From bb7e238a1d3c918b2853dd5b94977f2d407c32f5 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Randy Fay Date: Thu, 2 Apr 2026 07:35:13 -0600 Subject: [PATCH 1/4] initial structure for love letter to community blog --- .../blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md | 54 +++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 54 insertions(+) create mode 100644 src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md diff --git a/src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md b/src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md new file mode 100644 index 00000000..7a0d47ab --- /dev/null +++ b/src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md @@ -0,0 +1,54 @@ +--- +title: "A Love Letter to the DDEV Community" +pubDate: 2026-03-27 +summary: "The DDEV community makes this project what it is—through real feedback, hard questions, generous contributions, and genuine collaboration." +author: Randy Fay +featureImage: + src: /img/blog/2026/03/ddev-community.png + alt: DDEV community members collaborating +categories: + - Community +--- + +I've been working on DDEV for years now, and there's something I don't say often enough: + +**You make this worthwhile.** + +Not in an abstract, newsletter-sign-off way. In a real, daily, this-is-why-I-get-up-in-the-morning way. + +## Real Feedback About Real Problems + +The issues you file aren't noise. They're the signal. When something breaks in your workflow, you tell us—often with enough detail that we can reproduce it immediately. When something is confusing, you ask questions that reveal where our assumptions were wrong. + +That feedback shapes DDEV in ways that internal testing never could. We don't use DDEV on every possible OS, with every PHP framework, in every hosting environment. You do. And you tell us what you find. + +## Hard Questions Lead Somewhere + +Some of the best improvements in DDEV started with someone asking a question that seemed basic but turned out to be pointing at a real gap. Why does this take so long? Why does that require a workaround? Why can't DDEV just handle this case? + +Those questions are gifts. They push us to look at things we've gotten used to, and ask whether they actually need to be that way. + +## Generous Contributions + +The DDEV ecosystem is full of people who built something useful for themselves and then shared it with everyone. Add-ons, Docker images, CI configurations, documentation fixes, screencasts, blog posts, forum answers. The contributions that don't show up in the main DDEV repository are often the ones that make DDEV actually usable for people coming from specific platforms. + +Every person who took time to answer another user's question in the [DDEV issue tracker](https://github.com/ddev/ddev/issues) or [Discord](https://discord.gg/5wjP76mBJD) or [Drupal Slack](https://drupal.slack.com/app_redirect?channel=ddev) freed up time for the maintainers to work on the next feature. That compounds. + +## We Learn from You + +This is the part I want to be clear about: working with the community isn't just satisfying—it makes us better at this work. The patterns we see in your issues, the use cases we hadn't considered, the ways you've adapted DDEV for environments we never anticipated—that knowledge informs everything. + +## Thank You + +To everyone who filed an issue, answered a question, wrote a blog post, sponsored the project, gave a talk, built an add-on, tested a prerelease, or just told a colleague that DDEV was worth trying: + +Thank you. This project exists because of you, and it's better because of how you engage with it. + +If you want to stay involved, here's where to find us: + +- [Discord](https://discord.gg/5wjP76mBJD) — active community discussion +- [GitHub Discussions](https://github.com/ddev/ddev/discussions) — longer-form conversation +- [Sponsorship](https://github.com/sponsors/ddev) — financial support keeps development going +- [Contributor Training sessions](/blog/category/training) — monthly live sessions on specific topics + +Come say hello. From 01ae0894caa993df0154d7da4b8014364547cbee Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Randy Fay Date: Sun, 24 May 2026 08:07:13 +0200 Subject: [PATCH 2/4] Edits --- .../blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md | 29 +++++++++---------- 1 file changed, 14 insertions(+), 15 deletions(-) diff --git a/src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md b/src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md index 7a0d47ab..24513727 100644 --- a/src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md +++ b/src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md @@ -1,24 +1,24 @@ --- title: "A Love Letter to the DDEV Community" -pubDate: 2026-03-27 +pubDate: 2026-06-01 summary: "The DDEV community makes this project what it is—through real feedback, hard questions, generous contributions, and genuine collaboration." author: Randy Fay -featureImage: - src: /img/blog/2026/03/ddev-community.png - alt: DDEV community members collaborating +# featureImage: +# src: /img/blog/2026/03/ddev-community.png +# alt: DDEV community members collaborating categories: - Community --- I've been working on DDEV for years now, and there's something I don't say often enough: -**You make this worthwhile.