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Brent Toderash

Technologist & Open Source Advocate; Leader. Thinker. Contributor.

Brent Toderash at CloudFest, holding a microphone while speaking.
Photo: Roan de Vries

Think. Build. Write.
Shuffle. Repeat.

Seems like everyone's taking a WordPress pause and building static html sites again. Not to be outdone, I built this one with Astro, Tina, Git, & Vim. Claude helped out (of course), and Gemini chipped in with some image generation. Yes, I can write my posts from the command line.

Also visit YAWP.foo, a part-time writing project on recovering the fundamentals of open source, with applications to the WordPress ecosystem.

Written Here

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Open Source is Not Enough

In response to Joost de Valk's post saying that open source is the right start but not enough, I suggest some conditions needed for healthy open source projects. Without proper governance and a model that ensures sustainability, a briefcase full of funding could kill a project as easily as stimulating it.

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OSS Sustainability

Security & Trust in OSS Supply Chains

Supply chain security ensures you get what you asked for, but not whether what you asked for is safe. Establishing trust in software requires verifiable provenance with cryptographically attributable identity for the publisher.

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Supply Chain

Kairos: Being in the Room

A modest May 2026 gathering in Atlanta felt like a seminal moment for the open source enterprise CMS market in North America, which is currently facing uncertainty and upheaval. TYPO3 is stepping in boldly.

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TYPO3

Written There

Full index →
  • FAIR.pm

    2025 FAIR Recap

    At the start of 2026, a look back at what we achieved during 2025, from conversation through launch with several active projects.

  • FAIR.pm

    FAIR Roadmap for 2026

    An outline of ambitious plans for 2026. As things have played out, some significant disruption during the first quarter of the year meant shifting some priorities and adjusting the pace of certain goals.

  • Modern Earth Blog

    WordCamp Canada 2025 Recap

    A brief recap of WordCamp Canada (WCEH) 2025, where I spoke about software supply chain security and the need for a federated, distributed model for WordPress, as AspirePress and FAIR have designed and built.

  • Modern Earth Blog

    Storms of WordPress Controversy

    At WordCamp USA in late September 2024, Matt Mullenweg launched an attack on WP Engine, labelled them a bad actor for not contributing enough to WordPress development. One thing leads to another, and blocking their access to the WordPress repository results in a lawsuit. What to make of it all?

  • Modern Earth Blog

    Building Websites for Accessibility

    Accessibility standards are being introduced as regulatory requirements in legislation across many jusrisdictions, and website owners need to be aware of their obligations. Websites need to be not just easy to use, they need to be easy for *everyone* to use. That’s accessibility, in a nutshell.

  • Modern Earth Blog

    WordPress: 20 Years & Into the Future

    On the 20th anniversary of WordPress, I reflect on using WordPress over all that time and even back into its pre-history. I offer 6 favourite features and 6 least-favourite features of the platform.

  • Modern Earth Blog

    Technical Debt & Why it Matters

    Whether it's deliberate, inadvertent, or just plain old entropy sneaking up to bite you, even websites can accumulate technical debt.

Offhand Remarks