Michael Perrin’s mantra is “No manual clicks whatsoever in the web interface for deploying a WordPress project!”

He’d like to help WordCamp DFW attendees understand the benefits of a fully automated deployment process and discover some tools that can be really useful to developers in their development process, such as Docker, WP-CLI, Makefiles, and an additional one that he has developed to manage data.

Automation can be useful when several developers work together on a project, or when several environments are used. Michael Perrin will show the benefits of setting up such a workflow.

Michael Perrin says he’s always enjoyed the ease of use of WordPress and created several blogs with it as it has always been one of the most convenient solution.

I would say that my story with WordPress is almost a love and hate affair…! Spoiler alert, love came later!
However, as a full-stack web developer specialized in PHP development with the Symfony framework, WordPress was quite frustrating from a developer perspective as I got used to the latest best practices and features like code quality, testability, advanced design patterns, and many high quality libraries. I had the impression that WordPress was a little bit left behind and not embracing enough all the latest developments that the PHP community has introduced.

When he decided to WordPress a try again for developing websites, he was amazed by how WordPress evolved both on a technical point of view and from a user point of view as well:

The REST API that got introduced a few years ago is really clean and very handy to use, and makes WordPress very easy to integrate into other systems. The Gutenberg blocks, with the use of React, really convinced me that WordPress is moving in the right direction. They have a huge potential and introduce a new way to develop and extend websites.
On top of that, I am very much amazed by the quality of the plugins that are developed for WordPress. They provide an unrivaled ease of use to users thanks to the extensibility WordPress provides.

In the end I got quite surprised that I ended up loving WordPress again!

Michael Perrin and his wife publish a blog on WordPress.com, of which he says it’s a great way to share their experience in Texas and the US with her friends and family!

The user interface is really nice and easy to use and WordPress is a perfect fit to share our stories.

Besides of that, the introduction of WordPress at the company he works for has been a success. All the available plugins makes it very easy to integrate new features into the company’s websites.

I was quite amazed that I could easily develop some specific extensions for the needs of the company. Developing customized blocks is much easier that I thought, and that allows our editors to easily insert dynamic content into the website.
I developed for instance a reusable Gutenberg block that allows to insert a filtered list of products that the company sells on any page or blog post. I intend to develop more blocks like this one to allow our editors to create many more interactions in the website. I was glad I managed to easily integrate the React library into my WordPress theme to to create dynamic interactions like product or blog posts filtering for our visitors.

Michael Perrin has not had an extensive experience with the WordPress community so far as WordCamp DFW will be the second WordCamp he’s attending and speaking at (after WordCamp Vancouver).

I chose to come at the DFW WordCamp as I saw all the interesting topics from last year, and that is being held in Texas! I also really liked how welcoming the community is, and that first time speakers were encouraged to apply. I really like to see that the community is not only a developer community but with many other profiles as well. The community is full of designers, developers, people working in marketing, and so on. I could see topics that are not only related to development on the wordpress.tv website open the mind. I also really like that there is a strong focus on diversity in the community.

Michael Perrin says he may have a slightly different approach of development with WordPress due to his past experiences with other technologies like the Symfony framework. This is why he introduced some tools that may be a little bit less common and that the tries to automate all things in WordPress.

When I introduced the tools that I have used in my projects to my colleagues, I realized that they found them interesting and that what I found out could be shared and used (or even improved) by the rest of the community!

We are so excited that Michael Perrin is sharing his knowledge, perspective, and expertise with us!

Tweet @michael_perrin during Michael Perrin’s talk using #WCDFW and ask him about his love of traveling by train.

I have traveled by train in the US (including coming back to Houston from San Francisco or Detroit where I attended conferences on PHP).

Have you gotten your WordCamp DFW tickets? Act fast – we’re getting close!