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By Jeffro on February 9, 2010
While monitoring twitter today, I noticed a few prolific theme designers agree with a point that Chris Pearson made today.
Now that I’ve built the platform, I see why Thesis can do plugins’ jobs more efficiently than the plugins themselves. There’s no comparison. – pearsonified
I think I understand the reasoning behind the statement. Instead of using a plugin that may have more functionality than is needed, ONLY the functionality that is needed can be built into the theme making more efficient use. However, I’ve always been a fan of the idea that themes should be about good design alongside flexibility while leaving anything that can be handled by a plugin, to a plugin. Sure, a theme that provides all sorts of plugin functionality built-in provides a ton of convenience, but the distinct difference between a plugin and a theme is that when the theme disappears, the plugin and it’s options are still there. The same can not be said for a theme. What’s the difference between putting a wall around me, and building in a bunch of functionality that is typically left to plugins? I don’t see much of a difference. If the theme is built in a way that semi-locks in the user, that theme is doing it wrong. But, I’m not the one with a theme business so perhaps I’m wrong.
At the end of the day, the user has to decide on whether they want convenience, or flexibility.
Should Themes Contain Plugin Functionality Built-In?
- Some (39%, 32 Votes)
- No (37%, 30 Votes)
- Yes (24%, 20 Votes)
Total Voters: 82
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Posted in Polls | Tagged bundle, integration, Plugins, Themes |
By Jeffro on January 15, 2010
The chat logs from the latest bbPress developers chat are online and there is some exciting news to come out of the meeting. bbPress now has a official plugin on the repository albeit it’s not down-loadable just yet. If anyone was thinking bbPress would make for a good core plugin, you’re not alone. However, the focus is on improving the current stable version by fixing bugs and adding a few features for 1.1. Thoughts about bbPress as a core plugin have been postponed to after the release of 1.1. Filosofo was granted committ access to the bbPress SVN and has applied his patch for anonymous posting.
Posted in bbPress | Tagged bbPress, integration, meetup, plugin |
By Jeffro on July 22, 2009
Andy Peatling announced on Twitter today that he had completely rewritten the forums component for bbPress alleviating what he says are integration nightmares. One of the biggest advancements for the component is no longer needing an existing bbPress install to function. bbPress is now included as an external which can be setup in one click for new installations which is pretty darn cool in my book. If you already have an existing bbPress install, you can point the component to the bbPress bb-config file.
Also of note are the forum management tools in this new component:
Added complete forum management for group mods and admins (sticky/delete/close/edit) and edit/delete for group members on their own posts. Make sure you update your theme with the new template files in the /groups/ directory to get access to these features.
However, the “use existing install” option needs some testing so if you use BuddyPress, lend Andy a hand. Also expect some changes down the line with how it functions based on testing feedback.
Possible Growing Pains?
This new component reminds me of WordPress MU and WordPress. WordPress getting developed as the main project and WordPress MU just building on top of it. That’s what I see with BuddyPress and bbPress although I don’t think the component is getting any additional bbPress love that’s not there by default.
While this component now makes it as easy as possible to have forums as part of your BuddyPress powered site, I foresee many more bbPress users in the future which in turn should lead to more bugs being discovered, more patches being written, and of course, more feedback for Sam. bbPress ought to benefit from this ease of integration but one thing I’m concerned about regarding both projects is the development resources behind each one. Sam Bauers develops bbPress, Andy Peatling develops BuddyPress. That’s it in terms of paid developers. The rest comes from any contributions the community makes towards those projects. I wonder what will happen if BuddyPress becomes as big as I think it will and at the same time, brings bbPress along for the ride? Will they be able to handle their respective eco systems? It’s a problem I’m sure they would like to have but I’m interested in knowing how much more development resources will be pushed to these two if things go well.
Posted in BuddyPress | Tagged bbPress, BuddyPress, development, integration |