Prototyping Web Apps with WordPress
Blaise Freeman and Ned Lomigora
April 30, 2012
[email protected] www.zeeen.com
@zeeenmedia
• started with a proprietary platform
• lacking market validation
• slow to iterate
• dependency on others for iterations
• high cost
Technique: The Lean Startup Loop
Prototyping Tool: Wordpress
first version of zeeen book microsite
what customers said it felt like
what customers wanted
user feedback
and after many iterations... One stop login
Intuitive easy-to-edit admin interface
1. Zero Out Extraneous “Features”
add_action( 'admin_menu', 'wpzero_hide_menus' ); add_role( 'defaultuser', 'Default User'...
hide menus and widgets with a simple plugin
http://themble.com/bones/
strip out unessential theme elements
jQuery("#media-upload #save").click(e){ ...
if all else fails, hack things with jQuery
2. Use Existing APIs "Bad artists copy. Good artists steal." Pablo Picasso
3. Hack Core Responsibly-ish
Conclusion
• use other people's code
• speed trumps doing it "the right way"
• WP core is useful for building Web applications
Thank You!
For plugin source code please email us at
[email protected]
www.zeeen.com @zeeenmedia