WordPress All-in-One For Dummies E-Book

Lisa Sabin-Wilson

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Wissenschaft und neue Technologien
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2013

Seitenzahl: 1012

Beschreibung

Top WordPress guide, now fully updated for the latestWordPress release! This updated new edition comprises one of the largestcollections of practical intermediate to advanced information onWordPress. Fully updated for the latest WordPress release, thisin-depth book covers it all, from setting up your software topublishing your site, using SEO and social media, developing andusing plug-ins, running multiple sites with WordPress, and more.Veteran author Lisa Sabin-Wilson is a top authority on WordPress,and she and her co-authors pack this book with essential andeasy-to-follow tips, techniques, and advice. * Presents straightforward and easy-to-understand intermediate toadvanced coverage of the WordPress, the most popular blog softwarein use today * Features eight minibooks that cover what you need to know indepth, including WordPress basics, setting up the software,exploring the dashboard, publishing your site with WordPress, usingSEO and social media, customizing the look of your site, usingplug-ins, and running multiple sites with WordPress * Covers the very latest release of WordPress Get up to speed on WordPress with WordPress All-in-One ForDummies, 2nd Edition, and turn your hobby into a business!

Leseprobe

WordPress® All-in-One For Dummies®, 2nd Edition

Published byJohn Wiley & Sons, Inc.111 River StreetHoboken, NJ 07030-5774

www.wiley.com

Copyright © 2013 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey

Published simultaneously in Canada

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise, except as permitted under Sections 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, [phone], fax [phone]. Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, [phone], fax [phone], or online at http://www.wiley.com/go/permissions.

Trademarks: Wiley, the Wiley logo, For Dummies, the Dummies Man logo, A Reference for the Rest of Us!, The Dummies Way, Dummies Daily, The Fun and Easy Way, Dummies.com, Making Everything Easier, and related trade dress are trademarks or registered trademarks of John Wiley & Sons, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the United States and other countries, and may not be used without written permission. WordPress is a registered trademark of Automattic, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. is not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book.

Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty: The publisher and the author make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this work and specifically disclaim all warranties, including without limitation warranties of fitness for a particular purpose. No warranty may be created or extended by sales or promotional materials. The advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for every situation. This work is sold with the understanding that the publisher is not engaged in rendering legal, accounting, or other professional services. If professional assistance is required, the services of a competent professional person should be sought. Neither the publisher nor the author shall be liable for damages arising herefrom. The fact that an organization or Website is referred to in this work as a citation and/or a potential source of further information does not mean that the author or the publisher endorses the information the organization or Website may provide or recommendations it may make. Further, readers should be aware that Internet Websites listed in this work may have changed or disappeared between when this work was written and when it is read.

For general information on our other products and services, please contact our Customer Care Department within the U.S. at 877-762-2974, outside the U.S. at 317-572-3993, or fax [phone].

For technical support, please visit www.wiley.com/techsupport.

Wiley publishes in a variety of print and electronic formats and by print-on-demand. Some material included with standard print versions of this book may not be included in e-books or in print-on-demand. If this book refers to media such as a CD or DVD that is not included in the version you purchased, you may download this material at http://booksupport.wiley.com. For more information about Wiley products, visit www.wiley.com.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2013934916

ISBN 978-1-118-38334-6 (pbk); ISBN 978-1-118-38332-2 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-118-38335-3 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-118-38333-9 (ebk)

Manufactured in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

About the Author

Lisa Sabin-Wilson (WordPress For Dummies, WordPress Web Design For Dummies) has 10 years experience working with the WordPress platform, having adopted it early in its first year of release in 2003. Lisa is the owner of a successful design studio, E.Webscapes (http://ewebscapes.com), and is a regular speaker on topics related to design and WordPress at several national conferences. Additionally, she hosts WordPress workshops around the country, teaching people how to use the WordPress platform to publish their own sites on the World Wide Web. You can find Lisa online at her personal blog (http://lisasabin-wilson.com) and Twitter (@LisaSabinWilson).

