Precise info about the PHP foundation is hard to find. They have an annual budget of ≈500k USD, half of it assigned to developers[^1]. From a 2024 presentation video, they claim that the foundation has a "language impact" of 43% on the PHP core, with 57% for "other developers" ; but the graph does not state the metric used[^2].
But I could not find an answer to the most obvious questions:
What did they do last year? There is no annual public report of their activity.
Do they pay developers to work on whatever they want on the PHP core? Or does the foundation have an internal roadmap and assign tasks to developers?
Liz is one of the most genuine and thoughtful people I ever worked with. The software world would be a better place if more people like her were running the show. Best of luck to her.
"Elizabeth brings a rare combination of deep roots in the PHP community and proven leadership in open-source governance. She co-founded a volunteer-based nonprofit dedicated to supporting women and non-binary individuals in the PHP industry, served as Community Manager at GitHub where she led developer outreach programs including the Patchwork initiative, and has been active in CHAOSS – a project focused on open-source community health metrics."
Tells us everything we need to know. Hopefully this leads to the US government dumping PHP, which is a good thing.
What's your concern here? That she lead nonprofits? She seems overly qualified to run a separate nonprofit to me.
Why would the government dump any programming language for anything non security related, let alone for the actions of a third party nonprofit? PHP is still governed my a committee of approved voters like always, not by the PHP foundation.
Sometimes, but not necessarily.
It depends on the competence of the DEI "figurehead".
Some communities had a figurehead installed by committee who provoked negative reactions due to bad decisions. Sometimes the leadership arose naturally or just turned out very competent.
And frequently, the trans or gay or whoever is called incompetent and DEI regardless of "naturally" they rose and how good decisions they make. Their decisions arw bad faith twisted for ideological reasons.
And no one even worry about someone not rising naturally when he is not demographic, regardless of level of nepotism and good old boys network that got him in.
There are so many generalities and so much hand-waving in your comment that it's really hard for me to understand what situations or which people you're referring to. It would be much improved with some specifics.
For me the number has been closer to 80% (my interestes/categories have been, foss, software dev, high tech specialization / academic work).
This is not surprising because I remember looking at the stats, females accounted for 2% of open source developers. And it was 7% female software devs (non-oss included, work etc). These stats are a few years old. I wonder if we can still find stats about cis-women in FOSS. Have the stats increased? Or is it too much of political hot potato to gather such stats?
How many males are naturally fascinated with computers? I know I was. Therefore it makes sense that if we see a female name, it is not just possible but likely that, that person is trans. Nowadays when I see a female name, I don't make the same happy assumptions I used to. That said, I welcome anybody interested in computers with open arms.
In some of my circles it's a runing joke that Rust, along with Haskell and some other adjacent FP languages, are favored by trans women; and also when I think about the women I know personally who write Rust code in some kind of professional or hobbyist capacity, I think literally all of them are trans.
> The doctors are sympathetic, and I think some of them even understand—regardless, they can offer no solace beyond the chemical. They are too kind to resent, but my envy is palpable. One, a trans woman, is especially gentle; perhaps because her own frustrations mirror mine, our cognitive distance sabotaging her authenticity.
But I could not find an answer to the most obvious questions:
What did they do last year? There is no annual public report of their activity.
Do they pay developers to work on whatever they want on the PHP core? Or does the foundation have an internal roadmap and assign tasks to developers?
[^1]: https://opencollective.com/phpfoundation#category-BUDGET
[^2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XE4g1Tl6RQw at 06:45
There is[1][2][3], the one for 2025 just isn't out yet.
[1]: https://thephp.foundation/blog/2025/03/31/transparency-and-i...
[2]: https://thephp.foundation/blog/2024/02/26/transparency-and-i...
[3]: https://thephp.foundation/blog/2022/11/22/transparency-and-i...
https://thephp.foundation/blog/2025/12/02/can-we-count-on-yo...
Tells us everything we need to know. Hopefully this leads to the US government dumping PHP, which is a good thing.
Why would the government dump any programming language for anything non security related, let alone for the actions of a third party nonprofit? PHP is still governed my a committee of approved voters like always, not by the PHP foundation.
They chose a religious zealot to lead their project. All I saw was virtue signaling and DEI initiatives. That's so 2021.
>Why would the government dump any programming language for anything non security related, let alone for the actions of a third party nonprofit?
PHP is enough of a security nightmare for anyone to dump it. Considering how anti-DEI/woke the current administration is, it'll be an easy choice.
Some communities had a figurehead installed by committee who provoked negative reactions due to bad decisions. Sometimes the leadership arose naturally or just turned out very competent.
And no one even worry about someone not rising naturally when he is not demographic, regardless of level of nepotism and good old boys network that got him in.
> More trans people means more inclusive programming communities.
This is not surprising because I remember looking at the stats, females accounted for 2% of open source developers. And it was 7% female software devs (non-oss included, work etc). These stats are a few years old. I wonder if we can still find stats about cis-women in FOSS. Have the stats increased? Or is it too much of political hot potato to gather such stats?
How many males are naturally fascinated with computers? I know I was. Therefore it makes sense that if we see a female name, it is not just possible but likely that, that person is trans. Nowadays when I see a female name, I don't make the same happy assumptions I used to. That said, I welcome anybody interested in computers with open arms.
In some of my circles it's a runing joke that Rust, along with Haskell and some other adjacent FP languages, are favored by trans women; and also when I think about the women I know personally who write Rust code in some kind of professional or hobbyist capacity, I think literally all of them are trans.
There's a quote from the ctrlcreep short story Knowing One's Place (https://ctrlcreep.substack.com/p/knowing-ones-place) that has stuck in my mind since I first read it:
> The doctors are sympathetic, and I think some of them even understand—regardless, they can offer no solace beyond the chemical. They are too kind to resent, but my envy is palpable. One, a trans woman, is especially gentle; perhaps because her own frustrations mirror mine, our cognitive distance sabotaging her authenticity.