the correct cryptographic key that unlocks its encryption.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Exploring the most popular authentication protocols</strong></h2>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>WebAuthn</strong></h3>



<img width="660" height="330" src="https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/image.png?w=660" alt="WebAuthn registration ceremony" class="wp-image-1372" />



<p><a href="https://webauthn.io/">WebAuthn</a>, short for Web Authentication, is a browser-based Application Programming Interface (API) that works with biometric information. This means that it uses data like fingerprints and facial recognition or physical security keys instead of traditional passwords, which can be forgotten or stolen.&nbsp;</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Use cases</strong></h4>



<p>WebAuthn is adopted by major web browsers and a growing list of online platforms, allowing them to streamline the login process with a simple fingerprint scan and an extra layer of security through two-factor authentication. These include online banking, social media platforms, and companies that want to secure employee access to internal systems and applications.&nbsp;</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Pros and cons</strong></h4>



<table class="has-fixed-layout"><tbody><tr><td><strong>Pros</strong></td><td><strong>Cons</strong></td></tr><tr><td>It eradicates the need for passwords, eliminating the risk of phishing and other password-based attacks.</td><td>Transitioning to passwordless authentication requires user education and acceptance.</td></tr><tr><td>Offers a personalized, secure login via biometrics or secure hardware tokens, adding layers of security.</td><td>Ensuring smooth operation across all platforms and browsers demands ongoing vigilance.</td></tr><tr><td>Simplifies authentication, making secure access effortless for users across the globe.</td><td>The effectiveness of WebAuthn relies on careful integration to keep the device and biometric data safe.</td></tr></tbody></table>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Kerberos</strong></h3>



<img width="660" height="330" src="https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/image-1.png?w=660" alt="Kerberos authentication process" class="wp-image-1373" />



<p><a href="https://web.mit.edu/kerberos/">Kerberos</a> is a network authentication protocol developed in the 1980s by <a href="https://www.mit.edu/">MIT</a> as part of <a href="https://www.projectathena.org/">Project Athena</a> to secure network communications across an untrusted network.&nbsp;</p>



<p>With a unique ticketing system, Kerbos enables users to access network services only when they receive tickets from a Kerberos Key Distribution Center (KDC). These tickets prove the user&#8217;s identity without sending passwords over the network.&nbsp;</p>



<p>A vital component is the Ticket-Granting Ticket (TGT), obtained upon initial authentication, which is then used to request other tickets for specific services, streamlining secure access without repeated logins.</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Use cases</strong></h4>



<p>Kerberos is widely used in corporate environments, schools, and universities to secure access to networked services. Common use cases include accessing file shares, email servers, and database management systems within a secure corporate network and student information systems.&nbsp;</p>



<p>It’s also the default authentication protocol for <a href="https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/identity/ad-ds/get-started/virtual-dc/active-directory-domain-services-overview">Microsoft Active Directory</a> (AD). When a user logs into their <a href="https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/windows">Windows</a> domain, AD issues a TGT from its key distribution center. This TGT is then used to obtain service tickets for accessing various network resources within the domain.</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Pros and cons</strong></h4>



<table class="has-fixed-layout"><tbody><tr><td><strong>Pros</strong></td><td><strong>Cons</strong></td></tr><tr><td>Simplifies the user experience by requiring only one set of credentials – Single Sign-On (SSO), to access multiple services.</td><td>Implementing and maintaining a Kerberos system can be complex, requiring specialized knowledge.</td></tr><tr><td>Using strong encryption and temporary tickets, Kerberos minimizes the risk of password interception and replay attacks.</td><td>Kerberos requires precise time synchronization between all the devices in the network, which can be challenging to maintain.</td></tr><tr><td>Kerberos is designed to support large, complex networks, making it suitable for organizations of all sizes.</td><td>Kerberos is most effective within a controlled network environment, and extending its protection to external services or users can be complicated.</td></tr></tbody></table>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>LDAP</strong></h3>



<img src="https://lh7-us.googleusercontent.com/68F7hgb5PW44HdNRK_WxDCzcFXDqYuxZOyZkjayoeAt55sX4bdM9CVenTZqi3ghfq4mdoxpiXd4iYac9lS2qSgAGw-aSOLEsCQPtQBUEhw3LXgWdtQI_a7U6y01roWi5wEB_fMcbngUrucssajI5CFw" alt="" />



<p><em>How LDAP works</em></p>



<p>Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) is an open, vendor-neutral, industry-standard application protocol used for querying and modifying items in directory service providers over an Internet Protocol (IP) network. It’s designed to work on a client-server model, where the client makes requests to the directory server, which then responds to those requests.</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Use cases&nbsp;</strong></h4>



<p>LDAP is extensively used in Single Sign-On (SSO) systems, where it allows users to access multiple applications or services with a single set of credentials, improving the user experience and administrative efficiency.&nbsp;</p>



<p>It&#8217;s also foundational in creating and managing digital directories, including those for managing user information, such as names, passwords, and email addresses, across an organization.</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Pros and cons</strong></h4>



<table class="has-fixed-layout"><tbody><tr><td><strong>Pros</strong></td><td><strong>Cons</strong></td></tr><tr><td>LDAP is optimized for high performance, making it fast to search and access directory information.</td><td>While LDAP supports security mechanisms, its inherent security is considered weaker than some newer protocols, making it more susceptible to attacks like man-in-the-middle (MitM).</td></tr><tr><td>It can scale to accommodate many entries and supports a wide range of data formats, making it adaptable to various organizational needs.</td><td>Setting up and managing LDAP can be complex, requiring specific expertise, especially in configuring it to use stronger security measures effectively.</td></tr><tr><td>LDAP&#8217;s support for diverse data formats and structures allows it to integrate with a multitude of applications and systems, enhancing its utility.</td><td></td></tr></tbody></table>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>OAuth</strong></h3>



<img width="660" height="330" src="https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/image-2.png?w=660" alt="" class="wp-image-1374" />



<p><a href="https://oauth.net/2/">OAuth</a> is an authorization protocol that enables external applications to request access to private details in a user&#8217;s account without needing the user&#8217;s password. It acts as an intermediary, granting tokens to third-party services to access specific account information with the user&#8217;s consent, thus maintaining security and privacy.</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Use cases</strong></h4>



<p>OAuth is widely utilized across various social media platforms to allow seamless content sharing and user verification. For instance, when a website or app allows you to log in using your <a href="https://www.google.com/">Google</a> or <a href="https://www.facebook.com/">Facebook account</a>, OAuth is at work.&nbsp;</p>



<p>It simplifies the login process for users across websites and applications, enhancing the user experience by connecting different online services in a secure manner.</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Pros and cons</strong></h4>



<table class="has-fixed-layout"><tbody><tr><td><strong>Pros</strong></td><td><strong>Cons</strong></td></tr><tr><td>Users can grant limited access to their private information without exposing their passwords, maintaining control over what external applications can see and do with their data.</td><td>Despite its security benefits, OAuth can be susceptible to phishing attacks, where malicious actors trick users into granting access to their accounts.</td></tr><tr><td>OAuth allows for detailed control over the levels of access external apps have, enabling users to specify which data can be accessed and for how long.</td><td>Managing the lifetime and refresh of tokens can be challenging, as insecure handling or leaks can lead to unauthorized access.</td></tr><tr><td>For developers, OAuth simplifies integrating with third-party services, offering a standardized protocol for authorization.</td><td></td></tr></tbody></table>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>SAML</strong></h3>



<img width="660" height="330" src="https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/image-3.png?w=660" alt="SAML authentication process" class="wp-image-1375" />



<p>Security Assertion Markup Language (SAML) is an open standard for exchanging authentication and authorization credentials between an Identity Provider (IdP) and a Service Provider (SP). It enables secure, cross-domain SSO, allowing users to access multiple services with a single set of credentials to streamline the authentication process across different platforms and applications.</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Use cases</strong></h4>



<p>SAML is predominantly applied in the enterprise sector, facilitating SSO for various applications. It&#8217;s particularly beneficial for organizations with numerous cloud services and internal applications, as it simplifies the login process for employees, reducing the need for multiple passwords and enhancing productivity.&nbsp;</p>



<p>For instance, SAML is extensively utilized in institutions using <a href="https://workspace.google.com/">Google Workspace</a> or <a href="https://www.office.com/">Microsoft 365</a>, enabling users to log in to various applications and services with a single set of credentials.</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Pros and cons</strong></h4>



<table class="has-fixed-layout"><tbody><tr><td><strong>Pros</strong></td><td><strong>Cons</strong></td></tr><tr><td>SAML enables a smooth and secure user experience by allowing access to multiple services with a single authentication process.</td><td>Setup can be complex, requiring significant effort in configuration and maintenance, especially when integrating multiple services.</td></tr><tr><td>It supports advanced security features and complies with strict regulatory standards, ensuring sensitive data is securely shared across different services.</td><td>Since SAML centralizes the authentication process, it can become a single point of failure, where issues with the identity provider can affect access to all connected services.</td></tr><tr><td>As an open standard, SAML ensures compatibility and interoperability between different systems and applications, facilitating easy integration and adoption.</td><td>Although SAML enhances security, poorly implemented SAML assertions can be exploited, leading to unauthorized access and other security vulnerabilities.</td></tr></tbody></table>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>RADIUS</strong></h3>



<img width="660" height="330" src="https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/image-4.png?w=660" alt="RADIUS authentication" class="wp-image-1377" />



<p>Remote Authentication Dial-In User Service (RADIUS) is a networking protocol that provides centralized Authentication, Authorization, and Accounting (AAA) management for users connecting to and using a network service.&nbsp;</p>



<p>It centralizes access to various network resources, streamlining the process of managing user credentials and access rights across a wide range of network devices and services.</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Use cases</strong></h4>



<p>RADIUS is extensively used by Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and enterprises to manage access to network resources such as VPNs, network switches, and wireless access points. It allows for the management of user credentials, permissions, and tracking of user activity, making it essential for organizations that require secure and efficient access control.</p>



<h4 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Pros and cons</strong></h4>



<table class="has-fixed-layout"><tbody><tr><td><strong>Pros</strong></td><td><strong>Cons</strong></td></tr><tr><td>RADIUS is supported by a wide variety of network hardware and software vendors, ensuring flexibility and ease of integration in diverse IT environments.</td><td>While RADIUS can serve small to medium-sized deployments efficiently, it may face scalability issues in larger, more dynamic environments.</td></tr><tr><td>Its well-established protocol makes onboarding straightforward, allowing organizations to quickly set up and manage access controls without extensive customization.</td><td>Although user passwords are transmitted in an encrypted form, the lack of hashing or salting can pose a security risk, making passwords more vulnerable to certain types of attacks if the encrypted data is intercepted.</td></tr></tbody></table>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Exploring less common authentication protocols</strong></h2>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>CHAP</strong></h3>



<img width="660" height="330" src="https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/image-5.png?w=660" alt="Challenge-Handshake Authentication Protocol process" class="wp-image-1378" />



<p>Challenge-Handshake Authentication Protocol (CHAP) is a network security protocol that uses a challenge-handshake mechanism to authenticate a user or network entity. Its primary purpose is to securely establish a connection without transmitting the actual password over the network.&nbsp;</p>



<p>It operates in three phases: link establishment, authentication, and network connection. This ensures secure data exchange by periodically verifying the identity of the client using a three-way handshake method.&nbsp;</p>



<p>Commonly used in ISP settings, Point-To-Point (PPP) connections, and remote server access, CHAP provides a layer of security by preventing unauthorized access.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>EAP</strong></h3>



<img width="660" height="330" src="https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/image-6.png?w=660" alt="Extensible Authentication Protocol (EAP)" class="wp-image-1379" />



<p>Extensible Authentication Protocol (EAP) serves as a versatile framework supporting multiple authentication methods, making it adaptable to various network requirements. It is primarily utilized in wireless networks and point-to-point connections.&nbsp;</p>



<p>EAP functions by providing a standard mechanism for authentication, offering a range of methods such as EAP-TLS (Transport Layer Security), EAP-TTLS (Tunneled Transport Layer Security), and PEAP (Protected EAP), among others.&nbsp;</p>



<p>These methods cater to different security needs, showcasing EAP&#8217;s flexibility in authenticating network access.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>PAP</strong></h3>



<img width="660" height="330" src="https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/image-7.png?w=660" alt="Password Authentication Protocol (PAP)" class="wp-image-1380" />



<p>Password Authentication Protocol (PAP) is one of the simplest forms of network security authentication mechanisms, and it operates by exchanging plain-text passwords across the network.</p>



<p>Because this method is inherently less secure, PAP is generally used as a &#8220;last resort”, particularly in environments where other, more secure methods are not available or feasible. When other options are available, PAP is typically bypassed due to its vulnerability to eavesdropping attacks.&nbsp;</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>TACACS</strong></h3>



<img width="660" height="330" src="https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/image-8.png?w=660" alt="Terminal Access Controller Access Control System (TACACS)" class="wp-image-1381" />



<p>Terminal Access Controller Access Control System (TACACS) is used for verifying users on a network, particularly in environments requiring centralized control over authentication and authorization services.</p>



<p>It creates a secure dialogue between a client and an authentication server, employing a more sophisticated authentication mechanism than simpler protocols. It also allows for granular control over user permissions and the flexibility to support various authentication methods.&nbsp;</p>



<p>Despite its strengths, the TACACS’s complexity and the need for specialized knowledge for implementation are considered drawbacks.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Choosing the right authentication protocol: A use case approach</strong></h2>



<p>Selecting the optimal authentication protocol is crucial for enhancing a system&#8217;s performance, its security, and a smooth integration process. The decision on which authentication protocol to use can be influenced by several factors:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><strong>System architecture: </strong>The structural design of the system determines compatibility with different protocols.</li>



<li><strong>Resources available: </strong>Time, budget, and technical expertise available can significantly narrow down choices.</li>



<li><strong>Specific security requirements: </strong>Different protocols offer varying levels of security, making some more suitable for certain scenarios than others.</li>
</ul>



<p>Use case examples:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><strong>Small business server: </strong>For small businesses with limited resources and technical expertise, a protocol like RADIUS, known for its broad vendor compatibility and ease of deployment, might be the most appropriate choice.</li>



<li><strong>Cloud-based web application:</strong> OAuth shines in scenarios requiring secure third-party app integrations, making it ideal for cloud-based applications that need to support social media logins or access to other online services.</li>



<li><strong>Enterprise-level network: </strong>An organization requiring robust security and SSO across multiple systems might find Kerberos to be the best fit, thanks to its ability to protect against password attacks and support for complex network architectures.</li>
</ul>



<p>In certain contexts, a lesser-used protocol could be more effective. For instance, CHAP might be chosen over OAuth for its utility in point-to-point connection settings where third-party app integration isn&#8217;t a priority, but periodic authentication checks are essential.</p>



<p>Sometimes, you have to use multiple protocols to meet all the security and functionality needs of a system effectively. This flexibility will make sure that as your business grows or technology advances, the authentication mechanisms can grow and evolve with it, maintaining security and performance without compromising on user experience or system integrity.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Pairing your authentication protocol with Gravatar for a complete digital identity management solution</strong></h2>



<img src="https://lh7-us.googleusercontent.com/ll4OpUpkzXRSe1JAqrYViBLK2Xq_J0yozavb0Tvq0fRoX3k9sgk_-BrVbaXE2ytBCtmh_t8xPwOiAriyajisDqsb4fbZf042f0xH9OnyDIzv_daZ_gH-KiBnqKYFp7eS2JB7Lh5hSFvrE-DeC-UY9Rg" alt="Gravatar homepage" />



<p>So far, we’ve looked at the various authentication protocols available to help you choose the right one, whether it’s for your website, web app, internal login portal for your business, or any other use case. This plays a huge role in a streamlined and secure digital identity management setup, but there’s more you can do.&nbsp;</p>



<p>Enter <a href="https://gravatar.com/">Gravatar</a>, a tool that significantly simplifies the user management process for various digital platforms, including websites, blogs, eCommerce sites, and applications. By offering a universal and unique user identification system, Gravatar allows for effortless integration across multiple platforms, streamlining the validation processes for entities of all kinds.</p>



<p>To break this down, Gravatar lets users create a universal profile linked to their email address. By integrating Gravatar to your website or web app via Gravatar’s API, when a user with a Gravatar profile signs up to your website, you can automatically pull their data for a streamlined profile creation process.&nbsp;</p>



<p><strong>This not only simplifies profile management but also enriches the user experience, as individuals can carry their digital identity – via a consistent profile image and information – across the web.</strong></p>



<p>Integrating Gravatar offers the added advantage of a secure and personalized signup process. By leveraging Gravatar, developers can eliminate the complexities associated with managing profile image storage and retrieval, ensuring a more streamlined and efficient system. Users benefit from a trustworthy and straightforward identification system that respects their privacy and simplifies online interactions.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Build a digital identity management system your users deserve</strong></h2>



<p>There are so many different authentication protocols that it can make anyone’s head hurt. Hopefully, we’ve made it easier for you to see their differences and recognize their unique strengths and weaknesses. </p>



<p>The great thing about these protocols is that they don’t have to be a one-man army – you can combine them to get the most secure and user-friendly experience possible.&nbsp;</p>



<p>Whatever approach you take, Gravatar’s approach to identity management makes it a very unique and valuable complementary system for authentication, ideal for all kinds of websites and apps. Its ability to provide a universal identification system simplifies user management and improves the user experience and data privacy.&nbsp;</p>



<p>So why wait?</p>



<p><a href="https://docs.gravatar.com/">Explore Gravatar further</a> to understand how it can meet your digital identity management needs and provide the seamless, secure user experience your users deserve!</p>";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:7:"pubDate";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:31:"Sat, 04 May 2024 22:43:23 +0000";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}s:32:"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/";a:1:{s:7:"creator";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:11:"Ronnie Burt";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}}}i:39;a:6:{s:4:"data";s:13:"
	
	
	
	
	
	
";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";s:5:"child";a:2:{s:0:"";a:5:{s:5:"title";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:120:"Gutenberg Times: WordPress 6.6 Roadmap + demos, what’s next for Meta boxes, Pattern tutorials  — Weekend Edition 293";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"guid";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:35:"https://gutenbergtimes.com/?p=28364";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"link";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:119:"https://gutenbergtimes.com/wordpress-6-6-roadmap-demos-whats-next-for-meta-boxes-pattern-tutorials-weekend-edition-293/";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:11:"description";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:24671:"<p>Howdy, </p>



<p>Well, this week there has been plenty of information about what WordPress 6.6 might bring. It&#8217;s scheduled to be released in mid-July and will be fully packed with awesome features. The designer tools set for nocode site builders gets massively bigger with Pattern overrides, Grid Layout. Section Styles and Block Style variations. </p>



<p>There are  four more weeks left before Beta 1 is released, and most features will be settled by then. There will be parts that might not make it into the version after all. The last Gutenberg version will be 18.5 for features and three or four more with bug fixes. </p>



<p>Brace yourself, I felt overwhelmed putting the lists together and might have overused the list block in this newsletter.  I am trying to come up with a better way to curate the information for you and if you have ideas how to better keep you updated, please let me know. </p>



<p>Wishing you an wonderful weekend! </p>



<p>Yours, ?<br /><em>Birgit</em></p>





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<p><strong>Table of Contents</strong></p>



<ol><li><a class="wp-block-table-of-contents__entry" href="https://gutenbergtimes.com/wordpress-6-6-roadmap-demos-whats-next-for-meta-boxes-pattern-tutorials-weekend-edition-293/#0-word-press-release-information">Developing Gutenberg and WordPress</a></li><li><a class="wp-block-table-of-contents__entry" href="https://gutenbergtimes.com/wordpress-6-6-roadmap-demos-whats-next-for-meta-boxes-pattern-tutorials-weekend-edition-293/#0-p">Plugins, Themes, and Tools for #nocode site builders and owners</a></li><li><a class="wp-block-table-of-contents__entry" href="https://gutenbergtimes.com/wordpress-6-6-roadmap-demos-whats-next-for-meta-boxes-pattern-tutorials-weekend-edition-293/#2-word-press-6-0-1-and-6-1-scheduled">Theme Development for Full Site Editing and Blocks</a></li><li><a class="wp-block-table-of-contents__entry" href="https://gutenbergtimes.com/wordpress-6-6-roadmap-demos-whats-next-for-meta-boxes-pattern-tutorials-weekend-edition-293/#3-building-themes-for-fse-and-word-press">Building Blocks and Tools for the Block editor.</a></li></ol>
</div></div>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="0-word-press-release-information">Developing Gutenberg and WordPress</h2>



<p>The recording of last week&#8217;s <a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/04/25/summary-of-hallway-hangout-on-whats-next-in-gutenberg/"><strong>Hallway Hangout on what’s next in Gutenberg</strong></a> is now available. In their summary post, <strong>Anne McCarthy</strong> also included shorter videos for each feature demonstrated so you wouldn&#8217;t have to watch all of 80 minutes of video to learn about the various new features. The covered: </p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/04/25/summary-of-hallway-hangout-on-whats-next-in-gutenberg/#theme-style-presets">Theme style presets</a></li>



<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/04/25/summary-of-hallway-hangout-on-whats-next-in-gutenberg/#section-styles">Section Styles</a> with an example theme.json</li>



<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/04/25/summary-of-hallway-hangout-on-whats-next-in-gutenberg/#zoomed-out">Zoomed out view</a></li>



<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/04/25/summary-of-hallway-hangout-on-whats-next-in-gutenberg/#dataviews">Advancing data views</a></li>



<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/04/25/summary-of-hallway-hangout-on-whats-next-in-gutenberg/#synced-overrides">Overrides in synced patterns </a></li>



<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/04/25/summary-of-hallway-hangout-on-whats-next-in-gutenberg/#block-connections">Block connections</a> </li>