Dedication

To WordPress . . . and all that entails from the developers, designers, forum helpers, bug testers, educators, consultants, plugin makers, and theme bakers.

Author’s Acknowledgments

Every person involved in the WordPress community plays a vital role in making this whole thing work, and work well. Kudos to all of you! Also, big thanks to my wonderful husband, Chris Wilson, for his incredible support, backbone, and ability to put up with my crazy days of writing — I could not have done it without you!

Special thanks to the co-authors of the 1st Edition of this book who helped form the framework of the publication and ensured its initial success: Cory Miller, Kevin Palmer, Andrea Rennick, and Michael Torbert. Additional thanks and gratitude to individuals who have contributed content to this edition: Dre Armeda and Tony Perez for Chapter 5 in Book II and Chris Jean for Book VII.

Publisher’s Acknowledgments

We’re proud of this book; please send us your comments at http://dummies.custhelp.com. For other comments, please contact our Customer Care Department within the U.S. at 877-762-2974, outside the U.S. at 317-572-3993, or fax [phone].

Some of the people who helped bring this book to market include the following:

Acquisitions and Editorial

Project Editor: Rebecca Senninger

(Previous Edition: Christopher Morris)

Acquisitions Editor: Amy Fandrei

Copy Editor: Virginia Sanders

Technical Editor: Mitch Canter

Editorial Manager: Leah Michael

Editorial Assistant: Anne Sullivan

Sr. Editorial Assistant: Cherie Case

Cover Photo: Background © FotoMak / iStockphoto; W © mohamed sadath / iStockphoto

Composition Services

Project Coordinator: Katherine Crocker

Layout and Graphics: Jennifer Creasey, Joyce Haughey

Proofreaders: Melissa Cossell, The Well-Chosen Word

Indexer: Infodex Indexing Services, Inc.

Publishing and Editorial for Technology Dummies

Richard Swadley, Vice President and Executive Group Publisher

Andy Cummings, Vice President and Publisher

Mary Bednarek, Executive Acquisitions Director

Mary C. Corder, Editorial Director

Publishing for Consumer Dummies

Kathleen Nebenhaus, Vice President and Executive Publisher

Composition Services

Debbie Stailey, Director of Composition Services

WordPress All-in-One For Dummies®, 2nd Edition

Visit www.dummies.com/cheatsheet/wordpressaio to view this book's cheat sheet.

