Tag: WordPress

WordPress as a component system

Kenwood component stereo system with record player, tuner, amplifier, equalizer, casette tape, compact disc, and speaker components

Remember component stereo systems? WordPress is a component system too. Or it’s supposed to be if you’re using it optimally. From sites I’ve inherited I’ve observed developers breaking this by: Replacing the entire front end through decoupled architectures rather than installing clean optimal components Building an entire custom theme or developing a bloated child theme […]

Abandonment issues

Abandoned roll-up door with graffiti Never Forgotten

Theme and plugin abandonment is common. Themes and plugins need to be updated about monthly to reflect testing with latest core components, addressing community requests, fixing issues and developing new features. It takes a critical mass for the business side to work.

WordPress Santa Clarita Presentation on Database Cleanup

Presentation: Database cleanup, pruning cruft and optimizing WooCommerce sites

I’m presenting on the topic Database Cleanup at two events coming up. Everyone’s invited! The first venue will be WordPress Santa Clarita Valley Meetup the evening of Tuesday Sep 15th 7:00pm over Zoom. The second venue will be taking place mid October and will be announced soon…

Local WordPress development multi-environment sandboxes with fully-trusted SSL

Mac laptop with code editor in view

There’s myriad options for local WordPress development environments. Some are quite simple to set-up, usually connected to a paid hosting service that funds the local dev project. Some automatically install WordPress while others require manual installation into the web root htdocs plus database initialization. For Linux users like myself the options are primarily: direct installation/configuration […]

Co-organizing WordCamp Santa Clarita 2020

University Center - College of the Canyons

WordCamp Santa Clarita 2020 #wcscv website is now live and the call for speakers is up! Our call for sponsors, volunteers and opening of attendee tickets is forthcoming. Please stay tuned or subscribe for updates (see footer). I hope to see folks there in early April.

PHP 7.4 is here and performing well

Race track photo showing gridlines and counting down 11 to 1

WordPress hosting companies are notoriously behind in upgrading PHP – the web service that processes a website’s data and logical code into HTML output. The cost of this delay is enormous in terms of website maintenance and performance. The jump from PHP v5 to v7 was a big one that required software updates and often […]

Giving a Theme or Plugin Developer Admin Access

Man sitting at laptop wearing headphones, microphone at a busy office pod with two other workstations in the periphery

Let’s say you’ve reported a bug that you’ve observed in a theme or plugin. Good job by the way! Should you provide the developer admin access to your production site so they can diagnose or repair the issue? ABSOLUTELY NOT!

WordPress WooCommerce Developer Hourly Rate Research

Cartoon of a business man sitting at a computer desk with programming languages JS, CSS, HTML, PHP, C++ hovering above like speech bubbles

How much should your developer be charging you? This is a complex question to answer because the range is quite wide and there are many factors that contribute, such as location cost-of-living, skill level, how sharp the developer is and how busy his/her schedule is. I’ll provide you with United States oriented research I’ve come-up with.