My story – how did I get into the world of WordPress?

The story began in 2016. Specifically, I had attempts to build a website in the 2000s when Geocities and later Yahoo Geocities (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GeoCities) worked. But the real boost was in 2016, when I applied for an online web design training.

I've met WordPress before and started to be interested in it, so I was very happy to see that the course is WordPress based. I've done it successfully and I've already had a few clients. As usual, I went straight into the deep water, because I had to create not only a logo and image design, but also a bilingual webshop.

It was especially exciting during this period that I didn't have any capital or insight into what extensions to use, but I tried to solve everything with the help of free extensions. These initial attempts have been successful, and this is how my journey in the WordPress ecosystem started.

I started with the classics. Elementor, Divi, WPBakery. Somehow I felt that these foundations were few. That's why I've also learned to develop custom templates and extensions. I became more involved in front end development. I learned how to use different CSS framworks, JavaScript and PHP basics.

I was already doing business when I was able to charge enough money for a website to become a ‘profit’. I mean, I had a little extra money. In addition to trying to create an emergency reserve, I started to invest “unnecessary” amounts in self-training and premium add-ons.

As a result, I surprised myself for one of my birthdays with Oxygen Builder and the world opened up. This plugin (not a theme) has taken a completely different approach to SiteBuild. He took a developer approach and tools to WordPress, so I was able to build much more complex websites. Then came the rest. Bricks, Builderius and lots of useful plugins.

My idea was to build a toolkit that would cover a significant number of functional needs of my projects. I learned to use various plugins like ACF, Meta Box, Pods, ACPT, WPCodeBox, Scripts Orgadizer, Advanced Scripts, etc. And over time it has evolved what can be solved.

I only call myself a COVID entrepreneur because COVID “forced” me to become an entrepreneur. It's a long story, I'll tell you that some other time. The point is, I wanted to be able to do my best with minimal investment. That is, in many cases, people unfortunately don't even know that software works on their site in the background, which could cost them hundreds of thousands of forints per year. But it doesn't matter, because I wanted it that way. I wanted to try the latest solutions and technologies because I wanted to improve. That's still my creed. Always evolving. Otherwise, the world will pass you by and you will become a dinosaur.

Luckily or unfortunately, life helped me not to stop studying. Because on a regular basis, and this is still the case today, there are projects that are not common. That is, I always have to solve tasks that are not general. For example, I haven't made a “smooth” introduction page in a thousand years. Home, about us, services, contact. Ready.

Sometimes I am envious, because the fellow graduates regularly receive such projects, at least according to what they say. Until then, my fate brings projects where you always have to solve something extreme, complicated, without a general solution. But I realized it was good and I'm enjoying it. After all, many people are now asking me if I can find a solution to their problem. This is not only true for customers, but also for employees.

But that's why I didn't want to just be the WP guy. Or ‘web’. I wanted to delve deeper into software development. That's why I also completed a two-year software development and testing training because I'm interested in how things work. I am constantly experimenting with something at home. This is part of the reason why I moved to Linux, as I always say. I've always gone the hard way, but that's fine. I still train myself today. My Udemy account is full of ongoing courses, so if I have the time, I can train myself in different programming languages and IT in general. I don't like to be stuck on the same level. Because progress is the key to everything.

I also realized that I'm probably badly wired, because even relaxing is about watching tutorial videos with a few beers (first of all WordPress and linux, Open source) or trying something new on my sandbox server. I am in the process of writing or writing a blog. It's been my fun.

So this is how I got into the world of WP and this is how WordPress permeates my everyday life.