Preparing for WCUS: Your Core AI Contribution Playbook

Just last year, I had a conversation with a client, a smart developer himself, who was buzzing about WordCamp US Contributor Day. He was excited to dive into the Core AI table, but when he came back, he admitted he felt a bit lost. He showed up ready to code, but without any pre-reads, the sheer scale of the project left him overwhelmed, struggling to find an entry point. Sound familiar?

Look, the WordPress Core AI initiative isn’t some minor bug fix. This is foundational stuff. It’s a complex, evolving project with multiple interconnected building blocks. Showing up cold, expecting to just jump in and contribute meaningfully to something like this, is a total nightmare. You’ll spend half the day just trying to get your bearings. That’s precious time you could have spent actually making an impact on the Core AI Contribution Prep.

Your WCUS Core AI Contribution Game Plan

The Core AI team has been putting in serious work. To hit the ground running at WordCamp US Contributor Day in Portland, Oregon, on August 26, you absolutely need to do your homework. They’ve laid it out pretty clearly over on the Make WordPress AI blog. Here’s the skinny:

• Read up on the AI Building Blocks. Understand the high-level strategy. This isn’t optional, it’s your roadmap.
• Familiarize yourself with the core project repos: PHP AI Client, Abilities API, MCP Adapter, and AI Experiments. You don’t need to be a committer on day one, but know what they do.
• Skim the #core-ai Slack channel. Seriously. It’s a goldmine of context and recent discussions.
• And for Pete’s sake, register for Contributor Day, get a WordPress.org account, and join the Make WordPress Slack if you haven’t already. Basics, man.

This year, they’re approaching Contributor Day more like a hackathon for Core AI. That means a focus on building, creating proof-of-concepts, and improving contributor flows. It’s less about passive learning and more about active engagement. This is where knowing the building blocks pays off.

Say you’re working on an AI experiment plugin, integrating with the Abilities API. You might have something like this, just a conceptual peek, mind you:

<?php
/**
 * Plugin Name: bbioon AI Experiment
 * Description: Demonstrates basic interaction with the Core AI Building Blocks.
 * Version: 1.0
 * Author: bbioon
 * Text Domain: bbioon-ai-experiment
 */

if ( ! defined( 'ABSPATH' ) ) {
    exit; // Exit if accessed directly.
}

/**
 * Example function to interact with a hypothetical AI client.
 *
 * @param string $prompt The input prompt for the AI.
 * @return string The AI-generated response.
 */
function bbioon_call_ai_ability( $prompt ) {
    $response = '';

    // In a real scenario, this would involve using the PHP AI Client
    // and Abilities API to make an actual API call.
    // For Contributor Day, you might be helping to build out these interfaces.
    $api_client = new \bbioon\AI\Client(); // Placeholder for actual client.
    $response = $api_client->process_prompt( $prompt );

    /**
     * Filters the response from the AI ability.
     *
     * @param string $response The AI-generated response.
     * @param string $prompt   The original prompt.
     */
    return apply_filters( 'bbioon_ai_ability_response', $response, $prompt );
}

// Example usage:
// add_action( 'init', function() {
//     $ai_output = bbioon_call_ai_ability( 'Generate a blog post idea about WordPress performance.' );
//     error_log( $ai_output );
// } );
?>

This simple bbioon_call_ai_ability function, while conceptual, highlights how you’d likely interface with the Core AI components. Your task at Contributor Day might be refining such an API, building out adapter functionality, or creating these very AI Experiments that leverage the underlying building blocks.

The Bottom Line for Contributor Day

The takeaway here is simple: preparation isn’t just about being polite; it’s about being effective. Especially with something as cutting-edge as Core AI in WordPress, understanding the landscape beforehand is critical. It ensures you spend your time building, not just learning what to build. Trust me on this. You’ll thank yourself when you’re actually creating those proof-of-concepts instead of staring blankly at a GitHub repo.

Look, this stuff gets complicated fast. If you’re tired of debugging someone else’s mess and just want your site to work, drop my team a line. We’ve probably seen it before.