Table of Contents

Introduction

About This Book

Foolish Assumptions

Conventions Used in This Book

Icons Used in This Book

Beyond the Book

Where to Go from Here

Book I: WordPress Basics

Book I: Chapter 1: Exploring Basic WordPress Concepts

Discovering the World of Blogging

Understanding Blogging Technologies

Archiving your publishing history

Interacting with your readers through comments

Feeding your readers

Tracking back

Dealing with comment and trackback spam

Using WordPress as a Content Management System

Book I: Chapter 2: Exploring the World of Open Source Software

Defining Open Source

Understanding WordPress Licensing

Applying WordPress Licensing to Your Projects

Book I: Chapter 3: Understanding Development and Release Cycles

Discovering WordPress Release Cycles

Upgrading your WordPress experience

Understanding the cycles of a release

Finding WordPress release archives

Keeping Track of WordPress Development

Downloading Nightly Builds

Book I: Chapter 4: Meeting the WordPress Community

Finding Other WordPress Users

Finding WordPress news and tips on community websites

Locating users on social networks

Users Helping Users

WordPress support forums

WordPress user manual

WordPress mailing lists

Discovering Professional WordPress Consultants and Services

WordPress designers

Developers

Consultants

Contributing to WordPress

Participating in Live WordPress Events

Book I: Chapter 5: Discovering Different Versions of WordPress

Comparing the Two Versions of WordPress

Choosing the hosted version from WordPress.com

Self-hosting with WordPress.org

Hosting Multiple Sites with OneWordPress Installation

Discovering WordPress VIP Services

Book II: Setting Up the WordPress Software

Book II: Chapter 1: Understanding the System Requirements

Establishing Your Domain

Understanding domain name extensions

Considering the cost of a domain name

Registering your domain name

Finding a Home for Your Blog

Getting help with hosting WordPress

Dealing with disk space and bandwidth

Book II: Chapter 2: Using File Transfer Protocol

Understanding FTP Concepts

Setting Up FTP on Your Hosting Account

Finding and Using Free and Easy FTP Programs

Connecting to the web server via FTP

Transferring files from point A to point B

Editing files by using FTP

Changing file permissions

Book II: Chapter 3: Getting to Know PHP and MySQL

Understanding How PHP and MySQL Work Together

Exploring PHP Basics

Trying Out a Little PHP

Managing Your MySQL Database

Book II: Chapter 4: Installing WordPress on Your Web Server

Installing WordPress with Fantastico

Installing WordPress Manually

Setting up the MySQL database

Downloading the WordPress software

Uploading the WordPress files via FTP

Running the installation script

Book II: Chapter 5: Configuring WordPress for Optimum Security

Understanding the Basics of Web Security

Preventing Attacks

Updating WordPress

Installing patches

Using a firewall

Using Trusted Sources

Managing Users

Generating passwords

Limiting built-in user roles

Establishing user accountability

Staying Clear of Soup Kitchen Servers

Hardening WordPress

Multi-factor authentication

Limiting login attempts

Disabling theme and plugin editors

Filtering by Internet Protocol (IP) address

Killing PHP execution

Book II: Chapter 6: Upgrading WordPress

Getting Notified of an Available Upgrade

Backing Up Your Database

Upgrading WordPress Automatically

Upgrading WordPress Manually

Book II: Chapter 7: Backing Up, Packing Up, and Moving to a New Host

Migrating Your Existing Blog to WordPress

Movin’ on up

Preparing for the big move

Converting templates

Moving your blog to WordPress

Importing from Blogspot, er, Blogger

Importing from LiveJournal

Importing from Movable Type and TypePad

Importing from Tumblr

Importing from WordPress

Importing from an RSS feed

Finding other import resources

Moving Your Website to a Different Host

Creating a backup and moving manually

Using a plugin to back up and move to a new host

Book III: Exploring the WordPress Dashboard

Book III: Chapter 1: Logging In and Taking a Look Around

Logging In to the Dashboard

Navigating the Dashboard

Right Now

Recent Comments

Incoming Links

Plugins

QuickPress

Recent Drafts

WordPress Blog

Other WordPress News

Arranging the Dashboard to Your Tastes

Changing the order of modules

Removing Dashboard modules

Changing the Dashboard layout

Finding Inline Documentation and Help

