[wp-trac] [WordPress Trac] #14513: Time for a wp_post_relationships table?

[WordPress Trac]

#14513: Time for a wp_post_relationships table?
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 Reporter:  mikeschinkel     |        Owner:                
     Type:  feature request  |       Status:  reopened      
 Priority:  normal           |    Milestone:  Future Release
Component:  Post Types       |      Version:  3.0.1         
 Severity:  normal           |   Resolution:                
 Keywords:                   |  
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Comment(by mikeschinkel):

 Replying to [comment:21 matt]:
 > Could you describe some use cases for this besides manually-curated
 related posts?

 Absolutely, thanks for asking. Here is what I posted to wp-hackers on the
 same subject. Not everything mentioned would be a post of need to be
 related in the manner proposed but each example has at least two pairs of
 post types that need to be related and the first 3 are actual projects
 I've worked on since v3.0 went to beta:

   ''1. A law firm website has attorneys, practice areas, articles, case
 studies, and events/presentations.  Each attorney is in one or more
 practice areas.  Each article and each case study can be attached to one
 or more attorneys and relevant to one or more practice areas.  Each
 event/presentation can have one or more attorneys presenting and can be
 represented one one or more practice areas' calendars.''

   ''2.) A conference website can have sessions, sponsors, presenters, time
 slots and rooms. A session can have one or more presenters and be
 presented in one or more time slots and one room per time slot ,and a
 presenter can represent a sponsor or not.''

   ''3.) A website listing restaurant menus can have restaurants,
 locations, menus. A restaurant can have one or more locations and one or
 more menus (breakfast, lunch, dinner, catering, etc.) A menu can apply to
 all locations for a restaurant or only a specific location.''

   ''4.) A movie website could have movies and person-roles where a person-
 role could be an actor, producer, cinematographer, casting, film editing,
 costumer, set designer, composer, etc.''

   ''5.) A hospital website has doctors and departments.  Each department
 can have multiple doctors and each doctor can work in multiple
 departments.''

   ''6.) A radio station website could have stations and disc jockey's
 where a station could have multiple disc jockeys and each disc jockey
 could appear on multiple stations (given how radio works these days.)''

 I can give you many other examples if you need it. I've advocated with
 many business owners about using WordPress for their websites (often at
 Meetups) and I've identified obvious use-case for post relationships for
 every single prospective business person I've spoken to. This
 functionality would fill in one of the remaining few missing pieces
 businesses need without having to hire a developer to use WordPress for
 their entire website instead of just for their blog. And I expect the
 businesses I've spoken with are far from unique.

 ''(For developers who may fear adding this will reduce their ability to
 find clients to pay for enhancements consider that the more businesses
 that start to use WordPress the more of them will identify functionality
 specific to their business they need that does require a developer. So
 let's give them the low value generic things that are not "for free" and
 they'll have more money to spend on the higher value business specific
 things.)
 ''

 Actually, if there were only two (2) things left that we could ever add to
 WordPress I'd vote for 1.) something to address post relationships (which
 I will contribute code if given the agreed direction) and 2.)
 [http://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/12935 improved URL routing] (which
 I plan to work on in the near future.)  Beyond that, WordPress is pretty
 much baked, IMO. :-)

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Ticket URL: <http://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/14513#comment:23>
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