Author: Anchen le Roux

To make the most of the Workshops at WordCamp it is always good to come prepared. Being prepared for the workshops, save valuable time and resources.  You can just jump onto the training without worrying too much about what’s needed. It’s also much more fun knowing what you’re getting into.

Internet is also never guaranteed, so having everything downloaded and ready is the safer option.  Do not bargain to work on an online environment unless you have your own 3G access.

Here is a list of what’s need for most and specific workshops.

Needed for most workshops

• Pen and paper, or a note taking app
• Laptop
• Local installation of WordPress – Here are some options, please choose one in line with your technical level. You will only need one of the simple ones for the User Track
  • Varying Vagrant Vagrants – an open source Vagrant configuration focused on WordPress development. It has everything you need to run WordPress locally (and submit patches to WordPress core if you like), but does require some technical know-how to use effectively.
  • DesktopServer – simple desktop app for running local WordPress sites. Easy enough to use. Only available on Windows and Mac.
  • Chassis – GUI for running a local WordPress install. Easy to use, but would also benefit from some technical knowledge.
  • Local by Flywheel – simple and good-looking GUI for running WordPress locally. Integrates with FlyWheel’s managed WordPress hosting service, so it’s useful if you end up hosting with them. Available on Windows & Mac.
  • XAMPP – classic PHP development environment, which needs no introduction I’m sure.
  • MAMP – similar XAMPP, but not available on Linux. The free version is somewhat limited compared to MAMP PRO.There are other options available, but this should be enough to cover everyone. Any environment that has PHP and MySQL will work, so if you already have something like that running, then you can just download and install WordPress directly.

Needed for specific workshops

Space Pilot Track

The WordPress ABC for beginners.

Find all detail in the DropBox folder

How Facebook’s Ad Manager can save your WordPress/WooCommerce website

• WordPress installed and running on a local or online server.
• Woocommerce
• Facebook for Woocommerce (With Pixel installed if possible)
• Facebook Account (preferably business account)

Simple tips and tricks for great SEO

• [Required] A website where they would like to improve the SEO
• A Google account with:
  • [Optional] a Google My Business profile for the website (https://www.google.com/intl/en_za/business/)
  • [Optional] a Google Ads (Adwords) account (https://ads.google.com/intl/en_za/start/)
  • [Optional] a Google Search Console account for the website (https://www.google.com/webmasters/)
• [Required] A WordPress website with either Yoast or All in One SEO plugin installed (https://yoast.com/wordpress/plugins/seo/) (https://wordpress.org/plugins/all-in-one-seo-pack/)

Setting up an online store with WooCommerce

• WordPress installed and running on a local or online server.
• Download and install a Woocommerce-ready theme such as Storefront, Online eCommerce or fCommerce.
• Download Woocommerce if possible.

Space Engineer Track

WOOP: OOP-ifying WordPress

All the details you need can be found in this repo: https://github.com/mtdalton/wordcamp-jhb-woop

Building a Single-Page Application with VueJS and the WordPress Rest API

The base code and the details to get up and running can be found here: https://github.com/seagyn/wordpress-vue

Turning your WordPress plugin into a SaaS

Find the preparation post over here: https://jonathanbossenger.com/wordcamp-johannesburg-2018-workshop-prep/

Today we bring you the second round of speakers selected for WordCamp Johannesburg 2018

These speakers will be presenting  the talks on the second day of this year’s WordCamp

Read more about this exciting lineup and discover details on our Day 2  Talk track, which will conclude WordCamp Johannesburg 2018

Arvind Singh

A WordPress lover who is on the path to explore this CMS at its best. He has a keen interest in exploring the WordPress community. With an urge to learn more, Arvind is an ardent individual who never refrains himself from exploring the new technology. He’s an experienced WordPress developer and technical writer with a keen interest in web hosting.

Iwan Pieterse

I run a WordPress support agency called We Manage Your Site. I live in Pretoria. I like dinosaurs. And I love offering WordPress support services.

We use Paid Memberships Pro as a way to get our customers to use our site for WordPress support while paying us a small monthly fee.

