Core WP Developer Framework

WordPress starter framework for block theme development with a Docker-first local dev workflow.

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Quick Start

git clone https://github.com/Blake-C/core-wp.git your-project-name
cd your-project-name
rm -rf .git && git init && git add -A
git commit -m "Initial Commit"
git config core.hooksPath .githooks
docker compose up -d
docker compose exec cli_tools zsh

Inside the container:

wp-init

wp-init installs and builds the theme & composer packages, configures WordPress, sets the homepage and theme, and removes default themes and plugins.

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Access

Resource	URL
Site	http://localhost
phpMyAdmin	http://localhost:8000

phpMyAdmin credentials: server db, user/password from .env.

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Build Commands

Run inside the cli_tools container (docker compose exec cli_tools zsh, then cd wp-content/themes/core-wp):

Command	Description
pnpm run build	Full build: styles, scripts, images, static assets
pnpm run watch	Watch mode
pnpm run serve	Watch + Browser-Sync livereload
pnpm run serve:all	Same as serve plus PHP and HTML watching

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Importing an Existing Site

docker compose up -d
docker compose exec cli_tools zsh

1. Copy plugins/ and uploads/ into wp-content/
2. Import the database via phpMyAdmin at http://localhost:8000
3. Run a search-replace for the production URL:

   wp search-replace https://production.com http://localhost --precise --all-tables

4. Activate the theme and build:

   wp theme activate core-wp
   pnpm install && pnpm run build

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Production Deployment

cp .env-example .env   # fill in production credentials
chmod 600 .env
./deploy.sh

To deploy updates: git pull && ./deploy.sh

deploy.sh rebuilds the WordPress image on its latest base image, recreates the webroot volume from the new image, and restarts services. The database and uploads volumes are kept. Never redeploy with docker compose down -v, because it deletes the database and uploads volumes too.

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Maintenance & Updates

MAINTENANCE.md is the step-by-step runbook for updating pnpm and Composer packages, the light-cli and core-wp-wordpress images, WordPress, and the base images, with the versioning and changelog conventions to follow.

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Changelog

See CHANGELOG.md.

Assisted by Claude Code