** +**You make this so worthwhile.** -Not in an abstract, newsletter-sign-off way. In a real, daily, this-is-why-I-get-up-in-the-morning way. +Stas an I love to get up in the morning to hear what you have to say, learn from your experiences, share our path together. ## Real Feedback About Real Problems -The issues you file aren't noise. They're the signal. When something breaks in your workflow, you tell us—often with enough detail that we can reproduce it immediately. When something is confusing, you ask questions that reveal where our assumptions were wrong. +Your questions in Discord or Slack and the issues you file aren't noise. They're the signal. When something breaks in your workflow, you tell us, often with enough detail that we can reproduce it immediately. When something is confusing, you ask questions that reveal where our assumptions were wrong. That feedback shapes DDEV in ways that internal testing never could. We don't use DDEV on every possible OS, with every PHP framework, in every hosting environment. You do. And you tell us what you find. @@ -26,29 +26,28 @@ That feedback shapes DDEV in ways that internal testing never could. We don't us Some of the best improvements in DDEV started with someone asking a question that seemed basic but turned out to be pointing at a real gap. Why does this take so long? Why does that require a workaround? Why can't DDEV just handle this case? -Those questions are gifts. They push us to look at things we've gotten used to, and ask whether they actually need to be that way. +Those questions are gifts to all of us. They push us to look at things we've gotten used to, and ask whether they actually need to be that way. ## Generous Contributions -The DDEV ecosystem is full of people who built something useful for themselves and then shared it with everyone. Add-ons, Docker images, CI configurations, documentation fixes, screencasts, blog posts, forum answers. The contributions that don't show up in the main DDEV repository are often the ones that make DDEV actually usable for people coming from specific platforms. +The DDEV ecosystem is full of people who built something useful for themselves and then shared it with everyone. Add-ons, CI configurations, documentation fixes, screencasts, blog posts. -Every person who took time to answer another user's question in the [DDEV issue tracker](https://github.com/ddev/ddev/issues) or [Discord](https://discord.gg/5wjP76mBJD) or [Drupal Slack](https://drupal.slack.com/app_redirect?channel=ddev) freed up time for the maintainers to work on the next feature. That compounds. +Every person who took time to answer another user's question in the [DDEV issue tracker](https://github.com/ddev/ddev/issues) or [Discord](https://ddev.com/s/discord) or [Drupal Slack](https://drupal.slack.com/app_redirect?channel=ddev) freed up time for the maintainers to work on the next feature. That compounds. ## We Learn from You -This is the part I want to be clear about: working with the community isn't just satisfying—it makes us better at this work. The patterns we see in your issues, the use cases we hadn't considered, the ways you've adapted DDEV for environments we never anticipated—that knowledge informs everything. +Working with the community makes us better at this work. The patterns we see in your issues, the use cases we hadn't considered, the ways you've adapted DDEV for environments we never anticipated—that knowledge informs everything. ## Thank You To everyone who filed an issue, answered a question, wrote a blog post, sponsored the project, gave a talk, built an add-on, tested a prerelease, or just told a colleague that DDEV was worth trying: -Thank you. This project exists because of you, and it's better because of how you engage with it. +Thank you. This project exists because of you, and it's only possible because of the ways you engage with it. If you want to stay involved, here's where to find us: -- [Discord](https://discord.gg/5wjP76mBJD) — active community discussion -- [GitHub Discussions](https://github.com/ddev/ddev/discussions) — longer-form conversation +- [Discord](https://ddev.com/s/discord) — active community discussion +- [GitHub