View in #committee on Slack
@blueskyphoenixllc: Meeting here at 5:00pm UTC, which is about 35 minutes from now. Thanks everyone!
@wade: 
@blueskyphoenixllc: :skin-tone-2:
Who else is here?
@wade: I’m here
@blueskyphoenixllc: Can you @ everyone? I can’t seem to do it from here…
@mte90net: uh I forgot it
I am here
@wade: Slack crashed when I tried to @ everyone 
@blueskyphoenixllc: Nice. Thanks Slack.
@hello194: @hello194 has joined the channel
@raygulick:
@blueskyphoenixllc: Hi @hello194 thanks for joining us today :skin-tone-2:
@jnylen @tim.kaye @slack1596 @fwolf @guerreiro.rui
@slack1891: @slack1891 has joined the channel
@blueskyphoenixllc: hey @slack1891
@slack1891:
@blueskyphoenixllc: Well, we did have a 3 hour window and a pretty even mix between all three times so I expect those that can’t be here had hoped we’d do this meeting later. Let’s move ahead and everyone can respond as they are able.
@fwolf: uhm, I’m here
nearly forgot about it, but the reminder in the forum helped out 
@blueskyphoenixllc: Thanks!
@wade: There is no real agenda for today, just answering questions, updating on progress and touching base with the committee
@blueskyphoenixllc: Can we get a report from team leads? (as you log in and see this message @jnylen @slack1596 @guerreiro.rui)
I’ll start
@raygulick and I have been working with @klein and @cogginsalan on the Meet the Community (MTC) posts, and we have decided to start including some case studies as well. We think it’s a great way to show how CP is working for folks “in the wild”.
@cogginsalan: @cogginsalan has joined the channel
@fwolf: thats indeed a very good idea
@blueskyphoenixllc: I am working on a post to share an overall status update on where we’re at with CP and what’s queued up next.
@fwolf: I could offer a story into “ClassicPress Multisite” in the near / forseeable future
@blueskyphoenixllc: That would be great!
We have also been discussing curating some posts from some of our community members - with their permission, obviously
@fwolf: looks up what “curating” means in this context …
@blueskyphoenixllc: and also writing some how-to’s for those who may not be as well-versed in all things code… like how to make a child theme.
Curating: for instance… @slack1891 has written some great stuff that he has offered that we can post on our blog and refer back to his original post
@fwolf: ah, ok. so I was understanding it correctly
@slack1891: I’m happy to share them.
@fwolf: a bit like wptavern or “planet wordpress”, no? 
@slack1891: More classic… and pressier, too.
@blueskyphoenixllc: ah, I guess so, but no different than many other blogs out there.
Other than that, we’ve been monitoring our social media and sharing/retweeting periodically as it makes sense to do so. We’ve been pretty quiet there.
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@blueskyphoenixllc: @raygulick and I have also been working on the classicpress.net website redesign and hope to have something ready shortly — Ray, anything to add?
@raygulick: No.
@slack1891: Aside of curation, is there a list of topics that are of particular interest?
@blueskyphoenixllc: Good question — suggestions are welcome!
@wade: Quick update while I have service, I have been working on a doc to outline meetups (can’t post now - very little service) other than that I have been a little MIA but with summer I will finally have a more time to get back to contributing
Re the topics, I like the tutorials you and @laurence are doing
@slack1891: I posted an FAQ item on my site (not that it’s getting any action)… but it would be helpful if ClassicPress had similar… laying out a framework.
@blueskyphoenixllc: This is helpful, thank you!
“Pitch me!”
@slack1891: Ha, I have to throw in a little humanness from time to time
@fwolf: other stuff: I’ve started planning out a “lookup plugin compatiblity” thingy, but thats just my personal project. currently I’m figuring out the best format to store data in (probably DB and then have an import / export JSON file for public access and easier open sourcing the data).
basically to have something quicker in place than just the long list in the forum
@blueskyphoenixllc: Great — thank you!
Part of the reason for this meeting was to catch up with what’s everyone’s been doing… we’re all working at something, but I think it would be good for us to meet more regularly to touch base.
@mte90net what’s been going on with you?
@mte90net: After the 1.0 release nothing because I am waiting the transfer of our domain and website to move on
Also I tried to backport a patch but is not easy
I tried to recruit more coders and doing mentoring without any effective answers from the community
I think that everything is blocked because we don’t have coders that can contribute
@blueskyphoenixllc: Have you been in communication with @jnylen about the backport, coder concerns, etc?
@mte90net: Yes of course
We chatted about it but 2-3 people are not enoufh
@elisabetta.marina.cle: Sorry to interrupt. What can we all do apart from spreading the word out to help? I speak from a beginner perspective, I don’t have all the skills needed to code for core, but is there anything people like me can do?