Book III: Chapter 2: Exploring Tools and Settings

Configuring the Settings

General

Writing

Reading

Discussion

Media

Permalinks

Creating Your Personal Profile

Setting Your Blog’s Format

Posts

Media

Pages

Comments

Appearance

Plugins

Users

Tools

Book III: Chapter 3: Managing Users and Multiple Authors

Understanding User Roles and Capabilities

Allowing New User Registration

Adding New Users Manually

Editing User Details

Managing a Multi-Author Site

Tools that help authors communicate

Tools to promote author profiles

Tools to manage multi-author blog posts

Book III: Chapter 4: Dealing with Comments and Spam

Deciding to Allow Comments on Your Site

Positive aspects of allowing comments

Exploring reasons to disallow comments

Interacting with Readers through Comments

Tracking back

Comment and trackback display

Managing Comments and Trackbacks

Tackling Spam with Akismet

Book III: Chapter 5: Creating Categories and Tags

Archiving Content with WordPress

Building categories

Changing the name of a category

Creating new categories

Creating and Editing Tags

Book IV: Publishing Your Site with WordPress

Book IV: Chapter 1: Writing Your First Post

Composing Your Blog Post

Refining Your Post Options

Publishing Your Post

Being Your Own Editor

Creating Your Own Workspace for Writing

Adjusting screen options

Arranging post modules

Book IV: Chapter 2: Creating a Static Page

Understanding the Difference between Posts and Pages

Creating the Front Page of Your Website

Creating the static page

Setting page options

Assigning a static page as the front page

Adding a Blog to Your Website

Book IV: Chapter 3: Uploading and Displaying Photos and Galleries

Inserting Images into Your Blog Posts

Adding an image from your computer

Aligning your images through the stylesheet

Inserting a Photo Gallery

Book IV: Chapter 4: Exploring Podcasting and Video Blogging

Inserting Video Files into Your Blog Posts

Adding a link to a video from the web

Adding video with Auto-Embed

Adding video from your computer

Inserting Audio Files into Your Blog Posts

Podcasting with WordPress

Keeping Media Files Organized

Book IV: Chapter 5: Working with Custom Fields

Understanding Custom Fields

Exploring the Custom Fields Interface

Adding Custom Fields to Your Template File

Entering the code in the template file

Getting WordPress to check for your Custom Field

Exploring Different Uses for Custom Fields

Book IV: Chapter 6: Using WordPress as a Content Management System

Creating Different Page ViewsUsing WordPress Templates

Uploading the template

Assigning the template to a static page

Creating a Template for Each Post Category

Pulling in Content from a Single Category

Using Sidebar Templates

Creating Custom Styles for Sticky, Category, and Tag Posts

Working with Custom Post Types

Optimizing Your WordPress Blog

Planting keywords in your website

Optimizing your post titles for search engine success

Writing content with readers in mind

Creating categories that attract search engines

Using the <ALT> tag for images

Book V: Examining SEO and Social Media

Book V: Chapter 1: Exposing Your Content

Understanding the Three C’s of the Social Web

Content

Communication

Consistency

Making It Easy for Users to Share Your Content

Enable the user to share content

Don’t overwhelm the user with choices

Present the ability to share in the right place for your audience

Think about the user, not yourself

Determining Where You Need to Participate

Finding Influencers

Leveraging Twitter for Social Media Success

Building your Twitter account by using automated tools

Updating Twitter from your WordPress blog

Engaging with Facebook

Book V: Chapter 2: Creating a Social Media Listening Hub

Exploring Reasons for a Social Media Listening Hub

Eavesdropping on yourself

Keeping tabs on your brand

Exploring Different Listening Tools

Monitoring with Google Alerts

Tracking conversations on Twitter with RSS

Listening to blogs with Google Blog Search

Searching communities with Boardreader

Microblog searching with Twingly

Creating Your Own Personal Monitoring Mix

Grouping your monitoring results

Editing the Dashboard to Create a Listening Post

Book V: Chapter 3: Understanding Analytics

Understanding the Importance of Analytics

Exploring the Options to Track Data

Understanding Key Analytics Terminology

Signing Up and Installing Google Analytics on Your WordPress Site