Issues](https://github.com/ddev/ddev/issues) - [Sponsorship](https://github.com/sponsors/ddev) — financial support keeps development going -- [Contributor Training sessions](/blog/category/training) — monthly live sessions on specific topics Come say hello. From 56b7dc02988f72d4cd36d1b4d282135f7100d77c Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Randy Fay Date: Sun, 24 May 2026 08:20:47 +0200 Subject: [PATCH 3/4] edits --- src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md | 10 +++++++--- 1 file changed, 7 insertions(+), 3 deletions(-) diff --git a/src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md b/src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md index 24513727..f827535e 100644 --- a/src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md +++ b/src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md @@ -14,11 +14,15 @@ I've been working on DDEV for years now, and there's something I don't say often **You make this so worthwhile.** -Stas an I love to get up in the morning to hear what you have to say, learn from your experiences, share our path together. +Stas and I love to get up in the morning to hear what you have to say, learn from your experiences, share our path together. + +We feel so thankful to be creating something useful in collaboration with you. + +All of us have had jobs before where some boss was making random decisions on product features that we knew might be irrelevant in weeks or months. It's a frustrating feeling, and that lack of control is so terrible. With DDEV and your guidance, we always know that you're keeping us on track about real needs for real features. It's fantastic. ## Real Feedback About Real Problems -Your questions in Discord or Slack and the issues you file aren't noise. They're the signal. When something breaks in your workflow, you tell us, often with enough detail that we can reproduce it immediately. When something is confusing, you ask questions that reveal where our assumptions were wrong. +Your questions in Discord or Slack and the issues you file aren't noise. They're signal. When something breaks in your workflow, you tell us, often with enough detail that we can reproduce it immediately. When something is confusing, you ask questions that reveal where our assumptions were wrong. That feedback shapes DDEV in ways that internal testing never could. We don't use DDEV on every possible OS, with every PHP framework, in every hosting environment. You do. And you tell us what you find. @@ -32,7 +36,7 @@ Those questions are gifts to all of us. They push us to look at things we've got The DDEV ecosystem is full of people who built something useful for themselves and then shared it with everyone. Add-ons, CI configurations, documentation fixes, screencasts, blog posts. -Every person who took time to answer another user's question in the [DDEV issue tracker](https://github.com/ddev/ddev/issues) or [Discord](https://ddev.com/s/discord) or [Drupal Slack](https://drupal.slack.com/app_redirect?channel=ddev) freed up time for the maintainers to work on the next feature. That compounds. +Every person who took time to answer another user's question in the [DDEV issue tracker](https://github.com/ddev/ddev/issues) or [Discord](https://ddev.com/s/discord) or [Drupal Slack](https://drupal.slack.com/app_redirect?channel=ddev) freed up time for the maintainers to work on the next feature. ## We Learn from You From 6f0bbb05cfc1f3aafc866e2f13e1f5f83ae77ec6 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Randy Fay Date: Sun, 24 May 2026 08:31:22 +0200 Subject: [PATCH 4/4] linting --- src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md | 2 +- 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-) diff --git a/src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md b/src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md index f827535e..0d5552d7 100644 --- a/src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md +++ b/src/content/blog/love-letter-ddev-community.md @@ -16,7 +16,7 @@ I've been working on DDEV for years now, and there's something I don't say often Stas and I love to get up in the morning to hear what you have to say, learn from your experiences, share our path together. -We feel so thankful to be creating something useful in collaboration with you. +We feel so thankful to be creating something useful in collaboration with you. All of us have had jobs before where some boss was making random decisions on product features that we knew might be irrelevant in weeks or months. It's a frustrating feeling, and that lack of control is so terrible. With DDEV and your guidance, we always know that you're keeping us on track about real needs for real features. It's fantastic.