@slack1891: We need a few basic tutorials on it… like how to sync up our dev branch from upstream.
@blueskyphoenixllc: @elisabetta.marina.cle thank you for speaking up, you are not interrupting at all.
@mte90net: For core? No, we need highly skilled dev, so we need to be able to attract them to use the project and contribute
@elisabetta.marina.cle: That is clear @mte90net
@blueskyphoenixllc: @mte90net I think Elisabetta is asking what she can do to help find highly skilled developers to contribute.
@mte90net: Right now cp now is attracting mainly users and no coders or contributor
@elisabetta.marina.cle: That’s the point. Maybe we should try and interact in the places devs & coders hang out?
I think we are present on social media for users, but I feel we can try to speak to devs also
@fwolf: stackexchange?
@mte90net: I don’t think that we need to ask in forum
Scott started in that way
@slack1891: What about Google summer of code? Is that still a thing?
@mte90net: Yes but is over the gsoc
@elisabetta.marina.cle: We need to be in front of coders. Users are not enough.
@mte90net: The point is that we need more contributors overall also outside core
@blueskyphoenixllc: I don’t see that asking in the Forum is a bad thing, after all, if someone is in the forum, they’re interested. Still, it’s obvious that we need to find a different audience. I am not a developer, so I could use some help in this area. If we want to speak to devs on social, I need to know what to say that’s meaningful and compelling.
@elisabetta.marina.cle: So @mte90net we need users, coders for core and more generic code contributors. Did I understand correctly?
I think coders for core and generic code contributors may in a way overlap, that is maybe we can find them in the same place. But it’s certain users don’t hang out in those places
@mte90net: the point is the value proposition of the project. Why a dev should choose to contribute to CP if all the market is busy with WP and also is offering more stuff compared to CP?
@elisabetta.marina.cle: What about speaking to coders via LinkedIn?
@mte90net: reach personally coders is not the right way, they should be interested in the project and later contribute
@slack1891: I’m not sure about the makeup of the WP Plugins AtoZ podcast audience (assume coders and users) but John Overall (host) has expressed a lot of interest in speaking to community members if they’d just reach out.
@mte90net: but if we are getting only users and not developers to the platform this is the problem
@elisabetta.marina.cle: @mte90net I understand our project is still unsure of its USPs, but one obvious thing is CP is a new market. First in gets big money.
@mte90net: that’s not true so much for a developer, it is like with startup but anyway we are going off topic
it is better to do a meeting about how to get more contributors
@elisabetta.marina.cle: Second, with this negative approach (we are not enough vs WP) IMHO we are escavating CP’s grave…
@blueskyphoenixllc: @mte90net it would be helpful if you would please contribute concrete, specific ways in which we can reach more coders. I will create a forum post for this and all can contribute.
@mte90net: https://www.classicpress.net/blog/2019/04/04/what-is-missing-in-the-classicpress-project-that-you-could-contribute-to/
What is missing in the ClassicPress project that you could contribute to?
@slack1891: 
tutorials on keeping things synced up (ie branches) would help me contribute
@elisabetta.marina.cle: This post has a flaw. We are basically stating we “miss” things. Maybe it would be better worded as “there’s a lot going on, would you help us shape the future of CP?”
@slack1891: James gave me an example that worked in at the time, but, I couldn’t get it working later.
I made a good-sized pull request a while back (rewrite the install process) … and that’s where my branch still sits.
@mte90net: anyway this meeting is going off topic
@blueskyphoenixllc: Let’s talk further on the forum. I’ll also connect with @jnylen to get things moving forward.
@elisabetta.marina.cle: I am working to understand git myself. So I can’t be of help…
@mte90net: there are any other updates from other team lead?
@blueskyphoenixllc: We don’t have anyone else here, so hopefully they’ll chime in when they see the thread.
Does anyone from the community have suggestions / questions / comments?
@slack1891: No questions, just an update on what’s going on over here…
I’ve been working on an onsite plugin directory (small scale) … anticipate getting it launched this weekend if life doesn’t get in my way.
Also, I’ve subscribed (lifetime) to DigitalJuice … am anticipating creating vids for value added content.
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@blueskyphoenixllc: Hi @zulfgani
@zulfgani: Sorry late to the party
@blueskyphoenixllc: Topics have been created on the forum to propose topics for the CP blog and also to encourage skilled developers to contribute
@slack1891: Suggestion: we need a tutorial series that shows how to do the basics: syncing, backporting, whatever. There are a lot of people who seem to want to help, but, don’t have the requisite knowledge. A very pointed series of short tutorials is really needed.
@zulfgani: @slack1891 looking forward to seeing the directory - good to see there’s some traction on that side
@slack1891: It’s not a full scale directory, @zulfgani… it’s just Code Potent plugins… because I can’t stand to send people to GitHub to install.
