October 19, 2015 — WordPress is a great content management system but keeping your frontend-code clean and well structured in WordPress can be very tough. In this talk we go through the steps of using WordPress mainly for the backend and we’ll be using tools like the new REST api, Backbone and Handlebars to create a theme that loads fast and is an absolute joy to build and maintain.

Presentation Slides »

October 18, 2015 — Working on projects, with other people, can be hard. Working virtually on these projects can make it even harder. However, there is hope! In this session participants will learn how to ensure everyone working on a project is working together to make awesome things happen. Having an understanding of virtual teams and how they work is imperative to building a great project team. Practical tools will be given on how to utilize technology to open lines of communication, what to do when things aren’t go well on your project, and what you can do to “get the job done.”

October 18, 2015 — We will cover:
difference between onpage and offpage SEO
general WP settings for SEO
helpful plugins
picking a keyword
headers, alt tags, internal linking, meta tags
categories vs tags

October 17, 2015 — In May, 2015 Automattic acquired WooCommerce. In July, 2015 the San Francisco WooCommerce meetup group joined the San Francisco WordPress meetup group to invite the architects of that acquisition to discuss the process of the deal, as well as the future of the newly joined forces from the Automattic Lounge in San Francisco.
Watch the conversation between Catherine Stewart, VP of Business Development @automattic and Matt Cohen, WooThemes Product Team Lead, @automattic.
Moderated by Brent Shepard, Founder @prospress and Beka Rice, Author-Content Manager @skyverge.

October 12, 2015 — When someone tells you that anyone can contribute to WordPress you may not believe them, but in this talk I will show you how this is true.
Jenny will show you how you do not have to be a developer to contribute back to the open source project we all love so much, explain the different ways this is possible, how to set up and upcoming events that makes contributing back so easy.
This talk is aimed anyone, regardless of skill set and ability, who has not contributed to the WordPress project or any open source project before.

October 12, 2015 — WordPress development can be quite cumbersome, especially if you deal with different clients and everybody has own server configurations or special needs. Using Services like MAMP are great for a quick start but if you need to match certain criteria it is good to be as close as possible to live environment.

Vagrant is a tool, which lets you setup a Virtual Machine on your computer, which reflects your live environment. And people from the community already built some special VMs for WordPress developer. Setting up a new WordPress (Multi-) Site is just a mater of seconds and you’re ready to go.

This session, will teach you what Vagrant is, how you can use it and what specific WordPress solution exists to boost your WordPress development.

Presentation Slides »

October 11, 2015 — Many of the most popular WordPress commercial plugins started as side-projects. What makes those plugins different than the other 34,000 plugins in the repo?

During this presentation, Vova Feldman will share his journey as a plugin developer. What started as a side-project in late 2010, turned into a successful lifestyle business with a team of five members. He’ll cover his entire four-year experience, how he got into WordPress and the things he learned about commercial plugins economics. He’ll also share about the thin line between keeping your users happy and making money. And will explain why freemium plugins are great for the WordPress economy.

October 10, 2015 — Becoming a developer is not easy. It isn’t much easier once you become one. You start by knowing very little to no code, and just as you feel confident about coding, you realize there are at least 2 languages you need to now learn. I’ve been there, and this talk is about some skills I’ve learned to help jump from that starting level, to the next. Tricks and things I’ve learned through over a decade of coding to help you in your developer journey.

Presentation Slides »

October 10, 2015 — “Bloated Themes” – You’ve probably heard the term if you’ve been around WordPress much. In this talk I’ll address the problems with using themes that come bundled with 900+ shiny objects. You don’t want that if you want a stable, secure, fast website that will last more than 6 months. I’ll cover criteria to look for and things to avoid when choosing a premium theme, or a starter theme.

October 10, 2015 — IN THIS TALK I WILL:
* Look at long-term sustainability issues for a WordPress blog
* List best practices for sustainable WordPress websites
* Describe solutions for individuals
* Describe solutions and business opportunities for hosting providers
* Survey how other Web2.0 platforms are approaching these issues, eg: Google’s “”Inactive Account Manager”” or Facebook’s “”Memorialization Request””