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Fivvle Divvle
928 PointsPHP track or Wordpress track ?
Hi,
I'm finding it hard to choose between two courses at the moment. Either wordpress development or php course, was wondering if i could get some advice.
My objective: I'd like to be able to build wordpress themes to be used by many wordpress users.
My current skillset: I have completed codecademy html/css course and advanced to codeschool html/css path and finished that, including responsive design courses.
In addition, i have spent the last year buying and building websites based off wordpress themes that i have bought. In that time i've learn't quite a lot about being a wordpress admin so I am not looking at how i can build a wordpress website based off a theme and I am actually wanting to build a wordpress theme from scratch.
I'd like to save time by not having to do html/css that i already know as even though i'm not a pro css/html guy i'm quite competent. All in all, i want to learn to write wordpress themes and people have been telling me HTML/CSS and PHP main priority with a little MySQL and XML knowledge. I can cross html and CSS off the list which leaves PHP firstly and then MySQL and XML as my main priorities (Since one can write a WP theme with or without javascript i think i will hold off on learning JS for now).
Would it be better for me to go straight into the PHP development course or would it be better for me to go into the wordpress development course ? I know it's a funny question, i mean wordpress duh ? I looked at the track and saw that it starts of by learning how to use wordpress, so I really want to go on a course that cuts out a lot of the stuff i've already been doing for the past year and learn to write themes very well in as little time as possible.
Thanks !
Fivvle Divvle
928 PointsHi Melissa,
Thanks for your comment, I think i will do what you have mentioned. Will go to wordpress development course and watch specific videos.
Good luck with your courses and achieving your goals :)
3 Answers
James Gill
Courses Plus Student 34,936 PointsFivvie,
based on my own similar experience, decent PHP knowledge is a must if you want to develop themes (or plugins) of any meaningful size. Like Zac Gordon said, it's a prereq, and for good reason.
Also: WordPress has some idiosyncrasies in how it uses PHP. If you know some PHP, it probably won't derail your learning. But if you don't--it'll confuse the heck out of you.
But--you don't have to complete the entire PHP "track". Try the PHP Basics course, then switch to WordPress and see how it goes. If you find you're struggling, then consider doing the full PHP track first. I ended up doing that, and still felt there was much to learn.
Fivvle Divvle
928 PointsHi James,
Thanks for your advice, I have just gotten to the point now on the wordpress track for creating themes and have gone into some of the PHP stuff with the enqueue script actions etc... I feel like i dont just want to copy and paste what Zac is doing, apart from knowing what the functions and hooks do, i can read the codex, but i am still struggling with the overall syntax of how PHP should be written so I think i will hold off the wordpress track for now and learn some basic php as you mentioned before going back and continuing the WP DEVO track.
Thanks for that James ! :)
Zac Gordon
Treehouse Guest TeacherHi,
We list knowing basic html, css, JS and PHP before starting the WordPress track.
Fivvle Divvle
928 PointsHi Zac, I started the wordpress devo course and saw you in it. Nice job man ! :)
Kris Phelps
7,609 PointsHi Fivvie,
I was almost in your exact position, except I want to work on plugin development for WP. I chose the PHP track even though I'm pretty decent at HTML, CSS, JS, PHP and SQL. The reason is because I'm completely self-taught on all of these, and figured that it would be helpful for me to fill in the blanks that I've missed over the years while teaching myself.
By going into WordPress development with a strong command of all of these skills, I think I'm setting myself up to be a much stronger WordPress developer. If you go into the WP track with some holes that you don't know you have, then you are more apt to make mistakes, or do long winded work arounds when a fundamental concept would have easily addressed the problem. I hope this helps :-)
Fivvle Divvle
928 PointsHi Kris,
I think you make a really good point, I was mostly self taught as well until recently i thought, heck, why not learn to be really good at what i do and started taking courses. I tried a PHP course(free one) once and my brain was about to explode because i think its like you said, i was missing some fundamentals and holes of knowledge was stopping me from understanding. I will go the wordpress devo course which will hopefully get me through some fundamentals and build a good PHP foundation for more advanced things in the near future.
Good luck with everything you are learning Kris and on becoming a plugin developer !
Thanks for your Answer ! :)
Kris Phelps
7,609 PointsThanks and you too! :-) Who knows, maybe I'll be using one of your themes in the future :-D!
Melissa Wheeler
6,306 PointsMelissa Wheeler
6,306 PointsHey there, It sounds like to me that you might want to just do the PHP. I took the WordPress course as I had no experience or knowledge of anything to do with web design/development. I'm still in the early stages of my learning and I'm already finding some things redone dent. If you are comfortable with WordPress and HTML/CSS then I don't see any reason why you couldn't do the PHP course. You can always go to the library and watch a specific video from the WordPress course of from any course if you come across something that you don't already know or understand. Hopefully that helps. Good Luck!