Among programmers, it’s very unfashionable to use WordPress for your blog. (“PHP? Yuck.”) Instead, you should be using the latest minimalist static site generator, hosted on the latest free static hosting.

(A decade ago, this was Jekyll on Github Pages — I haven’t bothered to keep up, but I did put in my time. At various points, my blog was based on Jekyll, Pelican, and Octopress).

In 2020 I decided to restart my blog, but just use WordPress.

Three years, later this has been an unambiguously good decision. I keep running into things that save me significant time, compared to me trying to code this myself, or use a static site generator.

I think the proof is in the pudding. If the goal is to actually publish writing on the internet, consistently, over a long period of time, I’ve done that (or at least am well on my way — see the Archive).

Here are some handy things I’ve found myself needing that were just there for me. I’ll add to it as I run into more.

• Automatic redirects if you change a post slug
• Rich plugin ecosystem for nearly everything
• Extensive documentation, both first and third-party on how to do things. Even ChatGPT can advise.
• Ability to customize with PHP if absolutely necessary
• Migrating to a different permalink structure was a piece of case with the Redirects plugin
• Built in RSS feed
• Built in Recent post
• Built in Top posts/pages (via Jetpack)
• Built in downtime monitoring (via Jetpack)
• Easy mailing list integration (MailChimp, ConvertKit, etc)
• Built in grouping and taxonomy features (Tags, Categories)
• Built in Monthly Archives
• Built in comments
• WordPress/Jetpack mobile app for easy editing/moderation on the go
• One click plugin install to have dark mode for blog
• Builtin pingback detection if someone links to me