Sessions

Presented by Job Thomas in Auditorium.

The Gutenberg editor is swiftly approaching its merge into WordPress core. In this workshop, we’ll explore its potential and find ways to make optimal use of Gutenberg in your daily writing flow.

Presented by Chido Warambwa in Café.

In this workshop/session I aim to show case a little library I wrote that allows you to approach creating WordPress themes or plugins in a simplified, object oriented way. This library does this by abstracting most of the code associated with creating items like custom Post Types and providing API calls to handle interacting with these items. The workshop/session will be loosely based on the example found at http://wpoow.devchid.com (docs site). The workshop will also touch on items to consider when thinking about creating themes or plugins in a object oriented way.

Presented by Lindeni Mahlalela in Café.

WordPress has grown to be much more than a blogging and website building tool or CMS, it has grown to be a powerful platform that can be used to power or share data with other platform using the built in and extensible REST API. It can be used as a back end platform for other front end technologies including mobile applications. With the increasing adoption of mobile technologies it is about time to use existing or new WordPress websites to power the future.

Presented by Hanna Partridge in Auditorium.

This will be a type of case study for an interesting website on WordPress and WooCommerce. It will not be intense coding but a basic knowledge of WordPress and WooCommerce. The case study is based on our 2016 launched website that has reached R 1 million sales on a WordPress and WooCommerce site in 1 year September 2016 (launch month) – September 2017, and then did another million in the next 7 months again.
“Our website has some products that have over 120 variations on 1 product= 123 Variants is our biggest product. Basically I can pack out an entire room or 2 rooms’ floors using only the same 1 product in different colours and sizes. Coverage of the following:

• Basics you need to build an online store
• Implementing integrations like Facebook,Mailchimp on WordPress ( and why we do it)
• Maintaining and running the store.
• Using paid memberships pro and running parallel sales with Dynamic Pricing for public,gold members and wholesalers.

So this will be about running a successful store using WooCommerce. Tips about what to do, what not to do. Tips on what to use, how to market, how to provide excellent customer service, and provide a remarkable shopper experience online.
Some more topics I’ll cover.

• Simplifying the website layout, using new tools and old tools.
• The advantages of a UX Builder in your theme.
• Integrations of MailChimp, PayFast, i-pay and several other.
• The challenges we faced with over 8000 products.
• Hosting solutions and problems we faced, etc.

Those are some of the information. It can be a case study what we used and how we made it successful.
This topic can be beneficial for both developers and users.
I believe that developers sometimes need to see what the cosmetic side of what they do should look like too, and how to provide a great customer experience by simplifying the look of the website for your ‘average joe’ to navigate it.

Presented by Daine Mawer in Auditorium.

With the coming release of WordPress 5.0, we’re all getting ready for one of the biggest events in WordPress history: Gutenberg. Whether you’re excited or terrified, understanding the basic mechanics of the Gutenberg Block API is going to become a must for your business as well as for engineers who are building custom WordPress experiences for clients. In this workshop, I’ll take you through building your first Gutenberg block, step by step. We’ll then expand upon what you’ve built using further examples in order to show you the true power behind Gutenberg.

Please note that this is a technical workshop, a base understanding of Javascript, PHP and some general tinkering with Gutenberg would be beneficial but not required.

Presented by Anchen le Roux in Café.

An upbeat talk or workshop on how to change the website experience for clients by bringing in elements of fun and lightheartedness. No matter the process you follow from Discovery to Delivery you can make it an experience your clients will rave about for years to come. We’ll look at elements like:

• Entertaining workshops
• Enjoyable communication
• A well designed and clear process
• Over delivery and pleasant surprises

Presented by Matt Bush in Café.

Find the problem line in your plugin code, amend it, refresh the page in your WordPress test install, re-submit a form for the 937th time today, scream obscenities that you didn’t even know that you knew at the inevitable WSOD, consult debug.log, remove some failed values from the database, reset and start again.

Does this scenario sound familiar? Other than expanding your vocabulary in ways that would make your mother blush, do you want to carry on like this? Is there another way?

Yes there is, Test Driven Development. Learn how to write tests first and code second, to detect code smells through writing tests and how to test WordPress sites.

While testing won’t remove all possibility of turning the air blue, it offers a path to improved code, a controlled environment that behaves the same time every time, and at the very least, it will point you at the exact piece of code that is failing meaning that you can target your expletives accordingly.