Signing up for Google Analytics

Installing the tracking code

Verifying that you installed the code properly

Installing and configuring the Analytics plugin

Using the data from the plugin

Book V: Chapter 4: Search Engine Optimization

Understanding the Importanceof Search Engine Optimization

Outlining the Advantages That WordPress Presents for SEO

Understanding How Search Engines See Your Content

Using links as currency

Submitting to search engines and directories

Optimizing Your Blog under the Hood

Metadata

Robots.txt

Researching Your Niche

Creating Search Engine Strategies

Setting up your blog

Improving your blog’s design

Dealing with duplicate content

Creating an editorial SEO list/calendar

Establishing a routine for publishing posts on your site

Creating a link-building strategy

Book V: Chapter 5: Exploring Popular SEO Plugins

Exploring Must-Use Plugins for SEO Best Practices

All in One SEO Pack

Google XML Sitemaps for WordPress

Redirection

Yoast Breadcrumbs

WP-PageNavi

Robots Meta

Book VI: Customizing the Look of Your Site

Book VI: Chapter 1: Examining the Default Theme: Twenty Twelve

Exploring the Layout and Structure

Customizing the Header Image

Customizing the Background Color

Including Custom Navigation Menus

Enhancing Your Website with Widgets

Adding widgets to your sidebar

Using the Text widget

Using the RSS widget

Book VI: Chapter 2: Finding and Installing WordPress Themes

Getting Started with Free Themes

Understanding What to Avoid with Free Themes

Installing a Theme

Browsing the free themes

Previewing and activating a theme

Exploring Premium Theme Options

Book VI: Chapter 3: Exploring the Anatomy of a Theme

Starting with the Basics

Understanding the Stylesheet

Exploring Template Tags, Values, and Parameters

Understanding the basics

Using parameters

Customizing common tags

Creating New Widget Areas

Registering your widget

Displaying new widgets on your site

Simplifying customization with functions

Exploring common problems

Examining the Main Index and The Loop

Header template

Sidebar template

Footer template

Examining Other Template Files

Customizing Your Blog Posts with Template Tags

Putting It All Together

Connecting the templates

Using additional stylesheets

Book VI: Chapter 4: Customizing Your Theme

Changing Your Background Graphic

Uploading an image for background use

Positioning, repeating, and attaching images

Changing Your Header Graphic

Considering the image dimensions

Uploading a header image

Personalizing Your Theme with CSS

CSS selectors

CSS IDs and classes

CSS properties and values

Understanding Basic HTML Techniques

Changing Basic Elements for a Unique Look

Background colors and images

Font family, color, and size

Borders

Finding Additional Resources

Book VI: Chapter 5: Understanding Parent and Child Themes

Customizing Theme Style with Child Themes

Creating a child theme

Loading a parent theme’s style

Customizing the parent theme’s styling

Using images in child theme designs

Modifying Theme Structure with Child Themes

Overriding parent template files

Adding new template files

Removing template files

Modifying the functions.php file

Preparing a Parent Theme

Book VI: Chapter 6: Digging into Advanced Theme Development

Getting Started with Advanced Theming

Finding a good starting point

Customizing the theme to your needs

Adding New Template Files

Creating named templates

Creating and using template parts

Exploring content-specific standard templates

Using page templates

Adding Theme Support for Built-In Features

Adding support for custom menus

Adding support for custom post types

Adding support for custom taxonomies

Adding support for post formats

Adding support for post thumbnails

Exploring Theme Options

Understanding theme options basics

Building a simple theme options page

Using theme options in the theme

Book VI: Chapter 7: Using Theme Frameworks to Simplify Customization

Understanding Theme Frameworks

Discovering Popular Frameworks

Theme Hybrid

Carrington

Thematic

Genesis

iThemes Builder

Headway

Common Framework Features

Theme functions

Hooks

Child themes

Layout options

Styling

Customizing Theme Frameworks

Book VII: Using and Developing Plugins

Book VII: Chapter 1: Introducing WordPress Plugins

Extending WordPress with Plugins

Identifying Core Plugins

Distinguishing Between Plugins and Themes

Finding Plugins on the WordPress Plugin Directory