Daine Mawer

A Front-end Engineer at 10up, Daine has been a committed (no Git pun intended) and passionate open source follower for over 6 years now. Completely self-taught from the ground up, Daine has managed to grab the attention of many award-winning agencies and media houses in South Africa, not to mention international brands such as Women’s Health, Men’s Health and award-winning author, Ken Follett.

Daine’s roots truly began in education. Having trained some of South Africa’s biggest corporates in digital technologies, he found himself contributing not only to the business sector but to tertiary education as well. Daine has planned, developed, lectured and implemented web courses for students, professionals and newcomers; covering everything from UX, HTML5, CSS3, Javascript and WordPress Development. He is also an Envato Tuts+ Author and contributes regularly to the site.
He’s currently focusing his attention on delving deeper into Javascript, specifically React and NodeJS.

Daine gravitated to WordPress early on in his career, learning the ins and outs of theme and plugin development. He regularly contributes to the WordPress.org support forums, speaks at WordPress South Africa MeetUps and WordCamp Cape Town

When the laptop closes, Daine fills his time travelling, running and spending most of his disposable income on coffee in and around Cape Town’s hip food and restaurant culture. The laptop tends to open again to mess around with electronic music production and synthesis.

Languteka Machebe

A WordPress Plugin Tweaker, Self proclaimed coffee lover, A longboard commuter, Aspiring sit down comedian (Tells his jokes whilst sitting down), Pours his milk first then cereal… Any Questions?

Shane Rielly

I am a family man and I have an amazing wife and two great kids. I love surfing and the ocean, making people laugh and helping people to learn and understand things.

I am pretty much a serial entrepreneur. In the last 20 years, I have started and run a clothing manufacturing business and been a professional videographer, photographer and graphic and web designer. I have been designing and building websites for nearly 12 years.

I run a small digital agency called Lonely Viking where we specialise in developing beautiful looking websites that form an integral part of driving leads, conversions and sales for small and medium-sized businesses. Our clients understand the value of a well-orchestrated online presence and having a solid team like Lonely Viking behind them.

Godwin Ojebiyi

I’m a tech enthusiast and a natural problem solver, who has proven himself by successfully completing projects for IT consultancies, software houses, web design agencies, and individual clients. A top rated Freelancer(Upwork) Currently building business solutions based on WordPress and PHP for FTR (Canada), Industrial Matrix (Canada), and BPD Accessories(Trinidad and Tobaggo).

Hein van Vlastuin

I run a small development company in Jhb. Currently we have 6 developers. 3 of them work on WordPress projects, 3 of them work on .NET project.
We work mainly for international/Dutch clients.

I am keen to participate in a workshop about “Workshops for running a WordPress business (remote work, managing an agency, scaling your business etc)”, although I am not sure if I should be a sole speaker in such a workshop. I get most of my clients through my own personal network back at home. I myself am a Dutch citizen. But it might be interesting if I can run a workshop with someone who does similar work.

Besides that:
– I teach some people with limited coding experience how to start developing in WordPress using html/css/php/jquery/custom fields/custom post types etc

Andrew Lima

Customer Support & Developer for Paid Memberships Pro. I have previously worked with popular WordPress plugins such as Caldera Forms, Seriously Simple Podcasting and more. I also build my own WordPress plugins and WordPress themes and work on the odd WordPress project here and there.

Han shot first.

Ebrahim-Khalil Hassen

Ebrahim-Khalil Hassen is the founder of Zapreneur and Think Workers. Each of these websites are aimed at answering this question – Can the Internet help South African small business?

Ebrahim-Khalil started his career at the Gauteng Provincial Government, where he was the manager of the Vusani Amadolobha Grant Fund, which was South Africa’s first public-private partnership fund for urban renewal. The theme of public service reform saw him join the National Labour and Economic Development Institute (NALEDI), a research non-governmental organisation established by the Congress of South African Trade Unions. During his seven years at NALEDI, he managed the public sector transformation programme, with a focus on constructing alternatives. He lead the secretariat of the People’s Budget Campaign – a coalition between trade unions, churches and civil society that provided alternatives on fiscal policy.

