One of the biggest recent news for me was that I was assigned to a key reviewer in the Theme Review Team on WordPress.org.
So, what is Theme Review and a key reviewer?
Theme Review
Theme review here is the review process which makes sure that all the themes which can be downloaded from WordPress theme repository are well coded, secure and properly licensed. If a theme is in the repository, any user who has a WordPress site can search for them inside their WordPress admin panels and download, activate and change their websites/blogs designs. It’s very important to offer users safe and good themes.
WordPress now serves 23% of the web. If a theme has a problem in it, it’s going to be a huge problem for the site owners, the readers and the whole internet.
This is why all the themes in the repository are reviewed according to the requirements. There are lists of requirements all the themes must fulfill to be in the repository. The requirements are set so that the themes will
- suites with WordPress coding guide lines.
- be without any errors.
- work with most plugins properly.
- be switchable with other themes anytime without losing contents.
- be distributed under 100% GPL license.
The reviews are done by volunteers and everyone can join the theme review team. I joined in October, 2014, when I went to San Francisco to attend the WordCamp San Francisco. WordCamp San Francisco is a kind of special place where a lot of WordPress contributors gather and share their ideas. It was a big impact for me and there I found the way of contribution I can do.
Since then, I’ve been reviewing themes constantly and the other day, I was assigned to a key theme reviewer.
Key Reviewer
Citing from the theme review handbook,
People who are key reviewers are allowed to make themes live. These are an important piece to the theme review process, they make sure that the queues are kept low. In addition, you can guarantee they are a great source of reviewing knowledge as long standing reviewers.
I’m really proud of this. As a key reviewer, I can review the review done by other reviewers. So, at least in the aspect of reviewing themes, it means you can trust me.