There’s a Japanese word I like, “謎” – the dictionary defines it as “a mystery”, “riddle”, or “enigma” – I like to define it as “something that makes no logical sense whatever”.

Here is a part of WordPress that I think makes no logical sense whatever.

Inconsistent Naming Convention

In The Loop, as WordPress likes to call it, you are given some functions that will output information for you. Handy!

the_title(); // outputs the title of the blog post

the_content(); // outputs the content of the blog post

the_time(); // outputs the timestamp of the blog post

the_permalink(); // a "permalink" to the blog post

You get the idea. Now, you don’t want to output them? You want them in a variable? Fine:

$title = get_the_title();

$content = get_the_content();

$time = get_the_time();

BUT WAIT A SECOND.

$permalink = get_permalink();

WHAT?

WordPress, you had a great, consistent naming scheme up until then. Come on.