From 2007 to 2009, he worked part-time at the Centre for Poverty, Employment and Growth at the Human Sciences Research Council building proposals for employment creation in the public service. In 2011, Zapreneur was launched. As an independent public policy analyst, his clients have included TIPS, NALEDI and the Department of Economic Development. He currently serves on the board of the South African Labour Bulletin, and is a member of the COSATU Economics Panel. He previously served on the board of the Community Agency for Social Enquiry (CASE). He has been featured in the inaugural edition of the Little Black Book, received a commendation for contributions to public service from his alma mater, University of Witwatersrand. While still a student he served as Vice-President of the Student Representative Council and won an Academic Merit Award.

Warrick Kernes

Serial entrepreneur with 11 years eCommerce experience in South Africa and Europe. Winner of London’s 2009 Young Businessman of the Year Award. Founder of the SA award winning online store Action Gear (founded 2010, exited 2018). Guest lecturer on eCommerce at WITS Business School to MBA students and he has also talked on eCommerce for JP Morgan (S&P 500). Warrick sits on the Education Committee for the eCommerce Forum Africa and is also a regular contributing writer for the SA Entrepreneur Magazine.

In 2017 Warrick founded the Insaka eCommerce Academy and is now dedicated to growing SA’s eCommerce industry through these online learning courses and the Insaka Community.

Pascal Birchler

Pascal is a software engineer and WordPress core developer based in Zurich, Switzerland. He’s been working with WordPress for half of his life and is an avid member of the community. Living in a multilingual country, Pascal is passionate about internationalisation and improving this area in WordPress to make the web a better place.

Anchen le Roux

Anchen le Roux is the CEO and lead developer of Simply Digital Design a boutique studio in Pretoria Here she specialises in delivering solutions to photographers or creatives and the experience around creating a website.

She has a passion for everything WordPress and loves being part and contributing to the WP community.

Anchen is passionate about green, simple and nomadic living and occasionally find time to play the bass guitar.

We are very excited to announce the first round of speakers selected for WordCamp Johannesburg 2018

These speakers will be presenting  Workshops on the first day of this year’s WordCamp

Gear up to learn more about this fabulous lineup and discover details on our Day 1 Workshop tracks , which are sure to set the pace for your WordCamp Johannesburg 2018

Jonathan Bossenger

Jonathan Bossenger is an open source advocate who believes in sustainable business building by equipping his clients with tools that work for their business goals. As a lifelong learner, Jonathan is always finding new projects and skills to refine. Jonathan has spoken about several topics at WordCamps, Meetups, and podcasting including how to contribute to open source and understand GPL. He’s the organizer of WordPress Cape Town, works on the Seriously Simple Podcasting plugin, and is an expert at Codeable. When he’s not performing code reviews, you can find him spending time with his children, training Gracie Jiu Jitsu, and mentoring those in the WordPress community. Say hi to him on Twitter at @jon_bossenger and check out his site at jonathanbossenger.com.

tasabrahams

Born and raised in Cape Town, South Africa, I have a Bachelor of Science in Occupational Therapy, practicing in the field of mental health, neuro-rehabilitation and community development. I am one of the Directors of a non-profit company called Jozi 4 Autism that raises awareness about Autism in the City of Johannesburg and promotes equal access to services for families from underprivileged areas. I am also the founder and Director of a Website Consulting Business called Digital Engage.

When I was in my early 30’s and with 4 kids under the age of 10 in tow, I took a complete detour, up skilled myself in the art and practice of WordPress web design and online marketing and started my own business. I now refer to myself as a ‘multi-passionate entrepreneur’ and firmly believe that it is never too late to learn something new or follow a completely different career path.

Having children, particularly for women, changes everything. I wanted to be at home with my kids, but at the same time I craved the intellectual stimulation that repeat episodes of Barney and cleaning tops and bottoms of kids tends to suck from your life. So, with my health sciences knowledge and academic writing experience behind me I started freelancing as a health/wellness content writer.

