Hello Dolly GTFO
If you’ve seen the plugins list in a new WordPress install, you would have noticed a plugin called Hello Dolly. It comes preloaded with every WordPress install but not (thankfully) pre-activated.
What does it do? It displays random lyrics from the song ‘Hello Dolly’ by Louis Armstrong on your blog. That’s it.
How totally and utterly pointless! Most people haven’t even heard that song.
Now why is this plugin included with every WordPress install even though it is totally useless? The reason is that Matthew Mullenweg, one of the WordPress developers, wrote the plugin.
The part that sucks is that a useful plugin like wp-db-backup was removed without any reason by this Matt guy but this stupid ridiculous Hello Dolly plugin is included with every release.
You can follow the discussion about this issue here: http://skippy.net/autocrattic
(If you’re wondering why Matt’s site is page rank 7, it is because new WordPress installations used to have his site in the blogroll by default. Imagine the number of free backlinks he would have received.)
January 18th, 2008 at 6:00 am
I can’t make you like the lyrics to Hello Dolly, but I can tell you why the plugin is there. It’s meant to be a simple (and silly) template for plugin authors to get introduced to our plugin format, API, and a glimpse of how easy it is to write one. I don’t think every line of code needs to be 100% utilitarian, often it’s the flourishes that make you love something. (Or hate it.)
P.S. Why are you serving Javascript through TinyURL?
January 18th, 2008 at 12:04 pm
Okay, you’re not going to believe this, but I have that plugin enabled. Then again, I always read it in HAL voice.
January 18th, 2008 at 1:44 pm
Matt, I didn’t think of it that way. However a quote rotator plugin that welcomed users to modify it (with a line saying so in the plugin page) would work much better than a plugin that displays the lyrics of some song.
You really don’t want to know about the Javascript thing. It’s complicated.
George, you’re just nuts.