<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/04/25/summary-of-hallway-hangout-on-whats-next-in-gutenberg/#grid-layout">Grid Layout </a></li>
</ul>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p>These demos go hand in hand with  Anne McCarthy&#8217;s <a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/05/03/roadmap-to-6-6/"><strong>WordPress 6.6 Roadmap</strong></a> post on the Make Blog. The post covers all the features slated for the next WordPress release, scheduled for July 16, 2024.</p>



<p>In the post, McCarthy shared the links to &#8220;Iteration&#8221; or tracking issues on GitHub for each main feature. I bookmarked those, so I can keep track on the progress throughout the release cycle. The List below is incomplete, and your interests might be different from mine, so use at your own risk, missing out. Here is my list:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/issues/59659">Advancing site editor index views</a></li>



<li><a href="https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/issues/61215">Color &amp; Typography Variations for WP 6.6</a>&nbsp;</li>



<li><a href="https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/issues/59819#top">Introduce overrides in synced patterns iteration for WP 6.6</a></li>



<li><a href="https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/issues/57537">Section Styling, Colorways, and Typesets for WP 6.6</a></li>



<li><a href="https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/issues/57478">Improvements to Grid Layout and Subgrid support</a></li>



<li><a href="https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/issues/60219">Interactivity API &#8211; Iteration for WP 6.6</a></li>



<li><a href="https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/issues/60252">Epic: Block Hooks Features for WP 6.6</a></li>



<li><a href="https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/issues/60956">Block bindings API for 6.6</a></li>
</ul>



<img width="600" height="338" src="https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Dataviews-Roadmap-6.6-web.jpg?resize=600%2C338&ssl=1" alt="" class="wp-image-28424" />Screenshot: Advancing the new Data Views in the Site Editor, shared in <a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/05/03/roadmap-to-6-6/">Roadmap to 6.6</a>



<div class="wp-block-group has-light-background-background-color has-background is-nowrap is-layout-flex wp-container-core-group-is-layout-7 wp-block-group-is-layout-flex"><div class="wp-block-image">
<img src="https://abs-0.twimg.com/emoji/v2/svg/1f5d3.svg" alt="?️" title="Spiral calendar pad" /></div>


<p>Making plans to be at WordCamp Europe in Torino? I would love to meet you and chat! Please share Your calendar link via X (formerly known as Twitter) DM  or private message on WP Slack . <strong><a href="https://bit.ly/WCEUMeetBirgit">My calendar is public</a>. </strong> Just grab a day/time slot if that works better for you.</p>
</div>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p><strong>Joen Asmusse</strong>n shared in his <a href="https://make.wordpress.org/design/2024/04/22/design-share-54-apr-8-apr-26/">Design Share #54 (Apr 8-Apr 26)</a> the work of the WordPress Design team. Some of it is the design equivalent work on the WordPress 6.6 Roadmap items. Here is the full list the post covers: </p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Style Book updates</li>



<li>Synced pattern overrides</li>



<li>Grid layout Interface</li>



<li>Site editor responsiveness</li>



<li>Block connections</li>



<li>Style inheritance visualization</li>



<li>Shadows &#8211; UI to design your own via the site editor</li>



<li>List view density</li>



<li>Filter&nbsp;chips in narrow containers</li>



<li><strong>WordPress.org site</strong>
<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Visited Links on </li>



<li>Learn section lessons</li>



<li>Search, filter, and sort </li>
</ul>
</li>



<li><strong>Openverse site </strong>
<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Site theme switcher</li>



<li>Feature introduction ⋅ aka “What’s new”</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>



<a href="https://make.wordpress.org/design/2024/04/22/design-share-54-apr-8-apr-26/"><img width="600" height="469" src="https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Stylebook.jpg?resize=600%2C469&ssl=1" alt="screenshot of Stylebook changes " class="wp-image-28425" /></a>Screenshot of Stylebook updates, <a href="https://make.wordpress.org/design/2024/04/22/design-share-54-apr-8-apr-26/">shared on Make/Design blog</a>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p>First-time Gutenberg plugin release lead, <strong>Damon Cook</strong> published <a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/04/24/whats-new-in-gutenberg-18-2-24-april/"><strong>What’s new in Gutenberg 18.2? (24 April)</strong></a> and highlighted the following enhancements: <br /></p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/04/24/whats-new-in-gutenberg-18-2-24-april/#improve-pattern-overrides">Improve Pattern Overrides Experience</a></li>



<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/04/24/whats-new-in-gutenberg-18-2-24-april/#enable-template-previews-non-admin">Enabling Template Preview in the Post Editor for Non-Administrators</a></li>



<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/04/24/whats-new-in-gutenberg-18-2-24-april/#site-editor-starter-patterns">Site Editor: Support Starter Patterns</a></li>



<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/04/24/whats-new-in-gutenberg-18-2-24-april/#simply-reset-language">Simplify Template Reset Language</a></li>
</ul>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p><strong>Sarah Norris</strong> and I discussed WordPress 6.6 and 6.5.3, Gutenberg 18.1 + 18.2 and Create Block Theme Updates <a href="https://gutenbergtimes.com/podcast/gutenberg-changelog-99-wordpress-6-6-create-block-theme-updates/"><strong>this week&#8217;s Gutenberg changelog episode.</strong></a> Listen in and learn all about the latest features with the Create Block Theme updates and Gutenberg plugin updates. </p>



<a href="https://gutenbergtimes.com/podcast/gutenberg-changelog-99-wordpress-6-6-create-block-theme-updates/"><img width="652" height="186" src="https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Sarah-Norris-and-Birgit-Pauli-Haack-recording-Gutenberg-Changelog99.jpg?resize=652%2C186&ssl=1" alt="Sarah Norris and Birgit Pauli-Haack recording Gutenberg Changelog episode 99. " class="wp-image-28451" /></a>Recording the <a href="https://gutenbergtimes.com/podcast/gutenberg-changelog-99-wordpress-6-6-create-block-theme-updates/">Gutenberg Changelog 99</a>



<p class="has-accent-color has-light-background-background-color has-text-color has-background has-link-color wp-elements-f177aa95d38cec3bee70ac6dc4e58ab3">?️ Latest episode: <a href="https://gutenbergtimes.com/podcast/gutenberg-changelog-100-nasa-wordpress-block-editor/">Gutenberg Changelog #100 – NASA’s New Website – the Switch to WordPress and Block Editor</a> with Stacy Holtz and Gary Kovar, Lone Rock Point</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="0-p">Plugins, Themes, and Tools for #nocode site builders and owners</h2>


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							<div class="ngl-article-featured"><a href="https://gutenbergtimes.com/exploring-the-latest-version-of-the-create-block-theme-plugin/" target="_self" rel=""><img src="https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/CreateBlock-Theme.jpg?w=652&ssl=1" /></a></div><div class="ngl-article-title"><a href="https://gutenbergtimes.com/exploring-the-latest-version-of-the-create-block-theme-plugin/" target="_self" rel=""><span>Exploring the latest version of the Create Block Theme plugin</span></a></div><div class="ngl-article-excerpt">The Create Block Theme plugin was created to streamline block theme development by adding to the power of the Site Editor with theme-specific goodies and workflows. The plugin aims…</div>							</div>
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<div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<div class="toolbelt-video-wrapper"></div>
</div><strong>Jamie Marsland </strong>shows off the<em> synced Pattern overrides</em> and renamed them &#8220;Components&#8221;



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p>If you are not at all familiar with WordPress patterns are and how to use them, <strong>Wes Theron</strong>, instructional designer on the Learn.WordPress team, created a three-part tutorial for you: </p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBm1TPZ58Q8"><strong>Using block patterns </strong></a>&#8211; you learn the various methods on where to find patterns and how to add them to your pages, posts, and templates</li>



<li><strong><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PF8e1Z0GkK8&list=PL1pJFUVKQ7ETacCXdCCxwdAo-_xciwlQJ&index=3&pp=iAQB">Building a page with only patterns</a></strong> covers how to use various patterns to create a Services Page. </li>



<li><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8cb25mCHK18"><strong>Creating your own custom synced and non-synced patterns</strong></a>, you&#8217;ll learn how to create synced or non-synced patterns interface and user cases. </li>
</ul>



<p><em>More tutorials from the Learn.WordPress team are available via <a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1pJFUVKQ7ETacCXdCCxwdAo-_xciwlQJ"><strong>the YouTube playlist</strong></a></em></p>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p><strong><a href="https://twitter.com/kyralPieterse">Kyra Pieterse</a></strong> announced Pattern and Icons updates for MaxiBlocks: <a href="https://maxiblocks.com/14000-free-wordpress-icons-20-new-block-patterns/"><strong>14,000 free WordPress icons and 20 new story mix block patterns</strong></a>. &#8220;The additions range from minimalist layouts to dynamic text and image combinations, providing professional designs for diverse website requirements.&#8221; she wrote. </p>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p>In the the 49th episode of the WPMinute podcast, <a href="https://thewpminute.com/the-wordpress-theme-market-is-heating-up/"><strong>The WordPress Theme Market is Heating Up</strong></a>, <strong>Matt Medeiros</strong> interviewed <strong>Rafal Tomal</strong>, co-creator of the new <a href="https://rockbase.co/"><em>Rockbase</em></a> WordPress theme. Tomal, a renowned designer in the WordPress community, discusses his journey from working at Copyblogger and StudioPress to founding his agency and eventually creating Rockbase with his partner, Chris Hufnagel.</p>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p><strong>Ryan Welcher</strong> announced  the release of a new version of this <a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/advanced-query-loop/"><strong>Advanced Query Loop Block</strong></a> 2.2.3 that adds the ability to manually curate a list of posts to display. With the plugin&#8217;s Query Loop block variation a user can create complicated queries, such number of posts to display and post meta, combine multiple post types, filter for items before a date, after a date or between two dates or expand the sort order by more criteria. </p>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p>In his tutorial <a href="https://kau-boys.com/3624/wordpress/bringing-some-structure-into-the-theme-the-sidebar"><strong>Bringing some structure into the theme: The Sidebar</strong></a>, <strong>Bernhard Kau</strong> walks you through the steps, he used to add a sidebar to his theme all in the site editor and without code. It&#8217;s part of a series on working with Block themes. Previous posts are available by <a href="https://kau-boys.com/tag/fse">following the FSE tag</a>. </p>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p><strong>Wes Theron</strong> takes you on a step-by-step tutorial <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21W6J_-4Kx8"><strong>Designing with row and stack blocks</strong></a>. Using the Group block is one of the cornerstones of mastering the WordPress block editor. When you select a Group block, you have variations, the standard group, rows, stacks, and grids. </p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="2-word-press-6-0-1-and-6-1-scheduled">Theme Development for Full Site Editing and Blocks</h2>



<p>The <em>WordPress Theme handbook</em> received a whole <a href="https://developer.wordpress.org/themes/patterns/"><strong>new chapter about Patterns</strong></a>. You learn all you need to know about how to register pattern, using PHP, create Starter Patterns and how to lock patterns. Here are the subchapters in detail: </p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://developer.wordpress.org/themes/patterns/introduction-to-patterns/">Introduction to Patterns</a></li>



<li><a href="https://developer.wordpress.org/themes/patterns/registering-patterns/">Registering Patterns</a></li>



<li><a href="https://developer.wordpress.org/themes/patterns/using-php-in-patterns/">Using PHP in Patterns</a></li>



<li><a href="https://developer.wordpress.org/themes/patterns/usage-in-templates/">Usage in Templates</a></li>



<li><a href="https://developer.wordpress.org/themes/patterns/starter-patterns/">Starter Patterns</a></li>



<li><a href="https://developer.wordpress.org/themes/patterns/block-type-patterns/">Block Type Patterns</a></li>



<li><a href="https://developer.wordpress.org/themes/patterns/patterns-and-block-locking/">Patterns and Block Locking</a></li>
</ul>



<img width="652" height="337" src="https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/pattern-libary.webp?resize=652%2C337&ssl=1" alt="" class="wp-image-28410" />



<p><strong>&nbsp;<a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/references/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">&#8220;Keeping up with Gutenberg &#8211; Index 2024&#8221;</a>&nbsp;</strong><br />A chronological list of the WordPress Make Blog posts from various teams involved in Gutenberg development: Design, Theme Review Team, Core Editor, Core JS, Core CSS, Test, and Meta team from Jan. 2024 on. Updated by yours truly. The previous years are also available: <strong><strong><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/references/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index-2020/">2020</a>&nbsp;|&nbsp;<a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/references/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index-2021/">2021</a></strong>&nbsp;|&nbsp;<strong><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/references/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index-2022/">2022</a></strong></strong>&nbsp;|&nbsp;<strong><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/references/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index/gutenberg-index-2023">2023</a></strong></p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="3-building-themes-for-fse-and-word-press">Building Blocks and Tools for the Block editor.</h2>





<div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<div class="toolbelt-video-wrapper"></div>
</div>In the latest Developer Hours, <strong>Justin Tadlock</strong> and <strong>Nick Diego</strong> discussed how the Block Bindings API fits into the bigger picture of the block system and how you can combine it with existing features, laying the groundwork for much more advanced and dynamic site builds.



<p><strong><a href="https://gutenbergtimes.com/need-a-zip-from-master/">Need a plugin .zip from Gutenberg&#8217;s master branch?</a></strong><br />Gutenberg Times provides daily build for testing and review. </p>



<p>Now also available via <a href="https://playground.wordpress.net/?blueprint-url=https://gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/playnightly.json">WordPress Playground</a>. There is no need for a test site locally or on a server. Have you been using it? <a href="mailto:pauli@gutenbergtimes.com">Email me </a>with your experience</p>



<p><img alt="GitHub all releases" src="https://img.shields.io/github/downloads/bph/gutenberg/total?style=for-the-badge" /></p>



<p>Join <strong>Ryan Welcher</strong> and <strong>Nick Diego</strong> for the next <a href="https://www.meetup.com/learn-wordpress-online-workshops/events/300590175/"><strong>Developer Hours: Alternatives to Custom Meta Boxes in the Block Editor</strong></a> on <strong>Tuesday, May 14, 2024, at 15:00 UTC</strong> / 9 am EDT</p>



<a href="https://www.meetup.com/learn-wordpress-online-workshops/events/300590175/"><img width="600" height="338" src="https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/DevHours-Metabox-alternatives.webp?resize=600%2C338&ssl=1" alt="" class="wp-image-28412" /></a>



<p>You can watch all Developer Hours you missed <a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1pJFUVKQ7ETApyQQlt3pLNjPx2HrQwl5">via the playlist on YouTube </a> </p>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide" />



<p>On Twitch,<strong> Ryan Welcher</strong> took his audience on a journey on how to build an interactive to-do app for WordPress. </p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2129194618"><strong>Building a To-Do app with the Interactivity API</strong></a></li>



<li><strong><a href="https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2135353684">Finishing the Interactivity API To-do app</a></strong></li>
</ul>



<p class="has-normal-font-size"><strong>More Interactivity API Resources</strong></p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>New WordPress Make Channel on Slack:<a href="https://wordpress.slack.com/archives/C071CRKGKUP">#core-interactivity-api</a></li>



<li>New Component page <a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/components/interactivity-api/">Interactivity API</a></li>



<li><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndW-Kz0iDdY&list=PL1pJFUVKQ7ETApyQQlt3pLNjPx2HrQwl5&index=2&t=2759s&pp=iAQB">Developer Hours: Building custom blocks in WordPress with the Interactivity API</a></li>



<li><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sl6nqGN8YVQ&list=PL1pJFUVKQ7ETApyQQlt3pLNjPx2HrQwl5&index=4&pp=iAQB">Developer Hours: Exploring the Interactivity API in WordPress 6.5</a></li>



<li>Developer Blog: <a href="https://developer.wordpress.org/news/2024/04/11/a-first-look-at-the-interactivity-api/">A first look at the Interactivity API</a></li>



<li><a href="https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/interactivity-api/">Interactivity API Reference in the Block Editor Handbook</a> </li>
</ul>



<p class="has-text-align-center has-small-font-size"><em>Questions? Suggestions? Ideas? </em><br /><em>Don&#8217;t hesitate to send <a href="mailto:pauli@gutenbergtimes.com">them via email</a> or</em><br /><em> send me a message on WordPress Slack or Twitter @bph</em>.</p>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity" />



<p class="has-text-align-center has-small-font-size">For questions to be answered on the <a href="http://gutenbergtimes.com/podcast">Gutenberg Changelog</a>, <br />send them to <a href="mailto:changelog@gutenbergtimes.com">changelog@gutenbergtimes.com</a></p>



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<hr class="wp-block-separator has-css-opacity is-style-wide" />";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:7:"pubDate";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:31:"Sat, 04 May 2024 15:15:28 +0000";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}s:32:"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/";a:1:{s:7:"creator";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:18:"Birgit Pauli-Haack";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}}}i:40;a:6:{s:4:"data";s:13:"
	
	
	
	
	
	
";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";s:5:"child";a:2:{s:0:"";a:5:{s:5:"title";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:121:"Gutenberg Times: Gutenberg Changelog #99 – WordPress 6.6 + 6.5.3, Gutenberg 18.1 + 18.2, and Create Block Theme Updates";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"guid";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:53:"https://gutenbergtimes.com/?post_type=podcast&p=28444";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"link";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:99:"https://gutenbergtimes.com/podcast/gutenberg-changelog-99-wordpress-6-6-create-block-theme-updates/";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:11:"description";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:67597:"<p>In this episode, Sarah Norris and Birgit Pauli-Haack discuss WordPress 6.6 and  6.5.3, Gutenberg 18.1 + 18.2 and Create Block Theme Updates</p>



<p><a href="https://gutenbergtimes.com/podcast/gutenberg-changelog-99-wordpress-6-6-create-block-theme-updates/#shownotes">Show Notes</a> / <a href="https://gutenbergtimes.com/podcast/gutenberg-changelog-99-wordpress-6-6-create-block-theme-updates//#transcript">Transcript</a></p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Music:&nbsp;<a href="https://soundcloud.com/xirclebox">Homer Gaines</a></li>



<li>Editor:&nbsp;<a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/sandy-reed/">Sandy Reed</a></li>



<li>Logo:&nbsp;<a href="https://markuraine.com/">Mark Uraine</a></li>



<li>Production:&nbsp;<a href="https://icodeforapurpose.com">Birgit Pauli-Haack</a></li>
</ul>



<p class="has-larger-font-size" id="shownotes"><strong>Show Notes</strong></p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Special Guest:&nbsp;<strong>Sarah Norris</strong></h2>



<p>JavaScript Developer 6.4 editor tech co-lead / Core team rep </p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/mikachan/">WordPress Profile @mikachan</a></li>



<li><a href="https://sekai.co.uk/">Personal website: sekai.co.uk</a></li>



<li><a href="https://twitter.com/mikachan_">Twitter: @mikachan_</a></li>
</ul>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Announcements</h2>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://www.meetup.com/learn-wordpress-online-workshops/events/300590175/">Developer Hours: Alternatives to Custom Meta Boxes in the Block Editor</a></li>



<li><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dN_LaenY8bI">WordPress Playground: the ultimate learning, testing, &amp; teaching tool for WordPress</a></li>



<li><a href="https://github.com/WordPress/blueprints/blob/trunk/GALLERY.md">Sneak Preview: Blueprint Gallery</a></li>
</ul>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Create Block Theme plugin</h2>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/create-block-theme/">Create Block Theme plugin in the WordPress repository</a></li>



<li><a href="https://gutenbergtimes.com/exploring-the-latest-version-of-the-create-block-theme-plugin/">Exploring the latest version of the Create Block Theme plugin</a></li>
</ul>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">WordPress </h2>



<p><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/05/02/wordpress-6-5-3-rc1-is-now-available/">WordPress 6.5.3 RC1 is now available</a> </p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Gutenberg </h2>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/04/10/whats-new-in-gutenberg-18-1-10-april/">What’s new in Gutenberg 18.1? (10 April)</a></li>



<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/04/24/whats-new-in-gutenberg-18-2-24-april/">What’s new in Gutenberg 18.2? (24 April)</a></li>
</ul>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Interactivity API Resources: </h2>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>New WordPress Make Channel on Slack:<a href="https://wordpress.slack.com/archives/C071CRKGKUP">#core-interactivity-api</a></li>



<li>New Component page <a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/components/interactivity-api/">Interactivity API</a></li>



<li><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndW-Kz0iDdY&list=PL1pJFUVKQ7ETApyQQlt3pLNjPx2HrQwl5&index=2&t=2759s&pp=iAQB">Developer Hours: Building custom blocks in WordPress with the Interactivity API</a></li>



<li><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sl6nqGN8YVQ&list=PL1pJFUVKQ7ETApyQQlt3pLNjPx2HrQwl5&index=4&pp=iAQB">Developer Hours: Exploring the Interactivity API in WordPress 6.5</a></li>



<li>Developer Blog: <a href="https://developer.wordpress.org/news/2024/04/11/a-first-look-at-the-interactivity-api/">A first look at the Interactivity API</a></li>
</ul>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">What&#8217;s discussed: </h2>



<p><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/04/25/summary-of-hallway-hangout-on-whats-next-in-gutenberg/">Summary of Hallway Hangout on what’s next in Gutenberg</a></p>



<p><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/core/2024/05/03/roadmap-to-6-6/">Roadmap to 6.6</a></p>



<p class="has-large-font-size">Stay in Touch</p>



<div class="wp-block-group"><div class="wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow">
<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Did you like this episode? <a href="https://lovethepodcast.com/gutenbergchangelog"><strong>Please write us a review </strong></a></li>



<li>Ping us on Twitter or send DMs with questions. <a href="https://twitter.com/gutenbergtimes">@gutenbergtimes </a>and <a href="https://twitter.com/bph">@bph</a>.</li>



