Welcome to the official blog for the WordPress Support team.
Need help with a WordPress issue? You can find help with your WordPress problem by posting in the support forums or asking on the #wordpress IRC channel.
Want to get involved?
Answering a question in the support forums or on IRC is one of the easiest ways to get started. Everyone knows the answer to something!
We have a detailed handbook to help contributors learn how to work with the forums and IRC.
Weekly Meetings
As well as discussing support issues here on the blog, we use Slack for group communication.
Our weekly meeting is held every Thursday 17:00 UTC, with the first meeting of the month being office hours, and the next will be at Thursday, 17:00 UTC(your time zone) in #forums on SlackSlackSlack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/..
During last week’s support chat, the Support and MetaMetaMeta is a term that refers to the inside workings of a group. For us, this is the team that works on internal WordPress sites like WordCamp Central and Make WordPress. teams agreed on introducing blocks to the support forums.
The support forums have a long history in WordPress. So much so that the current forum editor predates TinyMCE. By introducing blocks, the support forumSupport ForumWordPress Support Forums is a place to go for help and conversations around using WordPress. Also the place to go to report issues that are caused by errors with the WordPress code and implementations. will make use of the modern WordPress editor to improve user experience. Users will be able to easily insert links, share code or embed screenshots. Using Blocks will also enable new possibilities, such as using patterns for common responses to allow for faster answers.
Due to how old the current editor is and how the forums work, enabling the blockBlockBlock is the abstract term used to describe units of markup that, composed together, form the content or layout of a webpage using the WordPress editor. The idea combines concepts of what in the past may have achieved with shortcodes, custom HTML, and embed discovery into a single consistent API and user experience. editor on a per-user, per-language, or per-forum basis is very challenging. The most likely scenario is that once the new forum block editor experience is ready to launch, it will be rolled out to all users on all forums.
The details
Initially, the Meta and Support teams identified four blocks to be added to the support forums: paragraph, list, quote, and code. These four blocks would most quickly modernize the support forum experience while gently introducing support forum users to using blocks.
The next one on the list is an “add via URLURLA specific web address of a website or web page on the Internet, such as a website’s URL www.wordpress.org” image block, as well as a few embed blocks, to make adding images easier.
Inline support links will also be included to help new users.
Next steps: test and share feedback!
Want to see these new blocks in action? Great! A live version of these blocks can be tested at https://test.wordpress.org/support/ If you would like to try it, please leave a comment and we will add you to the testing site.
A meta Trac ticket has been created to track known issues and tasks that need to be completed before support forum blocks are deemed fully functional. There are still a few things to iron out before the blocks can be made available to all users, but we are making quick progress and aim to enable blocks for all users as soon as possible.
You can help by taking time to test, flagging issues, and sharing feedback! Please make sure you review the meta Trac ticket for known issues but do not be afraid to suggest ideas outside the box. Let’s think big!
Please share your feedback before Monday, December 12th.
Any active Support Person can be a team representative and anyone can nominate a Support Person. Self-nominations will also be accepted.
If you know someone you wish to nominate or nominate yourself then please leave a comment in that post. As a matter of politeness if you do nominate someone, please consider asking them first. We don’t want to put anyone on the spot.
Using a Discord Server for live support akin to IRC
On the official WordPress.orgWordPress.orgThe community site where WordPress code is created and shared by the users. This is where you can download the source code for WordPress core, plugins and themes as well as the central location for community conversations and organization. https://wordpress.org/ site, support is limited to the support forums and the #WordPress IRC channel. The WordPress Slack is meant for administrivia and collaboration. It is not meant as a venue for live support.
Alan Fuller raised the idea about using a Discord server and that was discussed. This was actively discussed and pointed out that anyone can use IRC without an account. Discord requires an account to be used; that may not be a bar as Slack does too.
Many opensource projects use Discord as a way to provide live support to users and other contributors. The discussion left off with perhaps someone can try it and report back to the Support Team how that went.
“I have this issue too” replies and how to handle those in the forums
This was a follow up to an earlier conversation about this topic.
The consensus of those attending the Slack meeting was that for pluginPluginA plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party/theme topics if the developer is alright with it then let people pile on to those topics as much as they want.
There was also some talk about making a determination if someone is interleaving support, meaning they have their problem and are taking over someone else’s topic.
The exception for that is if the “I have the problem too” replies become abusive. Then those may be moderated as any other abuse is currently handled.
It’s time to select team representatives for 2023 across the WordPress project, including the Support team!
What is a Team RepTeam RepA Team Rep is a person who represents the Make WordPress team to the rest of the project, make sure issues are raised and addressed as needed, and coordinates cross-team efforts.?
Within the WordPress project, each contributor team has a minimum of two team representatives. Often abbreviated to “team reps,” these people represent the team across the project, share key updates across all contributor teams, and generally help to support the team as a whole. You can read more about the team rep definition and expectations on the Team Reps page and in last year’s announcement.
