This week on WordPress Weekly, I have the distinct pleasure to interview an awesome WordPress plugin developer. His name is Scott Reilly who has authored over 50 different WordPress plugins that you can browse here. It’s not too often I get the chance to interview a plugin author on the show so I’m highly looking forward to this. You can bet that I’ll be bringing up the topic related to donations, business models, and whether WordPress has been a thankless community to him.
What I need from you are questions. You can either publish them here in the comments or visit this thread in the tavern forum.
This week on WordPress Weekly, I have the privilege of interviewing both Randy Hoyt of AmesburyWeb who will discuss making WordPress work for business oriented sites while Scott Clark, co-author of the Pods plugin will discuss using WordPress as a CMS. Both of these guys presented at WordCamp Dallas two weeks ago so it will be a treat reviewing what went on at that event. I know many of you who listen to the show have wanted to hear an episode dedicated to the topic of ‘Using WordPress As A CMS‘ and I hope to deliver on that with Scotts help this week.
But the exciting news is that WordPress Weekly will notch a new milestone with this episode as Randy has informed me that there will be an ongoing listening party as the show is being recorded. How cool is that?
We are turning this recording into a full evening for local technical WordPress users and developers to meet and discuss using WordPress as a CMS. We’ll have pizza and drinks from 6:00-7:00, the live recording of the podcast from 7:00-8:00, and a question and answer session with Scott and Randy from 8:00-9:00.
I’m certainly interested to see how this all turns out. The only concerns I have is their ability to call into the show via Skype or some other piece of software and the background noise. The background noise is my main concern and I hope it won’t drown out the interview although if it were subtle, it would add a nice tough.
Most interviews with Matt Mullenweg revolve around WordPress which of course makes sense. However, there is more to Matt than just WordPress and the folks behind the blog BornRich do a good job showcasing that in their interview with the project leader. The interview ranges from discussing print media going away versus blogs, the web browser market, content discovery, micro-blogging, and backwards compatibility which I found to be a question I’ve wondered about myself:
Walker: With the launch of new versions of WP, and hopefully there will be more coming in the future, how do you manage backward compatibility with software efficiency?
Matt: We usually have at least a thousand people testing every new version before it’s released to the world. Still things get missed though, so I’d like to formally start testing say the top 20 plug-ins from the directory and make sure they work as promised when we introduce new versions.
Be sure to check out the interview, especially the bottom where there are some funny questions and answers.
Sean Daily who does the TEC Podcasts for the Lexnet Consulting Group recently published an audio interview he conducted with Matt Mullenweg. The 15 minute interview talks about what’s new in WordPress 2.8, the merger between WordPress.org and WordPress MU, the future of Matt and WordPress and a few other tidbits. The one thing I take away from this interview is the following quote from Matt.
If I had a billion dollars, I would want to do exactly what I’m doing today
Back on episode 47 of WordPress Weekly, I had the chance to interview Vladimir Prelovac but due to technical difficulties, I had to edit out the interview. So to make up for that interview, I’ve asked Vladimir a set of questions from the interview which covers most of what was discussed on the show. Thanks to Vladimir for answering these and maybe next time, the interwebs won’t be so mean to us.
What got you involved with the WordPress Project?
Having just quit my job I needed a place where I can settle and find a way to show my skills. That place was WordPress. It was easy to use, fast and had a big enthusiastic community. Sounded like a good plan to me!
I remember clearly that what won me over other platforms was the famous five minutes from starting installation to writing the first post. Simply amazing.
Which has been more difficult for you? Creating a plugin or a theme?
In today’s modern WordPress installations both plugins and themes live the same life, and a theme is often created with an insight of what plugins will be used with it and vice-verse.
Themes are hard to make as people tend to react more directly to visual aspects of design.
Plugins can be even harder, as the variety of possibilities having in mind all features of WordPress and integration with third party services is simply amazing.