It was also around 2011 that I had an idea to create a website that made it easier for people with disabilities in South Africa, to find equipment, services and information pertaining to the condition they or their loved ones experienced. This stemmed from my own difficulties as a therapist looking for resources for my patients. My cousin set me up with hosting, installed WordPress and told me to learn. After hours of learning code, themes, customization and the hard lessons a hacked site teaches you, I am now a proficient WordPress website creator. My first website was so very ugly, but at the time I thought was the most beautiful website I ever laid eyes on!

As I am always hungry to learn, I found myself in this digital world, learning about digital marketing, social media and content marketing. I decided to formalize all this knowledge and experience by doing a certification in Digital Marketing through UCT Get Smarter and formalized my business in October 2015 when I joined the Awethu Project Business Incubator.

My personal philosophy in life is:

“Let brave be the partner of fear. Fear helps you prepare, Brave helps you act”

Jedidja Snyman

Bio – Jedidja Snyman – WordCamp
She is not: Glamorous, Famous or Interesting in her own mind.
She is a down to earth person and an entrepreneur.
Her passion is to be creative and to see people around her happy – there is enough heartache in this world – So Smile!
She has studied at the Technikon of Pretoria.
She got a diploma in Graphic Design
She has 20 years of Graphic Design experience
She worked for various design and printer companies
She started her business in 2016
She can’t believe it is already 2 years down the line and still going strong
Her interest in web design started only 3 years ago when she started with a new company
At the company she didn’t do any web design but it started to grow on her and she started to do designs for the web pages
She started her own company. On her journey, she met a lot of new people.
Someone invited her to a web design course and she grab it with both her hands
Her first web page was her own
There after she made a web page for a client.
It was definitely not the easiest client, but it was a nice learning curve
It gave her the confidence to ask clients if she can make web pages for them
2 years ago she did her first WordCamp
When she came She didn’t knew very much, but she come anyway she really enjoyed it
She learned a lot off new things at WordCamp.
she applied it into her own webpage, and there after she applied it into her clients web pages as well
Her motto is: You first apply it to your own webpage and then to others, so if you make a mistake on your own webpage, it prevents you from making a mistake on others.

Matthew Datlon

I’m a full stack developer at Flicker Leap during the day and a game developer at Mattador Starfish at night. I mainly build web apps at Flicker Leap but I’m game to build anything (pun intended). I use WordPress both for large websites for clients and for my own websites. I’m obsessed with building systems and frameworks to make my life easier and make development quicker (especially in WordPress).

I also love playing the drums, video games and interior design.

charlesmackenzie

Charles qualified with a Bachelor of Business Science, majoring in Accounting with Honours in Finance through UCT before co-founding Flicker Leap. He is Google Adwords certified and is currently studying his Masters in Digital Marketing through the Digital Marketing Institute (Ireland). Charles has over ten years of digital strategy, marketing, development and project management experience. During this time he has assisted a number of entrepreneurs and businesses to launch and grow their brands online.

dianapm

I am a lecturer and PhD student at the Tshwane University of Technology.
I discovered WordPress in 2012, when a WordPress enthusiast asked me to help with the PHP code behind his website.
That is how I taught myself WordPress and discovered how amazing it is.
I have since been developing websites for various people and organisations.

Karel Marais

Experienced Business Owner skilled in Web Design, Web Content Writing, Sales & Marketing, and WordPress since 2007. Graduated from Vaal University of Technology.

seagyn

Seagyn has been using WordPress since 1.5 when he knew nothing about development. Many years down the road, he now writes code in both PHP and Javascript. Outside of code, Seagyn is a competitive touch rugby player. Most of all, he is a husband and father.

Hanna Partridge

I am part Entrepreneur, part executive,part content manager and part designer and editor and part amateur coder, and a keen WooCommerce and WordPress supporter and challenger. I love implementing and working on new features and doing the impossible on these platforms! I have a personal brand NeoHanna and I am also the Managing Director of Horze(International Equestrian Brand in South-Africa)- www.horze.co.za which is an amazing WordPress/Woocommerce website with interesting features.

