In reply to Bas Schuiling.

'It will take some time — we’ve had 15 years to polish and perfect core, after all'

This makes me cringe. Core works, but it’s a mess that desperately needs cleaning and updating to modern PHP standards.

My thoughts exactly. Not only updating to use more modern PHP features (ESPECIALLY namespacing and OO encapsulation), but updating the API itself. It's a mish-mash of accumulated experiments and learning desperately in need of a thorough redesign.