News
I’m sure you’ve been paying attention to the war. A pro-Russian war plugin appeared in the WordPress plugin repository resulting in a lot of heated conversation on the Internet. It was finally removed by the plugin team in the WordPress repository. Heather Burns covers a non-US perspective in her article.
Weglot, a popular WordPress multilingual plugin, has raised €45M from Partech Partners. Sarah Gooding, over at the WPTavern writes how this is the first time that Weglot has taken outside capital to expand its translation services.
The WordPress Performance Team has published a feature proposal that would enable WebP images by default into WordPress 6.0 core. The performance team has published their proposal over on make.wordpress.org.
Events
WordCamp Asia is tentatively back on the schedule of in-person WordPress events with new dates: February 17-19, 2023 in Bangkok, Thailand. It will begin with a Contributor day, followed by two conference days.
From Our Contributors and Producers
There is a technical discussion over on WordPress Gutenberg GitHub on the Dynamic replacement of server-provided content in blocks and in HTML attributes. The proposal uses Dynamic tokens which read like Shortcodes 2.0 but with a much better interface.
If you need to manage photo/image source attributions and licenses in WordPress go check out the premium version of Image Source Control. This plugin manages and displays image credits which have been an issue for years. If you enjoy founder stories, the article is worth a couple of minutes of your time to read.
Jamie Marsland submitted his 100th YouTube video on Gutenberg. If you are in search of a charity form for Gutenberg blocks for your site go check out his video.
Do you want to know how Crocoblock is doing in Ukraine? Lana Miro has a video on YouTube that you should go watch while they continue to work during this frightening time.
WP Minute Writer Eric Karkovack wrote a new Freelancer’s View: Overcoming the Challenge of Selling Clients on WooCommerce.
Listen to the latest podcast on buying a WordPress media property with Rob Howard on the Matt Report. Matt and Rob explore building an agency, how to hire, and Rob’s latest purchase of MasterWP.
Joe Howard took to Twitter to state that he’s working on a new product that isn’t the company he founded, WP Buffs. Stay tuned to the Matt Report for a full interview.
Next up:
Block Editor Dev Minute by Aurooba Ahmed
Transcript
Hi! I’m Aurooba and this is your Block Editor Dev minute.
Just like WordPress Core has a robust system of actions, filters, and hooks to help you customize WordPress and add functionality, the Block Editor also provides ways for you do the same in the Editor and in Blocks. There are filters, SlotFills (which are a little bit like hooks), and an entire Data module to help you do all kinds of things. Let’s say you have some very specific requirements each post must meet. If something is missing, you can create a helpful notification to let the user know by hooking into the Notices system of the Block Editor. You can even disable the publish button until they fulfill those requirements with the lockPostSaving action.
So the next time you need to customize something, instead of making a custom block or forgoing the Block Editor completely, check the Block Editor Handbook to see if an action, filter, or SlotFill can help instead. Thanks for listening!
WP Accessibility Minute” by Amber Hinds
Transcript
Hi, this is Amber Hinds, CEO of Equalize Digital and this is your WP Accessibility Minute.
What is accessibility? Simply put, accessibility means ensuring the websites you build can be used by people of all abilities, including those who are blind or deaf, have cognitive disabilities, or who cannot use a mouse. Really accessible websites work better for us all.
Website Accessibility has been gaining attention in the past few years and on Friday the U.S. Department of Justice issued a statement confirming that all websites need to be accessible in order to conform with the Americans With Disabilities Act. This is just one of more than 40 laws worldwide requiring accessibility.
Plugin and theme developers should consider moving accessibility improvements to the top of their roadmaps. Not only is this the right thing to do, it’s also a great way to make your products stand out in a crowded marketplace. As organizations and developers realize that they need to make their websites accessible they’re going to start selecting tools that support this over those that don’t.
How can you learn accessibility? Attend a WordPress Accessibility Meetup which takes place twice a month via Zoom. WP Accessibility Day, a 24-hour free conference will happen again on November 2nd and 3rd. Many Slack communities like WPCampus and GenesisWP have accessibility channels and there’s a WordPress Accessibility Facebook group too.
Thanks for listening to this WP Accessibility Minute. If you want to learn more about me and my plugin, Accessibility Checker, which makes it easier for you to find accessibility problems on your website, head on over to EqualizeDigital.com
Thanks to all of the members who shared these links today:
- Birgit Pauli-Haack
- Raquel Landefeld
- Thomas Maier
- Matt Cromwell
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