Enterprise WordPress Engineering

Beyond Themes: Headless, AWS Fargate, Timber, and High-Scale Architecture.

Introduction

This is not a guide for installing plugins. This is a curriculum for Senior WordPress Engineers building enterprise-grade applications. We focus on modern development workflows, containerization, and high-performance architecture.

🚀 WordPress Engineering Crash Course

Modern WP development in a nutshell:

// 1. Timber Controller (MVC Pattern)
class SinglePost extends Timber\Site {
    public function __construct() {
        $context = Timber::context();
        $context['post'] = Timber::get_post();
        
        // 2. Redis Caching
        $context['related'] = Timber::get_posts(
            'post_type=post&numberposts=3', 
            ['cache_mode' => 'transient', 'cache_time' => 600]
        );
        
        Timber::render('single.twig', $context);
    }
}

// 3. Native Gutenberg Block (React)
// No PHP registration needed if using block.json
// src/edit.js
export default function Edit({ attributes, setAttributes }) {
    return (
        <div { ...useBlockProps() }>
            <RichText
                tagName="h2"
                value={ attributes.content }
                onChange={ ( content ) => setAttributes( { content } ) }
            />
        </div>
    );
}

⚠️ Job Profile Requirements

🎯 Expected Outcome

By the end of this guide, you will be able to:

CAPSTONE-WP Final Project

Capstone: Headless-Ready Enterprise Portal

Objective

Build a high-performance, decoupled WordPress site that aggregates data from external sources and serves it via custom blocks.

Requirements
  • Architecture: Bedrock setup with PostgreSQL database.
  • Data Layer: Connect to NocoDB to fetch "Product" data and cache it in Redis.
  • Frontend: Create a custom Gutenberg block "Product Grid" that renders this data using React.
  • Templating: Use Timber/Twig for the theme structure, ensuring no PHP logic in views.
  • API: Expose a custom REST API endpoint for a potential Headless frontend.
Documentation

Create a `docs/` folder with setup steps, architecture decision records (ADRs), and API specs.

How to use this guide

Module 1: Modern Setup

Time: 5 hours | Complexity: Medium

Bedrock, Composer, and Env Config.

Module 2: Templating

Time: 8 hours | Complexity: Medium

Timber, Twig, SCSS Architecture.

Module 3: Block Editor

Time: 15 hours | Complexity: High

Native React Blocks, NocoDB Integration.

Module 4: Data & Performance

Time: 10 hours | Complexity: High

PostgreSQL, Redis, Query Optimization.

Module 5: DevOps

Time: 12 hours | Complexity: Very High

Dockerizing WP, GitLab CI, AWS Fargate.

Curriculum Overview

Module 1: Modern Setup - Bedrock, Composer, Env Config.

Module 2: Templating - Timber, Twig, SCSS Architecture.

Module 3: Block Editor - Native React Blocks vs ACF Blocks.

Module 4: Data & Performance - PostgreSQL, Redis, Query Optimization.

Module 5: DevOps - Dockerizing WP, GitLab CI, AWS Fargate.

Module 6: Headless WordPress - REST API, GraphQL, Next.js Integration.

Module 7: Enterprise Security - Hardening, Nonces, Sanitization, WAF.

Module 8: Plugin Development - OOP, Namespaces, Hooks, Unit Testing.

Module 9: WooCommerce Scale - HPOS, Custom Checkout, ERP Integration.

Module 10: Migration & Legacy - Refactoring, Data Migration, WP-CLI.