Expectations for team reps can vary from team to team. In general, Support team reps help to:
prepare for and run Support weekly team chats
providing as-required updates to other contributor groups
generally representing Support across the project, or in the occasional chat
maintain a high-level perspective and awareness on current Support projects
Team reps should expect to dedicate 1 to 2 hours per week to these activities. Any active Support contributor can be a team rep, and we can have more than two team reps. Likewise, an existing team rep can continue in the position, as well, though having new people in these roles is encouraged!
Opening nominations
Any active Support person can be a team rep, and anyone can nominate a team rep. Self-nominations are also accepted. Everyone is welcome to give some thought as to who is a good fit for this role and nominate them in the comments of this post.
Nominations for Support team reps will be open until December 1, 2022. Those selected as team reps will take over these responsibilities starting in January 2023 and would be in this position for the full year, until December 2023.
After the nominations close, if there are enough nominees that we need to make a selection, I will publish a poll the in the Support meeting on December 1, so everyone can cast their votes. We’ll keep the polls open for 24 hours. Keep in mind that whoever is selected as a team rep will need to accept the role. So if someone nominates you, and you aren’t available or interested, don’t worry!
If you have any questions about the team rep role, want to learn more, or any other doubts, please share them here in the comments!
A reminder that the US has returned to Standard Time, so check your calendar to make sure you’re here at 17:00 UTC.
Headlines / Community updates
This is where news that are relevant or good to know for the team from across the community are brought up and shared.
Support Team Representative nominations
Every year, we should select a new person to represent this team to the other WordPress teams and handle coordination issues. What is that job? See https://make.wordpress.org/support/2021/10/team-representative-nominations/ for more information. Let’s chat about this at the November 11 meeting and finalize things at the following meeting on the 18th.
Start your own topic? Or “Me, too!”reports
There has been some discussion around the “start your own topic rules”. Sometimes, a “pile on” may be the right way to handle pluginPluginA plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party/theme/bug issues, sometimes not. Let’s discuss and see if we can find a good policy.
The Rosetta Forums
This is the section where we reach out to the non-English speaking parts of our community, to see how they are doing, if there’s anything we can help each other with, or just interesting things going on that it would be nice to share with others.
There’s no requirements for previous participation or “fame” to share here, anyone is welcome, and we encourage newcomers to participate!
Unable to make the meeting, or maybe meetings just aren’t your thing? We would still love to hear how things are going in other non-English speaking parts of our community. Please feel free to let us know via the comment section below, in your own time, if there is anything you’d like to share, any questions or concerns you have, ort just to let us know you’re doing ok!
We will make a habit of putting this callout with every agenda post going forward, so that everyone has a chance to join in.
Open floor
This part of the meeting only happens if there is time, the team aims to cover the pre-planned topics first in any given meeting.
When open floor starts, any topic posted either as a comment to this agenda post will be looked at, or as many as there is time for. If there is still time left after this, then meeting attendees may step forward with questions, comments, remarks, anything relating to the support team that they’d like to handle.
It is also important to note that not everyone is comfortable posting things publicly, there is complete understanding of this, and users are welcome to contact the team representative (@sterndata) via direct messages on Slack with whatever they wish the team to look at together.
For any other items to discuss, please add them to the comments below, or bring them up in the meeting.
There has been no negative fallout from our relaxed policies on pluginPluginA plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party vulnerability discussion and premium product support established during the September 29th meeting.
PHPPHPPHP (recursive acronym for PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor) is a widely-used open source general-purpose scripting language that is especially suited for web development and can be embedded into HTML. http://php.net/manual/en/intro-whatis.php. 8.x
WordPress 6.x is tested with PHP 8 and offers preliminary support, but we cannot guarantee compatibility for third-party plugins and themes since that is the responsibility of the plugin/theme developer.
We, along with Drupal and Symfony, are asking the PHP group to extend support of PHP 7.4.x, but we have no firm answers yet.
No More Flagging for Premium Support
We are no longer flagging users for requesting premium support on the forums, as that hurts their ability to post across allWordPress.orgWordPress.orgThe community site where WordPress code is created and shared by the users. This is where you can download the source code for WordPress core, plugins and themes as well as the central location for community conversations and organization. https://wordpress.org/ forums.
Support requests for premium products will continue to be encouraged towards the proper support venue (without closing the thread), and as always, flags (or bans as necessary) will continue to be applied for other Guideline violations.
Become Flag-Neutral if not Flag-Negative
The Pending queue has become excessive lately and is a drain on Moderator time (your experience may vary depending on timezone).
As you rescue items from the Pending queue, please check the reason for the flag and un-flag as necessary. If you’re not un-flagging at least one person daily, please reconsider how strict you are on that end of enforcement.
Weekend Assignment
Please test the latest WordPress 6.1 RCRelease CandidateA beta version of software with the potential to be a final product, which is ready to release unless significant bugs emerge. and the Twenty Twenty-Three theme, and report any bugs you find!
