I.e., if your users want to insert a poll into a page, before you could probably install a plugin that integrates with the editor and admin panel. With this approach, you'll (probably) need to build that functionality yourself. So, your content and users need to be just right to do this.
Contact form 7's latest build has them using their own API - but it's still undocumented.
I don't do much WP dev anymore (thankfully moved to using Rails, Go and Node), but when I do I usually use that old project for deployment. I'll be sure to check this out, as the services architecture looks like a nice change of pace. I tried Bedrock/Sage in the past, but it was just too much for me and made some things harder than they should be.
Added links to my old projects below in case anybody is curious,
[0]: https://github.com/themejuice/tj (CLI) [1]: https://github.com/themejuice/sprout (theme)
One thing I really find myself having a hard time working with WordPress themes is that many of them are bloated and require so many plugins. The amount of css/js files that are required to load a page in a premium WordPress theme averages around 30+ files (at least from what I have seen working with WordPress themes).
HTTP/2 alleviates most of this, but there are plugins that can concatenate and minify css/js. It is a shame though that most of the attractive themes are so bloated.
The target audience just doesn't care (or dont even know). Theme authors want to solve as many problems as possible to increase the chances someone buys their theme. It's in their best interest to sell something with everything but the kitchen sink (V5.0 now with kitchen sink!)
I don't have it on my current webserver though, I'm not comfortable manually having to compile nginx, it seems like there's a lot that can go wrong there.
edit: lol today I learned cms != blog
cc @tyingq, @zaphar, @bybjorn, @dangerface
Another vote for Wagtail: my team has moved to it and have found it to be wonderful. It is the first time our tech, content, UX and marketing teams all agree on a CMS being wonderful. Streamfield is an absolutely killer feature. Our writers love the editor interface, which was clearly designed by and for content creators, and not by a bored developer like me.
Check out Wagtail. It takes a little bit more planning to get started, but wow, does it pay off in the long run.
It is truly free and open-source, released under the BSD license.
Check out the sites which are made with wagtail at madewithwagtail.org
cheers, ralph
It's super flexible no need for dodgy third part plugins that's no longer maintained. Instead of plugins I just build everything I need custom with the tools perch provides, I end up with something thats perfect for the client and its a lot faster than trying to modify some third party plugin.
Clients are initially scared of perch, they want wordpress because thats what they are used to and "thats what every one else uses". Five minutes into their perch training their attitude is "This is great. Why does every one else use wordpress?".
Sure its not free like wordpress but its only £50 and its worth every penny, you will easily make that money back in development costs in a day.
You can read more about the project here - https://www.laktek.com/2016/11/29/introducing-pragma/. We'll be sending out more beta invites in the next couple of weeks.
You can go with a niche CMS if you want, but WordPress is the most popular for a reason.
Edit: * Java on the back-end
WordPress is a flexible, multipurpose software platform.
Also, ACF Pro is your best friend in the CMS customization area & it easily dumps custom fields into the WP REST API for use in app frontends like ngx or React. I'm working on an app & CMS with this stack now and frankly, it's fantastic.
Thats my point you don't need to do any of that with a CMS it just works out of the box. People may be familiar with the admin interface but that doesn't mean its good, just that they havent seen anything better, if the admin interface is as good as something like perch you wont have to train the clients (we do anyway) its all just intuitive.
I cant reply to your other comment but I do still have to work with wordpress and I also use ACF Pro, it sucks so many plugins made by third party developers who have went bust and left me to maintain their garbage code.
As for alternatives I use and recomend https://grabaperch.com/
With that in mind, what would be the biggest timesaver(s) of using Perch?
If you mean the OSI definition of open source which defines how free the licence is, rather than how open the source code is then I suggest you check out the FSF they are the original OSI and advocate for free software and generally don't feel the need to change an existing definition and make it theirs.
I've built several high-traffic e-commerce sites using it, none of them had a blog. Compared to something like Drupal it's a total pleasure to use.
WordPress has the ability for pages as well as posts (along with versioning of those items). User account management with permissions. Custom fields. What exactly does "true CMS" mean?
And I'd argue the easiest-to-use admin area out there, or so my clients lead me to believe.
Thats why wordpress is a blog and not a CMS because the only content it handles well are blog posts and basic wall of text pages. A CMS will not limit or put a definition on the content it manages, thats up to you. As an example, how complicated would it be to model the content of a store, store manager and then the relation ships between them, this is basic stuff for any other CMS.
If you don't show your clients anything else they will think its great. My clients say the same thing about wordpress, until they see something else then they wonder why anyone uses wordpress.
Can you explain?
Interested in what other CMS's you would recommend? You aren't being very specific.
Which platforms? What was different about them that made them better than WP?
>because the only content it handles well are blog posts and basic wall of text pages
Unless you use post types. Now since 4.7 post types can apply to everything, including page templates. Have you tried using this and failed before you made your comment?