{"id":2020,"date":"2026-02-06T01:49:05","date_gmt":"2026-02-06T01:49:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/icelandconsulateghana.com\/jonathan-desrosiers-open-source-collaboration-and-a-proud-moment\/"},"modified":"2026-02-06T01:49:05","modified_gmt":"2026-02-06T01:49:05","slug":"jonathan-desrosiers-open-source-collaboration-and-a-proud-moment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/icelandconsulateghana.com\/is\/jonathan-desrosiers-open-source-collaboration-and-a-proud-moment\/","title":{"rendered":"Jonathan Desrosiers: Open Source Collaboration And A Proud Moment"},"content":{"rendered":"

This past weekend at FOSDEM<\/a>, I had a proud moment that had me reflecting on open source collaboration.<\/p>\n

We all experience moments like this throughout life. On occasion it\u2019s a result of my own efforts, such as finally publishing something I\u2019ve spent a considerable amount of effort on. But it\u2019s more common that the feeling is triggered by something someone else does.<\/p>\n

Late on day 1 of the conference, fellow WordPress Core Committer Dennis Snell<\/a> gave a talk in the Collaboration and Content Management track<\/a> called Stronger interop through HTML and better tooling<\/em><\/a> (recording can be found on the session page). The talk detailed how the HTML API within WordPress came about, the considerations that were made while building it, and how the end result has helped the broader web in addition to WordPress itself.<\/p>\n

Dennis did a fantastic job! While I\u2019m also a Core Committer, I have only been casually involved with this feature at best. It\u2019s impossible to keep track of everything being worked on within a project as large as WordPress. His talk filled in many of the gaps of my knowledge, and I learned a ton!<\/p>\n

Letting Go <\/h2>\n

When you\u2019re involved with a project in a sustained and meaningful way, it can be difficult to \u201clet go\u201d of the urge to weigh in on as many tickets, pull requests, and discussions as you can. While it\u2019s often true that you could add something that\u2019s valuable or mention a non-obvious detail, knowing when to engage <\/a>is a craft that requires consistent refinement and reflection.<\/p>\n

When Dennis was presenting, I found myself thinking \u201cI\u2019m so glad he worked on this project.\u201d He deeply researched prior art both internally and externally to WordPress, and he put a lot of care into thinking through what would be best for the users of the software. In the context of this challenge the users are primarily two groups: the developers interacting with the API and end users viewing sites with HTML manipulated by the API. Watching him present made me realize something important about collaborative work.<\/p>\n

In many ways I was relieved. It was a great reminder to \u201clet go\u201d. We need to have confidence in each other to take on challenging problems and share that work openly, creating space for emerging contributors to learn and grow.<\/p>\n

\"Dennis