WordCamp Cape Town 2016 session videos

24 November 2016WordCamp 1 Comment

In September this year, we all came together to improve our WordPress skills, build some community spirit, and just generally have a great time at WordCamp Cape Town 2016. One of the things we promised at the event was that all of the day 2 sessions would be recorded and the videos published online for everyone to watch, rewatch and appreciate.

Well now, thanks to the tireless work of the WordPress TV volunteer team, all of the sessions from day 2 are available on WordPress.tv! We didn’t record the workshops because they’re just a bit too impractical to film and watching a video of a workshop isn’t really all the beneficial as you need to really be there to take part. Sessions are different of course as they don’t require active participation on your part.

So, go forth and enjoy all of the talks from WordCamp Cape Town 2016 right here!

Community co-working #coworkpress

22 November 2016Community 1 Comment

As a local WordPress community we have an opportunity to connect with each other in a way that we can never really connect with those outside of Cape Town. To foster those connections and to give us space to become a more close-knit community of WordPress users, we’re going to be getting together as a community on the last Wednesday of every month to simply work alongside each other – otherwise known as ‘co-working’ (hence the incredibly clever hashtag #coworkpress).

These days will be informal and we will meet at a different location each month – each location is more than likely going to be a coffee shop, but we have no set rules on the type of place at which we’ll meet. We will not ‘plan’ these days in the sense that we will not be booking a table or anything – it’s more of a relaxed Capetonian day of working alongside each other with good coffee and good food.

You can arrive at any time during the day and leave at any time during the day – there’s no pressure to stay for any length of time other than that which your job allows and what you’re in the mood for. It’s also worth noting that these are not sponsored days – anything you eat or drink will be on your own tab.

Given that we will be changing the venue each month, you will need to follow our meetup group for details on where we will be each time.

The upcoming co-working day will be on Wednesday, 30 November at Tribe Coffee in Woodstock. On the day, we will collectively decide what venue we will use for the following meeting – obviously noting that we will not be doing this in December as it will be year-end holidays and this is Cape Town after all.

Looking forward to seeing you all there!

#coworkpress

WordPress Global Translation Day recap

14 November 2016Community, Events, Meetups 5 Comments

Saturday 12 November 2016 was the second WordPress Global Translation Day. It was my first event, not only as translator but also as co-event host. I was a little nervous as I would also mostly be meeting the attendees for the first time, so I had no idea how things would go down.

Fortunately the WordPress community is a great place, and this is because of the people in it. From the moment the first attendee arrived to when we eventually packed up for the day we had a blast, translating WordPress into our chosen languages, telling stories, cracking jokes and just generally having a good time.

Attendees included (from left to right in the picture above) Shabier, Wesley, Rosy, Sello and myself. Wesley, who submitted the locale request with the help of Trisha from the Johannesburg meetup group, was also translating Xhosa for WordPress for the first time. Not only that but Rosy started working on Sotho and Sello on Setswana. By the end of the day we had two translation files for these languages that we’ll be looking to submit requests to be added as locales for WordPress. We’re almost halfway towards adding all 11 official languages, just in one day.

At around 12pm we had the opportunity to share the live stream with Petya Raykovska (the WordPress Polyglots team lead) and the team from Johannesburg, led by Trisha. We had a few feedback/echoing issues but it was good fun to be able to share our story with the translation teams around the world. It was also pretty amazing to see all the other teams from Europe and India and share in their fun.

After a great lunch from Woolies and Vida (sponsored by the great folks at WooCommerce) we had a group Skype with John Parkinson, a volunteer with WordPress TV from Ohio in America, who is putting together a short video showcasing the day. Afterwards we had another Skype with Trisha and the team from Johannesburg, sharing stories and meeting our Gauteng counterparts. I for one am looking forward to seeing them all again in person at WordCamp Johannesburg this coming weekend.

Thanks to our generous sponsors, Ashleigh Norris and the team from The Business Center for the amazing venue and WooCommerce, who sponsored our data and lunch for the event. Also thanks to my co-host Hugh for helping with getting the sponsorships in place (and checking in with me from time to time to see how things were going.) To Petya and everyone in the Polyglots team, thanks for organising this amazing event. I’m looking forward to the next one

Finally a big thanks to Shabier, Wesley, Rosy and Sello for taking some time out of there day to help translate WordPress in their languages. I look forward to seeing you all again at our next meetup!

Global WordPress Translation Day – 12 November 2016

8 November 2016Announcements, Events Leave a comment

The Global WordPress Translation Day is 1 full day (24 hours) dedicated to bringing WordPress to more people around the world. It includes 24 hours of live training sessions on WordPress internationalisation & localisation as well as communities getting together to translate WordPress into their local languages. You can find out more on the Global WordPress Translation Day website.

For the Cape Town event on this day, we will be joining together to watch the live training sessions as well as work on translating WordPress into our local languages. The schedule for the live training sessions is on the Translation Day site, so you can see what to expect there.

If you would like to join us for the event, then please RSVP on the event page!

The details for our local event are:

Date: Saturday, 12 November
Time: 11:00 – 16:00
Venue: The Business Centre – No 1 Bridgeway Road, Bridgeways Precinct, Century City

If you can only attend for part of the event, then that’s not a problem – come when you can and join in the fun. If you can’t make it at all, but you would still like to take part then you can do that too! All you need to do is join our local Slack group here and head into the #localisation channel – that’s where all the translating discussion will be happening.