<li><em>If you have questions or suggestions, or news you want us to include, send them to <a href="mailto:changelog@gutenbergtimes.com">changelog@gutenbergtimes.com</a>. </em></li>



<li><em>Please write us a review on iTunes! <a href="https://gutenbergtimes.com/itunes/">(Click here to learn how)</a></em></li>
</ul>
</div></div>



<p class="has-large-font-size" id="transcript"><strong>Transcript</strong></p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Hello, and welcome to our 99th episode of the Gutenberg Changelog podcast. In today&#8217;s episode, we will talk about WordPress 6.6, WordPress 6.5.3, Gutenberg 18.1 and 18.2, and the create block theme updates. I&#8217;m your host, Birgit Pauli-Haack, curator at the Gutenberg Times and full-time core contributor to the WordPress Open Source project, sponsored by Automattic&#8217;s Five for the Future program. I&#8217;m so happy that Sarah Norris joins us again today. Some of you already know her as she has been a guest on the show before. Sarah is a core contributor on the Gutenberg project, also sponsored by Automattic, and this year&#8217;s core team rep, together with Joe McGill. Sarah, how are you today?</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> I&#8217;m good, thank you. Yeah, I&#8217;m doing really well. I&#8217;m celebrating a few recent releases at the moment. We got the font library has just come out in 6.5. I was working closely with some of the other contributors to that. Then we&#8217;ve also got a brand-new revamped Create Block Theme plugin, a few releases, we&#8217;re probably going to talk about them. Also, celebrating a couple of releases there as well. I&#8217;m also looking forward to this year&#8217;s WordCamp Europe. Really looking forward to some of the talks. We&#8217;ve got talks about playground, the interactivity API. There&#8217;s quite a few talks about block themes as well, so I&#8217;m really looking forward to all of that.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack: </em>WordCamp Europe has quite a great schedule, and if you haven&#8217;t checked it out, dear listeners, do so now because it also will be live-streamed. If you are interested in Block Editor and you&#8217;re listening, so I am assuming you are, you will see quite a few great talks. As Sarah said, playground, interactivity, API. It&#8217;s also HTML API workshop. I don&#8217;t know if that will be live-streamed, but Dennis Snell is the programmer of it and he&#8217;s also a great teacher and educator, so I&#8217;m looking forward to his workshop. These are exciting times in WordPress innovation and tooling. I just got back from WordCamp Leipzig and people are excited about the new revamped Create Block Theme plugin, and I came back on the Monday and on Tuesday, I think you released a new version, so everything that I showed had a different interface now, but I think it made it so much clearer.</p>



<p>The people are excited about that because that&#8217;s a no-code way to create themes, that&#8217;s we&#8217;ll talk about in a few minutes, and they&#8217;re also very excited about the upcoming grid layouts that are coming to Gutenberg also in July to WordPress 6.6. WordCamp Leipzig also was a full-German WordCamp, which is always a little bit unusual for me because I&#8217;m doing technical stuff mostly in English. I&#8217;m really happy to catch up with the German webcam community.&nbsp;</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Announcements</h3>



<p>Dear listeners, as you notice, we took a break in April, but we are back in full force. Before we head into the vastness of the Block Editor and WordPress happenings, I wanted to alert you to the next Developer Hours on Tuesday, May 14th, 2024 at 1500 UTC, that&#8217;s 9:00 AM Eastern Daylight, and you hear my hesitation. Time zones are the bane of my existence, so double check it, please.</p>



<p>It&#8217;s a very important Developer Hours. Nick Diego and Ryan Welcher will show plugin developers and those who have used Meta boxes before. It&#8217;s kind of a legacy feature, but it has been around for a long time to manage custom fields, and while Meta boxes are supported in the Block Editor, they&#8217;re considered legacy and do not provide an ideal user experience that we came to know. Then since the session, Nick and Ryan will explore current options available to custom plugin developers and theme settings in the Block Editor, so you can manage metadata using React and native WordPress components. You will learn how to use the slots in the sidebar and implement a model for additional.</p>



<p>Settings, fetch and save post metadata using JavaScript and also, connect post metadata to blocks. There are multiple ways to do this now in the Block Editor. By the end of the session, they will have an open discussion about the blockers, what prevents developers from migrating away from Meta boxes and possible solutions. It&#8217;s a great session for whoever is still, and there are many, many people who are still working with plugins that are using Meta boxes for their data. I think this is the start of a movement away from it. It also is a good place to gather the feedback what is actually a blocker, so it can be resolved in the Block Editor. May 14th, 2024 at 1500 UTC. All right, do you have any thoughts on this or ideas?</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> I mean, it sounds amazing. I think whenever there&#8217;s so many options, there often is with WordPress how to do something or just coding in general. It&#8217;s always good to go through them and find other people&#8217;s thoughts and maybe you hear a better idea on how you are doing it, but yeah, especially with custom Meta boxes. That&#8217;s good.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> There&#8217;s also been a GitHub issue or PR that the Meta boxes that are now on the bottom of the screen will be moved into a modal that is you have to click it to open it up from the top toolbar, and that way, now the post editor can also be loaded in the iframe and then have a better user experience and can better be styled and all that. The Meta boxes are a little bit one step away from the first screen, which is also good because the initial experience of having an empty post and then some gray boxes underneath is not a very intuitive interface either. I think with that PR also have been around for a while and discussed. I will link to it also in the show notes so you have the full context about things.</p>



<p>It&#8217;s going to be a shift because most of it is from PHP to JavaScript and that shift has not been easy for a lot of developers, including me. I learned JavaScript the third time now and I&#8217;m still not proficient. I learned the first time JavaScript was in 2023 when I was building my own static, my own static page builder. Not 2023, no, 2003, so it was one of the early JavaScript and it was a hell to go through.&nbsp;</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Community Contributions</h3>



<p>Anyway, so let&#8217;s go to our community contribution section. I&#8217;m just giving a shout-out to Anne McCarthy who put together a high-level demonstration of WordPress Playground.</p>



<p>WordPress Playground has been the most surprising tool of 2023 for a lot of people, including me, and I have fallen in love with it because it is a tool without having a server, without needing to install PHP or SQL Server or something like that. You have a link and you can install, pre-install a plugin that you can then preview and you don&#8217;t have to set up anything. Once you close your browser, it&#8217;s all gone. It&#8217;s in the ether, but you could, if you wanted to, have a storage option there. Anne McCarthy shows you what else can be done with Playground. The YouTube video will be in the show notes, of course. It also gives me great pleasure to give you all a sneak preview or sneak knowledge, pre-knowledge about the upcoming Blueprint community project. What are Blueprints?</p>



<p>Blueprints are the configuration files for Playground where you can use WPCLI, you can use import content, you can use PHP to pre-configure the Playground instance that you link to. Right now, there&#8217;s a gallery, a pre-version one gallery of 10 Blueprints. The community project is that whoever uses Playground can share their Blueprints with the world so other people can use it too and adopt it to their needs for their projects. It was great to figure that out and put this together. I think we will start later this month to make public announcements, but you can check it out and maybe check out some of those Blueprints already.&nbsp;</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Create Block Theme Updates</h3>



<p>I know you worked with Create Block Theme plugin preview. How&#8217;s that going? Do you get any numbers or so? How many people click on that link?</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris</em>: Actually, I haven&#8217;t checked. That sounds something to see how many people are using it. I know we&#8217;ve got great feedback about it and I think just in general, it&#8217;s a really good tool to preview plugins before you install it on your site, especially if you&#8217;re looking for a specific functionality from a plugin for a single website rather than something that&#8217;s going to be used everywhere, like all websites. It&#8217;s a great way to preview changes. I&#8217;ve not seen this Blueprint gallery before as well. This is a great idea too. Recently for the Automattic themes repo, we&#8217;ve added a Playground theme previewer, so that fits into this, like the theme tester Blueprint. A good example.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> I think there are a few kinks to work out, and I know that Adam Zielinski and his team are really working quite a bit on making things better. One kink is that when you upload, so you prepare the code, the content that you want to share with a Blueprint or with a Playground or template, a theme demo or so, you prepare the content in the Block Editor. You can export it normally with the WordPress export feature, but when you use it in a Blueprint, the images won&#8217;t come through, so you need to upload the images to a space where Blueprint has access to. I think the team is working on how to resolve that or make it a better experience. One of the theme testing Blueprints has that problem that the images point to a site that doesn&#8217;t have cross-site allowances problem, the course problem.</p>



<p>There are still a few kinks to work out. There&#8217;s one Blueprint in there where you can use WPCLI and add an attachment to a post, but then you need to upload that image beforehand. It&#8217;s an interesting conundrum, or how to solve it. The whole Blueprint features steps that you can automatically log in, you can automatically install plugins as many as you need. You can install a certain theme, you can upload some content. I actually use the WPCLI to add 12 posts automatically, so a query block has some content in there and not just the hello world. There are quite a few things that you can make those previews or testings a little bit more refined so you don&#8217;t have to have so much set up for some things, so it&#8217;s good. Yes, Create Block Theme updates, well, you brought it, brought some updates here to us.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> We&#8217;ve had a lot of updates on this, yes, Birgit. We&#8217;re trying to keep up with Gutenberg, maybe.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Oh, join the club.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> We&#8217;ve recently released the 2.1 version and then we&#8217;ve had a few point minor releases after that as well. We&#8217;re currently up to 2.1.3. Basically, the latest changes are a big revamp of the UI with an intentional move from the WP admin pages to the panel in the editor. I think for a while we&#8217;ve had a Create Block Theme. It uses a little spanner icon in the top right of the editor, so we&#8217;re trying to move a lot more of the options to that panel. Instead of having to jump between the WP admin pages and the editor, you should be able to stay in the editor for most of the tooling. We&#8217;ve also added a lot more options for how a theme is saved before it&#8217;s exported and there&#8217;s a lot more control, giving users a lot more control over how the theme is saved as well. Because previously, Create Block Theme was doing magic behind the scenes and it wasn&#8217;t obvious what was going on. We&#8217;ve tried to surface that a little bit better and it makes it more clear what&#8217;s happening to the theme export before you start importing it to other places.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Before we dive in into the details, for somebody who hasn&#8217;t heard about the plugin yet, the Create Block Theme plugin, what does it actually do? What is it for?</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> It&#8217;s to fill a gap basically between creating themes in the editor, which is obviously already really good and improves almost by the hour, too many updates, but most of the editor changes are very centric to the editor and therefore, to the single instance of the site that you&#8217;re working on. Create Block Theme tries to fill a gap where you&#8217;re making changes in the editor, and then it lets you export those changes so you can import them to either a standalone theme, so you can then do whatever you want with that, either make it open source, have it as a proprietary product. Any options that you can have for any other theme, but it lets you do it all from within the editor and hopefully, makes just theming in general a lot easier for no-code. We&#8217;ve tried to, because the people who work on it generally used to coding themes as well, we tried to make it friendly for both people who like to code and no-code as well.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> The workflow to create a theme would be to install a theme, preferably Twenty Twenty Four, but any block theme would do, make your changes and then decide if you want to have a child theme of that or a clone of that theme that has no connection to the parent theme, and put the changes that you make in the Global Styles, like the colors and the topography and the dimensions, and any of that changes. When a user makes them in the Block Editor, in the Site Editor, they&#8217;re stored in the database, so they&#8217;re not getting into the files. Like the template files, if you create a new template, it&#8217;s stored in the database. If you add new custom colors, they&#8217;re stored in the database. When you choose the Create Block Theme, everything of those changes that you made in the editor will be replicated or duplicated in the files for a new theme or whatever theme you decide to do. Is that correct?</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Yeah, that&#8217;s exactly it. I guess a quick way to sum it up would be instead of having user changes, it elevates those changes to the theme level and then you can do whatever you would normally like to do with a theme.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> I did a test of a few things, and I really enjoyed starting from a blank theme, which is not entirely blank. You get the theme JSON and you get the index HTML and you get whatever you need for a fully functioning theme. It&#8217;s just not a styled line, and then you can add your colors and your typography and upload the fonts. What are the things that are now in the new UI that you can decide on?</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> The main differences are how you save the changes to your active theme. Previously, you could just save all the changes and it&#8217;d just be like one option and you didn&#8217;t really know how things were being saved, and then you could export and you could do a one-click save and export as well, so it bundled loads of functionality into one button. With the new changes and the new UI, we&#8217;ve tried to break those out a lot more, so it gives you more control over how the theme is being saved, and then you can choose what&#8217;s exported as well. The things that we&#8217;ve separated out are fonts, so there&#8217;s now a save fonts option, so that lets you opt into including any installed fonts, and it also will delete any deactivated fonts from the current theme as well.</p>



<p>You can use the new font library basically as well with a new theme to install those fonts, and then you have more options on how they&#8217;re included in the theme. You also can optionally include your Global Styles changes. Like we&#8217;ve just been talking about, they were automatically being saved, so from the database into the theme level. You probably will want to do that for all changes, but now this is optional as well. In case you&#8217;ve made some changes maybe to test things out, or maybe you were testing out some typography and some colors and then you don&#8217;t like them, you cannot save them to your theme if you don&#8217;t want to do that. There&#8217;s also, we&#8217;ve separated out saving any template changes. This means any block edits or block markup changes that you make to templates will be included by default, but you can optionally not include them as well.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> That&#8217;s very cool.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> It just gives you more control. Again, if you&#8217;ve just been testing something, you might not want to include it in your theme, but probably likely you&#8217;ve been changing it to update the theme. Probably most of the time you will want to include the changes. We&#8217;ve also made it optional to disallow Create Block Theme from editing any existing templates to say you&#8217;ve cloned a theme that already includes a bunch of templates and you really like the way they&#8217;re set up. Maybe the text is already translatable, and this might be good if you&#8217;ve edited block markup in the templates manually. Maybe if you&#8217;re making the indentation look nice, anything like that, we&#8217;ve now got an option that Create Block Theme will only process. Processes like making text translatable or localizing images, it will only process the templates that you&#8217;ve edited within the editor and it will leave any previous templates that came with the theme.</p>



<p>Then we&#8217;ve also got a few other smaller things that are turned off by default because we found that most people probably want them off by default. These are making text strings translatable. Again, Create Block Theme used to do this for everything, so now it&#8217;s optional, so in case you don&#8217;t want that happening. It will also move any image assets. If you&#8217;ve uploaded images to templates, there&#8217;s an option to include these images in the theme assets folder and change the URL to be relative to the theme. That&#8217;s optional as well. If you turn that off, it won&#8217;t move any images and it&#8217;ll just leave them local instead of on the theme. Then the final one, which I think is probably the smallest change, but it is a major one, is optionally removing the ref attribute from the navigation book.</p>



<p>The ref attribute is important because it references a specific menu, but because the specific menu is local to the site instance, when you export a theme, that&#8217;s not going to exist on every site. We did explore doing this for every single navigation block, but obviously, not everyone&#8217;s exporting a theme. Some people just want to save a theme, and then they&#8217;ve got a collection of local themes that they use. It&#8217;s not always applicable, and it can mean that it visually looks like you&#8217;ve lost an entire menu when all of this happens. It&#8217;s just lost its reference to the existing menu. Alternatively to that, if you are exporting a theme and you want to distribute it on the theme directory or anywhere else, you probably don&#8217;t want to reference a menu that doesn&#8217;t exist anywhere else. It maybe sounds confusing if you don&#8217;t know the block markup for the navigation block. If you do, you probably, well, hopefully, when you see the option, you&#8217;re like, &#8220;Oh yeah, I do want to do that please remove over.&#8221;</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> It doesn&#8217;t assume things that are there that are not there, and then it&#8217;s not a good experience for a new user of a theme. Yeah, of course.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris</em>: Yeah, makes sense.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Totally makes sense. How are Patterns actually treated in the Create Block Theme?</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> For pattern management, that&#8217;s like the next thing we&#8217;re looking at because it&#8217;s a bigger beast to tackle, and interesting how it&#8217;s going to work with the changes in 6.6, but we can talk about those later, maybe. Currently, the main interaction with Patterns at the moment is that with the options, I&#8217;ve just gone through, the save options, with making text translatable and moving the image assets into the theme assets folder. Both of those things currently require PHP. Probably if you&#8217;ve been using the editor to make any changes and haven&#8217;t jumped into the code, everything is going to be in HTML. Create Block Theme will move these references into a PHP file, which is by creating a pattern. Because that&#8217;s currently the only way or one of the best ways, I guess, to make text translatable and to reference image assets from the theme director. That&#8217;s currently the only interaction with Patterns at the moment. We are hoping to maybe introduce pattern management, or at least iteratively make the pattern management experience better when using Gutenberg. That&#8217;s our hope anyway.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Patterns have been around for a long time. Well, it&#8217;s not the Patterns that were around for a long time, it&#8217;s a reusable block that can be used as a template part, for instance, and it&#8217;s now called Sync Pattern. They had its own import export feature in WordPress or still have that you can import Patterns via JSON where you can copy paste them from the pattern directory. There are many different ways to get to Patterns, so having one feature in Create Block plugin, that&#8217;s going to be a complex piece to tackle. Yeah, definitely. They also have the references to the original Patterns when you have the synced overrides. That&#8217;s something we are going to talk about. It&#8217;s going to be real complex. What I also like is that you can update the metadata of your new theme within the sidebar with a plugin, so you can change the name of it and you can change the description and do it all right there, so you really don&#8217;t have to touch code for that. That is a really good thing. What else? Oh, yes. Yeah, what else?</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Like you said, we&#8217;ve got a new metadata editor within the editor. You can now open a modal, I guess similar to the custom method fields. It just means, again, all the information goes into the readme.txt file, so probably anyone who&#8217;s editing that information already is familiar with editing the read me, but it just means that you don&#8217;t need to jump into your code editor and you can stay in the WordPress editor. Then, yeah, the other big thing is that you can now view your theme JSON file, so the currently active themes JSON file. Again, we&#8217;ve got a view to enable editing of this as well in the editor. Again, just saving you jumping in between code editor and on WordPress. That&#8217;s another exciting one. Hopefully, saves people time.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> That was actually the biggest, whoa. When I demoed that, I added a few custom colors and showed them in the editor and then saved them. The only barrier is you have to do two saves, you have to save it in the database or on the editor, and then you have to click on save and the Create Block plugin sidebar. Then I was able to show them, okay, and now let&#8217;s look at the theme JSON, and it shows the little custom colors palette there. It was really a big help to show the power of this Great Block Theme plugin.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> It&#8217;s nice.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Do you want to go through some of the changes from the change log of the plugin?</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Yes. Let&#8217;s see what we haven&#8217;t talked about. We&#8217;ve talked about the UI refactor. One of the recent big changes has been now Create Block Theme will process any background images on the Group Block, which it previously didn&#8217;t do. I know that, that&#8217;s probably a really popular theme option when people are adding background images to the Group Block. Now those will be exported with a Create Block Theme export as well.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> That&#8217;s great. I know I saw an issue also already used for one of the features that comes in 18.1, is the background for the whole site that you can add. That&#8217;s on the roadmap for that.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris: </em>Yeah, it is. Although, I think that we&#8217;re handling that in Gutenberg as well, I think, which is really interesting, so that&#8217;s probably another. I think we&#8217;re making it relative to the theme or there&#8217;s some exploration there, anyway. We need to look into that in more detail on how we can use Create Block Theme alongside that because that&#8217;s really interesting. The other thing I wanted to mention, is another recent update is you can now persist the safe changes options. The ones I run through before, there&#8217;s quite a lot and they&#8217;re basically surfaced as check boxes. If you&#8217;re a theme builder or if you&#8217;ve build in a lot of themes, you&#8217;re probably going to use the same options every time. There&#8217;s a new option now that will remember the check-boxes that you use basically, so you don&#8217;t have to keep unchecking or checking boxes.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Very helpful. Yes, thank you. Awesome. This is your little knowledge bit on the Create Block Theme. I really love that plugin and it had changed. From what I hear in the Outreach Channel and also with the people that I talk to, is that it changed the workflow on building block themes quite a bit and made it so much easier to just create themes. The only thing that it doesn&#8217;t do yet, I&#8217;m thinking, is to switch off some of the features of the Block Editor that are in the custom settings. If you want to switch off dimension controls or if you want to switch off custom color settings or something like that, you still have to do that or have the theme JSON, but I think that&#8217;s just one part that you still need to touch code.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Yeah, that&#8217;s a good point. We should introduce a new modal.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> I think there were some great examples there in the early days of block themes, because many theme developers or agency developers actually have this that build bespoke themes for one project and never replicated for any other project. They have this need to introduce guardrails on colors and typography because it&#8217;s brand styling. If you give users too much freedom on that design, they come up with your own designs and sometimes that&#8217;s detrimental to the clean look and feel of a website, so they want to build some guardrails. Right now, that&#8217;s only possible through theme JSON or theme support in the functions PHP. I also can see that most of those developers are not using the Create Block Theme out of the box. They&#8217;re using some of their themes and then have those theme JSON settings already in there and then use the Create Block Theme to just make the additional changes on the templates and on the colors or something like that. I don&#8217;t think it&#8217;s big, but it could be something we could look into.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">What’s Released &#8211; WordPress 6.5.3 RC1</h3>



<p>Although there was already a release to the WordPress releases, we have WordPress 6.5.3 release candidate, was just released, and it&#8217;s now available for testing. The final release is scheduled for May 7th. That&#8217;s next week. Many of you are listening to this past ad, so go and update your WordPress instances on your websites. It contains about 18, not a bad day, it contains exactly 19 bug fixes discovered with WordPress 6.5 release that couldn&#8217;t wait until 6.6 and also wasn&#8217;t supposed to wait. They are out now. You can follow up on the full list via the announcement post that will be in the show notes. There weren&#8217;t any particular bug fixes that stand out where I said, all good that, that is fixed, but also didn&#8217;t work too much with 6.5. I&#8217;m glad contributors worked on that.&nbsp;</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Gutenberg 18.1</h3>



