Presentation by Jane Wells of Automattic at WordCamp Montréal on growing community involvement as the future of the WordPress open source project.

1. The Future
of WordPress
Jane Wells
Automattic
WordCamp Montréal
July 12, 2009

2. Jane Wells
User Experience
Automattic | WordPress
jane@automattic.com
http://jane.wordpress.com
@janeforshort

3. “Jane Wells will be explaining new
features of WordPress 2.9 as well as
features to come in future versions
of the popular CMS.”
-Charles Lapointe
ressacmedia.com

4. Telepathic WordPress
(using XMLRPC protocol)

5. “The future of WordPress
is not about features.”
-Matt Mullenweg

6. “The future of WordPress is about people.”
-Matt Mullenweg

7. Growing a Community
of Contributors

8. Core Development
QA Testing
Forum Moderation
Documentation (Codex)

9. (Plugins) Core Development (Themes)
QA Testing
Forum Moderation
Documentation (Codex)
Organize Meetups/WordCamps

10. (Plugins) Core Development (Themes)
QA Testing
Forum Moderation
Documentation (Codex)
Organize Meetups/WordCamps
Graphic Design
Usability Testing
Information Arcitecture
Interaction Design
Accessibility
Screencasts/Presentations

11. Ben Dunkle
Design Professor
Designed icons
for WordPress 2.7
Icon contest (dev blog)
v
Icons, core graphics
v
bbPress icons
v
Plugin icons

12. Gordon Brander
Designer/Developer
Blue admin theme
WordCamp Denver
v
Admin mockups
v
Post graphics/CSS to Trac
v
Committed to core, 2.8

13. WordPress Handbook Series
• Only what you need to know
• Version-specific (2.7, 2.8...)
• SVN, Trac
• Editorial authority

14. WordPress Handbook Editions
• End-user (downloaded as help file)
• WordPress as a CMS
• Theme developer
• Plugin developer
• System Administrator

15. Doug Provencio
Writer
WordPress Handbook,
CMS Edition
WordCamp SF
v
CMS Handbook
v
Outline
v
Editor

16. Distributed Usability Testing
Argentina | Atlanta | Boise, Idaho | Boston | Chicago
Czech Republic | Dallas | Finland | India | Los Angeles | Mexico
Minneapolis | Netherlands | New York | New Zealand | Norway
Russia | San Francisco | Switzerland | Sydney | Tokyo | Toronto
Turkey | UK | Vancouver, BC | Vermont | Washington, DC

17. Development
• Contribute core patches
• Test pending patches
• Mentor beginning developers
• #wordpress-dev
• Write plugins

18. Denis de Bernardy
Developer
Trac Reports
#wordpress-dev IRC chat
v
Too hard to maintain tickets
v
Created new reports
v
Easy to follow tickets

19. Andy Peatling
Developer
BuddyPress
Client project
v
Plugins
v
BuddyPress community
v
Automattic

20. Community Building
• Meetups
• WordCamp
• Co-working
• Forums
• WordPress.tv

21. Jeremy Clarke
Developer
WordCamp Theme
Organizer WordCamp
Montréal
v
Requested theme
v
Fixed code
v
Returned for distribution

22. What Can You Do?

23. • Report bugs
• Core patches (including design)
• Test development versions
• Participate in forums
• Write plugins
• Create themes
• Abide by and promote the GPL
• Contribute to related projects like bbPress
• Mentor less experienced users/developers
• Suggest/discuss features on Ideas forum
• Vote in surveys

24. • Media feature design and development for 2.9
• Contribute to or edit a handbook
• Add community features to WordCamp.org
• Improve WordPress.tv
• Find ways to increase participation by women

25. • Media feature design and development for 2.9
• Contribute to or edit a handbook
• Add community features to WordCamp.org
• Improve WordPress.tv
• Find ways to increase participation by women
See me after class.

26. Questions?

27. Please feel free to contact me
with any questions or suggestions.
Jane Wells
jane@automattic.com
http://jane.wordpress.com
twitter: @janeforshort