Designing with Wix is ​​Faster

WordPress creator Matt Mullenweg says that using website builder platforms like Wix and Squarespace, the same project could take only a few hours for one person to complete, while revamping the WordPress homepage and download page. I questioned why it took weeks to be nearly complete.

What happened is that a group of WordPress contributors decided to revamp their WordPress home and download pages using the WordPress block editor as a showcase for what the new editor can do.

Everyone who commented on this suggestion said using the WordPress block editor was a great idea.

But a month later, Mullenweg wondered why it took a team of WordPress developers weeks to create just two pages.

He wrote that he had a hard time imagining it would take one person more than a day to complete a project using a Software as a Service (SaaS) website builder platform like Wix or Squarespace. .

Mullenweg writes:

“…it’s a very basic layout. It’s hard to imagine one person spending more than a day on either Squarespace, Wix, Webflow, or WP Page Builder.”

The meaning of his statement is clear.

WordPress block editor

The Block Editor, also known as the WordPress Gutenberg Editor, was introduced in 2018. Still, it wasn’t until 2021 that a key feature of full site editing, the template editor, was released as part of WordPress 5.8 and the template editor.

More parts of the full site editing experience followed over several months.

Block Editor’s goal is to modernize WordPress and make it easy for anyone to install and build a website quickly.

The Block Editor is the future of WordPress, but it’s still improving, so it’s not quite finished yet.

WordPress homepage redesign

On July 8, 2022, WordPress contributors (and Automattic employees) announced the kickoff of a redesign of the official WordPress.org homepage and download page, suggesting it be done using WordPress’ block editor. Did.

Block Editor is part of a WordPress initiative to modernize and make it easier to design your website without learning to code.

The idea was to showcase the WordPress block editor.

The announcement was well received.

One WordPress contributor commented:

“I am very excited to see this project flourish on WordPress.

…Using your homepage as a showcase for all the modern, innovative and empowering things WordPress makes possible is a great goal.

So, with WordPress, you can basically do anything. You can create anything.

I would love to see a design that shows the modernization of the site editor and layout features. It even does things that many have never seen before. ”

Another post:

“I am so excited about this project!”

Someone else wrote that it’s a great way to showcase the editor and the WordPress community.

“The biggest opportunity we see, especially on the homepage, is more cohesive WordPress Stories.

Aside from the power of the software itself and what it can do, there is a whole community of people who meet regularly to share their movements. ”

All comments were positive and upbeat.

About eight days later, Mullenweg criticized how long it took to redesign the WordPress news page recently, saying the project shouldn’t take long to complete.

he posted:

“This should take a week or two to launch instead of months. The most interesting thing is post-launch stats and feedback and subsequent iterations from there, not a long process.

The /news redesign took a very long time.

A lot of .org had to be redesigned and there is currently a lot of unfinished work accumulating, for example in navigation. You can’t spend too much time on any part. ”

A Month Later… Mullenweg Criticizes the Pace of the Project

It’s been a month since the team worked together on the two pages, and on August 1st, they shared the latest in a post titled Developing Redesigned Home and Download Pages.

This post is a hilarious update on all the progress made on the still incomplete redesign.

Eight days later, Mullenweg opened a debate criticizing the effort, commenting:

“This is not a good use of your time, nor does it further the actual goals of your new home page or download page. There are better places to spend your development time.”

The developer leading the redesign defended the pace of progress, writing:

“From design to launch in less than three weeks, I am very proud of the team’s collaboration. The new theme is amazing. The team involved built an outstanding theme in record time. I think people will love it.”

Others have also posted support for progress.

Mullenweg criticized the pace of the redesign:

“33 days from the start of the project doesn’t feel too early to me, but I think it’s worth digging deeper into not trying to turn Figma’s design into a theme too soon (again, It should take hours, not weeks.)

He then expressed his vision that this should proceed faster.

“I can imagine a world where it takes a month or more to launch a single design. We created approaches and copies, focused our development time on measuring success metrics for each approach, and iterated from there.”

He then compared the slowness of development on WordPress to the speed of development on SaaS website builder platforms.

“…“hours, not weeks” to implement — this is such a basic layout that I can’t imagine it taking one person more than a day in one of Squarespace, Wix, Webflow, or WP page builders.” It’s hard.”

Finally, he suggested using an existing code approach.

“So if you’re doing a more sophisticated version of the same thing, make these changes quickly in your existing code approach and move to something more valuable.

If you’re looking to go further with WP itself, you need a radically different approach. ”

Responding to Criticism

Reactions on Twitter ranged from ironic WordPress bargains to support for the team working on the redesign.

WordPress owners are complaining (to volunteers) that block themes take too long and all they have to do is update the custom HTML of their current themes… Welcome to the last 5 years of block editing @photo mat!https://t.co/mI4zKBnO6T

— Brian Coords (@briancoords) August 11, 2022

33 days from kickoff to launch is a short time for any enterprise project.

— John Locke 🐝 (@Lockedown_) August 11, 2022

Wow. Was Matt generally just about the theme of nuclear blocks? That was very worrying.

— Hendrik Rusen (@hluehrsen) August 11, 2022

But there are those who stand by Mullenweg.

i have to say i’m with you @photo mat here. It takes 33 days for a soft reboot of two landing pages, page builder or not.

I also used static php/html for high load pages. That being said, it happens in every project that developers are doing their own thing. No big deal, I think.

— Peter Carqueville (@PCarqueville) August 11, 2022

Is WordPress inferior to SaaS website builders?

Mullenweg’s comment seems to echo WordPress’ vision that development should be quick and easy.

From that perspective, 33 days is not ideal to recreate an existing design.

Are SaaS website builders like Wix, Duda, and Squarespace already surpassing WordPress?

Featured image by Shutterstock/Luis Molinero