<p>Okay, let&#8217;s get to the two last Gutenberg releases. The first tagline, Gutenberg 18.1, it was a fairly large release and, Release Lead Ramon Dodd, had the release post on what&#8217;s new in Gutenberg 18.1. That&#8217;s the release that answer has the background image for the Site Editor, but let&#8217;s take it from the top.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Enhancements</h3>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> The first one we were going to talk about is the zoom out, so this is invoking zoom out mode when opening the Patterns tab. It&#8217;s a great enhancement, because I think whenever you, or I guess most of the time when you insert a pattern, you&#8217;re going to want to see a bird&#8217;s eye view or well, literally, a zoomed-out view of your page because otherwise, you&#8217;re going to be zoomed into a smaller area of the page and it&#8217;s hard to see the new pattern or visualize where you want the pattern to go when you can only see a small section of the page. This invokes zoom out mode when you open the Patterns tab. I&#8217;d love to hear some feedback around if people are finding this useful as well. I think it feels very natural as well. It feels like a very nice animation that happens as well when you open the Patterns tab.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Yeah, I like it too. Also, in the Site Editor, you can now rename pages through the actions three-dot menu. Pages are now in the Site Editor, you can view them through the data view, the whole DataViews&#8217; new components and tables and the different layout views. You can have the grid layout view of all the pages and on your site, and then you have three-dot menus on the bottom of each card that gives you immediate actions that you can take with a page. One of them is rename a page, give it a new title, even if it&#8217;s a no-title page kind of thing. It&#8217;s an easy way to fix headlines and all that. I really like it for the new admin sections there.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris</em>: Another update to that page view that you&#8217;ve just been talking about is well, updating the index view. I think these changes are all related to the DataViews project. There&#8217;s some really good work going in here. It brings there the list of pages to the new DataViews section.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack: </em>The List View, so you have on the left-hand side, you have the navigation that is in the dark background, and then the List View shows you each page with a thumbnail or something like that in the title. Then when you click on it, it opens up another panel where you can see the whole page. It&#8217;s also quite interesting for the workflow that was, you never were able to do that in WordPress before. It was always you had to click on it and then it opens it again. This is much smoother and you can browse all the pages quite easily and to see how they look. It seems to be magical that they actually display the front-end view of the page in the editor, so it&#8217;s really cool.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Instead of having to click into a page, wait for a page reload and then click another one and wait for another reload. It&#8217;s now right there.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack</em>: Yeah, right there. The same, we see that for the pattern pages, there&#8217;s now also a table layout where you can see the patterns and then it opens it up. Then the content schema for pattern editing view. I wasn&#8217;t quite sure what that was.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> It&#8217;s when you can name blocks in a pattern, and then when you come out to the pattern view when you&#8217;re inserting a pattern, you&#8217;ll be able to see a content panel. Then those name blocks will show in that content panel. It&#8217;s probably good if you watch the video, the handy video that&#8217;s on the PR. It probably does a better explanation. It&#8217;s going to be good.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Oh, that helps me quite a bit because sometimes you see paragraph heading, paragraph heading, heading, heading, image.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Yeah, exactly.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> You don&#8217;t know exactly where you&#8217;re on the page, but if things have a name you know, &#8220;Okay, I&#8217;m in the right section where I want to change things in the List View. The List View is, I&#8217;m obviously not creating too much content because the List View is not part of my muscle memory. When I was demoing things from the theme and how things are changed, I never opened up the List View and people asked me behind that. The List View is always open, how to navigate the whole pages and all that. It&#8217;s definitely a change in muscle memory to open that up because the List View wasn&#8217;t really helpful in the first few years of the Block Editor, so I didn&#8217;t develop that. Okay, next. Next is a background UI controls that are now really extensive. You can have, what was it? The focus on the image. You can have a tiled background image on things and you can have a section, but this is set for the top level.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Yes, I think so. Well, so I think it&#8217;s related to the top level, the new top-level background image setting. As we tend to do in Gutenberg, we&#8217;ll add the setting, the new style setting to theme JSON. Then this PR I think that we&#8217;re looking at is adding the UI controls. This surfaces it in the editor. This is, again, it&#8217;s very close to theming. It really elevates what you can do for themes. Again, this would&#8217;ve just been, you would&#8217;ve had to do it with code and probably custom CSS.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Now you can, through the editor, you can change the background position, you can change the repeat, yes or no, or the background size of it, does it cover the whole thing, or there&#8217;s another one restrained. You can just upload the image there. I like background images, it gives so much more dimensions and layers to the Block Editor.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Yeah, it does. I really love web designs that use a big full-size background image. That&#8217;s the kind of design I like. I&#8217;m really pleased to see this come to the editor. We&#8217;ll see.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> There&#8217;s something that the DataViews, and I know it was there before that you can clear out customizations to templates, but now you also get a confirmation modal. I have learned that when you want to do, so some people wanted to switch out the theme, no, the updates of the theme doesn&#8217;t update templates at all when they were previously changed because the user changes trump the theme changes. When you update a theme on your site and you want the new changes coming in on templates for themes, you need to clear out the customizations beforehand. It&#8217;s a little bit of a quirk right now, and I don&#8217;t know how to solve this because of the hierarchy of changes, but maybe the Create Block theme. I don&#8217;t know if that&#8217;s a scope for that as well, but it&#8217;s something users and theme developers need to get their head around that, that&#8217;s actually what&#8217;s happening.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Yeah, exactly. Maybe a good solution here for the first case, it&#8217;d just be to surface what&#8217;s going on and try and explain to people just different levels of saving and this is how it works, like the template hierarchy, you just have to get used to that. Maybe there&#8217;s a first step of just telling people where things are being saved. I think this change helps you be less unintentionally destructive as well, because resetting things, it&#8217;s just, &#8220;Oh, I didn&#8217;t realize I was going to clear everything.&#8221;</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Yeah, you&#8217;re so right. Well, there are people who don&#8217;t press a button because they fear that they set up a nuclear bomb, but some people are just clicking around and saying, &#8220;Oh, I didn&#8217;t do anything,&#8221; but it all made it disappear. For them, it&#8217;s the next step as kind of have a confirmation modal, so you can think twice about what you&#8217;re doing there.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> The next one we&#8217;ve got is related to the List View you just mentioned. I think this makes it much easier to navigate. It&#8217;s adding keyboard shortcut to collapse List View items, but excluding the focused items. You&#8217;ve got the List View on the left-hand side and say you do have a lot of content, unlike Birgit, depending on the length, I think it can be challenging to navigate just because it&#8217;s another scrollable section. Adding this keyboard shortcut makes it much easier to collapse nested groups, basically. Yeah, it&#8217;s a good addition. Again, it&#8217;s probably good to watch the video.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> It&#8217;s definitely also a good quality of life kind of thing. I think that was for the enhancement of 18.1, Gutenberg plugin updates, 18.1.&nbsp;</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Accessibility</h3>



<p>There&#8217;s one thing that is available was an accessibility change for the DataViews that you can update. It has updated keyboard navigation in the list layout, so you can navigate through that through your keyboard, which is very important, so you don&#8217;t have to wait for the screen reader to announce everything. Then how do you get there? By keyboard. That&#8217;s a good thing. I think that was it for 18.1.&nbsp;</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Gutenberg 18.2</h3>



<p>We can now immediately go into the change law of 18.2, and that was a mammoth release with 234 individual PRs by 56 contributors. Four of them completely new, but it also was that large because there were two more days on the release.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>It wasn&#8217;t released on a Wednesday, it was released on a Friday of last week. Let&#8217;s head into it. </strong>Enhancements</h3>



<p>First things, all kind of animation changes that I clustered together. It makes it a little bit easier that, that&#8217;s animation, it&#8217;s not very distracting animation. It&#8217;s more like a feedback animation. It adjusts the frame, it animates the radios on the frame, it improves the header animation. The animation for opening and closing the editor right-side bar, the insert and List View panels. This is more like when you move through the editor, you get feedback on where you are and where you go. I think those are really good features. They&#8217;re mostly invisible, but you&#8217;re just going to feel them, that it&#8217;s nice out there.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> They&#8217;re small, tiny changes that make a big difference when they&#8217;re all grouped together, especially, just makes everything feel a little bit nicer to use. Next up, we&#8217;ve got using the grid layout by default on the templates in template parts view. Again, this is related to the DataViews work, I think. The grid makes more sense because they&#8217;re more visual.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack</em>: Template parts and templates are so visual. In their nature though, it&#8217;s good to see them, even if it&#8217;s only a tiny grid layout card, but it helps you navigate them without. You see them all in one scroll and then you can navigate to the one that you wanted to go to. Template parts are now patterns, so if you&#8217;re looking for your template parts, look on the patterns because there&#8217;s a big similarity between what patterns are sync patterns and template parts. They&#8217;re mostly all reusable things that can be, and so they&#8217;re clustered under the Patterns section. There is a simplified template reset language that kind of goes with 18.1 modal probably on resetting template changes customizations. What else?</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> There&#8217;s also related to what you were just saying about template parts I think in the Patterns, we now have an author field in that view.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> You can filter by, is it a template part or is it coming from the theme, or is it coming from the user and which user? It&#8217;s definitely helpful to navigate the whole thing and filter it when you have many, many template parts on the page. Yeah, so good, thank you. Then the editor, also in those layouts, you see in the editor now the word count and reading time in the post card, it&#8217;s not in the post, it&#8217;s more in the pages view, not in the post view, but you see them on the left-hand side in your screen. In the single Meta page screen. We need to get them all those names in.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> I think it&#8217;s related to, because we have that information is surfaced within the editor when you&#8217;re browsing templates, and so I think we&#8217;re trying to align the data that surfaced in both areas so it&#8217;s more familiar and not confusing. There&#8217;s some data that appears here and different data that appears when you are editing the post. We&#8217;re trying to align them to reduce confusion.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> It&#8217;s good to have that information right there with a page metadata here, a template. Then the next feature is that the template preview is now available in the post editor for non-administrators, because non-administrators also can change the templates, so now they can see the preview. I think that&#8217;s in the sidebar. When you&#8217;re editing a post or a page, in the sidebar, you can switch out the template. To know which template you use, you need to see what it is, so you get a preview of the templates that you can search for or look at before you switch them out. That&#8217;s definitely a good way to help content creators to do the right thing there.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> The publish flow has also been updated, so this is related to published status label.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Yes.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Yeah, it makes it clearer what the state of a post.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> This is on the post summary panel. It shows you, you might have noticed that when you use the Gutenberg plugin, that the featured image in some of the other data is now in a so-called summary panel on the post were the former called document settings. There, you can also see what nature it is. Is it a draft, is it a published one or not? Then you see the featured image and also the template and the URL and when it&#8217;s published and all that. That is now much clearer what status your post is about. Well, the page,</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Yeah, it&#8217;s good.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> The next thing is the Patterns page has now edit and view revision actions to the parts. Template parts now also surface the revisions in the editor, so you can see what&#8217;s changed here.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> In the three-dots menu, I think we mentioned that similar to the title change that&#8217;s been surfaced, so these are new options in that three-dot menu for editing and viewing the revisions.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> The resetting, you can also reset it.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Reset, yeah, and delete.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack</em>: Then the Site Editor now also supports startup patterns. It did for the page view, when you go through the WP Admin and to create a new page, it showed you already startup patterns when they came in with a theme, but the Site Editor page management system didn&#8217;t have that yet. This is just creating feature parity between the two views, the startup patterns, so you can select different page layouts, and you don&#8217;t have to start from a blank page which a lot of people have anxiety about. You can start about, so you see, okay, this is my header section, my middle section, and my additional service section or whatever is in the startup pattern. Full-page layouts can be done, can be surfaced through the theme, and now you have them inside editor as well. Cool.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> The next one we&#8217;ve got is we&#8217;ve improved the override indication for editable blocks in synced patterns. This is if you&#8217;ve inserted a synced pattern somewhere. Then when you&#8217;re looking around to edit things, things will be generally highlighted. There&#8217;ll be an outline around the block that can be edited. This update removes the outline that highlights things that can be edited. It removes it from things that can&#8217;t be edited in a synced pattern. Again, it&#8217;s kind just like a quality of life or UX improvement that feels, or maybe looks small, it makes everything feel a lot more easy to understand immediately.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> It takes the mystery out of it. You don&#8217;t have to click around and say, can I? Can I do? The next thing is in the zoom out mode, there&#8217;s an introduction of section containers where you can assemble patterns into sections and then zoom out or see them in the zoom out mode. There&#8217;s much work being done in creating sections that can be styled and all that. Well, that was a PR that went through multiple changes. Well, it started in February and has just been merged, and it&#8217;s April, so it took about two months to get through this. You were saying?</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Sorry. I was going to say, I think it&#8217;s related to some of the 6.6 changes, especially some of the things that we talked about in the recent Hallway Hangout. I think this is like some groundwork for section styling and being able to style parts of either patterns pages or entire themes, rather than thinking you might have to apply something to everything. You can now break it down into sections.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Cool. We will have a link to the Hallway Hangout that you just mentioned. That was what&#8217;s coming to 6.6, but we&#8217;re going to briefly talk about it as well and have the show notes, of course, have a link to it. The next two are DataViews changes. Again, there&#8217;s a lot of work being done, so it&#8217;s really hard to keep up, but every time you open up the Gutenberg Site Editor in the Gutenberg plugin, it has little changes in there. One is that you can now display fields as a batch in the grid layout. Then you can make checks, boxes and actions visible on touch devices, which actually is really helpful when you&#8217;re on a tablet or on mobile. There is also an experiment out of custom views. I&#8217;m not quite sure what that entails, but I&#8217;m going to look at it real quick. Do you have anything to add to that?</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> I think when I was reading this before, I think this is because the DataViews work is now not experimental, it&#8217;s moving the custom DataViews into an experiment. Rather than all the DataViews being an experiment, it&#8217;s just moving this single part of it, the custom DataViews as being experimental. You have to enable it.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Is that the beginning of making DataViews a little bit extensible and you can create custom views or is that not that part?</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> I think it is. It&#8217;s like when you create your own reports in data reporting tools and stuff like that, you can create your own view for, well, I&#8217;ve seen the demo for creating your own view for pages, but I&#8217;m sure we&#8217;ll have many others. Again, it just gives users a little bit more control. It makes things feel more professional as well, because you can give it specific names rather than it all sounding very specific WordPress.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> The same.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Yeah, the same, basically from the site.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> I think it comes with a work for custom post types as well. If you need custom post types, custom fields, that&#8217;s all that whole soup of complexity and extensibility that comes with it. This is good that there&#8217;s already some work being done on that part. Because we already get some questions about extensibility of the DataViews use, and people who have done this with WP Admin are keen to see how they can work with the new components in the DataViews. This is definitely a good thing to start out with that.&nbsp;</p>



<p>Then there were some changes for the layout pieces of the Site Editor. It added the row control for grid layouts in manual mode, which is good. It needs some testing and some feedback. You can also now, and this is what a lot of people are waiting for, is applying negative margins. We talked about it before, I think here on the podcast, but applying negative margin was something that a lot of people were waiting for, doing it in UI. It was always possible through theme JSON, but now there&#8217;s some UI or some settings that you can do in the sidebar.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris: </em>Yeah, and we&#8217;ve also reduced the specificity of the layout.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> That&#8217;s why I leave it to you. I can&#8217;t pronounce that word. Specificity, yeah.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Again, it makes it hopefully easier for themers or anyone interacting with CSS. It makes it much easier rather than unexpectedly being overridden by CSS from Gutenberg. This change will hopefully make that a lot easier. There&#8217;s some changes like we&#8217;ve wrapped existing styles in a ware block, so which makes them less specific. I believe the semantic class names have been improved as well, but I think I might be jumping into a different PR there, but hopefully, it all collectively makes styling things much easier for Gutenberg.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack</em>: I think the semantic thing with just an 18.3. Yeah, it&#8217;s coming.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Yeah, we talked about this.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> No problem to mention it here, it&#8217;s coming. To say it&#8217;s not the last that we work on it. Then for the Global Styles, we talked about the background image or mentioned it, now you can have a display of default background for the size value in the Global Styles. We have the background UI control labels that are changed and then you use text and button background color for color indicators. There&#8217;s a lot of things that improve handling background images in the Global Styles.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris: </em>Then this other one we&#8217;ve got for Global Styles is the color indicators now use the text and button background colors. I think this helps make the color palette selection clearer.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Absolutely.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> It&#8217;s when you start variations, I think it helps. Again, it probably helps to see this visually in the PR. When you view browse styles in Global Styles panel, if a theme has multiple style variations, you&#8217;ll see a little, like a preview box that previews the typography, the background image, and then two other theme images, theme colors, sorry, from the color palette. This changes those two colors to use the text and button background colors. I think it just generally gives you a better idea of the variation color palette compared to previously. Another good improvement.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">APIs</h3>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Especially, yeah. There are new APIs in 18.2, and they definitely need some testing because there&#8217;s now additional support for the plugin post status info in the slot for the Site Editor. Most of the changes are actually to give the plugin a more menu item for the API. Then what&#8217;s the other one? Plugin site, more menu item, that&#8217;s one. Then the other one is unify the plugin sidebar slot between the post and Site Editor. Because most of the time, you need the feature from a plugin in, in both. Because if it&#8217;s a plugin with blocks, blocks can be used in the Site Editor as well as in the post editor. It&#8217;s really beneficial to have those slots there. You could add as a plugin developer something into the post status info and you can create, so unify plugin, more menu item, you can create more menu items. I think some of the UIs, I feel that the Create Block Theme is actually using some of those new APIs already because it feels a little bit differently than before where you can open a menu and then have another slot and all that. Yes.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Yeah, exactly. I think these are the API changes of bringing more parity to the, like you said, between the post and Site Editor. I think most of these changes are moving these APIs into the editor package. Instead of them being separated, they&#8217;re only included in one package, and then that makes it much easier for plugins to use.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Then they don&#8217;t have to include too many packages to use those. I think going through the create plugin GitHub repo might help quite a few plugin developers to find some solutions for their move away from the Meta boxes or the WP Admin setting pages into the editor. That&#8217;s a new avenue there. Maybe we need to do a Developer Hour on how did you do this? All right. I really like that, how this all comes together. You&#8217;re right, if you scroll further on the changelog, you get to the ad semantic classes.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> I knew I&#8217;d seen it somewhere.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Then there were some changes on the interactivity API. You can now have multiple event handles for the data WP on directive. That is really helpful because you can have for different actions on a button, you can have different event handlers. That&#8217;s really cool.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Yeah, it is. The other one we&#8217;ve got is updating the query block to allow, oh, non-interactive blocks. Sorry, non-core. I&#8217;m missing a vital word. Non-core interactive block, so you can include any block. Any block that enables the interactivity. API can now be included in the query block.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Oh, yeah, that&#8217;s really helpful when you have custom post types with some interactions there. We love it. Cool. The interactivity API is another powerful feature that only in the next few months we&#8217;ll see really the extent of how powerful it actually is and what other people do with it. There have been quite a few Developer Hours with it. Some examples, there was a developer blog post about the introduction of the interactivity API. Earlier, or last month, there was a Developer Hours with creating blocks with the interactivity API with another real-world example. I know that Ryan Welcher is now working on his Twitch stream on doing a to-do app with the interactivity API, and this shaped up quite nicely.</p>



<p>Part two, I think, happened this week. I will put all these interactivity API mentions into the show notes so you can look up about them, what happened in last month about that.&nbsp;</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">What’s in Active Development or Discussed &#8211; WordPress 6.6 Hallway Hangout</h3>



<p>This concludes our what&#8217;s released sections and we are really way into the hour, but I wanted to still talk with you, Sarah, about the Hallway Hangout on what&#8217;s next in Gutenberg. There was a demo time, I think it was an hour and a half, where product managers and designers came together and demoed how certain things are going to work and what they&#8217;re preparing for the 6.6 version that&#8217;s coming out. Beta will be June 4th and it will come out on July 8th. I think that&#8217;s the schedule. Of course, so then the last version of Gutenberg coming in, I think it&#8217;s 18.5. We are now 18.3 release candidate is out, so we are about three releases away from beta. Isn&#8217;t that scary?</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> It&#8217;s terrifying, and everything moves so fast. You think you&#8217;ve got a break, and you haven&#8217;t.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> What was the topic about, or what did we cover? What was covered in the Hallway Hangout? It was the data view efforts in the relationship with the admin redesign. I think that was a part of the extensibility there. I think the biggest piece is the overrides and sync pattern because that changed. It was slated for WordPress 6.5, but then got pulled after beta one when the flow was not as intuitive as one would&#8217;ve wanted. It&#8217;s a similar setup, so when you have a pattern that is synced, you can enable overwrites. What you also have to do is to give the overrides a name for each single override so people that use the pattern can see in the sidebar which are the things that you can override and can click on it. I think that is a very good demo to watch.</p>



