I need a fresh WordPress. I need a light WordPress. What would it take to fork WordPress and remove all blog-related code and turn it into a true content management system? I know we all agree that WordPress is way past its blogging life and has turned into a proper content management systems years ago.
I’ll make a list of things that don’t belong in core (in my opinion):
Emojis
They definitely don’t belong in core, as they require an extra content pass to parse and render them. Make it a featured plugin or pass it next door, to Jetpack. Milliseconds, I don’t doubt it, but still. Also, the JavaScript libraries.
Smilies
Same as above, plugin territory.
WordPress Capital P
I know, I’m a fanatic too, and I try to correct people when they spell it wrongly, but really? I’m sure other content management systems don’t autocorrect their own name in the user-generated content.
oEmbed
Non-bloggers definitely don’t need this, and if they do, they can grab it as a featured plugin or as a module in Jetpack.
Pingbacks and trackbacks
While definitely useful for a blog, they’re not at all useful for a business/corporate site, where comments are disabled (or should be disabled by default). I know it’s a nice featured, but in some server configurations, they can slow down the entire site.
Gravatars
Again, might be useful for beginner blogs, but for business/corporate sites or for established blogs, they’re just extra load. Again, plugin territory.
Declutter head
Remove all RSD, WLW references, WordPress generator tags and post short links. Also, RSS should default to disabled. I am still considering WordPress-generated <rel> tags for a business/corporate site, as I don’t see the real value. This plugin does a really good job with cleaning up and improving overall WordPress performance.
Declutter widgets
Remove blog-specific (and I might say obsolete) widgets such as calendar, archive, meta, links, RSS, tag cloud.
Quick draft dashboard widget
Remove it, as it’s purely a blog-specific feature, and it doesn’t save any time.
Remove support for PHP lower than 5.5
I’m sure the codebase would be reduced by at least 25%. Also, in the same category, remove all deprecation features. If a function is gone, it’s gone for good.
Move REST API to a plugin
I’m not sure what the usage percentage is, but it’s not too high. It’s still an in-development feature.
Remove SWFUpload
As SWFUpload is based on Flash, we all agree it’s obsolete, and it needs to die.
Remove WordPress Password protected posts
This feature is not secure, and it can be circumvented easily. It’s a workaround for a very old feature. There are great membership plugins out there.
Also, I’m sure there are lots of unused files and unused code buried deep in there.
While these are my personal opinions, feel free to contribute and let me know what would you remove from WordPress.
UPDATE: I found more useless features: Gutenberg, tag line, post formats, post via email, update services, privacy policy, user contact methods (AIM, YIM, Jabber), keyboard shortcuts, jQuery dependency, jQuery Migrate, version parameter from scripts and stylesheets.
Photo by Christopher Burns on Unsplash
