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WordPress, the most common content management system (CMS) on the Web, has about 60% market share. It is even found on nearly a third of all web sites, not just those running a CMS. Given this enormous presence, WordPress has changed the Web quite a bit through its existence. Here are seventeen trivia about WordPress.
If one person were to work on WordPress by themselves, it would take [them] 151 years of work to complete the project. Of course, there were many more people helping to build WordPress, but it's fun to think about how much went into the development of this software so many people use today. And to think they did it for free!
[...] It's hard to find a piece of software that is more influential than WordPress. It's used by millions of people all around the world, and because it's so good, and also because it's free, it will likely continue to be the CMS of choice for years to come. But no matter what happens, we can always be grateful for WordPress for making it easier for us to build websites, connect with one another, and turn the internet into what it was always meant to be: a safe space for free speech and uncensored self-expression.
Previously:
(2020-02-21) Hackers Exploit Critical Vulnerability Found in ~100,000 WordPress Sites
(2018-12-07) WordPress 5.0 Release Brings Brand New Editor for Easier Page Design
(2018-03-05) About a Third of All Web Sites Run on WordPress
(2015-12-28) Web Design Tools for Moderate Users
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Wednesday April 01 2020, @12:52AM (4 children)
Could hatred for Wordpress be related to disdain for PHP as a programming language?
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Wednesday April 01 2020, @01:56PM (3 children)
Disdain for php? Here? /s
Not sure if you're kidding, but in past discussions on SN many have expressed much vitriol for php. Nevermind that it's been the usual sweeping generalization, and nobody has ever been specific with complaints. Okay, a couple have, but they just mentioned philosophical issues like "strong typing" and stuff I don't care about. Emily Litella and I are not sure what all the fuss is about. But WordPress is surely a pile of php scripts and so far, 12+ years running, no problems.
There are continuing "security" complaints about php, but I have no idea what specifically they mean. Any programming language can open up bad coding to security issues. I could rant on about javascript- more specifically, what browsers are allowed to do through javascript engine.
My only complaint with php, but it's for any interpreted language, is that it's horribly CPU inefficient. But as I mentioned above, there are plugins which do their best to cache binary interpreter output.
Possibly a better approach would be some kind of structure where as much code is compiled/assembled/linked into modules, and only run the interpreter for what's really necessary. And again, the wp-cache, wp-super-cache, and others attempt to do that.
Any specific thoughts about php?
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Friday April 03 2020, @03:56PM (2 children)
I am not kidding.
Those who thing PHP as a language leads to unreliable programming will want to avoid anything that is written in it.
-- hendrik
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Friday April 03 2020, @04:37PM (1 child)
Please tell me if I'm understanding what you wrote: that php inherently doesn't encourage good programming?
If that's true, I get it, but it opens up a very large and broad discussion of who should be programming what, and with what.
And even bigger- who should be doing what in society.
I had started writing a long rant but deleted it. :) Bottom line: I see square pegs in round holes everywhere, including the people who are "in charge" and making bad decisions. (Boeing). It's all about the "Dilbert Principle"... Somehow society needs to wake up...
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Saturday April 04 2020, @03:29AM
Yes, programmers vary. I have attention deficit. I try to program in such a way that my errors are likely to have obvious and glaring consequences long before they reach production. So I prefer static typing for anything large. It makes me more productive.
Other people may not live under such a constraint.
Oddly, though, for my current work I've chosen a Scheme dialect which is statically untyped. I'm using some data structures that are difficult to type correctly -- a lookup table in which the elements are extremely heterogenous. Doesn't fit well with current models of static typing.
I have some language design ideas about this ...
But Racket has run-time type checks and does very little guessing what the programmer means ... so it works fairly well.
I'm not sure how PHP does this. Is there for example, a rigorous distinction between a number and a string representing a number? Will it accept either in a function that wants the other and implicitly convert?
I admit I don't know, not being a PHP user.
I do remember PL/1, in which automatic implicit conversions from fixed to string to bitmap back to number changed the first number into quite a different one. There are situations where you want to do this, but in the usual situations where you want values to remain somewhat invariant and you don't explicitly ask for it you're unlikely to want it without warning or notice.
PHP looks as if it started as a notation for a web page that cold have parameters substituted into it, and then got a language tacked on. From what I've seen it is necessary to be very careful not to get things wrong. A common mistake (and attack opportunity) is to mix up sanitized and unsanitized strings.
Not my preference. But I do understand that other programmers are different.
-- hendrik