<p>I&#8217;ll share the summary of posts on make core in the show notes, and there were quite few smaller videos in there that show off some of the new features that are coming. You and I, we just talked about the zoomed-out view. There is some advanced content only editing in how that is handled. Then of course, another big feature is a grid layout support that&#8217;s coming and the pattern styles, which means that you have a section in a website that you can attach a style universally without having to style each additional block that&#8217;s in that section. Is that what I&#8217;m hearing?</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> Yes. Yeah, I think that&#8217;s right. Similar to how we can currently apply different style variations to an entire theme. This would allow you to apply style variations or any other kind of variation of global styles, I guess. I&#8217;m trying not to say style variations again.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> Lots of expectations.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris: </em>Yeah, that&#8217;s right. It makes it much easier to get some more variety of styling, and means you don&#8217;t have to switch themes as well.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> I think that what I find how things are changed in the Global styles and if you needed it to be overall change for the whole site or do you want to just for this post and where those change is happening. There are attempts to find a way to clarify where things have been changed or where they&#8217;re styled, and so you can actually reverse some of the things. Revisions probably helped, certainly. The Hallway Hangout was quite interesting to see. Was there anything that stood out for you?</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> It&#8217;s hard to pick, actually. I think the DataViews work is really, really cool and really sets us up for the admin redesign work. It&#8217;s just really nice to see these fresh designs go into WordPress. I also really like anything to do with Patterns because I work with themes a lot, so all of that is super interesting and it&#8217;s giving users a lot more control and allowing different areas to be edited. Then some areas are locked down, just a lot more control is really, really good. Also, on the zoomed-out view, that content only editing view is very interesting too because I think it&#8217;s all in the name. It only allows you to edit the content rather than being distracted by editing all the other blocks that are surrounding the content. Again, really interesting stuff going on.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> It also helps the developers that do bespoke site to kind of put up some the guardrails more intuitively for the content creators and not just make it easy for them to create those. Yes, so definitely, dear listeners, if you only get one thing out of this hour of Gutenberg Changelog, follow up on the show notes and look at the summary of the Hallway Hangouts for what&#8217;s next in Gutenberg. Because it gives you a pretty good preview way ahead of time of what will come into WordPress 6.6, and there&#8217;s quite a lot that&#8217;s coming as you can hear. We are at the end of the show. Is there anything else you wanted to highlight before we close out that you didn&#8217;t get a chance to talk about it? Because it will be chopped up.</p>



<p><em>Sarah Norris:</em> No, I think we talked about everything. Well, there&#8217;s always too much as well.</p>



<p><em>Birgit Pauli-Haack:</em> We shouldn&#8217;t wait a month to catch up everybody up on the Gutenberg happenings. Before I end on the show, I wanted to remind everyone on the Developer Hours on alternatives from Meta boxes, May 14th. If you listen to this after May 14th, go to one of the last weekend editions on the Gutenberg Times and you&#8217;ll find the recording of that hour so you can follow up after the fact. I think it&#8217;s definitely also a video to watch.&nbsp;</p>



<p>All right, as always, the show notes will be published on gutenbergtimes.com for the podcast. This is episode 99. If you have questions and suggestions or news you want us to include, send them to <a href="mailto:changelog@gutenbergtimes.com">changelog@gutenbergtimes.com</a>. That&#8217;s <a href="mailto:changelog@gutenbergtimes.com">changelog@gutenbergtimes.com</a>.</p>



<p>For those who are still listening and haven&#8217;t switched off, we have episode 100 coming up, and it will be a special edition of the Gutenberg Times. I will talk with the agency that did the redesign of the NASA website, and we will talk about WordPress scales as well as implementation challenges and pathways to migrate content, decisions about how to decide on core blocks or custom blocks, and have a good time with the agency, the content creator, team members and developers on how they actually accomplish that.&nbsp;</p>



<p>Thanks, everybody, for listening, and I wish you a wonderful weekend, week, say goodbye, and yeah, till the next time.</p>";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:7:"pubDate";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:31:"Sat, 04 May 2024 11:13:50 +0000";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}s:32:"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/";a:1:{s:7:"creator";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:19:"Gutenberg Changelog";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}}}i:41;a:6:{s:4:"data";s:13:"
	
	
	
	
	
	
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";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";s:5:"child";a:2:{s:0:"";a:5:{s:5:"title";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:83:"Do The Woo Community: Coding Practices, PHP Nomad, and ChatGPT with Alex Standiford";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"guid";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:28:"https://dothewoo.io/?p=83330";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"link";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:80:"https://dothewoo.io/coding-practices-php-nomad-and-chatgpt-with-alex-standiford/";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:11:"description";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:126:"In a geeky conversation, Alex Standiford discusses remote work, WordPress development, the potential of PHP Nomad and ChatGPT.";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:7:"pubDate";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:31:"Thu, 02 May 2024 10:42:00 +0000";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}s:32:"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/";a:1:{s:7:"creator";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:5:"BobWP";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}}}i:43;a:6:{s:4:"data";s:13:"
	
	
	
	
	
	
";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";s:5:"child";a:2:{s:0:"";a:5:{s:5:"title";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:94:"WPTavern: #118 – Nahuai Badiola on Digital Sustainability Across the Whole WordPress Project";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"guid";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:48:"https://wptavern.com/?post_type=podcast&p=155606";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"link";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:108:"https://wptavern.com/podcast/118-nahuai-badiola-on-digital-sustainability-across-the-whole-wordpress-project";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:11:"description";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:43513:"Transcript<div>
<p>[00:00:00] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Welcome to the Jukebox podcast from WP Tavern. My name is Nathan Wrigley. Jukebox is a podcast, which is dedicated to all things WordPress. The people, the events, the plugins, the blocks, the themes, and in this case, sustainability across the whole WordPress project.</p>



<p>If you&#8217;d like to subscribe to the podcast, you can do that by searching for WP Tavern in your podcast player of choice, or by going to wptavern.com/feed/podcast. And you can copy that URL into most podcast players.</p>



<p>If you have a topic that you&#8217;d like us to feature on the podcast, I&#8217;m keen to hear from you, and hopefully get you, or your idea, featured on the show. Head to wptavern.com/contact/jukebox and use the form there.</p>



<p>So on the podcast today we have Nahuai Badiola Nahuai is a freelance WordPress developer, theme and plugin creator. He also writes WordPress code tutorials, and enjoys sharing everything he learns about web sustainability in his blog, podcast, and at WordPress events.</p>



<p>Nahuai&#8217;s life took an unexpected turn one day when he attended a 10 minute lightning talk at a WordCamp. The content of that talk was web sustainability, and it profoundly changed his perspective on how we should view our use of the internet. Nahuai has since been a vocal advocate for sustainability within the WordPress community.</p>



<p>Nahuai extensively researched website sustainability, and came across The Green Web Foundation, exploring the broader dimensions of sustainability beyond just environmental impacts. This passion not only led to the creation of the podcast series, SustainWP, which aims to elevate the discourse on digital sustainability, but also to exploring practical ways WordPress can contribute positively to our planet.</p>



<p>Today, Nahuai and I discuss the nuances of the environmental impact of web development with a particular focus on WordPress. We discuss ideas like reducing code in plugins, and highlight the performance team&#8217;s effort to make WordPress more green.</p>



<p>The broader scope of sustainability, including economic and social pillars, is also on our agenda, underlining initiatives like sustainable contributor channels, and the intriguing potential of a plugin that helps reveal the environmental footprint of websites.</p>



<p>If you&#8217;re curious about sustainability within WordPress web development, and the community more broadly, this episode is for you.</p>



<p>If you&#8217;re interested in finding out more, you can find all of the links in the show notes by heading to wptavern.com/podcast, where you&#8217;ll find all the other episodes as well.</p>



<p>And so without further delay, I bring you Nahuai Badiola.</p>



<p>I am joined on the podcast By Nahuai Badiola. Hello Nahuai.</p>



<p>[00:03:24] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Hello Nathan, and nice to be here. Thanks for inviting me.</p>



<p>[00:03:28] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> You&#8217;re very, very welcome. I&#8217;m really happy to have you on today. We&#8217;re going to be talking a little bit about sustainability. I will let Nahuai explain what all of that means, in terms of your digital footprint, especially for your websites.</p>



<p>Before we do that Nahuai, would you just spend a few moments telling us your biography, maybe your WordPress origin story, something along those lines, just so that we know a little bit about you.</p>



<p>[00:03:51] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Good. Good. Yeah, I will do my best to, summarize it. So I will go to 2014. Okay, that was the first time I was starting building websites with WordPress. And back then I was still a neuroscientist, so I was following the researcher path. So I was doing my third postdoc in Italy, and I really enjoyed the research part.</p>



<p>I still do, I love researching things, but the researcher lifestyle, not that much. So at the end it&#8217;s a lot of time going to a workplace, and when you are a boss, or you are a researcher, you do a lot of paperwork, but a lot. And it was like, it doesn&#8217;t sound like the plan I want to do when I&#8217;m 40 or whatever when I arrive to that point.</p>



<p>So I started looking for options, as you can guess, after 15 years of, let&#8217;s say a specialization on neuroscience, it was like, what can I do? I always be very inclined to technology and the online stuff, so I always enjoyed that part, and I was lucky enough to find WordPress pretty early on.</p>



<p>Let&#8217;s say when I was saying, okay, maybe, I want to do something online. Maybe I want to become a freelance to have more freedom. You can laugh here if you want to because we know it&#8217;s not that easy. But I can say that I live much better right now than when I was a researcher, so it didn&#8217;t went that bad.</p>



<p>So in that moment, I started using it as a user, just building websites for me. The typical travel blog for my wife and these kind of things. I was enjoying this, that part. I was also enjoying tinkering with code. So I was enjoying modifying themes or creating small snippets, these kind of things. And the really nice thing about WordPress is that you have a ton of content online. So that&#8217;s really nice.</p>



<p>So another good thing is that there are cool podcasts about WordPress like this one. So I started to listen to them in English, but also in Spanish. And when I went back to Spain, where I&#8217;m from, if you didn&#8217;t notice my accent by now. I started going to meetups because I already heard about the community, Spanish community.</p>



<p>Indeed, it&#8217;s a quite active, and vibrant community. So I start going. Then I start giving some talks and then going to WordCamps, some talks in WordCamps. And then I was already falling in love with WordPress community, so I also started organizing the meetup in my hometown, not hometown, but where I live now, Terrassa, near to Barcelona.</p>



<p>So I was really into the community. I was really enjoying. I was pretty much going well business wise, let&#8217;s say. And there was a moment in, this is already 2019, so we move forward five years, I went to WordCamp Pontevedra, and there was a lightning talk, talking about the impact of internet in CO2 emissions.</p>



<p>So it was like, wait, what? And the idea is pretty straightforward. So we know that the internet is this cloud, this thing that we think is ethereal, and it&#8217;s run by rainbows and cats and, but it&#8217;s not, it&#8217;s really run by coal mainly. So the idea is, internet are servers. Those servers need energy. And that energy is mainly still coming from fossil fuels. So that&#8217;s that.</p>



<p>So everything you can do to reduce that footprint, it&#8217;s more than welcome. And in that moment, it was like, this was a quite obvious thing to think, but I didn&#8217;t think about it until I went to this talk. So that&#8217;s one of the realizations of the importance of going to this kind of events.</p>



<p>And sometimes you just stumble upon a talk that you say, okay. Indeed, since then I&#8217;ve been researching digital sustainability. I&#8217;ve been also talking about it, and for not making this journey too long, I will just move to the part when I met Hannah Smith, probably in another WordCamp, WordCamp Europe, Berlin, also the same year.</p>



<p>I know that I knew that she was already doing some research in digital sustainability. She was one of the, I don&#8217;t want to call it leader, but people that is sharing about it, and is good doing it. So I start talking with her. I just approach her and say, do you feel it&#8217;s okay if we talk online, of course, every month or every two weeks? And she was, let&#8217;s do this.</p>



<p>So, in that moment, that relationship went on. We talk mainly about digital sustainability. We really feel really close to our heart, that part. And thanks to that probably, I learn about the Green Web Foundation. This is a nonprofit, that is, they do a really cool things.</p>



<p>You probably, if you heard it, you probably heard it because they have a directory of green hosting. So hostings that are using clean energy, let&#8217;s say. But they do much more things. One of the things they do is they have a fellowship. And that was when Hannah was part of the first cohort of the fellowship, and she did a really cool workshop. It&#8217;s called Doing the Donut. I will leave you the link so you can share it, but I don&#8217;t want to spend too much time here.</p>



<p>Just to say it was a brilliant workshop, interactive workshop I attended as a attendant. And the idea was to put into perspective the impact of digital. Things we do as business, as consumers, in the environmental, and the sociological, and the economic.</p>



<p>So that was one of the first approach of, okay, sustainability is maybe not only the environmental part, but there is also a social and economic part. So that was another aha moment, let&#8217;s say.</p>



<p>[00:10:06] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> I think getting into the social and the economic part would interesting in a moment. But just for now, so 2014, the beginnings of this, but really the whole of your future really pivoted around a 10 minute lightning talk. You can imagine a scenario in which you just decided, I won&#8217;t go that.</p>



<p>[00:10:26] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Skip it.</p>



<p>[00:10:27] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, somebody said, let&#8217;s go get a coffee, and your life would be profoundly different. I often have conversations with people who turn up to a WordPress event, and they&#8217;re not really sure what it is that&#8217;s going to catch their attention. But there&#8217;s always something, whether it&#8217;s volunteering or the code or whatever it may be.</p>



<p>But fascinating, just really interesting that 10 minute lightning talk led to such a profound change in your life. And the Green Web Foundation, and the fellowships, and all of that bound into it as well.</p>



<p>So, okay, for those people who are listening, it may be that you have never connected the word sustainable, or sustainability, with the environment. So that&#8217;s I think one of the things that we want to drive home. Every time you hear that word in the WordPress landscape from now on, you are thinking about the environmental impact. But more broadly as well as we&#8217;ll get onto the social, and the economic impact.</p>



<p>Now you&#8217;ve taken this to a really interesting new level as well because you like recording the audio and putting a podcast out. So I want to draw attention to everybody. Maybe if you are anywhere near a computer, just hit pause and go and search for SustainWP. It&#8217;s a podcast series, and I&#8217;m really, I&#8217;m just going to hand it over to you. What was the point of that podcast series?</p>



<p>[00:11:42] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> So linking to what I was saying about Hannah&#8217;s workshop. It was a brilliant way of putting together things that I didn&#8217;t thought about it before. So I really liked the philosophy of trying to be more aware in our space. So I say, okay, this is frame in detail, digital sustainability as a whole.</p>



<p>I wanted to move it to WordPress. Let&#8217;s say we do a workshop about it. The workshop thing didn&#8217;t went far, so I moved to the podcast format, and the idea was indeed the sustainability piece, a limited podcast series. So it&#8217;s nine episodes, and the idea is to see the different parts in monographic episodes, let&#8217;s say.</p>



<p>The first one is like an introduction of what are you going to find there. But then I move forward and explain what are the three pillars of sustainability, as you say, the environmental, the economical, and the social. But I don&#8217;t do it alone, because that would be not that much interesting. But I invited too, 13 guests. Brilliant people from WordPress community, and also from the digital sustainability, let&#8217;s call them again, leaders or thought leaders.</p>



<p>So at the end, you can hear pretty much the ideas of every one of them in the different topics. So you are not going to listen to a whole interview, but I will extract snippets of audio, give it context, and put it and wrap it in every episode. That&#8217;s a lot of work, by the way.</p>



<p>So thanks again to the Green Web Foundation, because I was able to do it thanks to the Green Web Foundation Fellowship that I was awarded in the second cohort. So that&#8217;s why I could do this more refined format, let&#8217;s say. Just to explain that is a different format.</p>



<p>[00:13:30] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Just to interrupt there, I think podcasting, it really hadn&#8217;t occurred to me that podcasting as a distribution medium is actually fairly sustainable. Video, it consumes a lot of resources. If you begin playing that then there&#8217;s megabytes and megabytes of data flowing around.</p>



<p>[00:13:46] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Yeah, the website is quite low carbon. Also, another cool thing about podcasting, feed, it&#8217;s a feed. That&#8217;s a really nice thing in sustainability. The social part is also like, it&#8217;s accessible to everyone. You have to be married to any platform. You can listen in the web, in your podcatcher. That&#8217;s another really cool thing about podcasting.</p>



<p>At the end is, we talk about the three pillars in sustainability and how they understand them. So I think that it was really interesting for me. I hope more people find it interesting. And then we took these three lenses and talk about how we can improve WordPress, in an events level, because we meet quite a lot, and we like to meet. It&#8217;s brilliant we meet. I already explained that I have a lot of good things from those meetings. But maybe we can meet in a more sustainable way.</p>



<p>And the other part is about the CMS, how we can do the CMS, let&#8217;s say more sustainable. This part is, the environmental part is very important because WordPress is installed in millions of installations. So everything that we can improve performance wise. And here, I want to give a great kudos to the Performance Team, because they are doing brilliant work here. A lot of cool improvements are coming to WordPress. Lazy load, all the assets that are loaded, only if the block is there. Brilliant stuff.</p>



<p>And the formats, also the WebP. Brilliant stuff. But also we have, since it&#8217;s an open source project, we also have the longevity part there. Because, this is run by people that is put in there voluntarily, or maybe sponsored by some companies. But that part is also really important. How we can keep this project ongoing for a lot of years, because I think that it can. So, we also tackle those topics, and that&#8217;s the part that is more socioeconomic. We talk about Five for the Future project and other stuff. And I think there were a lot of interesting ideas and discussions about it.</p>



<p>[00:15:56] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Can I just ask a quick question? Well, one question and then one observation. The first one is, you mentioned a few times the three pillars. Just to cement into everybody&#8217;s heads, would I be right in saying that&#8217;s environment, social, and economic? Are they the pillars? Okay. So just wanted spell that one out.</p>



<p>The second thing, which is an observation, is, yeah, it really hadn&#8217;t occurred to me quite so profoundly until you just said it, that if you can modify the CMS, which powers 43% of the web, in one stroke, you are doing so much good. If you can cut out, I don&#8217;t know, 10 kilobytes, or a hundred kilobytes, or a megabyte from every single WordPress website, millions and millions of times over, you&#8217;re doing profoundly good work, by doing one thing. And that really hadn&#8217;t hit home for reasons I can&#8217;t explain, but okay, that&#8217;s really amazing.</p>



<p>[00:16:51] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> I want to mention one example. That one was eyeopening for me, let&#8217;s say. It was when Danny van Kooten share the impact it has to remove, I think it was 20 kilobytes of JavaScript from one of his plugins. I think it was MailChimp for WooCommerce. And since that plugin was I installed in, I think, 2 million WordPress or something like that, it was tons of CO2 he was reducing. Just because of those 20 kilobytes.</p>



<p>[00:17:25] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So 20 kilobytes from his plugin, which by the sounds of it, has an enormous user base. 20 kilobytes spread across those 2 million websites, and I guess he&#8217;s doing some analysis of how many times his plugin is loaded and all of that, tons.</p>



<p>[00:17:40] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Yeah, tons. I don&#8217;t remember. And I think he also put it in car travel or something like that. It was like a lot of car travel, or a lot of kilometers done in car, and it was like, this is huge. So that was a popular plugin. Imagine what can be done in Core that can have potentially even more impact. And indeed, I think they are already doing it somehow in Performance Team. So, yeah.</p>



<p>[00:18:06] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> It&#8217;s interesting that the Performance Team, let me just rewind a bit. So the WordPress Performance Team has been going for, let&#8217;s go for about two years, something like that.</p>



<p>[00:18:13] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Two or three, I think, yep.</p>



<p>[00:18:15] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Nahuai&#8217;s holding up three fingers.</p>



<p>[00:18:17] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Yeah. because they started as part of Core, but now are established, so that&#8217;s why maybe we have two dates, but yeah.</p>



<p>[00:18:25] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Okay, so three years and in that time, the messaging that seems to come out of that team, not from the team, but the interpretation I often have in my head is how much quicker it&#8217;s making WordPress. Because you always think of performance, oh, it&#8217;s going faster. And of course that&#8217;s true, and that&#8217;s great, but an intended consequence I guess, is this environmental, sustainable side of the performance.</p>



<p>And again, I hadn&#8217;t really joined the dots there. And if you are saying that 20 kilobytes, from a 2 million install plugin means tons of CO2. If we take megabytes out of the core of WordPress, that must be hundreds and hundreds of tons of CO2. I have no intuition as to what that number would be, but I&#8217;m guessing it would orders of magnitude more. Again, just another profound realization.</p>



<p>[00:19:21] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> So, this team was already ongoing for let&#8217;s say two, three years, and they are doing brilliant stuff. Again, I can&#8217;t praise enough for their work. But, in parallel to this SustainWP project I was doing, and putting the dots together and seeing the sustainability not only as an environmental part, but also economic and social part. In parallel, we were creating a first sustainability initiative inside WordPress. And the last year in WordCamp Europe in Athens, we became an official team, after doing a lot of, all the steps that are needed to be a, an official team.</p>



<p>I don&#8217;t want to spend too much time on the process because I don&#8217;t want to take too much time. I want to tackle so many things. So I will encourage you if you&#8217;re interested on understanding better how the team was created. We have a dedicated episode in SustainWP, is the number seven. And there you can see how the evolution went.</p>



<p>[00:20:21] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> I&#8217;m just to interrupt there and tell the listener the URL, because many people listening to this and won&#8217;t be desk or anything, so let&#8217;s put it in your head. It&#8217;s sustainwp.com. No hyphens or anything. Just sustainwp.com. And then if you go down to episode seven, it&#8217;s called WordPress Sustainability Team.</p>



<p>So you can short circuit by listening to that episode. It seems to run to just under an hour. Sorry, carry on.</p>



<p>[00:20:45] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> No, no, that was nice. Yeah, that&#8217;s, we have to remember this is audio and it&#8217;s always good to do this kind of stuff and say, hey, remember. So you will have it also in the show notes, but if you are interested.</p>



<p>So at the end we&#8217;ve been doing, first in the initiative and now as an official team. We&#8217;ve been meeting in Slack every week, and we&#8217;ve been talking about how we can do the project more sustainable in all the areas. And one of the two projects that we have right now ongoing, and I will mention briefly in case you want to join us, because we are open to always to have new contributors.</p>



<p>One of them is the handbook that is aiming to create a more sustainable events. So as I say, we meet a lot, in meetups, WordCamps, and especially in the flagship WordCamps. A lot of stuff is moving around. So the idea is since the organizers we have to remember are volunteers, so they are not professional people that are usually creating these kind of events.</p>



