Author: Tom (Page 378 of 428)

Writing WordPress Code – Clean, But Not Clever

September 24, 2012 / Tom / 0 Comments

I think of one the biggest challenges that programmers face as we become more comfortable and well-versed in our programming language(s) of choice, is that we become intimately aware of some of the more clever things we can do with the code.

For example, one feature of dynamic programming languages is that they offer anonymous functions. They’re really powerful and you can do some really cool stuff with them, especially in JavaScript; however, this always introduces a tension:

Are we writing code to be clever or are we writing code for others to understand?

Since I spend the majority of my time working with and writing about WordPress, I thought I’d share my thoughts on writing WordPress code.

What’s The Best Way To Manage WordPress Assets?

September 21, 2012 / Tom / 0 Comments

When it comes to developing web sites and web applications, there are two things that developers always consider as it relates to the project’s assets and its performance:

The number of HTTP requests a page requires
Loading all of the assets versus only what we need for a page (also known as YAGNI or You ain’t gonna need it.)

This is an obvious problem as we have tools like Head.js and Sprockets for managing this issue, and then we have customizers for larger utilities like Bootstrap that allow us to customize our builds.

Managing WordPress assets is becoming incredibly more relevant especially as frameworks, themes, and plugins become more powerful, and as people begin to build full applications on top of WordPress.

Extending WordPress Plugins with Hooks

September 21, 2012 / Tom

I've closed comments on this post as I'd like to keep the discussion on the source post.

Earlier this week, I shared my thoughts on custom, non-standard hooks within the context of WordPress themes which resulted in a great discussion in the comments and on Twitter, so it seems only appropriate to share a resource on how to get started with WordPress plugin hooks.

Last week, Pippin Williamson of Pippin’s Plugins published a terrific article on Envato that explains how to write extensible plugins with WordPress plugin hooks.

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How To Get a Page’s Permalink By Slug

September 19, 2012 / Tom / 0 Comments

If you’re used to working with The Loop, then you’re all too familiar with the_permalink. Simply put, it’s how to get the link to the post currently being rendered in the browser.

But if you’re working on anything more advanced than using the typical Loop, then you may be looking to get the permalink for a post by other means – perhaps by a page slug or by a page’s title.

I’ve had to do this in some recent work, as well, so here’s what I do when I need to get permalink by slug:

Why I’m Against Placing Custom Hooks in WordPress Themes

September 18, 2012 / Tom / 0 Comments

One of the things that I my team and I are often asked is if we’re ever going to place hooks in our core theme files for Standard. The short answer is “no,” but there’s actually a few reasons why I’m personally against placing custom hooks in WordPress themes.

Although this is stemming largely from building and managing a commercial theme, the discussion isn’t limited to that particular scenario. Rather, this is something that I’ve actually discussed with a number of other WordPress users and developers.

Overall, I’m generally against placing custom hooks in WordPress theme files, so I thought I’d share my reasons why I’m not a fan of doing this.