Title: How to explore the codebase?
Last modified: August 31, 2016

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# How to explore the codebase?

 *  [dudeperfect95](https://wordpress.org/support/users/dudeperfect95/)
 * (@dudeperfect95)
 * [10 years, 2 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/how-to-explore-the-codebase/)
 * Good day,
 * I read one article about how to become better at WordPress and noticed one tip:
 * > Explore the Codebase
   >  Take time to explore the WordPress codebase on Trac and
   > on Xref. Read through the documentation to understand how things work. Look
   > up what doesn’t make sense to you and ask questions. Familiarize yourself with
   > how WordPress is structured.
 * [http://core.trac.wordpress.org/browser](http://core.trac.wordpress.org/browser)
 * So how should I start doing this? There are a lot of files, should I explore 
   the core files, that are downloaded with WordPress?

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)

 *  [Matheus Martins](https://wordpress.org/support/users/matheusfd/)
 * (@matheusfd)
 * [10 years, 2 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/how-to-explore-the-codebase/#post-7006313)
 * Hi _dudeperfect95_
 * If you want to learn about WordPress, you need to knw at least a little bit knowledge
   about HTML, CSS and PHP.
 * The WordPress.org give some links too where you can learn [Learn](https://learn.wordpress.org/).
 * You can look at the core files, that files you get when you download WordPress
   too. Sure you will learn 🙂
 * Hope you will be the next WordPress magic 🙂
 *  [Phil Erb](https://wordpress.org/support/users/philerb/)
 * (@philerb)
 * [10 years, 2 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/how-to-explore-the-codebase/#post-7006318)
 * The WordPress [Codex](http://codex.wordpress.org/) and [Developer Resources](https://developer.wordpress.org/)
   are also good resources.
 *  Thread Starter [dudeperfect95](https://wordpress.org/support/users/dudeperfect95/)
 * (@dudeperfect95)
 * [10 years, 2 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/how-to-explore-the-codebase/#post-7006388)
 * I know all these resources and I already read them.
 * I read this article
    [http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2012/08/how-to-become-a-top-wordpress-developer/](http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2012/08/how-to-become-a-top-wordpress-developer/)
 * One part of it says “Explore codebase”, and it links to the link I showed you.
   I felt odd to see this, because it doesn’t give much information for me at first,
   so I wanted to ask you how to start exploring that link.
 *  [Phil Erb](https://wordpress.org/support/users/philerb/)
 * (@philerb)
 * [10 years, 2 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/how-to-explore-the-codebase/#post-7006395)
 * I guess it depends a bit on your ultimate goal. Basically, I’d suggest to pick
   some interesting functions from the developer reference or Codex and then review
   the code behind those functions – the developer reference gives you the path 
   to the file where each function lives.
 * Look at your favorite theme or plugin and pick out the functions it uses – check
   out how WordPress enables it to do what it does. And, more importantly, how it’s
   going to enable you to do what you want to do.

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)

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## Tags

 * [20q2016](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/20q2016/)

 * In: [Everything else WordPress](https://wordpress.org/support/forum/miscellaneous/)
 * 4 replies
 * 3 participants
 * Last reply from: [Phil Erb](https://wordpress.org/support/users/philerb/)
 * Last activity: [10 years, 2 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/how-to-explore-the-codebase/#post-7006395)
 * Status: not resolved

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