<p>They do what they can with the time they have. So the main idea is to put together a lot of ideas that could improve the sustainability of the event in a list. So they can go there and say, okay, I would like to do a bit more sustainable event. What can I do? Can I reduce the swag? That could be an option.</p>



<p>Leaving the option to the user in the registration if they want to have a T-shirt, if they want to have a lanyard even, because I have already enough lanyards. So this kind of small things that maybe if we start to standardize it. Maybe we don&#8217;t need to create so much swag for the welcome pack, let&#8217;s say.</p>



<p>Then we also have some ideas from sponsors. Indeed, some of the sponsors came to WordCamp Europe contributor day and they were willing to understand how they can do a bit better in that way. So some of them are already trying to do better.</p>



<p>Another big part could be promoting the traveling. So traveling by train when it&#8217;s possible. And indeed in this years WordCamp Europe, in Torino, there is a dedicated page where there is information about the trains you can take if you are in Europe.</p>



<p>So just putting easier to organizers to serve those resources. And then make it easier to the people that is attending to have maybe a more sustainable habits when they are going.</p>



<p>[00:23:18] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> I guess many of us have been to WordPress events, and obviously a lot of people have spent time organizing it. But like you say, it&#8217;s run by volunteers and it may well be that you just don&#8217;t have the ideas that would be contained in the handbook.</p>



<p>So we&#8217;ll link to the handbook as well, so go through that list and maybe some of those, if you&#8217;re a Meetup organizer, or if you&#8217;re a Word camp organizer, some of those things you could tick off. That&#8217;s, yeah, that&#8217;s really interesting.</p>



<p>[00:23:44] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> That&#8217;s still a draft, but yeah, we will like to have it in a more definitive format by the WordCamp Europe this year in Torino. So hopefully we have it.</p>



<p>[00:23:52] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> One other quick thing, you mentioned contributor day. If you don&#8217;t know what that is, the contributor day is often attached to the beginning or the end of a WordPress event. And the idea is that you show up and you put yourself onto a table, and that table has a theme, and you work on that thing for the duration of that day.</p>



<p>So it may be photography, it may be core, it may be marketing. So is there a sustainable or a sustainability table? Is that often the case now? If you were to go to one of the WordCamps, maybe one of the larger ones, is that a part of the agenda to get a sustainability table?</p>



<p>[00:24:25] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Yeah, indeed. Last year we had the first one in Europe, let&#8217;s say in the first one in a flagship WordCamp. Because we already did in Barcelona and Pontevedra. This year is going to be also a contributor day with sustainability table in Torino. The idea is to be one of the tables that is usually set up for that.</p>



<p>Of course, we need someone that is coming to the meeting somehow, and they know more or less what are we working on? But yeah, yeah. The idea is to spread and have it as one of the, since we are already an official team, if in a WordCamp there is someone that is working in something that we are doing in a sustainability team, they are welcome to host the sustainability table.</p>



<p>[00:25:06] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So call to action, dear listener. If are heading to a WordCamp event, particularly Torina, in the year 2024, WordCamp Europe, and you&#8217;re not sure where to put yourself for the contributor day, now you&#8217;ve got an option.</p>



<p>[00:25:19] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Indeed.</p>



<p>[00:25:20] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> We&#8217;ll, provide links in the show notes, but maybe we&#8217;ll get some contact details for Nahuai as well, anyway. Brilliant, carry on.</p>



<p>[00:25:26] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Yeah, so we can link it with this. If the event handbook doesn&#8217;t sound appealing enough to come to the contributor day, or to come to the Slack meeting, we are also doing, creating a plugin that aims to surface some information about the impact, environmental impact. Of the website, probably in the WP admin, or site health, or we have to think where to put it.</p>



<p>But at the end, the idea would be, the initial idea was to use some of the APIs that are there to surface how much CO2 is emitting your website, okay. Giving you some context. You are in the 10% dirtiest websites. Or, you are in the 15% more cleaner. So something like that. And also some resources to understand better what that means, because maybe that&#8217;s a new information for you, like it was for me in 2019.</p>



<p>And the idea is to raise awareness. So the people that are using WordPress, they see that and if they are intrigued and they want to know more about it, they can understand better. And the following idea would be they take actions to improve that, okay. But that would be the next step.</p>



<p>[00:26:40] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So the plugin not only will surface where you stand in the panoply of websites, you know you&#8217;re in the top 10% in terms of sustainability, or you&#8217;re in the bottom 10%. But also in the future you&#8217;ll be providing guidance, things that you can do to mitigate the things that we have flagged. Okay, that&#8217;s fascinating.</p>



<p>[00:26:58] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> That will probably be another plugin because, and I will explain why we want to keep really simple, the one that is surfacing information about the environmental impact. Indeed, we are now thinking that maybe using CO2, calculating the CO2, it requires to do calls to a third party API, that we don&#8217;t want to do it, or include the library. And we don&#8217;t want to do it because the aim is to build a feature plugin that can go inside core.</p>



<p>So it has to be really lean, and clean, and comply with everything that is needed to be in core.</p>



<p>[00:27:38] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Including this into core. Sorry, I&#8217;m interrupting alot.</p>



<p>[00:27:41] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Yeah. no, that&#8217;s so nice because you&#8217;re excited with it. So I think this would be huge if we manage to do it. And we are taking steps slowly because of this. Because the aim is to be in core.</p>



<p>If we manage to put some context there, maybe, I don&#8217;t know if CO2, but maybe it&#8217;s performance metric, and creating some kind of rating that also you can understand. So from A to F or whatever we decide. So the user can see a red F or a green A, and they say what that&#8217;s mean. And probably we have to put some links to understand better the context.</p>



<p>But having that in core, I think it&#8217;s a brilliant way of raising awareness about it.</p>



<p>[00:28:26] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah. One of the things that&#8217;s coming into my mind is that, obviously if you&#8217;re a WordPress professional, if you&#8217;re a web developer, I imagine you&#8217;ve scratched the surface on this topic a little bit. You&#8217;ve probably had at least some thought that, boy, we produce a lot of carbon with this industry.</p>



<p>But the people who are managing the websites, the people who are in effect, the clients who have had the website built for them, who don&#8217;t really have the technical expertise, maybe they are content creators, or writers, or journalists or whatever it may be. It&#8217;s an interesting thing to present them with as well to surface in their mind, boy, my website, yes, of course. It&#8217;s running on a computer and it&#8217;s producing carbon.</p>



<p>I think that&#8217;s also quite interesting, because the audience for that is much bigger than the developer audience. And so reaching out to those people and just injecting that thought. Okay, your website has an impact. That&#8217;s really profound as well.</p>



<p>[00:29:18] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Yeah. And as it was for me, the environmental part and the CO2 part, in SustainWP we talk about the carbon tunnel vision that we usually have in sustainability. That means that in a lot of places we equate CO2 to sustainability. And that&#8217;s just one part, but is one of the parts that is easier to understand.</p>



<p>We play so much with it. And I usually refer it as a Trojan horse. So you start talking about CO2, and the impact in the environmental part, and you gather some interest, and maybe you are, if you are good enough, you can learn them to understand that sustainability is not only environmental, and there are more things.</p>



<p>And talking about this, one of the things that the team would like to improve is what I was mentioning before about the longevity of the project. Right now there are a lot of contributors, some of them are sponsored, which is brilliant, but others are not. The ones that are not sponsored, sometimes it&#8217;s okay for them because they are putting, let&#8217;s say two hours a week, and they are fine because they have all their stuff. But there is people putting more time than that, and probably it&#8217;s not sustainable in time.</p>



<p>So, one of the aims, and one thing that was already talking in the Community Summit last summer, was to create what I call for a lack of a better term, like a portal where we can put the contributors that are doing active stuff on the project, and are not sponsored, of course. And companies that are open to sponsor people that are contributing to the project.</p>



<p>[00:31:05] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> You are acting a bit like a go-between to connect people who perhaps don&#8217;t have the expertise to get involved with this, but they have the finance. They have the capacity to put somebody in that chair, and they can pay them for their time and make that worthwhile. Okay. That&#8217;s interesting.</p>



<p>[00:31:22] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Yeah, so here probably one of the things that as a first idea or product that can go there. It would not contain the financial part, because that&#8217;s really tricky. It would be maybe just a way to contact. It&#8217;s a portal where you can connect.</p>



<p>[00:31:39] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah. You are making the introductions. Right, I get it.</p>



<p>[00:31:41] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> And then they go wherever they want. They need to go to do the financial part. Because the financial part is quite tricky. And indeed there is already something put in place that is called WordPress collective community.</p>



<p>[00:31:56] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, the WPCC. Yeah, I&#8217;ll link to that.</p>



<p>[00:31:59] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Exactly. And that&#8217;s an initiative that it&#8217;s ongoing. I think at least they already managed to sponsor, I think a couple of people. Basically you can put some money there as individual, but also any company can put some money there to sponsor people that is contributing.</p>



<p>But in this portal idea thing would be to have like a, a directory of people that is doing active things. And for that, maybe it&#8217;s going to be helpful, the metric dashboard, project that is starting. Meaning that probably the companies that want to put some money in someone, they want to see a specifics.</p>



<p>So this person is doing, let&#8217;s say, five hours in community team, and is doing this specific task. So they know that they are putting the money there. Or let&#8217;s say in plugins, review or in theme review, or whatever, team it is.</p>



<p>So I think there is a lot of potential there. I think the people in Five for the Future, are willing to improve some of the system that is there. Because right now, Five for the Future is a brilliant project, but I have the feeling that it&#8217;s mainly big companies sponsoring full-time to contributors, which is brilliant. And that&#8217;s why the pace of WordPress evolution is that fast. Because Automattic and other big companies are putting a lot of people working on there.</p>



<p>But there is, from my point of view, a lack of freelance that are putting time to the project. And they are not able to gain any sponsor, because maybe it&#8217;s tricky. It&#8217;s more tricky to sponsor part-time, someone, instead of having an employee just donated to. So I think we can improve some things there.</p>



<p>So I&#8217;m just talking about the idea, because I know there is interest in a lot of sense, and we just need to find the way of moving it forward. But I think it would be really beneficial if we can close that gap between contributors that are already doing things, and companies that are, they are understand they have to do something, give something back, or they want to have some cool people related with their brands, let&#8217;s say.</p>



<p>[00:34:14] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> What&#8217;s fascinating here is, there&#8217;s obviously the code side of things. Reducing the impact of the footprint that WordPress creates. But it also appears from everything that you&#8217;ve just said, that if code is not your thing, the sustainability team, they need your help in all sorts of other ways. Like trying to figure out how to marry up sponsors with contributors, freelancers with sponsors, and so on and so forth, how to actually shape that team.</p>



<p>So it&#8217;s very meta that, isn&#8217;t it? You want people on the team to help you figure out what the team will be doing.</p>



<p>Okay, that&#8217;s perfect. So my guess is that you are, you have your doors wide open. You are hoping that people will listen to this and will come knock on your door, find it wide open, step inside. So where do we go? Where&#8217;s the best place, best place or places to find out more about the sustainability initiatives in WordPress?</p>



<p>[00:35:04] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Yeah, I think probably it&#8217;s coming to the weekly meetings. Probably we are going to move it to every two weeks, so we can have time to do more stuff between the meetings. We will leave the link of the Slack channel. It&#8217;s easy, we are the sustainability channel. So I think you can come and you can join some of the ideas that are going. You can drop your idea if you are willing to move it forward.</p>



<p>So one of the posts I wrote in the Green Web Foundation Fellowship, during the fellowship, it was sustainability as an umbrella term, because I really think, and during this journey, I saw it even more clear, that sustainability has a lot of things that are, they can be under it. So that&#8217;s one of the benefits of having this team, and we can collaborate with performance. Indeed for the plugin that we were talking before, probably it makes sense, a lot of sense to collaborate with them.</p>



<p>But there is also parts of inclusivity and making the events, not only more sustainable in a environmental way, but also inclusive. And that&#8217;s why we also want to have a close relationship with the DEIB working group. I think you already talk with Birgit, right?</p>



<p>So there are a lot of things that maybe we don&#8217;t have to do everything under our team, but I feel we really need to collaborate well, or have good relationship with other working groups or with other teams. And yeah, it&#8217;s a really cool place to come, and drop your idea or join forces with the things that we are already doing.</p>



<p>[00:36:42] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> As with every episode, everything that Nahuai has mentioned, I will try to track it down, or probably Nahuai&#8217;s going to drop the links into our shared show notes. But everything that we&#8217;ve mentioned, I will endeavor to get on the WP Tavern website. So if you go to wptavern.com/podcast, search for this episode, and you&#8217;ll be able to see the show notes there.</p>



<p>It&#8217;s the topic of our time this, isn&#8217;t it really. There are a few things which matter, and then there are some things which matter a lot, and this really does feel like it goes into the, this matters a lot, category. If somebody wanted to reach out to you just to bat some ideas around with you personally, that might be a good way in. Where can we get in touch with you personally?</p>



<p>[00:37:27] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Yeah, probably all the workers related stuff, Slack is a good place. If you are not there, you will probably join earlier or later. But if you don&#8217;t want to start there, you can find me also in Mastodon. I&#8217;m on Twitter, not very active, but I still have the account. And my website, and my mail. My mail is where I manage everything, so you can also find it. Even if it&#8217;s, if the website is in Spanish, you can go to contact and just write me something and, no problem. And yeah, I think that&#8217;s pretty much it.</p>



<p>I feel like, as I say, sustainability is so many things and we had limited time. I think we are doing good job putting everything together. If you really want to hear really cool ideas and some debates about it, we already did the plaque of SustainWP, but I really think that they were brilliant, the, guests. And if you&#8217;re interested in the topic, I think you can enjoy that podcast.</p>



<p>[00:38:24] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Perfect. There&#8217;s nine episodes over there. It just remains for me to say a great big thank you. It&#8217;s amazing to hear somebody that&#8217;s quite so passionate about this subject.</p>



<p>Hopefully you&#8217;ll have driven some engagement in your direction. Nahuai thank you so much for chatting to me on the podcast today. I really appreciate it.</p>



<p>[00:38:40] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Thank you Nathan, and let&#8217;s hope somebody is the tipping point where they discovered this link as that talk in Ponte Vedra was for me, and they just start being interested in the topic. Thanks a lot Nathan.</p>



<p>[00:38:53] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> I have my fingers and my toes all crossed. Thanks so much.</p>



<p>[00:38:56] <strong>Nahuai Badiola:</strong> Bye bye.</p>
</div>



<p>On the podcast today we have <a href="https://nbadiola.com/">Nahuai Badiola</a>.</p>



<p>Nahuai is a freelance WordPress developer, theme, and plugin creator. He also writes WordPress code tutorials and enjoys sharing everything he learns about web sustainability in his blog, podcast, and at WordPress events.</p>



<p>Nahuai’s life took an unexpected turn one day when he attended a 10-minute lightning talk at a WordCamp. The content of that talk was web sustainability and it profoundly changed his perspective on how we should view our use of the internet. Nahuai has since been a vocal advocate for sustainability within the WordPress community.</p>



<p>Nahuai extensively researched website sustainability and came across the Green Web Foundation, exploring the broader dimensions of sustainability beyond just environmental impacts. This passion not only led to the creation of the podcast series SustainWP, which aims to elevate the discourse on digital sustainability, but also to exploring practical ways WordPress can contribute positively to our planet.</p>



<p>Today, Nahuai and I discuss the nuances of the environmental impact of web development with a particular focus on WordPress. We discuss ideas like reducing code in plugins, and highlight the Performance Team&#8217;s efforts to make WordPress more green.</p>



<p>The broader scope of sustainability, including economic and social pillars, is also on our agenda, underlining initiatives like sustainable contributor channels and the intriguing potential of a plugin that helps reveal the environmental footprint of websites.</p>



<p>If you&#8217;re curious about sustainability within WordPress web development, and the community more broadly, this episode is for you.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Useful links</h2>



<p><a href="https://pontevedra.wordcamp.org/2024/">WordCamp Pontevedra</a></p>



<p><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2019/speaker/hannah-smith/">Hannah Smith&#8217;s presentation at WordCamp Europe 2019</a></p>



<p><a href="https://www.thegreenwebfoundation.org/">The Green Web Foundation</a></p>



<p><a href="https://www.thegreenwebfoundation.org/fellowships/">The Green Web Foundation Fellowships</a></p>



<p><a href="https://sustainwp.com/">SustainWP Podcast</a></p>



<p><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/performance/handbook/about-the-team/">WordPress Performance Team</a></p>



<p><a href="https://wordpress.org/five-for-the-future/">Five for the Future</a></p>



<p><a href="https://www.dannyvankooten.com/blog/2020/website-carbon-emissions/">CO2 emissions on the web</a> by Danny van Kooten</p>



<p><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/sustainability/handbook/">WordPress Sustainability Team Handbook</a></p>



<p><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/summit/">WordPress Community Summit</a></p>



<p><a href="https://www.thewpcommunitycollective.com/">WordPress Community Collective</a></p>



<p><a href="https://wordpress.slack.com/archives/sustainability/">Sustainability Slack Channel</a></p>



<p><a href="https://w3c.github.io/sustyweb/">Web Sustainability Guidelines (WSG) 1.0</a></p>



<p><a href="https://doingthedoughnut.tec">Doing the Doughnut Tech website</a></p>



<p><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1uYaGP876SpQ_GLTJRFuI2YFbSh7M9Ku6MizDhHpabgs/edit#heading=h.nllhqa6j8gqd">Sustainability Team Events Handbook</a> (Google Doc)</p>



<p><a href="https://nbadiola.com/">Nahuai&#8217;s website</a></p>



<p><a href="https://mastodon.social/@nahuai">Nahuai on Mastodon</a></p>



<p><a href="https://twitter.com/nahuaibadiola">Nahuai on X</a></p>";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:7:"pubDate";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:31:"Wed, 01 May 2024 14:00:00 +0000";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}s:32:"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/";a:1:{s:7:"creator";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:14:"Nathan Wrigley";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}}}i:44;a:6:{s:4:"data";s:13:"
	
	
	
	
	
	
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";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";s:5:"child";a:2:{s:0:"";a:5:{s:5:"title";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:57:"HeroPress: Paving my way in WordPress through Communities";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"guid";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:56:"https://heropress.com/?post_type=heropress-essays&p=6748";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"link";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:166:"https://heropress.com/essays/paving-my-way-in-wordpress-through-communities/#utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=paving-my-way-in-wordpress-through-communities";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:11:"description";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:11481:"<img width="1024" height="512" src="https://heropress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/043024-rtl-min.jpg" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="Pull Quote: I started an online meetup for Arabic speakers across the world." />
Here is Nada reading her own story aloud





<p class="has-text-align-right"><a href="https://heropress.com/feed/#arabic">هذا المقال متاح باللغة العربية</a></p>



<p>In an unexpected twist, my life has led me on a path where I ended up working with WordPress almost every single day of my life…</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-the-beginning">The Beginning…</h2>



<p>My story begins in Istanbul in 2016, I haven’t heard of WordPress then except in one encounter with a friend who used to be a renowned journalist and quit his job, learnt how to use WordPress, and became a full-time freelancer building and maintaining WordPress sites.&nbsp;</p>



<p>I graduated from the Faculty of Economics and Political Science and has worked most of my career then in PR and digital marketing roles where I had no contact or knowledge of WordPress. When I moved to Istanbul I interviewed and got a job at an advertising agency and part of my job requirement was to create an editorial calendar, write and optimize blogs for GoDaddy.&nbsp;</p>



<p>This was my first time to run an editorial calendar myself, I enjoy creative writing and had to write countless papers for university but haven’t done it professionally. I was very excited about the opportunity to learn something new. I remember very well watching hours and hours of search engine optimization videos and thinking to myself: This feels so hard, almost impossible, little did I know.</p>



<p>I spent about 3 years managing the blog as part of my work and using WordPress every day, I slowly learnt how to navigate the plugins, do SEO and even launched the Arabic blog in 2019.&nbsp;</p>



<p>I must say that I enjoyed it a lot and was especially happy when I got to see the results of the hard work that was put in to maintain the blog.&nbsp;</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-the-middle">The Middle…</h2>



<p>A few years later I moved to GoDaddy as a marketing manager and trained a team to be responsible of the blog and I moved to a different role with different responsibilities. A couple of years pass, and I move to a new team where I’m responsible for the growth of some products and WordPress was a part of it… we meet again!</p>



<p>This time I was working with WordPress with a different angle and perspective, not only as a user but looking at the marketing and community side of it, and this is when I heard about meetups and WordCamps.&nbsp;</p>



<p>My dear friend Maja Loncar was the first one to introduce me to meetups and WordCamps and explained how WordPress is more than a CMS, it’s a community. Early 2023, I was asked to be part of the GoDaddy team going to WordCamp Asia 2023, and I must admit I was anxious.&nbsp;</p>



<p>I had been to many events before that but nothing like this one, and I started prepping for my first ever contributor’s day and WordCamp in Thailand.&nbsp;</p>



<p>I remember Adam Warner’s reassuring words to me before the event which has helped me feel confident and at ease. I must say I had a wonderful time in Thailand, the community was very welcoming, and I got to meet a lot of wonderful people.&nbsp;</p>



<p>My first contribution was to the training team, and at that time I realized that there is no training material in Arabic, which made me think about meetups and WordPress communities for Arabic speakers.</p>



<p>Back in Dubai, I started looking up meetups in the Middle East, and started reaching out to the organizers in hopes to bring them back to life and help or co-organize if possible. I was met with disappointment at that time as most of these meetups weren’t active anymore (especially after COVID) and the organizers weren’t enthusiastic or were too busy. I remember speaking with Maja about this, and she said: what don’t you start one yourself? She explained to me the amount of effort that’ll need to be done and I thought about it. A few months later I started an online meetup for Arabic speakers across the world.&nbsp;</p>