Optimization is a big topic as it relates to WordPress. What are some things that the WordPress team could do to increase performance of the software where end users wouldn’t need to optimize as much?
My first suggestion would be to revise the database structure. Often I see WordPress blogs struggling with just a couple of thousands post. It feels like categories and tags are currently handled in a sub-optimal way.
The second thing I think should become a core feature is caching functionality similar to WP Super Cache. Almost all other platforms offer some kind of out-of-box caching mechanism.
Third major area of improvement could be changing the current editor of choice (TinyMCE) as it just feels as not up for the job, both feature and performance wise.
And finally, ability to automatically update third party tools that WordPress uses (jQuery, RSS parser and other libs) without having to wait for next WordPress release will show immediate performance gains when these tools are upgraded.
What inspired you to write the WordPress development book?
When someone comes to you and offers you to write a first book on a certain topic you stop to think will you be up for the job. After I decided I can do it, the prospect of actually creating something that will outlast me was simply to alluring to pass. Writing a book must be one of the hardest things I ever did but I am now enjoying every moment of it.
Is the book aimed towards PHP developers or those who don’t know any PHP?
Well really both in a way. Those who do not know PHP will still be able to understand what the book is about and what WordPress plugin development can bring to them – especially first and the last chapter. Of course PHP knowledge will be a big plus for understanding all details.
For those aspiring to create WordPress plugins, can you provide some developer tips that they should follow?
I have just recently written a whole article on this topic and I think it is best if I just point anyone interested to read it here http://mashable.com/2009/03/25/wordpress-plugin-developer-tips/
What about security? Can you offer some tips on how to develop WordPress plugins using secure code?
As long as the code and hacking is concerned, WordPress has evolved into a pretty secure platform, and you can find some security tips in the above mentioned article.
However, every single plugin you that you use on your blog has the ability to pretty much do anything imaginable to your site (should the plugin author want to do harmful things), and this is in my opinion where biggest security threat to WordPress lies today. Currently the entire community is more or less relying on assumption that plugin authors have good intentions. It is little scary to me.
Is there anything else you’d like to say to the WordPress community?
Read Jeff’s and my blog for latest WordPress happenings
Thanks again to Vladimir for answering these questions and of course, for the plug.
On episode 53 of WordPress Weekly, David and I had a chance to talk with Daniel Scocco who is the man behind the popular (and I do mean popular) site DailyBlogTips.com Daniel has used WordPress for DBT since 2005 and he also publishes reviews about a ton of WordPress plugins and themes so it made sense to have him on the show. However, the show wasn’t all about WordPress as we also discussed content generation, monetization, what it’s like to be in the Technorati top 100, and much more.
Ad Copy:
This episode of WordPress Weekly is sponsored by, WebDevStudios.com. WebDevStudios is a website development company specializing in WordPress support and development services. Be sure to check out their new WordPress Support Packages at http://webdevstudios.com/support
WordPress Tavern Listener Poll:
Each week from now on, I’ll be featuring a new listener poll question on WPTavern.com The poll is located in the sidebar on the right hand side of the site.
Last weeks poll question was: Is Blogging dying because of Facebook, Twitter, etc?
Out of a total of 36 votes, 23 of you said it’s just evolving, 12 of you voted no and 1 of you voted yes.
This Weeks Poll Question Is: Do you take into consideration whether a theme is licensed under the GPL or not before you purchase it?
Plugin Picks Of The Week:
Jeff – Odiogo Listen Button – Odiogo.com is a service that takes your text based blog posts and provides a listen button where end users can listen to a synthesized voice read the blog post. This makes your blog a little more accessible to those with vision problems. The voice isn’t bad but you can tell we still have a long way to go for natural sounding speech.
David – WordPress File Monitor – Checks to see if any files have been changed. Very important as code insertion hacks happen fairly often if your permissions aren’t set up correctly.
WordPress Trivia Question:
Which version of WordPress was named after a core developers son?
