Isn't it ironic?
The new GPLDL website is finally publicly available. It is faster, cleaner and built on Astro, while GPLDL continues to support the WordPress ecosystem.
5 min read
The new GPLDL website is finally publicly available.
We are glad the release is done. We are also realistic enough to know that a rebuilt site can still have rough edges, small glitches and details that only become visible once real users start clicking through real pages with real expectations. If you notice something broken, confusing or simply not as polished as it should be, please use the contact form and tell us.
The overall experience should already be much improved: faster pages, cleaner navigation, a more focused blog, a clearer repository structure and a technical foundation that gives us more room to build the next things we have planned.
And now for the ironic part.
GPLDL still supports the WordPress ecosystem. We still provide WordPress plugins and themes for download. We still care about the GPL, WordPress builders, agencies, freelancers, site owners and everyone who benefits from open source software. But GPLDL itself no longer runs on WordPress.
Isn’t that ironic?
Are we no longer eating our own dog food? Are we no longer drinking our own champagne? Partly, yes. But not because we stopped believing in WordPress.
The truth is more practical. For the rebuild of GPLDL, we had a long list of plans and still have many more things we want to implement. The more we planned, the clearer it became that we would need to write a lot of custom code anyway. Some of the functionality we wanted did not fit neatly into the WordPress ecosystem anymore, at least not without adding complexity, plugin dependencies and ongoing maintenance work we were trying to reduce.
And yes, we also had help from our AI friend named Codex.
So we asked a simple question: if we are rebuilding GPLDL from the ground up, what foundation gives us the cleanest path for a fast, modern, maintainable content and repository site?
That is how Astro came along, and it convinced us.
Why Astro Fits GPLDL
Astro is especially strong for content-heavy websites where performance, structure and maintainability matter. GPLDL is exactly that kind of project: a public website with articles, static pages, repository views, SEO-sensitive content and a need for speed.
The biggest reason is that Astro is content-first. It is built for fast pages, predictable routing and clean content structures. The blog and static pages can live as files, with metadata that is easy to validate and render consistently.
Astro also ships very little JavaScript by default. That matters because not every page needs to behave like an application. A blog post, repository overview or informational page should load quickly, render clean HTML and not force the browser to download unnecessary client-side code.
The islands approach is another good fit. When a page needs interactivity, that interactivity can be added in focused pieces instead of turning the whole site into a heavy client-side app. For a site like GPLDL, that means we can keep most pages lean while still building richer tools where they actually make sense.
Astro also reduces some operational burden. There is less database-driven page rendering, less plugin surface area, less theme/plugin compatibility work for the site itself and fewer moving parts in the public frontend. For GPLDL, that means more time spent improving the repository, the content and the member experience instead of maintaining a traditional CMS stack for every part of the website.
In short, Astro gives GPLDL:
- Fast content pages and strong SEO fundamentals.
- A modern developer workflow.
- Clean content collections and structured metadata.
- Less unnecessary frontend JavaScript.
- A smaller maintenance surface.
- Enough flexibility to add dynamic features where we need them.
Does This Mean Astro Is Superior to WordPress?
Not universally.
Astro was the better choice for the new GPLDL website. That does not mean WordPress is suddenly obsolete or that we would never use it again. WordPress still has an enormous ecosystem, a familiar admin experience, a huge plugin market and a long history of solving real publishing problems for real people.
The numbers are still massive. According to W3Techs on May 21, 2026, WordPress is used by 59.5% of all websites whose content management system is known. That equals 41.9% of all websites. No serious discussion about the future of content management can ignore a platform with that footprint.
WordPress will continue to be the right choice for many projects: editorial teams that need a mature admin interface, WooCommerce stores, client-editable marketing sites, membership projects, publishing workflows and businesses that benefit from the plugin ecosystem.
But WordPress also needs to change, and it is changing. The ecosystem is moving through difficult questions around blocks, performance, AI, collaboration, developer experience and long-term maintainability. We will keep watching that closely because GPLDL remains deeply connected to WordPress.
For GPLDL itself, though, we picked Astro over WordPress. Not as a statement against WordPress, but as a practical decision for this particular site, this particular rebuild and this particular future roadmap.
So yes, it is a little ironic.
But it is also honest.
We can support WordPress, provide WordPress plugins and themes, respect the GPL, and still choose the best technical foundation for GPLDL itself. This time, that foundation is Astro.