<p>The meetup has been running for around a year now, and it’s been through ups and downs – this was also the title to my first talk in WordCamp Asia 2024 in Taiwan.&nbsp;</p>



<h1 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-the-story-doesn-t-end-here">The story doesn’t end here…</h1>



<p>Ever since my first WordCamp, I’ve been to 3 other WordCamps and attended several meetups and got to meet and have genuine friendships within the community and I was honored to be a speaker in WordCamp Asia 2024. My journey doesn’t end here, it’s just the beginning…</p>



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity" />



<h1 id="arabic" class="kt-adv-heading6748_0a1131-22 wp-block-kadence-advancedheading">كيف غيرت المجتمعات قصتي مع WordPress</h1>



ها هي ندى تقرأ قصتها بصوت عالٍ





<p class="kt-adv-heading6748_74de5b-0d wp-block-kadence-advancedheading"><br />في تطور غير متوقع، قادتني حياتي إلى طريق انتهى بي الأمر بالعمل مع WordPress كل يوم تقريبًا من حياتي&#8230;</p>



<p class="has-text-align-right"><br />البداية&#8230;<br />تبدأ قصتي في اسطنبول في عام 2016، ولم أسمع عن WordPress من قبل إلا من خلال لقاء أحد اصدقائي كان صحفيًا مشهورًا وترك وظيفته، وتعلم كيفية استخدام WordPress، وأصبح يعمل بدوام كامل كمستقل لبناء وصيانة مواقع WordPress.<br /><br />تخرجت من كلية الاقتصاد والعلوم السياسية وعملت معظم مسيرتي المهنية في العلاقات العامة والتسويق الرقمي حيث لم يكن لدي اتصال أو معرفة بـ WordPress. عندما انتقلت إلى اسطنبول، أجريت مقابلة وحصلت على وظيفة في وكالة إعلانات وكان جزء من متطلبات وظيفتي هو إنشاء تقويم تحريري وكتابة وتحسين المدونات لـ GoDaddy.<br />كانت هذه هي المرة الأولى التي أدير فيها تقويمًا تحريريًا بنفسي، أنا أستمتع بالكتابة الإبداعية واضطررت إلى كتابة عدد لا يحصى من الأبحاث اثناء دراستي في الجامعة، ولكني لم أفعل ذلك بشكل احترافي. كنت متحمسة جدًا لفرصة تعلم شيء جديد. أتذكر جيدًا مشاهدة ساعات وساعات من مقاطع فيديو عن تحسين محركات البحث وأفكر في نفسي: هذا شيء صعب للغاية، يكاد يكون مستحيلًا، لم أكن أعرف الكثير في هذا الوقت.<br />قضيت حوالي 3 سنوات في إدارة المدونة كجزء من عملي واستخدمت WordPress كل يوم، تعلمت ببطء ما هي الاضافات، والقيام بتحسين محركات البحث، وحتى ساعدت في إطلاق المدونة باللغة العربية في عام 2019.<br />يجب أن أقول إنني استمتعت بهذا العمل كثيرًا وكنت سعيدة بشكل خاص عندما رأيت نتائج العمل الشاق الذي تم بذله للحفاظ على المدونة.<br /><br />منتصف الحكاية&#8230;<br />بعد بضع سنوات انتقلت إلى GoDaddy كمدير تسويق ودربت فريقًا ليكون مسؤولاً عن المدونة وانتقلت إلى دور مختلف بمسؤوليات مختلفة. يمر عامان، وأنتقل إلى فريق جديد حيث أكون مسئولة عن نمو بعض المنتجات وكان WordPress جزءًا منها&#8230; ووردبريس نلتقي مرة أخرى!</p>



<p class="has-text-align-right">هذه المرة كنت أعمل مع WordPress بزاوية ومنظور مختلفين، ليس فقط كمستخدم، ولكن بالنظر إلى الجانب التسويقي والمجتمعي منه، وهذا عندما سمعت عن اللقاءات وWordCamps.<br />كانت صديقتي العزيزة مايا لوكنار أول من عرّفني على اللقاءات وWordCamps وشرحت لي كيف أن WordPress أكثر من مجرد CMS، إنه مجتمع. في أوائل عام 2023، طُلب مني أن أكون جزءًا من فريق GoDaddy الذي يذهب إلى WordCamp Asia 2023، ويجب أن أعترف أنني كنت قلقة.<br />لقد زرت العديد من الأحداث قبل ذلك، ولكن لا شيء مثل هذا الحدث، وبدأت في الاستعداد ليوم المساهم الأول على الإطلاق والWordCamp&nbsp; في تايلاند.<br />أتذكر كلمات آدم وارنر المطمئنة لي قبل الحدث والتي ساعدتني على الشعور بالثقة والراحة. يجب أن أقول إنني قضيت وقتًا رائعًا في تايلاند، وكان المجتمع مرحبًا جدًا، وقابلت الكثير من الأشخاص الرائعين.<br />كانت مساهمتي الأولى لفريق التدريب، وفي ذلك الوقت أدركت أنه لا توجد مواد تدريبية باللغة العربية، مما جعلني أفكر في اللقاءات ومجتمعات WordPress للمتحدثين باللغة العربية.<br />عندما عدت إلى دبي، بدأت في البحث عن لقاءات في الشرق الأوسط، وبدأت في التواصل مع المنظمين على أمل إعادة المجتمعات إلى الحياة والمساعدة أو المشاركة في التنظيم إن أمكن. وقوبلت بخيبة أمل في ذلك الوقت لأن معظم هذه اللقاءات لم تعد نشطة (خاصة بعد COVID) ولم يكن المنظمون متحمسين أو كانوا مشغولين للغاية. أتذكر أنني تحدثت مع مايا حول هذا الموضوع، فقالت: لما لا تبدأي به بنفسك؟ شرحت لي مقدار الجهد الذي يجب القيام به وفكرت في ذلك. بعد بضعة أشهر بدأت لقاء عبر الإنترنت للمتحدثين باللغة العربية في جميع أنحاء العالم.<br />بدأ اللقاء منذ حوالي عام، وقد مر بتقلبات &#8211; كان هذا أيضًا عنوان حديثي الأول في WordCamp Asia 2024 في تايوان.<br /><br />القصة لا تنتهي هنا&#8230;</p>



<p class="has-text-align-right">منذ أول WordCamp لي، زرت ثلاثWordCamps أخرى وحضرت العديد من اللقاءات وحصلت على صداقات حقيقية داخل المجتمع وتشرفت بأن أكون متحدثة في WordCamp Asia 2024. رحلتي لا تنتهي هنا، إنها مجرد البداية&#8230;</p>
<p>The post <a href="https://heropress.com/essays/paving-my-way-in-wordpress-through-communities/">Paving my way in WordPress through Communities</a> appeared first on <a href="https://heropress.com">HeroPress</a>.</p>";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:7:"pubDate";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:31:"Wed, 01 May 2024 04:00:00 +0000";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}s:32:"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/";a:1:{s:7:"creator";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:15:"Nada Elsharkawy";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}}}i:46;a:6:{s:4:"data";s:13:"
	
	
	
	
	
	
";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";s:5:"child";a:2:{s:0:"";a:5:{s:5:"title";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:101:"Do The Woo Community: Empowering Diversity and Inclusion in WordPress and Beyond with Shanta Nathwani";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"guid";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:28:"https://dothewoo.io/?p=83283";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"link";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:100:"https://dothewoo.io/empowering-diversity-and-inclusion-in-wordpress-and-beyond-with-shanta-nathwani/";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:11:"description";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:118:"Shanta Nathwani and Birgit chat about diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging in the WordPress and tech community.";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:7:"pubDate";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:31:"Tue, 30 Apr 2024 11:23:45 +0000";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}s:32:"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/";a:1:{s:7:"creator";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:5:"BobWP";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}}}i:47;a:6:{s:4:"data";s:13:"
	
	
	
	
	
	
";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";s:5:"child";a:2:{s:0:"";a:5:{s:5:"title";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:103:"WordPress.org blog: WP Briefing: Episode 78: Guided Growth: Cultivating Contributors Through Mentorship";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"guid";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:53:"https://wordpress.org/news/?post_type=podcast&p=17229";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"link";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:104:"https://wordpress.org/news/2024/04/episode-78-guided-growth-cultivating-contributors-through-mentorship/";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:11:"description";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:23886:"<p>Explore the transformative world of the WordPress Contributor Mentorship Program with guest host Angela Jin and special guest and sponsored contributor Hari Shanker. Whether you&#8217;re a long-time WordPress enthusiast or new to the scene, this episode is packed with insights, stories, and tips to help you engage more deeply with one of the most passionate open source communities.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Credits</h2>



<p>Guest host: <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/angelasjin/">Angela Jin</a><br />Guest speaker: <a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/harishanker/">Hari Shanker</a><br />Editor:&nbsp;<a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/dustinhartzler/">Dustin Hartzler</a><br />Logo:&nbsp;<a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/javiarce/">Javier Arce</a><br />Production:&nbsp;<a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/bjmcsherry/">Brett McSherry</a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<a href="https://profiles.wordpress.org/eidolonnight/">Nicholas Garofalo</a><br />Song: Fearless First by Kevin MacLeod</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Show Notes</h2>



<ul>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/5">Five for the Future</a></li>



<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/community/handbook/contributor-day/contributor-working-group/contributor-mentorship-program-for-wordpress/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">About the Contributor Mentorship Program</a></li>



<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/community/handbook/contributor-day/contributor-working-group/contributor-mentorship-program-for-wordpress/contributor-mentorship-program-cohorts/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Details of Mentorship Program Cohorts</a></li>



<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/community/2024/04/08/wordpress-contributor-mentorship-2024-q1-cohort-graduates/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Mentorship Program Cohort 2 Graduation Post</a> &#8211; Express interest in the next cohort by&nbsp;leaving comment or sending a message to @harishanker in the <a href="https://make.wordpress.org/chat/">Making WordPress Slack</a></li>



<li><strong>Small List of Big Things</strong>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/support/2024/04/brainstorming-a-support-team-contributor-ladder/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Brainstorming a Support Team Contributor Ladder</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://make.wordpress.org/updates/2019/06/17/observations-on-wordpress-contributor-team-structure/">Observations on WordPress Contributor Team Structure</a></li>
</ul>
</li>



<li><a href="https://wordpressfoundation.org/news/2024/kim-parsell-2024/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Apply for the Kim Parsell Memorial Scholarship for WordCamp US 2024</a></li>



<li>Upcoming WordPress events:
<ul>
<li><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/">WordCamp Europe 2024</a>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/tickets/">Tickets</a></li>
</ul>
</li>



<li>Find upcoming events in your area on <a href="https://events.wordpress.org/">events.WordPress.org</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
</li>



<li>Have a question you&#8217;d like answered? Submit them to&nbsp;<a href="mailto:wpbriefing@WordPress.org">WPBriefing@WordPress.org</a>.</li>
</ul>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Transcript</h2>



<span id="more-17229"></span>



<p>[00:00:00] <strong>Angela:</strong> 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 insights into the community that supports it, and get a small list of big things coming up in the next two weeks. I am your guest host, Angela Jin.</p>



<p>Let&#8217;s go!&nbsp;</p>



<p>[00:00:30] (Intro Music)&nbsp;</p>



<p>[00:00:40] <strong>Angela:</strong> I am delighted to be guest hosting this episode of the WordPress Briefing and to talk about the Contributor Mentorship Program, a community-driven initiative in the WordPress space that is proving to really support contributor journeys. And joining me today is special guest, Hari Shanker, Five for the Future Program Manager. Welcome, Hari!</p>



<p>[00:01:02] <strong>Hari:</strong> Thank you, Angela. Excited to be here.</p>



<p>[00:01:04] <strong>Angela:</strong> Now, before we dive into the Contributor Mentorship Program, can you first tell me a bit about yourself? I&#8217;d love to know a bit more about your role as Five for the Future Program Manager.</p>



<p>[00:01:16] <strong>Hari:</strong> Sure. So, my name is Hari Shanker. I live in India in a city called Kochi. And I&#8217;d like to share some context to explain what I do. I am a sponsored contributor working full-time on WordPress, and I have been contributing primarily to the WordPress Community Team full-time since April 2020, where I am a Community Program Manager, formerly known as a Super Deputy.</p>



<p>Since September 2022, I have been working exclusively on projects that bolster the WordPress contributor experience. A key part of this work is my role as the Program Manager for the Five for the Future program, where my day-to-day work involves supporting and empowering companies and individuals that have pledged a part of their time to contribute to WordPress.</p>



<p>[00:02:00] <strong>Hari:</strong> In parallel, I also lead the Contributor Working Group of the WordPress Community Team, which has the goal of making the contributor experience in WordPress the best it can be. Our recent focus has been on running an experimental contributor mentorship program as well. </p>



<p>[00:02:16] <strong>Angela:</strong> Excellent. Thank you. So, I was recently at Open Source Summit, and figuring out funding and commitments to projects was a very hot topic. And people were really interested in Five for the Future. And so, Hari, would you mind giving us a quick overview of what Five for the Future is, and how it aims to support the WordPress open source project?</p>



<p>[00:02:44] <strong>Hari:</strong> Absolutely. The Cofounder of WordPress, Matt Mullenweg, launched Five for the Future in 2014 as a call to action for organizations and individuals who have benefited from WordPress, either the CMS or the community, to contribute up to 5 percent of their resources to the continued success of the WordPress project.</p>



<p>[00:03:03] <strong>Hari:</strong> In 2019, this idea was formalized as a program with a pledging page that lives in the URL WordPress.org/five. Right now, this program attempts to foster generous collaboration towards the long-term health and stability of our project for the future. So, like any large and successful open source project, WordPress has a lot of big goals and tasks, not all of which can be accomplished by volunteers in that available time.</p>



<p>Here&#8217;s where sponsored contributors come in. Sponsored contributors have more time, availability, and bandwidth to make an impact on a lot of these tasks. They also work on some routine but important administrative and housekeeping tasks that are essential to keep the project running smoothly. At this time, the program has 868 contributors from 183 companies, who have pledged 7,722 hours of contribution time per week for the program. I can also share that roughly 70% of contribution activity in WordPress is coming from these sponsored contributors. That is the Five for the Future program in brief.</p>



<p>[00:04:15] <strong>Angela:</strong> Thanks, Hari. That&#8217;s incredible that so much of our contribution comes through sponsored time and clearly is very necessary to keep the WordPress open source project running. Wonderful. All right, well, I would love to dig into the Contributor Mentorship Program. Can you tell us a bit more about how this came to be? What is the Contributor Mentorship Program?</p>



<p>[00:04:41] <strong>Hari:</strong> Oh, absolutely. It is one of my favorite programs and one of the best things that I&#8217;ve worked on personally. So, the Contributor Mentorship Program aims to onboard new contributors to WordPress by providing them one-on-one and cohort-based mentorship for a period of typically four to six weeks. The mentorship program typically coincides a major WordPress release.</p>



<p>[00:05:04] <strong>Hari:</strong> And the idea behind the program is to help new contributors kickstart their WordPress contributor journey by providing them an in-depth overview of the WordPress project as well. To talk a bit about how this started, it all began in 2022-2023 when I started researching on the WordPress contributor experience. I discovered that there were gaps in the onboarding experience for new contributors. And I did some research on how we can solve this issue.</p>



<p>Now, while those gaps can be fixed by improving the overall WordPress contributor onboarding experience through technical changes or changes in the program. Mentorship really stood out as an excellent solution to solve the problem. Based on my discovery from this research, I worked on revitalizing the WordPress Contributor Working Group of the Community Team. And together, our group we started working on building a mentorship program. We did a few months of collaborative discussions and brainstorming. And as a result, the group put together the idea for a pilot cohort-based mentorship program, which paired up 13 new contributors as mentees with one mentor each. The cohort worked together for four weeks, and 11 of these mentees graduated after making impactful contributions to the project, with over half of the cohort staying on to make long-term contributions. In fact, we just wrapped up the second cohort of the program in February 2024, which had 52 participants, of which 44 graduated from the program.</p>



<p>[00:06:34] <strong>Angela:</strong> Amazing. Congratulations. And I speaking just for myself, I know how important mentorship was to, to a lot of my journeys, both within WordPress and outside of, and so I think it&#8217;s wonderful that we&#8217;re able to bring mentorship to this space. What sort of benefits are there to participating in this program, either as a new WordPress contributor or as a mentor?&nbsp;</p>



<p>[00:07:04] <strong>Hari:</strong> There&#8217;s a bunch of benefits for both new contributors and mentors in this program, starting with new contributors. First and foremost, new participants in this program they get to kick off their WordPress contributor journey by making initial contributions. So, in my mind, the biggest benefit that they get is they get a chance to actually make their first contributions in the area of their choice with help from a mentor. The other main benefit that I see is that these mentees or new contributors. They get to learn a lot about the WordPress project and how it works. They get to learn about the WordPress release process broadly. And in short, participants in this program also get a chance to network with and learn from experienced WordPress contributors.</p>



<p>And finally, this program is a great opportunity for mentees or new contributors to pick up a lot of valuable skills that they can use in the real world. For mentors, they also get a lot of benefits from this program. In fact, to share another anecdote, some of our mentors they contributed for the first time to WordPress core in the last cohort.</p>



<p>[00:08:14] <strong>Hari:</strong> So, that is also something that they also get to learn, which means mentors also get to learn new skills when they be a part of this program. So, for mentors, even they get to enhance their skills, they get to expand the network within the WordPress community, but in my mind, the biggest benefit that they gain is they gain fulfillment from guiding new contributors. And personally, as a mentor myself, it&#8217;s one of the most valuable thing that you can gain from such a program. That feeling of belonging, that feeling of, you know, fostering sustainability and innovation in the project. I also feel that mentoring new contributors is a great way to bolster your leadership and communication skills, which is extremely valuable in any professional context.</p>



<p>[00:08:54] <strong>Angela:</strong> Absolutely. I definitely see that being able to share your experience and mentor others is a really valuable way to help the next generation of WordPressers be successful in our space. Now, you&#8217;ve talked a bit about what results you&#8217;re seeing from this program, and it&#8217;s really exciting to see that so many mentees are successfully graduating from this program. I&#8217;d love to hear more about the impact and results that you&#8217;re seeing from the mentorship program. Could you give us more details there?</p>



<p>[00:09:32] <strong>Hari:</strong> Absolutely. So, I shared some numbers earlier. We had 11 mentees out of 13 graduating from the 2023 cohort and 44 outta 52 mentees from the 2024 Q1 cohort graduating. From the first cohort we have six of these mentees continuing to make impactful contributions to the project, but we have more encouraging results from the second cohort, in fact. So, ten of our mentees in the second cohort got props for contributing to WordPress 6.5, and one of our mentees was a noteworthy contributor. That&#8217;s about 22% of all the mentees. Fourteen mentees from the latest cohort, which is 31%, they have committed to join the WordPress 6.6 release squad. And the program actually gave eight new core contributors to the project, which includes mentors, as I mentioned earlier.</p>



<p>[00:10:21] <strong>Hari:</strong> We did pre and post-cohort surveys, and the results are very interesting. I can definitely share some numbers here. So, we had a question on contributor familiarity. The familiarity of contribution for new contributors went up from 53% to 80%, that&#8217;s around 26% increase. The contribution confidence went from 57% to 82%, which is around 28%-29%. We asked if the mentees how many of these mentees were satisfied by the program. We heard that 88% of all the mentees were satisfied. 80% of mentees achieved their personal goals as part of the program. A key part of the program experience was that we asked mentees to create contribution plans to make future contributions.</p>



<p>[00:11:06] <strong>Hari:</strong> 62% of our mentees actually made a future contribution plan. So which means, which is a 30, 60, 90-day plan. So, these mentees they&#8217;re gonna follow a plan to contribute to WordPress for the next three months. Finally, we also created a ton of learning materials for these mentees, and we are in the process of releasing them. So these are, most of these are videos, so we plan to release them in WordPress or TV and in the Learn WordPress platform. So, in my mind, seeing these mentees out in the world making impactful contributions that is the biggest impact that I&#8217;m seeing. So, having them in the project as long-term contributors. That is, in my mind, one of the biggest impacts that we&#8217;ve had from this program.</p>



<p>[00:11:46] <strong>Angela:</strong> Yeah, that&#8217;s really incredible to see that new contributors to WordPress, upon joining this program, able to better navigate this vast ecosystem and make important contributions to our space. And that they&#8217;ve made these connections, so they are sticking around and staying with us and continuing to help us build WordPress. That&#8217;s incredible.&nbsp;</p>



<p>[00:12:14] <strong>Angela:</strong> Now, I understand that between the first cohort and the second cohort, the Contributor Working Group made some important updates and iterated on the cohort itself. And one of the big changes, I understand, was to design cohorts around contributor projects. I&#8217;m curious now that we&#8217;ve talked about how fantastic this program is. Are there plans for future cohorts, and what might those cohorts look like?</p>



<p>[00:12:44] <strong>Hari:</strong> Absolutely. So, we have received a lot of interest in future cohorts. So, our working group just did a chat last week, and there was overwhelming positive interest and from all our working group members and other participants saying that we would love to be in a future cohort. So, short answer, yes, we will have a ton of these cohorts going forward. And we are, in fact, hosting a new cohort alongside WordPress 6.7. In October-November, 2024. And we will most likely continue to host at least one mentorship cohort every year. Ideally two, but I&#8217;m just saying one to make sure that we are sustainable. It is hard to predict how future cohorts will look like, but based on all the discussions our working group has had, I can definitely tell you how the next cohort is going to look like.</p>



