Lesson learned.
Don't update the WordPress theme.
Fuck you, "dev" that made our webpage.

That sounds like the wrong lesson...

@sheriffderek What would be the lesson? To back up and diff the whole theme to see the breaking changes?

@c3r38r170 the correct lesson is to never ever use WordPress. There's always a better alternative.

@eval That can be a hard sell at times unfortunately

oh yeah, using CMS such as Joomla, Drupal, Wordpress is a terrible mistake. Learned it the hard way. Later development is hell.

It's better to make from scratch. The expansion is much easier.

@c3r38r170 there are many ways to use WP, with varying degrees of technical skill. No code, low code - or full on. When using a premade theme... people stack child themes on top to solve this, - but in either case it should be in a git repo, a local install, and in some cases - maybe even a dev server. The data should probably be backed up and migrated with WP migrate pro. If something bad happens, you should be able to revert. But - I’m not sure which lesson is here. It could be “don’t mess with things you don’t understand” - or “there should be a README” - or - any. Umber of things. It’s definitely not “don’t use Wordpress” though.

@sheriffderek once you put that much effort into it, you can just use an actually good CMS like directus, netlify CMS, strapi, contentful, ghost etc. They all have good and bad sides, but none of them are the pile of shit that WordPress is. WordPress tries to do stuff that simply isn't possible with todays technology, and fails spectacularly. So yes, the lesson IS fuck WP.

@eval you missed the point. It’s ok.

@sheriffderek i didn't miss the point, i just have a different opinion.

Your main argument is that if one uses WordPress in a certain way it doesn't suck as much anymore. And that's true, but our conclusions are different because with all that needs to be done to make WP bearable one needs s programmer that knows his shit and a sizable amount of time. And most usable programmers would agree with me that they would rather use something else instead.

@eval https://devrant.com/rants/2383416/... For context.

@c3r38r170 oh haha thanks for this. Seems like you already made up your mind aswell. We've got cookies on the other side ;)

“WordPress tries to do things that aren’t possible with today’s technology.”

- @eval

@sheriffderek yes. The whole idea of making a system that abstracts design and functionality to a point where non programmers can build a website is just plain impossible for now. One can make a limited use case - say a blog where the user can create posts, change colors and categories.

As soon as you start adding functionality - E-Commerce, forum, SEO and whatnot, the programmers designing the platform have to decide between flexibility and stability. If you don't, and instead rely on a huge pile of themes and plugins to get what you want, you start to have a big shitshow really quickly.

1/2

At this point people like you become necessary that actually do know html css and js to clean up the mess and create plugins that work well together with a predefined list of other already installed plugins.

In the end, those who really want a stable and extensible WP start to use less and less plugins, and spend more time actually programming. And at that point, it just doesn't make sense anymore to use WordPress and it's ass backwards way of modeling content at all.

So why not skip all the bullshit and just use a proper headless CMS and some Vue/React/Svelte from the beginning? Because then you couldnt promise your clients a full professional page for 500-2k$, and make devs like us look expensive, just to charge for updates, bugfixes and replacement of old fucked plugins.

1.5/2 haha

At some point clients realise that, and then they come to me and say "our only real requirement is NOT AGAIN WORDPRESS". That actually happened, and it's good for me - because there's much less competition and customers are actually happy because they can understand the CMS and content structure in full, without 2000 bugs and vulns.

And THAT is why i hate WordPress.

@eval why not use _____ (insert thing that is new) - wasn’t an option in the past. I’ve used 10 or so different headless CMSs. I’ve been experimenting with them from day one. To say they are always better than wp is really just naive. It’s ok though! We all have to come to our conclusions. It depends what type of project you want to make : and the money and time you have. I spent most of my career trying to get away from Wordpress... and I would never have guessed - that 4 frameworks later, countless stacks, and 10 years.... that I’m finding myself saying “let’s use Wordpress.” I think it really does the trick for many situations. It all depends on the project goals though. And I agree about the themes and plugins for sure. I just like the custom post types and free admin panel. I certainly use it as a framework / and not really as an eco system. I barely even write any php. Haha. I guarantee that ‘react + headless CMS’ will cost 20x more in the long run. I’d turn down any Wordpress work that wasn’t greenfield - and that I didn’t write all the code for. So, I think that’s in line with your views. But my main original point : is that you could take the OP’s rant and insert ANYTHING - besides WP, and it would be the same! “Oh great... so, our dev used angular 1.5 - and I can’t update to Angular 6! Fuck.” - or vue 2 / 3. Or joomla. Or prismic. Or really, “oh great... so - I just had to take over a project. It’s written in pug, node, and uses contentful api and costs $200 a month - and is a crazy react mess - ... they could have built this in 2 days with wordpress. It’s just a brochure site...”

@eval re: abstraction: I can’t agree more. I think that web flow is a total joke. However a CMS and a template for engine - and a clear set of inputs and rendered outputs is totally possible and normal - and is probably MOST of the internet. For say, a lawyer website: users, areas of law, specialties, employees, etc (a few key resources) - some static contact info etc - even relating things - - WP gives you a lot of bang for your buck. It’s good at that. Server-side rendered / and just a few ugly loops - and you’re in business - and the client is used the to interface in many cases. I’d NEVER give the client any layout or visual design options ever.