Translating WordPress is super easy to do! You don’t need any technical knowledge to get involved – all you need is some mild proficiency in any non-English language and you’ll be able to help out.

The only local South African languages that WordPress is able to be translated into at the moment are South African English and Afrikaans. If you would like to start translating WordPress into a different language (that does not appear on this page) then please comment on here with the language name as well as your username for WordPress.org ASAP, so we can get the Polyglots team to add your requested language to that list before the day starts. This is very important, otherwise you may not be able to work on translating WordPress into your language on the day.

I can’t personally make it on Saturday, but Jon Bossenger will be there to make sure everything runs smoothly. It’s going to be a great event!

#WPTranslationDay

GROW! Students at WordCamp Cape Town 2016

8 November 2016WordCamp, , , , , , 1 Comment

For the last few years, we’ve always had visitors from RLabs’ GROW! Leadership Academy. Here are a few of their experiences.

Chante Petersen

“WordCamp 2016 took place at River Club in Observatory on the 9th of September and I was fortunate enough to attend. It was the first time that I attended the event and my experience is one to be remembered.

I’m not a designer or a coder, but WordCamp showed me how interesting it can be. The speakers were very passionate about what they were saying and that passion came across in their talks. It kept the crowd engaged and interested.

The talk that stood out the most for me was Leo Gopal’s. I enjoyed the message he was bringing across. I would definitely attend another WordCamp if I had the opportunity.”

Marlin Erasmus

Follow: @marlinerasmus

“I was very fortunate to have another great experience at WordCamp this year. I totally enjoyed most of the talks, but I couldn’t relate to the advice or features that involved programming as I’m not familiar with it.

The talks that I liked the most were the ones about Mental wellness by Leo Gopal and Rob Hope’s lightning talk about one-page sites. I was also very encouraged Konstantin Obenland on how WordPress.org was founded. The MCs were also very entertaining and I really enjoyed them thoroughly.”

Ilyaas Arendse

“I am really grateful for the opportunity that was afforded by the team to go to this year’s WordPress Wordcamp. It was really awesome getting to interact with other WordPress users, they taught me things about WordPress that I did not know.

I learnt about how they are constantly improving on the platform and how they are getting ready to release a new version of WordPress 4.7.

And from a WordPress user’s perspective I learnt about how people are using the platform to their advantage by becoming experts on WordPress and starting their own businesses of designing websites for companies, and how some use their blogs that they have created to express their feelings and help others that are in the same position as they are.

There is still so much more for me to learn and I intend to do just that.

On a lighter note; the food was the bomb. I am also really grateful that the food served at the event was Halal because being Muslim I am not permitted to eat any non-halal foods.

Overall the day was well spent and I would go again in a heartbeat.”

Sasha-lee Matthews

Follow: @SasheY_M

“This was not the first time I attended WordCamp and yet again it was another great experience.

I never knew that one could use WordPress to help the community and make a difference. I learnt about so many people who use their WordPress websites to make a difference.

I was so inspired by Leo Gopal’s talk on ‘Mental Wellness,the WordPress Community and You.’ He shared about how he could use WordPress and his story to impact people who were going through similar situations as himself. Because he was brave and shared his story, it inspired me to get back on my blog and also share my story to show people that there is light at the end of the tunnel and that things won’t be this way forever.

#WPHugs

It then also got me thinking about buying myself a domain so that I can explore more of the plugins and themes that were spoken about. In addition, I got to meet very interesting people and tell them about the work I do.

I am really grateful to have gotten the opportunity to attend WordCamp 2016. It is definitely one for the books!”

Robin Jack

This was my first WordCamp experience. It was very fruitful for me, I took as much in as I could. I am amazed at all the things you could do with WordPress. It was amazing to hear about all the business ideas and how you can help out in your communities using WordPress.

The session that really got to me was the talk about mental awareness by Leo Gopal. That session gave me the most insight and allowed me to do some reflection on my own.
It was good hearing about people’s business plans and how they used the WordPress platform to go forward with their ideas.

It was definitely a great experience and I look forward to future WordCamps. Thank you.

Back to Basics

7 November 2016Announcements, Community 1 Comment

This blog has been somewhat neglected of late and that’s largely because we just haven’t been putting in the time into it that we should be. To some degree, the same can be said for our local meetup group – while we (the organising team) have endeavoured to organise regular events for the community, we have fallen far short of what we intended. This is steadily changing though as more people are getting involved in assisting with event organising – a fact that make me exceptionally excited.

So, from here on out you will start to see more activity on this blog (now that it is living at it’s new home on WordPress.com) and we will be pushing for more local events as well. Keep an eye out on the blog for some announcements real soon, as well as some new ways that you can get involved in the local community. You can follow the blog via email from the form in the footer.

WordPress is all about community and we only work if more people get involved in making it happen – the more that everyone helps out, the more effective we can be.

I’m looking forward to pushing this community further, together!

Charity Hackathon Recap: Video & Photos

5 September 2014do_action, Press Leave a comment

[box]This post originally appeared on WooThemes.com – head over there to leave a comment.[/box]

Since we posted a wrap up post about the first do_action( ‘wordpress-charity-hackathon’ ), we have heard from a number of people all over the world who are interested in replicating the idea in their own cities. We will soon have a greater resource online that will assist people with getting their own do_action events going, but in the mean time you can get a pretty good idea of how it all worked from the video and photos taken at the event.

If you were at the event then go ahead and tag yourself in the Facebook album (embedded below). Read More…