The "WordPress Killer" needs a business model. When building NextBlock CMS, I knew I wanted the core to be free and open-source forever. But I also plan to offer premium capabilities—starting with our upcoming E-commerce library—to sustain the project. This presents a technical challenge: How do you manage open-source code and closed-source premium modules in the same ecosystem?
The Nx Solution This is why we spent Phase 2 migrating to an Nx Monorepo. It allows us to keep distinct boundaries between our core libraries and our future premium libraries.
The "Empty Package" Strategy We are taking a unique approach to distribution.
NPM Placeholders: We will publish "empty" or "shell" packages to the public NPM registry for our premium libraries. This reserves the namespace and prevents confusion.
Private Registry via GitHub: The actual source code for the Premium E-commerce library will live in a private GitHub repository.
The Handshake: Once a user purchases a license, they are invited to the private repo. Their package.json will point to the private instance, seamlessly pulling the premium code into their monorepo workflow.
Why this matters This setup ensures that we can maintain a single, cohesive developer experience. You don't have to hack together two different CMS versions. You simply "unlock" the premium libs when you're ready.
Phase 3 is all about executing this vision. The E-commerce library is coming, and it’s going to be fast.
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