3 February 2023

Feels like January flew by faster than a Wagtail chasing a bug. Before we know it, another Wagtail release will be here. So we thought this would be a good time to share some thoughts on how to find and select good packages for Wagtail.

Five questions to help you find good packages

If you're new to Wagtail packages and Django packages, then sorting through all the options might feel a bit overwhelming. That's why we gathered up five questions that you can use to evaluate packages for your projects. Those questions are:

1. Is there an up-to-date listing on PyPI?
2. Are there new releases that are less than a year old?
3. Is there up-to-date documentation available?
4. Are the maintainers active and responsive?
5. Are there opportunities to sponsor the package?

We explored each of these questions in a blog and included some other handy resources for evaluating packages.

Check out the full blog HERE

Bonus Tip: Find Wagtail packages by version

Did you know you can filter packages in the Python Package Index (PiPY) according to Wagtail version? For example, you can use this link to find available packages for Wagtail 4.

Latest chirps

• Introducing Wagtail’s new accessibility checker: Get a peek at the new accessibility checker created by Albina, one of our Outreachy interns.
• What makes Wagtail a great CMS (and it's powered by Django and Python): Freelancer Raoul Capello wrote up an excellent quick article about the advantages of choosing Wagtail.
• Django template w/optional Wagtail: If you're shopping for a Wagtail project template, developer sephii on GitHub has a solid one to consider that incorporates Wagtail, TailwindCSS and more.
• Wagtail blog video series: Byiringiro Elie shared a 12-part video series walking through how to build a Wagtail blog on YouTube.

Feedback wanted

Albina (aka albinazs), is looking for your opinions on a built-in accessibility checker she created to help both editors and developers flag accessibility issues in their content. Have a look at the tool and share your thoughts.

Matt Westcott (aka gasman) is proposing a Wagtail 5.0 release that will include cleaning up a bunch of deprecated code. Read the details and let him know what you think.

Release candidate available

The release candidate for Wagtail 4.2 is still available for testing. If you have any last-minute bugs to report, please share them here.

Until next time, thank you for reading! If you have a news item to contribute, please reach out to us through our Slack community or email us.