Build on the right WordPress foundation
A freelancer rebuilt WooCommerce from scratch and left a store that broke on every plugin update. Here is why building with WordPress hooks and filters beats fighting the framework.
Tag: Block Styles
Why ‘write more code’ is terrible advice for developers
A client WooCommerce checkout kept throwing a random fatal error. The fix was not more code, it was reading the core files first. Why reading code beats writing more of it.
Why your custom WooCommerce emails look broken in Gmail
A client WooCommerce order emails looked fine in Apple Mail but broke in Gmail. The reason: Gmail strips CSS from the head. Why inlining your styles is the only reliable fix.
How WordPress inheritance ended my copy-paste widget mess
A client’s site had the same widget code copy-pasted twelve times. Here is how I use an abstract base class so one edit updates every widget instead of twelve.
How autoload in the WordPress Options API can slow your site
A plugin stuffed 2MB of logs into one autoloaded option and dragged every page down. Here is how the Options API autoload flag works and how to split the data properly.
Cleaning up messy WordPress hooks with PHP interfaces
Hooks buried in class constructors made a WooCommerce plugin impossible to follow. Here is how a small PHP interface and a hook manager give every class a clear, testable contract.
Why a simple WordPress plugin edit broke everything
A client asked for one small change to a meme shortcode plugin, but its 2,000-line class made every edit risky. Splitting it by responsibility fixed that.
Using the mediator pattern to untangle WordPress plugin code
A tangled inventory plugin had hooks and direct class calls everywhere. Treating the WordPress Plugin API as the mediator, with hooks in a dedicated subscriber class, keeps the core logic clean and testable.
Stop writing messy WP_Query arrays. Do this instead.
Got a call from a client running a huge WooCommerce store. They wanted a “related products” feature that was… ambitious. It needed to show products…
My no-BS MacBook setup for WordPress development
A new junior dev joined my team last week, and I had to get them set up. I figured I’d just send them my list…