BDD is the best way to communicate business requirements from stakeholders to developers. General Chicken explains what BDD is from a business POV.
Quora: Why do American bloggers include disclosure for cookies?
General Chicken answers a question from Quora.
General Chicken answers a question from Quora.
Do page builders slow down my website or is it a myth?
General Chicken answers a question from Quora.
General Chicken answers a question from Quora.
WordPress plugin: Randomize Main Loop Order
This is a plugin I made in response to a Quora post.
Better Error Messages
What do you think of Gutenberg?
Gutenberg is the end of WordPress. It’s time to fork the CMS away from Automattic.
Business Stakeholders: How to Describe a Software FEATURE
A feature from the biz perspective
What is a feature?
A feature is an aspect of software that is useful. Anything you can express, that is possible, and that you can afford, can be a feature. A bug is an aspect of software that isn’t useful.
Since we’re talking about development, we’re discussing software features that don’t exist yet. These are features that we would like to build, or existing features that we would like to make better. Describe a feature with should statements:
- It should email all the clients once a month.
- The client should have a setting page in the admin area.
- The plugin should have a custom post type called GPS coordinates for each subscriber.
- The div should show a timeline of Civil War battles in the footer area.
The next statement you should create is the reason for the feature you are requesting. What is the business value of this feature? Describe the reason by using a “Because”, or “So that” or “In or that”
- So that the clients are routinely updated.
- In order that the user can change the settings.
- Because we need to store the GPS data.
Alternatively, you can use Gherkin syntax for feature development.
Vanishing Checkbox in WordPress Comment Form
This is the tale of the incredible vanishing checkbox, on WordPress versions 4.9.6 and 4.9.8.
WordPress uses cookies by default to log in users and track who is making a comment. Cookies are small snippets of data kept on a user’s browser. WordPress is trying to deal with the new GDPR regulations. It seems from following Trac, that it’s a giant cluster fuck.
This annoying checkbox was forced onto every WordPress site in the world as of 4.9.6:
As soon as I saw this monster I started making a plugin to roll it back. It was obvious to me that most sites wouldn’t want this, and that it served absolutely no purpose. It comes from a misunderstanding of the law, and a desire to be clever.
There is no requirement in GDPR for websites to display a check box for cookie use. None, totally false.
Then comes out 4.9.8 which removed the check-box that was just installed!
However! This revert also breaks functionality. Users who aren’t logged in have no way now of knowing that their comment was submitted.
So the situation as of 4.9.8 is that the comment cookie check box came and went, and now everybody’s site is broken.
You can solve the problem by re-activating the comment check box in the admin SETTINGS >> DISCUSSION, but then you’ll still have the checkbox. Or use this plugin to restore functionality to the way it was.
How to find the best possible WordPress plugins
How to find the best WordPress plugins
Post this template as a guaranteed contest on upwork.com or freelancer.com for $40.
******** Recommend and install a WordPress plugin *********
I want to install a WordPress plugin, but I’m not sure exactly which one I should use.
Give me a very brief overview of what WordPress plugin(s) I should use, how much it will cost me (if anything), and what functionality it has. I’m not looking for a comprehensive overview of WordPress plugins, I’m looking for a specific plugin and someone who can execute installing it. You don’t need to submit credentials or previous projects, just know how to use the plugin you recommend and be able to install and set up the functionality.
Submit a simple text entry describing what plugin I should use, and you’re contact information. I will provide you with access. This is a guaranteed contest.
Functionality I need:
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
The Toolkit for WordPress BDD
To do Behavior Driven Development [BDD] in WordPress, you need to get the tools! Here is the stack you should use:
Operating System
Ubuntu. I personally use an Ubuntu 20 development server on my MacBook Pro laptop. You can run Ubuntu on most machines with a USB memory stick, and it’s free. I use Ubuntu on the Amzaon AWS remote cloud servers and production servers. Ubuntu is a brand, but it’s just a Debian based Linux distro, so it’s future proof. If you stopped liking Ubuntu, you could switch to another distro without hassle.
You can also use Mac or Windows.
Containerize?
Many teams who do testing use virtualization like kubernetes or Docker. I don’t quite undertstand the rationale for this in 2020. An entire serve is virtually free, so why btoher with a server within a server? I prefer to use full blown, cloud based WordPress sites. Just use a dummy domain name.
Get the stack
Once you have a machine with Ubuntu running, you can load the entire development stack by running a single command:
source <(curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/johndeebdd/Remote-BDD-Setup/master/installScripts/wordpress.sh)
Directions
Test Framework
Codeception with WordPress modules - PHPunit is the standard and default library for doing unit testing in PHP. CodeCeption INCLUDES PHPunit, as well as a whole series of libraries for doing BDD.
End to End [E2E] Testing
You should use the WPWebDriver and WPDb modules. You can use Selenium to drive a full browser. You can write your test in the Gherkin format, or in procedural PHP. Generally, I consider Gherkin cumbersome and not worth the candle.
Sample acceptance.yml
WP-Unit testing
You should use the WPloader and WPQueries modules.
Sample unit.yml
Where does code live?
Use a Git repo. Use Github for code that has a public face. Use Bitbucket for private repos [or pay Github for a private repo, either way].
How do you control outsourcer Git commit access?
First setup a few emails: freelancer1@yourdomain.com
, freelancer2@yourdomain.com
etc. These accounts are granted direct commit access to the repo. Give the outsourcer access to the email account. The repo itself can set a webhook to pull to the production server upon commit. When you want to freeze the outsourcer from the project, you just change the password on Github and email accounts. The project manager retains access to pull to production. The outsourcer can make a commit and it appears directly on the development server. When the commit is approved by the project manager, he does a manual pull to the production machine.
How does the outsourcer work on the code?
Some programmers will have their own IDE setups that they like and know how to use. Eclipse is the best free IDE, while PHPStorm is probably the best commercial IDE. If they know how to pull down from Github and run the code on a local host, great. If they don't know how to do that, setup a development server in the cloud for them. Our stack include the Codiad IDE, which is an open source IDE similar to PHPStorm. TO access it, just go to /codiad/ on your development server, it's all setup already.
How do you run the test suite?
cd /var/www/html/wp-content/plugins/{project dir}
bin/codecept run -vvv --html
How do I see the test results?
They appear in the terminal, or at http://yourdomain.com/wp-content/plugins/{project dir}/tests/_output/
Usually in the terminal you can use the up arrow shortcut.
How do I commit to the repo?
git add --all
git commit -m "some kind of message!"
git push origin master
How do I log in to the WordPress site?
You can log in by using the FastRegister plugin. Just enter an email in the sidebar form and viola! You're logged in as an admin.
How do I log in to a terminal?
The stack will preconfigured a user called "freelancer" with a password "password". Just SSH into the system without a pem file.