Profiles

WordPress Origin Story

When WordPress was starting to get some traction with its v1.2 launch, I started to take notice. I had been hunting for a good CMS for a few years before WordPress even existed … but every one that I tried didn’t really grab my attention or sustain my interest. Some were installed and uninstalled in the same week. Others were too complex (Mambo, before it changed names, and Typo3 for instance) … so I stuck with my own PHP-based flatfile type CMS that I’d been using since about 1997.

Then … WordPress came into my life. It didn’t take too long — about v1.5 — before I migrated a couple of sites … then several more quickly followed. The thing that grabbed me — and still does — was the size of the *global* COMMUNITY. It is great that it’s pretty much the industry-benchmark these days.

My fave WordPress moment was going to a Wordcamp in Melbourne several years back. I must do that again!

I can’t believe it has been in my life for 15 YEARS now! Wow! While I still do a few micro sites by hand (in my early coding days, long before WordPress, I used BBEdit and UltraEdit as my text editors, I still do with UltraEdit!) … and a couple with Dreamweaver … about 90% of my web content is now based on WordPress.

  • Member Since: July 31st, 2005
  • Website: deankennedy.com
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  • Created a topic, Helpful as the WordPress ecosystem grows, on the site WordPress.org Forums:
    It used to be that I could keep an eye on my sites for…

  • Posted a reply to So much better than manual management, on the site WordPress.org Forums:
    Fixed now ... thankfully same day. ManageWP also reached out to me and responded quickly…

  • Posted a reply to It was good … but …, on the site WordPress.org Forums:
    They claim "it just works" ... but it is not right now. Just to add…

  • Created a topic, It was good … but …, on the site WordPress.org Forums:
    I've been using this for 3 years and love it. I have 1…

  • Created a topic, Simple and effective, on the site WordPress.org Forums:
    This add-on works as I hoped it would! Nice and simple…

  • Created a topic, Comprehensive and extendable, on the site WordPress.org Forums:
    Aside from a huge range of widgets, the Widget Creator…

  • Created a topic, Conflict with WordPress v5.6, on the site WordPress.org Forums:
    I upgraded to WordPress v5.6, and my main navigation s…

  • Created a topic, Using custom icons in Elementor social icons widget, on the site WordPress.org Forums:
    I got this plugin to work find, and added a small set …

  • Created a topic, Just keeps getting better; top features and support, on the site WordPress.org Forums:
    Having used several popular themes (Divi, Studio Press…