<p>[00:13:35] <strong>Hari:</strong> So, as per current plans, we will have around 20 to 30 mentees supported by mentors. And the cohort will most likely start early on in the 6.7 release process. The idea is that we would like our mentees to be more deeply involved in the 6.7 release as early as possible. We also plan to have a lot more learn-up sessions in the next cohort.</p>



<p>One feedback that we heard was our mentees really enjoyed some of the learn-up sessions, and they would like these sessions to be scheduled in advance as much as possible so that they can attend as many of them as possible. So, more learn-up sessions. </p>



<p>[00:14:14] <strong>Hari:</strong> And finally, you mentioned projects when you spoke of the latest cohort. We are going to double down on projects in the next cohort. So the hope is to have a host of projects for folks to work on and, ideally, have all mentees work on some project or the other. So, we had projects as an experiment for the earlier cohort. Some mentees did work on projects, while some they were broadly contributing. So, ideally, for the next cohort, every mentee in the program will be a part of some project or the other. It could be a small one. It could be a big one, but there will be some project of some sort for every mentee in the program, ideally. And finally, some contributors in our cohort, they received a scholarship to participate in the last cohort. We hope to expand that. We hope to provide more opportunities for scholarship for contributors.</p>



<p>[00:15:05] <strong>Hari:</strong> I&#8217;m not sure how viable it is, but we did see that the folks who received scholarship, they got a chance to contribute more. So we would ideally like to provide more opportunities for scholarship, especially for folks from underrepresented backgrounds, so that they can contribute to WordPress and, you know, upskill as part of this program.</p>



<p>[00:15:23] <strong>Angela:</strong> Fantastic. Well, hopefully, we have convinced our listeners today to get involved in the Contributor Mentorship Program. And so, if somebody wanted to get involved, either as a mentee or a mentor, how should they go about doing so?</p>



<p>[00:15:42] <strong>Hari:</strong> That&#8217;s a great question. We have not opened up signups for mentors and mentees for the next cohort yet. As I mentioned, it&#8217;s going to happen later this year. However, those interested in the next cohort of the program can comment on the post. I think we can share the link in the show notes. We just published a post announcing the graduation of our mentees, and we had asked folks who are interested in joining the next cohort comment there.</p>



<p>[00:16:07] <strong>Hari:</strong> So if you&#8217;re interested in joining the next cohort, either as a mentor or a mentee. You can comment on that post. Alternatively, you can also DM me. If you&#8217;re not comfortable commenting in a public space, my name is Hari Shanker. I am Hari Shanker, which is H-A-R-I-S-H-A-N-K-E-R. That&#8217;s my username in the Make WordPress Slack. You can DM me there expressing your interest, and I will make sure that we send you the call for interest form when it&#8217;s published.</p>



<p>Additionally, and this is especially to all the mentor applicants, we have a Contributor Working Group, which meets every third Thursday of the month in the Community Team channel on a text chat. It&#8217;s called a mentorship chat. It happens every month, and you can find a link to it in the Make WordPress meetings, P2 blog. So, if you&#8217;re interested in being a mentor, or if you&#8217;re interested in building the Contributor Mentorship Program, or contributing to the Contributor Mentorship Program, I would invite you to join our chat. So, the next chat is being held in May. Please join our next chat. That&#8217;s also a great way to contribute to this program, especially if you are interested in being a mentor.&nbsp;</p>



<p>[00:17:10] <strong>Angela:</strong> Wonderful. Thank you so much for joining me today, Hari. It&#8217;s been a pleasure.</p>



<p>[00:17:16] <strong>Hari:</strong> Thank you. It&#8217;s been an honor, and thank you for inviting me to be a part of this program.&nbsp;</p>



<p>[00:17:19]&nbsp;(Music interlude)&nbsp;</p>



<p>[00:17:27] <strong>Angela:</strong> And now it is time for our small list of big things. We&#8217;ve got three things for you this week. </p>



<p>The first is a proposal to explore the Support Team contributor ladder. If you are not familiar with the concept of the contributor ladder, it is based on the five stages of volunteering, which examines how a volunteer gets onboarded and steps into progressive roles. By thinking through the contributor ladder, Make WordPress teams are able to improve onboarding, engagement, and connection with contributors and generally improve the health of their team. If this is of interest to you, we have a great overview post about the contributor ladder, and you can see the discussion in action over on the Support Team.&nbsp;</p>



<p>[00:18:14] <strong>Angela:</strong> Second, is that the WordPress Foundation has just announced the Kim Parcell Memorial Scholarship for 2024. This scholarship is in honor of Kim Parcell, an incredible long-time contributor, and is awarded to a current WordPress contributor who is a woman, has not previously attended WordCamp US, and requires financial assistance to attend this year&#8217;s event.&nbsp;The scholarship will provide travel assistance for the recipient to attend WordCamp US this year in Portland, Oregon, and covers travel from your home city, hotel, and your ticket to the event. The application is open through May 30th, and you can apply on the WordPress Foundation page.&nbsp;</p>



<p>Third is a reminder of our next big WordPress event, WordCamp Europe, which will be in beautiful Torino, Italy, June 13th through the 15th. You can still get tickets on their website. If you can&#8217;t make it to Italy, never fear. This time of year sees a good number of WordPress events around the world, and they are a great way to connect with WordPress friends and hear all about the latest and greatest in WordPress. You can go find upcoming events on events.WordPress.org to see what events are happening in your area. If there isn&#8217;t a WordPress event near you, you can become an organizer and start hosting events locally.&nbsp;</p>



<p>[00:19:42] <strong>Angela:</strong> And that, friends, is your small list of big things. Don&#8217;t forget to follow us on your favorite podcast app. Or subscribe directly on WordPress.org/news. You&#8217;ll get a friendly reminder whenever there&#8217;s a new episode. If you liked what you heard today, share it with a fellow WordPresser, or if you had questions about what you heard, you can share those by emailing WPBriefing@WordPress.org. I am your guest host, Angela Jin. Thanks so much for tuning in today for the WordPress Briefing. In a couple of weeks, Josepha will be back as your regular host for the next episode.&nbsp;</p>



<p>[00:20:21] (Music outro)&nbsp;</p>";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:7:"pubDate";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:31:"Mon, 29 Apr 2024 12:00:00 +0000";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}s:32:"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/";a:1:{s:7:"creator";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:14:"Brett McSherry";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}}}i:48;a:6:{s:4:"data";s:13:"
	
	
	
	
	
	
";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";s:5:"child";a:2:{s:0:"";a:5:{s:5:"title";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:93:"Do The Woo Community: A Comunidade Portugal do WordPress – The Portugal WordPress Community";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"guid";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:28:"https://dothewoo.io/?p=83262";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"link";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:88:"https://dothewoo.io/a-comunidade-portugal-do-wordpress-the-portugal-wordpress-community/";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:11:"description";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:148:"No nosso programa Vozes da Comunidade, WordPress pelo Mundo, destacamos a comunidade WordPress de Portugal para uma conversa na sua língua materna.";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:7:"pubDate";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:31:"Mon, 29 Apr 2024 08:15:09 +0000";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}s:32:"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/";a:1:{s:7:"creator";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:5:"BobWP";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}}}i:49;a:6:{s:4:"data";s:13:"
	
	
	
	
	
	
";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";s:5:"child";a:2:{s:0:"";a:5:{s:5:"title";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:61:"Gravatar: Revamping User Authentication: The Role of Passkeys";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"guid";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:32:"http://blog.gravatar.com/?p=1366";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:4:"link";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:88:"https://blog.gravatar.com/2024/04/26/revamping-user-authentication-the-role-of-passkeys/";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:11:"description";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:15104:"<p>Passkeys are leading the charge in transforming how we secure our digital identities.&nbsp;</p>



<p>This article offers a comprehensive exploration of passkeys – breaking down their mechanics, illustrating their advantages over traditional passwords, and showcasing their role in the next wave of secure online authentication.&nbsp;</p>



<p>Whether you&#8217;re a developer, IT professional, or simply tech-curious, join us as we explore the ins and outs of passkeys, providing practical examples and guidance on how to implement them for a safer, smoother online experience.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>What are passkeys?</strong></h2>



<p>A passkey is a secure method that distinctly identifies a user through advanced mechanisms that go beyond the traditional “something you know” attribute of passwords. Instead, passkeys encompass facets like “something you are”, like biometrics, or “something you have”, such as a physical security key.&nbsp;</p>



<img src="https://lh7-us.googleusercontent.com/mJ-N_j8Rr3Kta7O0S1DPWe0hisuvejqbUimVJUxf6QqdNMVvbEEaURvRXrm342DaXsuKk8ce9AZBJs05gXVDUrN5tzDUJ0-2oGcoR6tJ98YNeS1jc63lCtOmY0FQaFyK-9JYAbF-uiPGN406xgZUwGU" alt="" />



<p><em>Example of biometric authentication</em></p>



<p>Using passkeys for your websites and platforms gives visitors an easy way to verify their identity without typing complex passwords, replacing them with unique and often temporary credentials, enhancing security and user experience.</p>



<p>These tokens often come in the form of unique, time-sensitive codes that protect online spaces against unwanted entries. The most common types include facial and fingerprint recognition, complicated designed patterns, or secure PINs, which are often specially generated for this specific login attempt.&nbsp;</p>



<p>There are many advantages to integrating passkeys:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><strong>Enhanced security: </strong>Passkeys offer a more secure authentication method compared to traditional passwords, significantly reducing the risk of unauthorized access.</li>



<li><strong>User-friendly: </strong>They simplify the login process, making it quicker and more convenient for users by eliminating the need to remember and type passwords.</li>



<li><strong>Reduced forgetfulness issues: </strong>The temporary nature of passkeys means users don&#8217;t have to remember a static password, decreasing the chances of lockouts due to forgotten passwords.</li>



<li><strong>Resistance to brute force attacks:</strong> Passkeys&#8217; unique and often temporary nature makes them much harder for attackers to guess through repeated trial and error.</li>



<li><strong>Decreased dependency on password recovery: </strong>Passkeys significantly reduce the reliance on potentially insecure password recovery methods, as users no longer need to reset forgotten passwords frequently.</li>
</ul>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Passkeys are built on FIDO standards</strong></h3>



<p>​​Short for Fast Identity Online, <a href="https://fidoalliance.org/what-is-fido/">FIDO is a global authentication standard</a> designed to reinforce and simplify the <a href="https://blog.gravatar.com/2024/02/21/securing-cyber-space-role-of-digital-identity-verification/">digital authentication process</a>, making it simpler for users and more secure against threats.&nbsp;</p>



<p>These standards are based on public key cryptography and have played a crucial role in encouraging the adoption of passkeys by ensuring they comply with rigorous security and ease-of-use criteria.</p>



<p>Through the integration of FIDO protocols, such as <a href="https://fidoalliance.org/specs/u2f-specs-master/fido-u2f-overview.html">U2F (Universal 2nd Factor)</a> and <a href="https://webauthn.io/">WebAuthn</a>, passkeys benefit from an advanced security infrastructure. U2F adds a layer of protection by involving a physical security key in the authentication process, while WebAuthn allows for the registration and verification of users on web applications through biometric data, mobile devices, or FIDO security keys, moving away from password reliance.</p>



<p>This combination of passkeys with FIDO standards has significantly improved digital authentication, making it safer and more user-friendly.&nbsp;</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Understanding the user flow with passkeys</strong></h3>



<p>Passkeys are revolutionizing the way we authenticate, making logging in smoother and more secure. Imagine the ease of entering a secure system or website without the hassle of remembering complex passwords. Here&#8217;s a simple breakdown of how a typical passkey authentication process works.&nbsp;</p>



<ol class="wp-block-list">
<li><strong>Registration: </strong>First, a user chooses to create a passkey for a service. This often happens during the initial sign-up or through a settings menu for existing users. The user confirms their identity through a verification method, like an email link or a text message code.</li>



<li><strong>Creating a passkey: </strong>The system prompts the user to authorize the creation of a passkey. This can be done using a device&#8217;s biometric features (like a fingerprint or facial recognition) or a PIN. The passkey is then generated and securely stored on the user&#8217;s device, as well as with the service, but in a way that the service can&#8217;t see the passkey itself.</li>



<li><strong>Authentication:</strong> When returning to the service, the user is prompted to unlock their passkey, again using biometrics or a PIN. The device then communicates with the service, confirming the user’s identity without transmitting the passkey. This seamless interaction ensures that the user&#8217;s credentials are never exposed to potential theft.</li>
</ol>



<img src="https://lh7-us.googleusercontent.com/h-3BYhKjAzHzS7m2CRR052HrW-uSCLfW3eq3yuOBTOKOERTvaDgYpP6_DkkRcf4XV3a8297IjTP6_rVix8LoMDLp3yO-GJb7z4XVyjRxUoKDpGMlybjbSiOiQnWHPCrOikaHtJlKqkxHcz-cQhxr9Wk" alt="" />



<p><em>How passkey authentication works</em></p>



<ol class="wp-block-list" start="4">
<li><strong>Cross-device usage: </strong>Passkeys can also be used across different devices, thanks to cloud synchronization, making authentication even more convenient without compromising security.</li>
</ol>



<p>This flow stands out from traditional passwords by eliminating the need for users to remember anything or enter credentials manually, reducing the risk of phishing or password theft. Besides that, because the authentication is tied to the user&#8217;s device and/or biometrics, it significantly enhances security.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Exploring real-world examples of the Passkeys experience</strong></h2>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>iOS, Android, and desktop recognition&nbsp;</strong></h3>



<p>On mobile platforms like <a href="https://www.apple.com/ios/ios-17/">iOS</a> and <a href="https://www.android.com/">Android</a>, the experience of using passkeys is designed to be incredibly intuitive. When users attempt to log into a service that supports passkeys, the operating system prompts them to authenticate using a method they are already familiar with, such as a fingerprint, facial recognition, or a PIN.&nbsp;</p>



<p>A lot of modern laptops, both <a href="https://www.apple.com/">Apple</a> and <a href="https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/windows">Windows</a>, include a fingerprint scanner in the power button, and since 2015, Windows laptops have started including facial recognition, as well. Until a few years ago, this was a function only available for mobile devices.&nbsp;</p>



<p>For example, this is how the prompt looks on a Mac laptop when trying to access information behind a security wall, such as the <a href="https://passwords.google.com/">Google Password Manager</a>.&nbsp;</p>



<img src="https://lh7-us.googleusercontent.com/GZlGyRgyu3PrBnsgE5crkCM3Kk4HU6B2_a35zOEDRaEgd85wDYjTpmqT8D-pwSJyMgelVRpb7rFIcKWJMcTHu-y-sMk9hYHzqB3HtL_WYsCP2_98CDtFAI_Uax15ZHJkkV0EeJ7aOuV4npax5rKz-pM" alt="" />



<p><em>Touch ID option on a Mac computer</em></p>



<p>In the device&#8217;s settings, people can specify where they want to use this type of recognition. For instance, these are the settings for <a href="https://support.apple.com/en-us/102381">Face ID</a> on an iPhone.&nbsp;</p>



<img src="https://lh7-us.googleusercontent.com/jhIZZkyZll7qzM7XTaOtnQX9yRiPouo6M1rUbhRaUlXSzeHACN-hkb4wpG_aoJwxJEgWvxkyKBOR2P8kdNXC1AJ__WNHiFdtJi8u8LFc7aaxN8e88g3IKS20iXKzpVzpuFj86t0RU3hJiisD0aXUAlA" alt="" />



<p><em>iPhone Face ID settings</em></p>



<p>This seamless process eliminates the need to type in usernames and passwords, offering a secure and streamlined login experience directly integrated into the device’s ecosystem.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>LastPass</strong></h3>



<img src="https://lh7-us.googleusercontent.com/wHL2HDti53JiWZxrChIqFYKIoiFIDevPE6YxOVIMlSKIfjrOv9-yuTK-n_Mv2oQVyMWj9lQEc9cRfBnLg2SQim_LvhlfLc5BfIiF2NXLMrztex_LsFcmWoxAjQVXh-BlejN-c7Mxhg6UKmfql-Msb-Y" alt="" />



<p><em>LastPass Passwordless Vault service page</em></p>



<p><a href="https://www.lastpass.com/">LastPass</a> is a popular password manager that has embraced passkeys, providing a user-friendly interface that simplifies the shift from traditional passwords to passkey authentication. Users can generate and manage their passkeys within the LastPass app, which then facilitates easy and secure access to various services.&nbsp;</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Google Passkey</strong></h3>



<img src="https://lh7-us.googleusercontent.com/ld6VCp7T9H7ktjiChFNGi3g_V1PUT4i0U4sTvdgBQROssXfQY7GabMKekA34N4YLvLe7FsaQch2rjiUCJA8WCSKJCFzNHbw-v4BzRQN0XHwd0UbqkBW_2JXZ2W8krrgWesM5L02FuQwV9wJgbntFVy8" alt="" />



<p><em>Google Passkey homepage</em></p>



<p>Google has been at the forefront of implementing passkey authentication across its services. Users can <a href="https://www.google.com/account/about/passkeys/">create a passkey for their Google Account</a>, which then allows for swift access to <a href="https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/">Gmail</a>, <a href="https://www.google.com/drive/">Google Drive</a>, and other Google services.&nbsp;</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>Why developers, users, and businesses prefer passkeys over passwords and MFA&nbsp;</strong></h2>



<p>Over the past few years, more and more developers and businesses prefer passkeys over traditional passwords and Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA). Let’s see why.&nbsp;</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>They&#8217;re safer</strong></h3>



<p>Traditional systems are very vulnerable. For example, in 2021, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/18/nyregion/nyc-law-department-hack.html">the New York City Law Department experienced a significant cyberattack</a>, where attackers accessed sensitive data, including city employees&#8217; personal information, police misconduct evidence, plaintiffs&#8217; medical records, and the identities of minors charged with crimes, through a single employee&#8217;s compromised email password.&nbsp;</p>



<p>Passkeys, on the other hand, are immune to common threats like phishing and keylogging, as they do not transmit sensitive information that can be intercepted or deceitfully obtained.&nbsp;</p>



<p>This is possible because passkeys use public-private key cryptography, a method far superior to the conventional password system. Unlike passwords, which rely on a shared secret known by both the user and the service, passkeys work by creating a pair of keys: a private one that stays with the user and a public one stored on the server. So, even if a server is compromised, attackers cannot impersonate the user without access to the private key.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>They’re easier to use</strong></h3>



<p>Passkeys significantly simplify the user experience. People don’t need to remember complex passwords, manage multiple credentials, and constantly reset passwords.&nbsp;</p>



<p>Instead, they gain access with just a tap or a biometric check, making the process not only quicker but also more enjoyable. This simplicity and speed appeal to tech-savvy individuals and those less comfortable with technology, expanding the accessibility of secure online services.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>They result in more conversions</strong></h3>



<p>The frictionless nature of passkey authentication reduces dropout rates during the signup process and encourages higher user retention by removing common login-related frustrations. This ease of use can significantly boost conversion rates, as users are more likely to complete sign-up processes and continue using services that offer an effortless access method.&nbsp;</p>



<p>Furthermore, by adopting passkeys, companies can distinguish themselves from competitors, offering a modern and secure authentication solution that appeals to privacy and convenience-conscious consumers.</p>



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>They can be used for single sign-on purposes</strong></h3>



<p>Passkeys seamlessly integrate with Single Sign-On (SSO) solutions, enhancing both convenience and security. SSO allows users to access multiple services or applications with a single set of credentials, reducing the burden of remembering numerous passwords.&nbsp;</p>



<p>By incorporating passkeys into SSO frameworks, users enjoy an even smoother login experience across various platforms, with the added benefit of heightened security.&nbsp;</p>



<p>This integration not only simplifies user access but also bolsters productivity and security for businesses by minimizing the potential attack surface for cyber threats.</p>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading"><strong>It’s time to enter a passwordless future</strong></h2>



<p>By the end of this article, you’ll have understood what passkeys are – and more importantly, you’ll hopefully agree that it’s time for passkeys to trump passwords once and for all.&nbsp;</p>



<p>At <a href="https://gravatar.com/">Gravatar</a>, we’re paving the way for a more open, connected, and user-centric internet – and our approach to profile management lets you build a complete digital identity management solution along with your passkeys authentication service.&nbsp;</p>



<p>With more than 20 years of serving as people’s globally recognized avatar, Gravatar allows users to create profiles that serve as universal identifiers across any website or web application that integrates with Gravatar’s API. This minimizes the need for users to manage data across different platforms and also minimizes the need for you as a developer or website owner to store user data directly.&nbsp;</p>



<p>So, if you’re looking to enhance your site, app, or online store, <a href="http://docs.gravatar.com">discover more about how you can integrate Gravatar</a> and join the movement toward a more secure, efficient online experience for everyone.&nbsp;</p>";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}s:7:"pubDate";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:31:"Fri, 26 Apr 2024 17:09:46 +0000";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}s:32:"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/";a:1:{s:7:"creator";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:"data";s:11:"Ronnie Burt";s:7:"attribs";a:0:{}s:8:"xml_base";s:0:"";s:17:"xml_base_explicit";b:0;s:8:"xml_lang";s:0:"";}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}s:4:"type";i:128;s:7:"headers";O:48:"WpOrg\Requests\Utility\CaseInsensitiveDictionary":1:{s:7:"*data";a:9:{s:6:"server";s:5:"nginx";s:4:"date";s:29:"Thu, 30 May 2024 03:49:22 GMT";s:12:"content-type";s:8:"text/xml";s:13:"last-modified";s:29:"Thu, 30 May 2024 03:30:29 GMT";s:4:"vary";s:15:"Accept-Encoding";s:15:"x-frame-options";s:10:"SAMEORIGIN";s:16:"content-encoding";s:4:"gzip";s:7:"alt-svc";s:19:"h3=":443"; ma=86400";s:4:"x-nc";s:9:"HIT ord 1";}}s:5:"build";s:14:"20230921022033";}