The deadline to apply as a speaker at WordCamp Johannesburg is approaching! Only 2 more days left.  We will close speaker application on the 21 st  of September at midnight SA time.

As a reminder please find the details below:

WHAT WE’RE LOOKING FOR

Don’t submit a talk on what you think we want to hear; offer to speak on something that you are passionate about. Everybody has a unique WordPress story to tell, and we want to hear yours.

• What are you uniquely qualified to speak about?
• Have you used WordPress in an interesting or innovative way?
• Was WordPress the foundation for creating something meaningful in your community?
• How has WordPress helped you grow your business?
• What was your experience updating your code for the latest WordPress release?

TOPIC IDEAS

These topics are not meant to be prescriptive — they’re rather there as a guide to help you think of something you want to talk about.

• Workshops for beginners
• Workshops for designers (or for developers wanting to learn more about design principles)
• Plugin/theme development
• Setting up an online store (particularly with WooCommerce)
• Gutenberg (for developers and content writers)
• Workshops for running a WordPress business (remote work, managing an agency, scaling your business etc)
• Lessons from the Open Source Communities
• Marketing
• Security
• Building with the WordPress REST API
• Coding and Development Best Practices
• And any other WordPress topic you’re passionate about

We are still short on a few Workshops so if your topic can be presented as a workshop please submit as such or indicate on application.

All candidates will be informed as to whether or not their talk was accepted from the 25th of September.

If you’d like to propose multiple topics, please submit the form multiple times, once for each topic.

If you have any other questions regarding being a speaker, please see this post

To apply please go here and fill in the application form!

To encourage more applicants we’ve brainstormed (and borrowed from other WordCamps) the most popular questions you as a potential Speaker might have.

If we’ve missed anything, do not hesitate to contact us or leave a comment below.

Q: Can you submit more than one talk?

Yes! This will significantly increase your chances of being accepted and give us a wider variety of talks to select from.

We will however most likely only select one of your submitted talks.

Q: Are all types of talks welcome?

YES! The stage is set for a wonderful variety of speakers. We are open to the full spectrum of session formats and encourage you to submit anything from standard slide presentations to panels, demonstrations, and more.

Whatever your idea, we’d love to hear it.

Q: How long do sessions have to be?

We encourage a variety of session formats, which include, but are not limited to;

• Lightning talks: (maximum of 10 mins with a group Q&A)
• Long form talks: (maximum of 40 mins inclusive of Q&A)
• Workshop: (maximum of 90 mins but can be shorter)

Don’t hesitate to get creative and submit a session format you think might be interesting!

Q: Is there a speaker’s package?

All speakers will receive a complimentary ticket to the entire event, including the After Party and the VIP Dinner

Q: Who will be in charge of wrangling speakers?

We are thrilled to have our organisers, Anchen le Roux and Andrew Lima, taking care of our speakers. Anchen will be the speakers’ main contact to the entire WordCamp Johannesburg organising team and any questions should be directed to the Speakers team by email.

Q: Does it matter if you haven’t spoken at a conference before?

No not at all! If you have a topic that is interesting, then we would love to hear from you.

We are committed to helping you share your experience, idea or knowledge; we hope that everything we’ve put in place will serve to support our speakers in contributing to an incredible WordCamp.

Q: What should people talk about?

Anything you like! The WordPress ecosystem and community do such a variety of different things with WordPress – whether that’s designing, writing content, building businesses or adding features and functionality – we want to hear it all!

Tell us your stories of success and growth, but don’t be afraid to also tell us of your worst experiences and how you turned them around. We can all learn from each other!

That said all the talks we’ve picked in the past – and will be picking this year – are all about helping the WordPress community be the best they can be. As a diverse community, we share a range of interests, skills, knowledge and experiences.

Similarly, if your talk has some connection to WordPress, or is directly about WordPress itself, we would love to hear from you!

Q: How do I submit my application?

You can submit your application by going to this page, logging into your WordPress.org account and submitting the form.

Hope to see you on stage!