Presented by Shannon Smith & Kathryn Presner
This introductory session is geared for bloggers, web designers and programmers who are new to WordPress. Even those who don’t know a Codex from a Cadillac will feel comfortable here. Delving into WordPress from a beginner’s point of view, we use unintimidating plain language to explain the fundamental concepts of WordPress, from themes, to widgets, to plug-ins. We go spelunking in the admin panel and show real-world examples of what WordPress can do. Questions are welcome, and no query is too basic, so don’t be shy!
For beginners to WordPress, no knowledge of HTML required.
Kathryn Presner of Zoonini Web Services takes a holistic approach to web design and development, building unique sites that work well, look great, and are easily found in search-engine results by the target market. She is passionate about helping people avoid common website pitfalls and enjoys speaking to entrepreneurs on the topic. A moderator in the WordPress support forums, Kathryn has given talks on WordPress for beginners at events including Girl Geek Dinners and WordCamps in Toronto and Montreal. Follow @zoonini on Twitter.
Shannon Smith is the founder of Café Noir Design a boutique Montreal web design company specializing in bilingual web design. She supports web standards, semantic markup, microformats, open source products, and sustainable business practices. Shannon works with a number of PHP/MySQL content management systems to create clean, minimalist designs, that adhere to W3C standards. She holds graduate degrees in journalism and psychology. Also a foodie and mother of three. Follow @cafenoirdesign on Twitter.
14. Some WordPress Basics
Structure Presentation
Markup
Language ➜
Database vs. files
PHP vs. HTML Dynamic Functions
Scripting
Do I need to know
Language ➜
PHP?
Data
Database ➜
17. Introduction to Themes
A WP Theme is a collection of Template files -
(X)HTML + PHP + CSS
The CSS (aka stylesheet) usually controls the
layout and design
Only two template files are required: index.php,
style.css
Some are optional: sidebar.php, comments.php,
etc.
http://codex.wordpress.org/Stepping_Into_Templates
http://codex.wordpress.org/Template_Hierarchy
20. Get Started With
Blank Themes
Starkers
http://starkerstheme.com/
DIW Blank Theme
http://themeclubhouse.digwp.com/
Whiteboard
http://whiteboardframework.com/
Base
http://fresh01.co.za/2008/07/14/base/
Roots
http://www.rootstheme.com/
HTML5 Boilerplate
https://github.com/iamamused/wp-theme-html5-boilerplate
21. Get Started With
A Pre-made Theme
WooThemes
http://www.woothemes.com/
elegantthemes
http://www.elegantthemes.com/
Press75
http://www.press75.com/
WPswitch
http://wpswitch.com/
Theme Madness on WP Candy
http://wpcandy.com/series-on/theme-madness-2011/
22. Introduction to Plugins
What is a plug-in?
Where do you get plug-ins?
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/
24. Introduction to Widgets
What is a
widget?
What is a
widget-ready
theme?
http://codex.wordpress.org/WordPress_Widgets
http://automattic.com/code/widgets/
28. Links
wordpress.org (of course!)
The Codex:
http://codex.wordpress.org/
wordpress.tv
http://wordpress.tv/
wcmtl.org/wpmtl.org
Montreal WordPress
Community on Facebook
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?
gid=199180685044
WordPress on LinkedIn
http://www.linkedin.com/groups?
home=&gid=154024&trk=anet_ug_hm
29. Cheat Sheets
WP Candy Cheat Sheet - Basic and Advanced
http://wpcandy.com/teaches/the-wordpress-help-sheet
http://wpcandy.com/teaches/the-advanced-wordpress-help-sheet
WordPress Template Tags Reference Guide
http://www.dbswebsite.com/design/wordpress-reference/V3/
Optimization Cheat Sheet for WordPress
http://codex.wordpress.org/WordPress_Optimization/Cheat_Sheet
Various 3.0-Ready Cheat Sheets
http://www.webanddesigners.com/11-extremely-helpful-wordpress-cheatsheets/
Remember: Cheat sheets need to be current
30. Theme Development Tools
Theme Test Drive Plugin
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/theme-test-drive/
Official Theme Development Checklist & Sample Data
http://codex.wordpress.org/Theme_Development_Checklist
Book: Digging Into WordPress
http://digwp.com/
Online and In-Person Classes
31. WordPress Inspiration
We Love WP
http://welovewp.com/
WPInspiration
http://wpinspiration.com/
WP Float
http://wpfloat.com/
WP Showcase
http://wordpress.org/showcase/
32. Kathryn's Must-Have
Plugins
All in One SEO Pack 3 security plugins:
WP-DB-Backup WordPress File
Monitor
Maintenance Mode
Secure WordPress
Feedsmith
WordPress Exploit
Obfuscate Email
Scanner
Subscribe to Comments
Extremely helpful if
needed: Widget Logic
33. Shannon's Must-Have
Plugins
WP-DB-Backup WP Super Cache
Contact Form 7 WP Minify
Jetpack WP-smushit
php-enkoder
WordPress SEO (feedburner, google
analytics, wufoo forms,
Google XML Sitemaps
microformats)
