David Theriault

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  • 2022 Web Almanac Performance Data Shows WordPress Sites May Be Overusing Lazy-Loading

    The last two chapters of the 2022 Web Almanac were released this week, they were Structured Data and Performance, completing the 729-page ebook of the report. The WordPress-specific chapter was published earlier this month with metrics that indicate adoption is continuing it’s trend of growing year over year. The Performance chapter was written by Etsy performance engineer Melissa…

  • Openverse Audio Catalog Passes 800,000 Files, Audio Support Now Out of Beta

    Openverse, which was formerly known as Creative Commons Search before it joined the WordPress project, has passed an important milestone with its newly added support for audio files. The catalog has now indexed more than 800,000 audio files from across the internet and its development team has now taken audio support out of the beta phase. Visitors to…

  • Twenty Twenty-Two theme is the first of the block theme era to be tagged accessibility-ready

    After an amazing seven-month long effort across multiple contributor teams at WordPress, the Twenty Twenty-Two (also known as TT2) default theme will be tagged as “Accessibility-Ready” when WordPress 6.1 ships this coming November. It is the first block theme to meet the requirements for gaining this wonderful distinction for accessibility. During its development the theme was also…

  • WebP by Default Pulled from Upcoming WordPress 6.1 Release

    Last month, the plan was for WordPress to generate WebP images by default for new JPEG image uploads and that was put on hold for the upcoming WordPress 6.1 release after objections from lead developers. The original proposal had been merged into core at the end of July, despite significant feedback and concerns from WordPress’ developer community objecting…

  • Getting a Job After Coding Bootcamp

    I read a good article by Matt Mullenweg about getting a job after taking part in a coding bootcamp. While the applications/resumes have been written well he goes on to talk about lack of experience. By this he means the lack of real job experience especially in the field that you are trying to get…

  • WebP by Default Merged into Core for WordPress 6.1 update

    WebP, the new image format developed by Google, which is intended to replace JPEG, PNG, and GIF file formats, will soon be generated by default for new JPEG image uploads in WordPress and used for website content. The main work was committed to core for inclusion in the upcoming WordPress 6.1 release. The initial proposal was revised after…

  • Is It Time To Give Up GitHub?

    I was pointed to an interesting article from WP Tavern called Give Up GitHub: The Time Has Come! on the Software Freedom Conservancy website. The Software Freedom Conservancy is a nonprofit organization centered around ethical technology. Their mission is to ensure the right to repair, improve and reinstall software at your choosing. They promote and…

  • WordPress Birthday 2022

    I want to wish WordPress a Happy 19th Birthday today.

  • WordPress Performance Team Puts WebP by Default Proposal on Hold After Feedback

    The WordPress Performance team has put its WebP by Default proposal on hold after the community voiced some critical feedback and significant technical concerns of this proposal. The new feature that was proposed would generate WebP images on upload by default for new JPEG uploads and would use the WebP images by default for website content. WordPress’…

  • Performance Team Proposes Enabling WebP by Default in WordPress 6.0

    WordPress’ Performance Team has published a feature proposal that would enable WebP images by default in the next update to WordPress, expanding core support for the modern image format.  In July, 2021, WordPress 5.8 introduced WebP support, which allows its users to upload and use WebP images in their content. If the proposal is eventually approved, version 6.0…