[wp-hackers] Caching as part of the core

[Mike Schinkel]

On Jul 23, 2012, at 11:20 PM, Dion Hulse (dd32) wrote:
> So, Why not include a full-page cache in WordPress then? Well.. several reasons:
> 1. We have Plugins for this - the fact we have at least 5 different
> plugins which do this in different ways goes to show something: There
> is never a right way, nor a wrong way, every plugin suits different
> use-cases

Existence does not imply a need for many; it likely implies lack of leadership. Nature abhors a vacuum hence 20,000+ plugins at wordpress.org. Inspect the cache plugins and you'll find common patterns with arbitrarily different implementations.

Not asking for a user feature, asking for more API.  Let plugins innovate on UX not API. 

> 3. Not all server configurations are the same...although it can be done within PHP,
> that's still an overhead many people don't want (thus,they use a
> plugin to override it.. etc..)

60-80% is better than 0% improvement for those w/o technical skills or budget or ability to understand a bazillion configuration options. 

> I can guarantee you, If a *basic* file cache was added to WordPress, most
> of the plugin authors who write this stuff would leave it to us to maintain..

If they were convened I bet they would come up with a base caching API, and APIs are not hard to maintain.

> Just look at the Debug functionality for WordPress for example - It all
> requires a plugin, same as caching, different databases, etc

There is a defacto-standard debug bar plugin promoted by the core team. There is no equivalent for caching.

> 5. What are you trying to fix?

To fix incompatible implementations with otherwise compatible benefits. People innovate on top of APIs but chaos reigns when there are no APIs or they are not sufficiently prescriptive.

> better categories ... and WordPress suggesting people install a plugin
> from each (ie. Anti Spam, Caching, Social, This, that, and the other)

Yeah.

-Mike