San Diego WordPress Meetup

We’re back with another San Diego WordPress Meetup, hosted by Ansir Coworking.

This month’s theme: Vibe Coding for WordPress.

If you’ve been using AI to move faster (or you’ve tried and it felt like chaos), this night is for you. We’ll keep it demo-heavy and interactive, focused on real WordPress work: plugin features, Gutenberg blocks, debugging, and the guardrails that keep you from shipping something cursed.

Drinks provided. If you can’t make it right at 6:00 PM, no worries, but plan to be there by 6:30 PM when we start. Space is limited, so RSVP.

Agenda

6:00–6:30 PM: Pre-networking + WordPress help desk

• Meet folks, grab a drink
• Bring your laptop and questions
• Quick icebreaker: what’s the last thing AI helped you ship?

6:30–6:40 PM: Welcome

• Quick intro + format for the night
• House rule: Don’t paste and pray, test before you ship.

6:40–7:10 PM: Lightning talks (15 min each)
We’ve got 2–3 open slots. If you want to do a quick talk or demo, drop it in the Meetup comments or hit me up.

• AI for debugging WP
• Gutenberg with AI
• Prompt patterns for plugin dev
• Security/perf gotchas
• Agency workflow and scoping

7:10–7:45 PM: Live demos (interactive)

• Build a legit plugin feature fast (with the boring but important stuff)
• “The AI lied” debugging break (and how to recover)
• Gutenberg sprint: scaffold a block, polish it, clean it up

7:45–8:00 PM: Prompt Battle
You submit prompts, we run a few live, then vote:

• best prompt
• best result
• funniest failure
  (Yes, there may be prizes.)

8:00–8:10 PM: Community announcements + wrap
Events, jobs, shoutouts, next meetup teaser.

💬 Want to present, sponsor, or have questions? Use the Meetup comments.

We’re keeping things rolling with another San Diego WordPress Meetup! Huge thanks to Ansir Coworking for hosting again.

This month’s theme is Performance Night: Core Web Vitals for WordPress. We’re going to focus on the stuff that actually moves the needle, LCP, INP, CLS, plus the real-world WordPress causes behind them (themes, plugins, fonts, images, caching, third-party scripts, Woo, builders, etc.). This will be practical, a little nerdy, and very interactive.

Drinks will be provided. If you can’t arrive right at 6:00 PM, that’s OK, but please plan to be there by 6:30 PM when we kick things off. Space is limited, so RSVP to reserve your spot.

6:00 to 6:30 PM: Pre-Networking and WordPress Help Desk

• Food and drinks
• Help desk table (bring your laptop and performance questions)
• “Site teardown” signup sheet (volunteers who want us to review their site live)

6:30 to 6:40 PM: Welcome

• Devin Walker: San Diego native, longtime WP community member, co-founder of GiveWP, now Automattician
• Thanks to Ansir Coworking and the broader WP community for support
• What we’re doing tonight: quick primers, lightning talks, live teardowns, and a final checklist you can use tomorrow

6:40 to 7:20 PM: Lightning Talks (15 minutes each)
2–3 slots available (submit via Meetup comments or message me)
Suggested topics:

• “Core Web Vitals in plain English (and what to ignore)”
• “Image optimization that actually works in WordPress”
• “Fonts, CSS, and the fastest wins for LCP”
• “Caching 101 vs 301 (page cache, object cache, CDN)”
• “Woo performance pitfalls and quick fixes”
• Speakers: slides or demos encouraged
• Each talk: ~12 minutes presentation, ~3 minutes Q&A

7:20 to 7:55 PM: Live Site Teardowns (Interactive Session)
Hosted by Devin Walker

• We’ll review 2–3 volunteer sites live (no dunking, just practical fixes)
• For each site:
• Quick read on real-world CWV (CrUX/PageSpeed)
• Identify the biggest bottleneck (LCP, INP, or CLS)

Make 3–5 concrete recommendations:

• what to change
• why it helps
• how to test it

7:55 to 8:05 PM: The “Top 10 WP Performance Wins” Checklist

• A fast recap you can take home:
• the most common high-impact fixes
• what’s worth paying for vs what’s not
• how to avoid regressions (simple process + tooling)

8:05 to 8:15 PM: Community Announcements & Closing

• Upcoming WordPress events and updates
• Job postings, collaborations, shoutouts
• Next meetup teaser

Want to present or have event questions? Drop them in the Meetup comments.

💡 Want your site reviewed? Bring a link and be ready to share (or submit ahead of time in the Meetup comments if you prefer).

This month’s theme is Security Night: Real WordPress Incidents and Hardening That Matters. This is not a doom-and-gloom night, and it’s not a sales pitch. It’s practical, real-world WordPress security, what actually goes wrong (plugins, creds, hosting, supply chain, misconfig, “helpful” admin users), and what you can do to lower risk without turning your life into a checklist.

Drinks will be provided. If you can’t arrive right at 6:00 PM, that’s OK, but please plan to be there by 6:30 PM when we kick things off. Space is limited, so RSVP to reserve your spot.

6:00 to 6:30 PM: Pre-Networking and WordPress Help Desk

• Food and drinks
• Help desk table (bring your security questions)
• Optional: “Ask a security question anonymously” box (paper or QR)

6:30 to 6:40 PM: Welcome

• Quick hello + format for the night
• We’re currently lining up presenters and would love a few volunteers (lightning talks, demos, or short incident stories)

6:40 to 7:10 PM: Lightning Talks (15 minutes each)
We’re looking for 2–3 volunteers (submit via Meetup comments or message the organizers)

• Suggested topics:
• “How WordPress sites actually get hacked”
• “The plugin supply chain: what’s real risk vs noise”
• “Hardening wp-admin without breaking clients”
• “Security basics agencies skip (and regret)”
• “WooCommerce security: fraud, accounts, and permissions”
• Speakers: slides or demos encouraged
• Each talk: ~12 minutes presentation, ~3 minutes Q&A

7:10 to 7:20 PM: Break

7:20 to 7:55 PM: Real Incident Teardowns (Interactive Session)
We’ll walk through 2–3 real-world incident scenarios (sanitized, no naming and shaming):

• What happened (symptoms and timeline)
• Root cause (what actually allowed it)
• Containment steps (what to do in the first hour)
• Recovery steps (cleanup, restores, password rotation, review)
• Prevention (the few changes that would have stopped it)

Example scenarios we can cover:

• Stolen admin creds + no MFA
• Vulnerable plugin + messy update strategy
• Malicious redirects injected via a rogue plugin/theme
• Infected uploads or backdoors hiding in plain sight

7:55 to 8:10 PM: Hardening That Matters (The Short List)
A fast, opinionated checklist:

• MFA + role hygiene
• Updates with a rollback plan
• Backups you’ve tested (and restores you’ve practiced)
• Least privilege, disable file editing, limit admin exposure
• WAF/CDN basics and rate limiting
• Monitoring: what to alert on (and what to ignore)

8:10 to 8:20 PM: Community Announcements & Closing

• Upcoming WordPress events and updates
• Job postings, collaborations, shoutouts
• Next meetup teaser
• Want to present or have event questions? Drop them in the Meetup comments.

💡 If you’ve dealt with a WordPress security incident and are willing to share lessons learned (sanitized), even a 5-minute story is gold.