@blueskyphoenixllc: @slack1891 do you have any suggestions on who might have the skills to create that series?
and I’ll go add this to the forum post
@slack1891: James mentioned he’d get to them at some point.
A tut is ideal… nobody wants to go back to the same person again and again asking the same questions.
I can’t even bear to share my own articles on social more than once.
@zulfgani: @slack1891 I gathered and the hope is at some point it might come handy for the rest of us if you are open to open sourcing it
@slack1891: It’s not really scalable… like for the official directory. I also wrote it as a CP plugin, so, it’s not real useful outside of that.
@zulfgani: Due to time constraints I may not be able to do much on the Core contribution side but happy to step on Default theme for CP
@slack1891 give us the base and sure we can break it and bend it to suite
@slack1891: That’s my fear
The full directory needs to be thought of as open-ended… I presume my directory will slow down once I get 100 titles in.
(it uses post meta and core taxonomy… not incredibly performant once you get a ton of items)
@fwolf: same issue I got with my “quick compatiblity lookup” thingy, hence the idea of not using CP at all, or just for backend (read: editing / adding data, but running it in a separate data structure)
@slack1891 nobody hinders you to create custom table structures …
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@slack1891: It wasn’t necessary for an in-house plugin that wouldn’t get over 100 titles.
Anyway, back to contributing… I think if we had the tutorials, we could start getting some of us (who are currently interested/involved) up to speed as opposed to hoping we’re going to attact top developers “just because”
I want to help with certain things, don’t know how, there’s no tuts, so I go back to whatever I was working on before.
@blueskyphoenixllc: I agree — those who are invested in CP are most likely to be willing to do the work to become more proficient.
@slack1891: I suspect we’ve got tons of talent out here…just, it needs to be molded a bit, channeled.
@raygulick: Git tuts would help a whole lot, although there are no shortage of Git courses out there.
@slack1891: I’ve followed lots of generic tuts… what would be more helpful is this is how to do it in a ClassicPress context
@laurence: Thanks for allowing community in committee space.
IMO - we have some planned items in the petitions. If we concentrate on at least pushing those into core or a major item like making the core plugins, that will pull in the devs. Many are watching in the sidelines. When work is moving people love to chime in.
@slack1596: has a few minutes while eating
(fyi, if you’re going to pick a time for these things between 6-9pm UK time noone from over here is likely to be around much)
picking up the main point i see: more devs
yes, we need more devs, but we also need something concrete for them to work on
@blueskyphoenixllc: @slack1596 I know you’re security and @jnylen is core but can you elaborate on that at all? How can we get that moving forward?
@slack1596: we have a sort of roadmap for v2, but it’s not prominent in the way it needs to be as we keep having to point people to it
@slack1891: New devs are great, too, but, I think if we don’t work on cultivating the skills of our current members, we’re leaving a lot of possibilities on the table.
We don’t need to be attracted in…we’re already here.
…“just” need some polish.
@slack1596: if we look at the problem backwards - what does success look like? - we’re going to need people to manage the plugin directory
and to maintain a good faq for getting a plugin into it
and to help people getting a plugin into it
in reality, the core work needed for v2 is relatively little
i did a lot of it at the start - it needs updating, but moving xml-rpc and the rest api out into a core plugin is all but done
@slack1891: Done or it didn’t happen.
@slack1596: v2 isn’t supposed to be a huge release, more structural than functional
it can’t be “done” until the definition for core meta is done
@tim.kaye: What skills will “people to manage the plugin directory” need?
@slack1596: i’m hoping to have some code auditing in place, so the results of that will need to be checked, at minimum
having someone actually read the readme (or even just take a glance at it) would be a dramatic improvement over wp
explaining why we blocked access to a plugin will be needed too
@slack1891: The reading of readme’s and similar can be handled by most everyone. The biggest task (in my mind) is the approval process…inspecting the code.
Especially as plugins grow…it takes not only time, but, a very solid understanding of both PHP and ClassicPress to do this by hand – it’s not something that just everyone can do.
@slack1596: unless there’s a queue of people lining up to audit plugin code, i plan to automate it and stop there
@fwolf: similar to what WP PRT / TRT is working on, I guess?
@slack1891: Something like the process over at pluginvulns? Scan for the typical baddies, ie?
@fwolf: PHP Sniffer framework or sth
PHP_CodeSniffer
@slack1596: there are a lot of choices - it’s about minimising the false positives as much as finding things
@mte90net: maybe is better to move this discussion in core or we are going off topic
@slack1891: I don’t have anything to add… just chatting along.
For me, it’s: tuts, tuts, tuts
@blueskyphoenixllc: Okay then that’s a wrap for the committee meeting — thanks to everyone for being here!
