Opinion – Re: Moving away from Divi?

So, there are a lot of people criticizing Divi for leaving behind a bunch of shortcodes.

Wait, let me correct that.

There are a lot of people on Elementor’s payroll that criticize Divi for leaving behind a bunch of shortcodes. (The loudest of the complainers)

basically, there are a lot of people that criticize Divi for leaving behind a bunch of shortcodes.

Why do I make that distinction?

Well many new page builders (Elementor, Beaver, to name a couple) pride themselves in “not leaving behind any shortcode residue” upon deactivation.

Let’s discuss this..

1. There’s nothing wrong with shortcodes

Absolutely nothing wrong.

I still remember when WordPress first got shortcodes in ver. 2.5 (in 2008) and I was so happy with my newfound super power.

That’s how the page builder industry became such a huge thing.

That’s how WordPress became such a huge thing.

Lemme say that again for y’all:

Shortcodes massively helped WordPress take over the web industry.

We started with shortcodes letting us easily define columns and buttons and CTAs, and moved onto putting them in the text editor so it’s easier to define them without memorizing the shortcodes. Then we went onto a plugin that let us drag and drop things… and BAM page builders.

Now the question arises: Is this legacy, and should we move on?

No. There’s no reason to.

Mainly because I don’t think shortcodes are outdated.

This is because shortcodes are small macros. It really doesn’t matter if that’s how it builds pages. As long as you’re using the page builder interface well, and/or copy pasting the right shortcode, there’s absolutely no reason shortcodes to be considered be either outdated or useless.

Also..

Divi, Avada, Enfold, Flatsome, Jupiter, Bridge, BeTheme, Salient, Impreza, and Uncode… (many of which use) WPBakery Page Builder (aka Visual Composer), and SiteOrigin Page Builder, etc

It’s safe to say that if you’ve used WordPress, you’ve heard of at least one of those products.

They ALL use shortcodes. Just combining those sales/installation numbers would give you tens of millions of WordPress websites.

And those are just in the page-building area. If you consider all the other plugins that offer other functions..

like Contact Form 7, or Woocommerce…. or pretty much ANY widely used plugin that adds significant functionality to WordPress uses shortcodes. Shortcodes are not only here to stay, they power WordPress, and ultimately, the internet.

So… “Divi leaves behind shortcodes” being a problem is malarky. Gimme a break.

Using shortcodes is not a problem.

2. The alternative solution isn’t any better

I’ve given the (in)famous Elementor more than enough chances. I’ve really tried to get used to it. I’ve even suggested it to some DIY clients.

This post is not about using Elementor (that’s for a different post, different day), so staying on topic, when Elementor is deactivated… you end up with useless crap. WTF.

THAT’s what the Elementor crowd was raving about?

What’s the use of having some raw html? Does it retain anything? No.

Without Elementor’s stylesheets enqueued, what’s left is just as useless as any other page builder deactivation artifacts. GTFO with your pretentiousness. ugh.

3. You’re gonna be building fresh anyway… right… right?

You build a website with a page builder. Now you want to try another page builder. So you need to keep the content, and start using the new page builder to build.. a.. new… page. Right?

So…….. you copy paste the text somewhere, and use that when building the new page. The images are already in the library… (or you upload more)

At what stage do you need to even check what’s left of the page on deactivation? Caring about that sounds pretty stupid.

Here’s an analogy:

You’re redoing your bedroom. You pull out all the furniture to paint the walls and put in a new carpet. Then you get angry that the old carpet has marks on it, and the walls are dirty before you paint them. You still have your furniture, right? And you’re redoing the room. What’s the problem?

I find nothing wrong with that. Deactivating Elementor, and activating Beaver doesn’t make ANY process easier, at all. Foaming at the mouth trying to convert others to use the product you “like” just seems… weird. Especially when the arguments are stupid too.

Hey check this out:

Yeah… I was surprised to say the least.

Anyways, share this post with your friends. 🙂

Photo by frank mckenna on Unsplash