Hi all. This could be a case of a lack of understanding on my part but in my first 24hours of using wordpress I can't help but feel how unintuitive it is.
For context, I have a background in tech so I use tech products and SAAS solutions everyday at work.
Firstly, templates. Templates are great, I love that we have so many options but I can't help but notice that when I import a template I'm left having to pay a fee for the template despite it not saying that when I click install & activate. I understand that this is to make sure that creators are paid for their templates but this needs to be listed before installing & activating because I've, many times, found a template I like only to find out that its pretty much unusable..
Now that I've found a blank canvas template I'm happy however, when I go to edit the site it drops me into a page that I can't even see in my pages. If I import a template, these new directories/pages should populate in the pages section. I've published my site after installing a template and it still doesn't show up in my pages.
The next issue I've been running into is an issue with creating a custom login page. Firstly, why do I need a plugin to customise a login page ?? If this page is already available then it should populate in my pages, I shouldn't be forced to install plugins to manage something that should be native to the platform. It seems that wordpress sell themselves as an *everything* tool but fail to actually meet the standards that should be native and instead rely on the community to create plugins to fix what shouldn't be broken.
Troubleshooting seems very lackluster. This is a hosting platform that stores logs so that you can troubleshoot issues so why is there not a big tab that says 'troubleshooting' or 'logs'. I don't want to run around the platform to be told I have to download a file and investigate logs myself. Again. this is something that should be natively supported – why do I need a plugin to view logs ??? I've only come across the need to check logs because I've installed a plugin called login press but have ran into an issue with the customizer where it shows a blank screen when it should be showing the login screen.
Don't get me wrong, I don't want to feel as though I'm shitting on wp, I love the possibilities with it however it just seems that a lot of self teaching is required. I have a lot of experience with other dev tools and these functionalities are all native to those platforms however those are enterprise platforms that I use at work, so I've opted for a cheaper alternative. I use cheaper quite loosely here, there are a lot of hidden costs with WP which I also find quite frustrating but thats another issue.
Anyway, am I just stupid or is this a genuine issue that new users have ran into as well?
When you say “templates” – I think you mean themes?
And there are no fees – unless you’ve actually signed up to [Wordpress.com](https://Wordpress.com)? If so, please read the pinned post in this sub to understand the difference between [Wordpress.com](https://Wordpress.com) and [Wordpress.org](https://Wordpress.org)/self-hosted – they’re two very different things.
Most of this is just down to you being new to WP and not understanding how things are done e.g. why would a CMS need to have a way to view logs? That’s a server admin tasks.
I certify it! WP is unintuitive as well as the themes!
I’m also new to WP, I’m using the Astra and Kadence themes. Learning little by little, without using templates! I run it from local server using XAMPP.
Ever since they have introduced the Block Themes (which have kind of drag drop interface) things have been quite unintuitive. I would suggest install classic themes like Astra or Kadence.
Since you know coding you should self host, as it will give you a lot more flexibility.
If you want to test things locally, you can use LocalWP or [Studio by WordPress](https://developer.wordpress.com/studio/) which is simple to install.
When you start using WordPress you should understand that it is a tool for both a layman and a techie, so if you come as a techie and would like to dig deep, you will have to spend some time on the system to understand and accomplish any custom tasks.
Majority of the users of WordPress are layman who mostly want a few page website, with a blog feature.
Most of the plugins on the platform work seamlessly, if you find any issue contact the developer through the plugins page or post in the forums and you will get a reply almost instantly, from a very large open source community.