Announcements:
On May 16th from 9am-5pm, join me at WordCamp Columbus taking place at Columbus State Community College. so far, there are over 100 people scheduled to be in attendance including Lorelle, Jane Wells, Noel Jackson, Mark Ghosh and more. Tickets cost $25.99 and I believe there are a few more left. Visit WordCampColumbus.com for more information.
This edition of WordPress Weekly featured a special interview with the WordPress project leader, Matt Mullenweg. In this interview we asked a wide variety of questions. Some of which were mine while most of them came from you, the listeners of the show. It was great to get Matt back on the show again and I hope we can do this every three or four months just to talk WordPress. Here are the list of questions we covered during the show.
With Prologue 2 now publicly unveiled can you give us an overview as to what this theme is and how it’s different from Prologue 1?
Can you tell us about the 100 hour CMS Showdown event that took place at SxSW?
What is the process one must go through in order to patch a bug, complete a ticket and get it into the core of WordPress?
Question from Technocrank – Does it make sense to get involved with open source software projects in general?
What was your original vision for WordPress? In your opinion, has the software reached that vision and if so, what is your vision for the WordPress of the future?
Does you feel that WordPress already has the functionality it needs to be a good CMS or are some things still missing? If so, does you see them making it into core in the near future?
What is the state of the entire WordPress project? (WordPress Ideas, WordPress support forum, WordPress documentation project, etc.)
I’ve noticed that in most of your keynote sessions, you now include a section at the end regarding the license that WordPress is filed under. Is this part of a new strategy to educate WordPress users about the GPL license?
Can you give use your stance on selling GPL compliant themes or plugins. Is WordPress.org going to support commercial GPL Themes in some other way or what’s up with commercial GPL products and WordPress.org?
Do you feel that the GPL is the perfect license for WordPress or is it just the “most suitable” right now? Would they switch from GPL to something else if there was another license coming out that was more specific about webbased applications and code that doesn´t have to be compiled?
WordPress calls itself a “Publishing Platform” and many people use WordPress as a complete content management system. What features do you foresee being added in the future that will further extend the “CMS” capability of WordPress?
What benefits and features are coming to WP.org 2.8?
Apparently improvements are being made to widgets, “Improved Widget user interface”. Can you describe those improvements and how they will affect WP Users and/or theme developers?
Ok, what about the Theme installer/updater. How does that work?
What benefits are there for the core of WordPress to use Simple Pie instead of MagPie RSS?
Hooks are being added, Users, Categories, Link Categories, etc. Please explain what benefit these will add.
Will greater flexibility be added to roles and capabilities within the admin? For example – the ability to create custom roles?
Why not incorporate more of the commonly used SEO features into the WP core?
What feature are you most excited about within the WordPress software?
What is Automattic doing next as a company, and how has its continued acquisitions helped both the company and the WordPress community?
Are there any WordPress community members that deserve special recognition from the community that you don’t think are getting it as much as they should?
What is your fav plugin?
Ad Copy:
This episode of WordPress Weekly is sponsored by, WebDevStudios.com. WebDevStudios is a website development company specializing in WordPress support and development services. Contact them today for help with your WordPress powered website.
WordPress Tavern Listener Poll:
Each week from now on, I’ll be featuring a new listener poll question on WPTavern.com The poll is located in the sidebar on the right hand side of the site.
Last weeks poll question was: Is Blogging dying because of Facebook, Twitter, etc?
Because of the interview, we didn’t have a chance to go over the poll so it’s been extended by a week.
This Weeks Poll Question Is: Is Blogging dying because of Facebook, Twitter, etc?
WordPress Trivia Question:
How long has Matt been a member of WordPress.org?
WordPress Trivia Answer:
6 Years. We was the first registered member in 2003.
Announcements:
We will be interviewing Daniel Scocco of DailyBlogTips.com on May 1st, 2009.
