Twenty years on the web and still not done with it. Kevin Kyburz runs the web agency this:matters, builds websites with WordPress and EmDash, and helps maintain EmDash, with Swiss precision, or at least that's the plan.
Less than a week after 1.1.0, EmDash 1.2 is here. The editor becomes a writing surface, videos drop straight into the text, and a site moves to a new domain without passkey chaos. What the update brings and what to check first.
Two rules taken from the name carry the whole design: weekly issues and the dash as the only motif. Posts get data sheets as covers instead of stock photos, and EmDash on Cloudflare does the rest.
EmDash promises safe plugins thanks to its sandbox. I ran a probe plugin locally and on Cloudflare: what the sandbox really blocks, where its limits kick in and why the plugins agencies build most often run outside it.
The WordPress import brings every ACF value along, but repeaters arrive split up and images and relationships point to old WordPress IDs. I show how a small script turns them into real EmDash fields, and what's still manual work.
Is EmDash worth it for agencies that look after lots of WordPress sites? An honest comparison: where EmDash shines, where WordPress is still ahead and how to run a pilot without risk.
EmDash's admin has no update button. An update is a deployment. I updated a site on Cloudflare and rolled it back again, and I walk you through every step, with timings and what happens to your database along the way.
I set up an EmDash site the way someone new to it would: create it locally, run the setup, publish a first post and deploy it to Cloudflare. Here is the path with measured times, and the places where you can get stuck.
An EmDash site needs backups too. I show you what the built-in backup does, what D1 Time Travel, the site package and a SQL dump cover, and which one actually gets you back on your feet.