[wp-hackers] Two new, long-overdue plugins to make your wordpress life a little easier...

[Marcus Pope]

Except that my plugin adds overhead, doesn't work with multi-site installs, and has a couple of bugs that will require even more core filter hacks to resolve that were recently discovered.  

With root-relative urls at the core, you get rid of all DNS hacks, all staging / migration scripts and can literally use your version control system to push to staging/production with 100% reliability.

> Far more than setting-up absolute URLs for a WordPress staging server. Even with the right DNS, using strictly relative URLs is
> still a major hassle and requires pre-deploy audits or alert-scripts.

This is not true, root-relative urls do not require pre-deploy audits or alert-scripts.  Please provide a use case where you think they do and I will explain why it doesn't.

> On both platforms I've worked on this was because there are usually subdomains/IPs for static pages, subdomains/IPs for
> dynamic content (Java, 3rd-party licensed DBs/APIs, etc), some resources requiring server-server authentication, and still
> other subdomains/IPs for assets and CDN content.
> In general, it's near-impossible to access the staging versions of all necessary resources without a VPN to the staging
> environment (which would also solve your problem of accessing a staging server from home).

Subdomains & ip's are still completely compatible with root-relative URLS (please understand I'm not talking about relative urls other than root-relative urls.)  Even with authentication there is no need to hardcode the domain/subdomain/scheme/port in the url.  If a platform you used did require that it was flawed.  

My point is we should take out that flaw in wordpress.  It does not change the behavior of regular users, and makes enterprise uses possible. Regular Users CAN USE THIS WITHOUT ANY TECHNICAL SUPPORT.

Staging servers can be publicly hosted to answer your vpn concerns, but still staging servers that hard-code production urls in their database for every link sent to the browser CANNOT be managed or even logged-into with how wordpress core is design without these hacks.

-----Original Message-----
From: wp-hackers-bounces at lists.automattic.com [mailto:wp-hackers-bounces at lists.automattic.com] On Behalf Of Mike Bijon
Sent: Friday, October 28, 2011 2:54 PM
To: WordPress Hackers List
Subject: Re: [wp-hackers] Two new, long-overdue plugins to make your wordpress life a little easier...

Marcus, your plugin may make relative URLs workable and it's polished (plus, your code is about as clean & short as it could be for this). However, I think Otto's points about why core should stick with absolute URLs are solid. Non-tech users can rely on core this way, and anyone with the expertise to setup one or more staging servers should stick with the plugin method (one main reason why plugins are there anyway).

Personally, I think a more-graceful way to handle absolute URLs and multiple servers is Crowd Favorite's RAMP plugin. It uses a one-time, on-deploy script. That's similar to what my Capistrano deploy-scripts do, and exactly what TeamSite does.

My experience with enterprise platforms (I've run both StoryServer and TeamSite-based orgs) is that they require a huge amount of DNS & config juggling. Far more than setting-up absolute URLs for a WordPress staging server. Even with the right DNS, using strictly relative URLs is still a major hassle and requires pre-deploy audits or alert-scripts.

On both platforms I've worked on this was because there are usually subdomains/IPs for static pages, subdomains/IPs for dynamic content (Java, 3rd-party licensed DBs/APIs, etc), some resources requiring server-server authentication, and still other subdomains/IPs for assets and CDN content.
In general, it's near-impossible to access the staging versions of all necessary resources without a VPN to the staging environment (which would also solve your problem of accessing a staging server from home).

-- 

Mike Bijon
email: mike at etchsoftware.com
web: Etch Software - Web Mechanics <http://www.etchsoftware.com>
phone: (310) 625-4702

"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing" -Alexander Pope _______________________________________________
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