Case Study

Tide

A path to better code across the WordPress ecosystem.

Announced at WordCamp US 2017 in Nashville, Tide has been officially adopted by the WordPress project and is on its way to being introduced to WordPress.org and WordPress core.

Project Scope

  • API Development
  • Partnership Engagement
  • WordPress.org Integration
  • DevOps
  • Cloud Computing

Project Partners

Automattic
Google
WP Engine


The Inspiration

Code quality has always been at the core of who we are. Few things take a higher priority when serving our clients because we know that the stability of their business is closely tied to the integrity of their web platform. A few lines of bad code can bring a business to its knees. However, our pursuit of excellence has shown us that adhering to best practices, and even identifying the quality of a package of code, is much harder than it should be. Tide exists to lower this barrier, democratizing code quality for the whole WordPress ecosystem.

With the influence that WordPress has, we realize that by making it easier to choose and create good code we increase the quality of code everywhere. This advances our company mission of working for an open web that is more performant, secure, reliable, and accessible.

How Tide Works

Tide takes WordPress plugins and themes and runs a series of automated tests to identify their adherence to community-defined best practices. The results of these tests are returned as detailed reports, equipping developers to improve their code, as well as consolidated key insights, empowering users to make better decisions about what they could install. To bring these insights to the community as soon as possible, the first phase of the project is integrating PHP Compatibility results from Tide with WordPress.org.

I’m very very excited about this. Tide will give developers better tools and information to improve their plugins and give users [better] information when choosing plugins.

Matt Mullenweg, CEO @Automattic

The Impact

Few packages of code have had a greater influence on the open web as WordPress. Its ecosystem of plugins, themes, and related services is far-reaching and the network of businesses and communities around it is stronger than any other in modern tech. Tide’s purpose is to make it easy to improve the quality of code throughout this ecosystem. Better code at this scale means 30% of the web is more performant, secure, reliable, and accessible. This is a big deal to us and to all the ecosystem partners and contributors who have been and will be involved in the project.

Inspired by the proverb “A rising tide lifts all boats”, when we lower the barrier of entry to writing and choosing quality code for enough people, it will lift the quality of code across the whole WordPress ecosystem.

Luke Carbis, Product Owner @XWP Alumni

Supporting the project

The Tide core project and its application within WordPress.org and WordPress Core is ongoing and will be better with your help. To find where you can contribute, the best place to start is make.wordpress.org/tide

Key Takeaways

  • Impact on 30% of the web
  • Better code quality everywhere
  • A stronger open web
  • Phase 1: WordPress.org Integration

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Talk to us about how a custom implementation of Tide can improve the performance and security of your platform.