Thank You WordPress - Robert DeVore

Thank You WordPress

WordPress version 1.5, named Strayhorn after the pianist Billy Strayhorn because “we thought he was perfect to represent the power and elegance of this release” was released February 17th, 2002.

That seems to hold true with the upgrades that 1.5 brought users and developers, like the addition of Pages, additional templates and site customization, comment updates and the introduction of the almighty Kubrick theme from Michael Heilemann!

WordPress 1.5 is the version I first found, and my introduction to content management systems.

It was the version I learned to love and eventually build an entire life on.

It’s the same version I learned PHP with, building horrendously ugly table based layouts in my spare time when I wasn’t working at a “regular” job (so, pretty much all the time ?).

WordPress saved my life

I’ve said it before, but I feel that it needs repeating – open source changed (and saved) my life, and the main component of that change has been WordPress.

Without WordPress, I may have picked up another CMS and learned to work with it, but I can’t say for sure if that would have happened.

My life was in a very different place when I found WordPress, and I believe the community surrounding WordPress is what has kept me around for these last 13 birthdays.

I believe that the community will be what keeps me around for the next 15 years, as I open up to attending WordCamps and further integrating myself with the community going forward.

Thank you WordPress

Thank you to Mike Little and Matt Mullenweg for creating WordPress and not leaving it to die like so many other open source projects have been abandoned in the past.

Because of your drive to make WordPress a reality, you’ve changed my entire life.

Thank you to everyone who’s ever published a tutorial, doc or code snippet online through your own websites or places like Stack Overflow and Github.

Through your content, I’ve learned everything I’ve ever known about WordPress development, and web development as a whole.

Thank you to every developer who’s created a free WordPress theme or plugin.

And thank you for publishing them in the WordPress directory, Github repository and your own websites.

Thank you to everyone who’s in the WordPress community today, making it what it is, and will become in the future.

From Gutenberg to further advancements with the WP REST API, the people building these projects are protecting WordPress’ place in open source history for the next 15 years and beyond.

And thank you, for reading this article and showing support for open source developers like myself who are pushing to better ourselves and the entire community every day.

You’re the real MVP’s!

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