Simple Image Widget
35. What Next? Questions?
Get the presentation at Slideshare
http://www.slideshare.net/cafenoirdesign
Company links
http://www.zoonini.com
http://www.cafenoirdesign.com
Twitter links
@zoonini
@cafenoirdesign
Kathryn \nI’m Kathryn Presner. Been building Web sites for over a decade through Zoonini Web Services. My background in communications leads me to look at web design holistically, taking into account design/technical aspects/content/optimization. I'm a moderator in the WordPress support forums and particularly enjoy helping newbies because I remember very well what it was like to be new to WordPress.\n
Shannon\nShannon Smith is the founder of Café Noir Design Inc., a small boutique web design company in the Montreal area specializing in bilingual web design. She supports web standards, semantic markup, microformats, open source products, and sustainable business practices. Shannon works with a number of PHP/MySQL content management systems to create clean, minimalist designs, that adhere to W3C standards. She also holds graduate degrees in journalism and psychology. Also a foodie and mother of three.\n
Shannon\n
\n
Kathryn\nWhat is WordPress? \n- popular open-source blogging platform that started in 2003\n- two distinct flavours: WordPress.com & WordPress.org\n- .org - need your own Web host server but the basic software is Open Source, meaning that the source code is made available to anyone, free of charge and free of copyright restrictions\n- .com - WordPress hosts site for you, there are commercial limitations (advertising, affiliate links), limited choice of themes or plug-ins, can’t install your own plug-ins or custom themes, to access certain features & customization you need to buy credits, URL like janesblog.wordpress.com (you can upgrade to use your own domain). WordPress.com may display ads on your site unless you upgrade\n- our focus today is on WordPress.org\n
Shannon\n\nThis blog for an illustrator allows the designer to share news easily\n-Typical blog format, few plugins\n
Kathryn\nWordPress doesn't have to be used like a traditional written blog - example: presner.com (video blog), can also be used solely as a CMS (content management system)\n\nThis site for a business coach incorporates a blog as well as informational pages (CMS part). Each section has a different colour scheme.\n
Shannon\n-plugins here are mostly for navigation, audio\n
\n
Kathryn\nThis portfolio site for a film & TV editor features dozens of video clips. “Premium theme” purchased & customized.\n
Shannon\nhttp://sixrevisions.com/wordpress/16-wordpress-sites-to-help-you-build-a-better-blog/\n-Doesn’t look like a blog\n-Uses few plugins\n-Uses web tools instead (Google interactive maps, Wuforms, Email Signup, etc.\n
Shannon\n
Shannon\nSome technical things that are helpful to understand at least the basics of:\n- WordPress runs on PHP (scripting language) PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor& MySQL (type of database)\n-Php allows for a dynamic site\n- Difference between database vs. files\n- file - document\n- database - bits of information that can be interconnected in different ways\n- WordPress - and most other CMS’s - use both files and a database to allow quick updating and access of information\n- What is PHP and how does it differ from HTML. Do you need to know HTML or PHP or CSS to use WordPress? No - BUT a little bit can go a long way.\n- We will assume most of you know at least a little HTML but little-to-no PHP\n-On top of these can be added javascript, flash, etc.\n-Javascript is a programming language designed for performing dynamic tasks.\n-Flash is a multimedia platform that is popular for adding animation and interactivity to web pages. It contains a scripting language called ActionScript.\n-Ajax uses a combination of HTML and CSS to mark up and style information. The DOM is accessed with JavaScript to dynamically display, and to allow the user to interact with, the information presented. JavaScript and the XMLHttpRequest object provide a method for exchanging data asynchronously between browser and server to avoid full page reloads.\n
Shannon\n- Posts vs. Pages \n- Pages are just what they sound like - whole pages on a site\n-meant to be used for static content - content that rarely changes\n-example : the about page\n
Shannon\n- posts are individual entries within a blog, they can include things like:\n- the title of the entry, the date, tags, categories, comments\n-typical blog entries, but can also be any dynamic content (events list, etc.)\n
Shannon\nIntro to themes\n- a theme is a collection of template files that tells WordPress what your site should look like and how it should work\n- (X)HTML files & CSS stylesheet\n- Where to get a blank theme\nHow does a theme file work - i.e. usually pulls in header, footer, sidebar\nTheme file structure \n(Good intro for beginners here: http://www.wpdesigner.com/2007/02/21/wp-theme-lesson-1-intro/)\nhttp://css-tricks.com/the-book-digging-into-wordpress/\n\n
Shannon\n-List of typical theme files\n
Shannon\n-Typical layout\n-Atypical layouts can include multiple sidebars, special files for repeating sections, like contact info, etc.\n
Shannon\nFree, easy to use\n-Can also make your own\n
Shannon\nCan be paid or free\nSmashing magazine often has roundups of attractive pre-made themes\n
Kathryn\nPlug-ins add extra functionality to the basic WordPress setup, so you only have to install what you need. This keeps your base installation as lean & mean as possible. \n\nThe WP plug-in directory lets you choose from thousands of plug-ins contributed by the WP community.\n\nYou can often get added functionality without a plugin - see passups.ca\n
Kathryn\nPlug-ins do everything from encrypt email addresses to make them harder for spammers to harvest to... to generating a complete database backup of your site and emailing it to you.\n\nThose things are “behind-the-scenes” - often plug-ins are more up-front, too - like rotating testimonials or social-bookmarking tools.\n
Kathryn\nWidgets allow you to drag-and-drop ready-made bits of functionality to a pre-designated spot on your site. It could be a search box, a text bock, a calendar, or list of archives in your bog... just for starters. \n\n-You can widgetize many areas of your blog, not just the sidebar. \n\nhttp://wpmu.org/how-to-widgetize-a-page-post-header-or-any-other-template-in-wordpress/\n\n
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Kathryn\nIntro to the admin panel: see http://www.geekniche.com/you/tutorials/intro-to-wordpress/\nWordPress 3.2 is due out June 30\n\n
Kathryn\n
Kathryn\n
Kathryn\n
Kathryn\n\nTheme Test drive might remove widgets or theme-specific settings.\n