On the evening of Tuesday, January 27th, I had the pleasure to converse with Michael Pick, an employee of Automattic and also the guy behind the newly launched WordPress.TV. WordPress.TV is a new website which aggregates all sorts of WordPress content in video form. The site has already made a name for itself by showcasing many of the videos from recent WordCamps. Here is just a sampling of what we discussed during the show.
Here are some of the questions we covered on the show:
What is the purpose of WordPress.TV?
How did WordPress.TV reach fruition?
Will WordPress.TV feature content created by people other than Automattic?
What do you plan on doing with videos that seemingly disappear?
Can someone suggest a video that is produced with a language other than English?
If there were any plans to let the videos be downloadable or even a podcast?
Are WordPress.tv videos released under the GPL? Would love to use this stuff for company training videos
Near the end of the show, I let my curiosity get the best of me.
Plug For A Podcast: Plugins Podcast is a podcast which aims to cover one WordPress plugin a week with occasional interviews of plugin developers as well as heavy plugin users. Episodes range between 10-15 minutes and are in mp3 format. Angelo already has a podcast available on the pluginspodcast.com website where he discusses the CForms2 Custom Forms plugin. So if you’re a plugin junkie, this sounds like the show for you.
Announcements: This Friday will be Keith Murray’s last episode as co-host of the show. Please stop by for the going away party as we send Keith off to greener pastures.
Continuing with the theme of E-Commerce, this week I had the chance to interview Dan Milward who is the man in charge of the WP E-Commerce plugin. During the hour long conversation, we discussed the feature set of WP E-Commerce, e commerce in general, what its been like to operate a business in and around WordPress and much more. If you have used WP E-Commerce in the past or are just interested in hearing what Dan has to say regarding the plugin, definitely tune in to this episode.
Disclaimer: This interview was not purchased or is sponsored in any way.
Here are some of the questions we covered on the show:
What are the differences between the free version of the plugin and the gold cart solution?
In your opinion, why has WP E-commerce become synonymous with WordPress and E Commerce?
What are your thoughts on the GPL?
How has it been like for you and Instinct to run a business based on and around WordPress?
How well does WP-E-commerce work with WordPress MU?
Announcements: Next week will be Keith Murray’s last episode as co-host of the show. Please stop by for the going away party as we send Keith off to greener pastures.
It’s not often that we feature plugins or themes that you have to pay for but when the product is fully compliant with the GPL, things are gravy! In this special episode of WordPress Weekly, we talk e-commerce with Jonathan Davis who is the developer of the Shopp E-Commerce plugin for WordPress. Jonathan gives us the low down on what his plugin has to offer. What is also interesting is his business model. The plugin is fully compliant under the GPL but without purchasing the update Key, you won’t be able to upgrade the software. If you’re interested in learning about an e-commerce solution for WordPress, definitely take a listen to this episode.
Disclaimer: This interview was not purchased or is sponsored in any way.
Here are some of the questions we covered on the show:
Why did you create Shopp when WP-Ecommerce was already available?
Speaking of WP-Ecommerce, what does Shopp have to offer that the competition doesn’t?
Which payment options/gateways does Shopp support?
For a single site license, the plugin costs $55.00 What else does a user get when they purchase the plugin?
Does this plugin work with WordPress MU?
Announcements: On January 23rd, Dan Milward of the WP E-Commerce plugin will be our special guest to discuss E-Commerce from his point of view and tells us what his plugin is capable of.
This week on WordPress Weekly, I have the distinct pleasure to interview an awesome WordPress plugin developer. His name is Scott Reilly who has authored over 50 different WordPress plugins that you can browse here. It’s not too often I get the chance to interview a plugin author on the show so I’m highly looking forward to this. You can bet that I’ll be bringing up the topic related to donations, business models, and whether WordPress has been a thankless community to him. 
On episode 53 of WordPress Weekly, David and I had a chance to talk with Daniel Scocco who is the man behind the popular (and I do mean popular) site