Presented by Pascal Birchler in Auditorium.

Soon after the release of WordPress 15 years ago, support for internationalisation was added to the software. This meant that themes, plugins, and WordPress itself could be translated. This was a huge deal as WordPress is used all over the world, in countries where English is not the main language. WordPress was quickly translated into German, Japanese and many more languages.

Over the years, WordPress has steadily improved the way we have to work with internationalisation. However, challenges still exist and there will always be new ones ahead. Projects like Gutenberg and ecosystems beyond WordPress.org force us to continuously iterate.

In this talk you’ll learn how to make use of the latest and greatest technology to make your WordPress plugin or theme fully internationalised. Pascal is going to highlight how you can leverage the powers of WordPress, GlotPress, and WP-CLI to improve the translation workflow in your WordPress projects.

Presented by Anchen le Roux in Sessions.

How to be a successful WordPress freelancer or agency owner while living a full life. In our fast pace world it can sometimes be difficult to have it all, but unlike popular believe it’s definitely doable. This talk looks at a framework to keep life as stress free as possible:

• Productising
• Productivity
• Planning
• Prioritisation
• People
• Processes

Presented by Claire Nieuwoudt in Sessions.

We all know the basics of good customer service, we just tend to hate doing the work. I absolutely love to infect people with my obsession to do business differently. Mostly through sharing my adventures and misadventures with customers, as well as sharing tips and tricks on how I do this with my WooCommerce store and stay sane. It makes for great conversation so I love for people to ask as many questions as possible. I may just throw a few bow ties at the people who ask the best questions.

Presented by Oduor Ken Jagero in Sessions.

Content Management Systems (CMSs) like WordPress, Drupal and Joomla have bridged a huge gap when it comes to content creation and it’s wide spread. They has given a voice to many folks who otherwise would not be heard. When we talk about content creation, we are also talking about templates, wizards, and other tools we use to modify content. As I’ve seen this growth in Africa through my work and my involvement with CMS Africa, I will speak about my love for open source content management and how in Africa it has created a level playing field between the technologically capable and those who don’t consider themselves geeks.

Presented by Thabo Tswana in Sessions.

In May 2016, Harare, Zimbabwe was selected to host a WordCamp Incubator. This led to the birth of a local WordPress community. Thabo will talk about what it took to get the WordPress community in Harare started, and what you can do to grow your community.

Presented by Vedanshu Jain, Hugh Lashbrooke, Thabo Tswana, Pascal Birchler, Trisha Cornelius in Sessions.

Have you ever wanted to contribute to WordPress, but just don’t know where to start? In this panel we will bring together a group of experienced WordPress contributors to discuss all the varied ways that you can easily become involved in the WordPress project.

The day after WordCamp, we will be hosting our first ever Contributor Day, so this will be some great preparation for that!

Presented by Trisha Cornelius in Sessions.

In an ideal world everyone would automatically feel safe and welcome in tech spaces, both at events and in the workspace. But, in reality, creating an inviting space requires work. This talk covers some principles and practices that can be implemented to make a space welcoming for everyone.
Talk Description

The data is clear. People who do not identify as white males often are excluded in technology spaces. Sometimes it is intentional, but most time it is a series of omissions that result in the exclusion.

This talk will explore:

• Understanding inclusion and creating an inclusive environment
• Why talk about diversity and inclusion at all
• Social differentials and micro-inequalities
• The importance of leadership in creating a welcoming environment
• Visions and values for an inclusive environment
• Imposter syndrome as a barrier to diversity and inclusion
• The advantages of creating an inclusive and diverse environment
• Steps that can be taken to create a welcoming environment

As a woman in tech unfortunately I have both witnessed and experienced harassment, although not as much as others. This talk draws heavily on the work of Nene Molefi, specifically her book A Journey of Diversity and the works of Laura Bates in Everyday Sexism as well as countless other articles.

Presented in Sessions.

In a separate track, some high-schoolers will be taught the basics of WordPress sites. During this plenary session, they will present their projects to us.

Presented by Jonathan Bossenger, Bruce Lunnis in Sessions.

How getting involved with the WordPress community changed my life. From attending my first WordCamp in 2013 to being a Co-Organiser of WordPress Cape Town & WordCamp Cape Town in 2018. How the community helped grow my network, grow my WordPress development agency, and changed my career path from developer to community manager, all while travelling the world.