Searching for plugins from the Dashboard

Finding plugins through WordPress.org

Evaluating Plugins before Installing

Details

Ratings

Downloads

Stats

Support

Finding Plugins Outside the Plugin Directory

Comparing Free and Commercial Plugins

Book VII: Chapter 2: Installing and Managing Plugins

Installing Plugins within the WordPress Dashboard

Manually Installing Plugins

Upgrading Plugins

Updating on the Plugins page

Updating on the Updates page

Updating manually

Activating and Deactivating Plugins

Deleting Plugins

Deleting via the Dashboard

Deleting manually

Book VII: Chapter 3: Configuring and Using Plugins

Exploring Activate-and-Go Plugins

Discovering Settings Pages

Akismet

Google XML Sitemaps

All in One SEO Pack

Using Widgets

Akismet

Twitter Widget Pro

Additional widgets to try

Enhancing Content with Shortcodes

Gallery shortcode

Embed shortcode

Twitter Widget Pro

Comprehensive Google Map Plugin

Book VII: Chapter 4: Modifying Existing Plugin Code

Setting the Foundation for Modifying Plugins

Removing Part of a Form

Modifying the Hello Dolly Lyrics

Changing a Shortcode’s Name

Book VII: Chapter 5: Creating Simple Plugins from Scratch

Understanding Plugin Structure

Inspecting WordPress’s core plugins

Knowing the requirements

Following best practices

Creating Your First Plugin

Setting up the plugin files

Adding the file header

Testing the plugin

Fixing Problems

White screen of nothingness

Unexpected output error

Filtering Content

Setting up the plugin structure

Testing the filter

Replacing contractions in your content

Creating Shortcodes

Setting up the plugin structure

Building a simple shortcode

Using shortcode attributes

Adding content to shortcodes

Adding Widgets

Coding a simple widget

Adding an options editor to a widget

Building a Settings Page

Setting up the plugin structure

Adding a new Admin menu entry

Creating a settings form

Configuring default settings

Adding settings functions

Creating the MSP_Form class

Testing the plugin

Book VII: Chapter 6: Exploring Plugin Development Best Practices

Adding a File Header

Creating a readme.txt File

Setting up the header section

Adding other sections

Internationalizing or Localizing Your Plugin

Using GetText functions for text strings

Creating the POT file

Book VII: Chapter 7: Plugin Tips and Tricks

Using a Plugin Template

Making Your Plugin Pluggable

Enhancing Plugins with CSS and JavaScript

Calling stylesheets within a plugin

Calling JavaScript within a plugin

Custom Post Types

Using Custom Shortcodes

Adding Functionality to Profile Filters

Correcting Hyperlink Problems

Book VIII: Running Multiple Sites with WordPress

Book VIII: Chapter 1: An Introduction to Multiple Sites

Deciding When to Use the Multisite Feature

Understanding the Difference between Sites and Blogs

Setting Up the Optimal Hosting Environment

Checking out shared versus dedicated hosting

Exploring subdomains versus subdirectories

Choosing Linux, Apache, MySQL, and PHP server environments

Adding a virtual host to the Apache configuration

Book VIII: Chapter 2: Setting Up and Configuring Network Features

Enabling the Network Feature

Exploring the Difference between Subdirectories and Subdomains

Installing the Network on Your Site

Disabling the Network

Dealing with Common Errors

Book VIII: Chapter 3: Becoming a Network Admin

Exploring the Network Admin Dashboard

Managing Your Network

Settings

Sites

Users

Themes

Plugins

Updates

Stopping Spam Sign-Ups and Splogs

Book VIII: Chapter 4: Management of Users and Access Control

Setting Default User Permissions

User registration

Controlling access to sites

Importing users

Changing Defaults

Site-specific sign-up

Changing roles on sign-up

Locking down menus

Exploring Default Site Settings

Book VIII: Chapter 5: Using Network Plugins and Themes

Using One Theme on Multiple Sites

Enabling themes for individual sites

Installing themes for network use

Setting the default theme for sites

Gathering and Displaying Network-wide Content

Adding posts from network sites

Listing network sites

Displaying user comments

Sitewide tags and categories

Using and Installing Network-wide Plugins

Discovering Handy Multisite Plugins

Book VIII: Chapter 6: Using Multiple Domains within Your Network

Finding Your Way with Domain Mapping

Parking or pointing domains

Domain name server records

Installing the Domain Mapping Plugin

Obtaining your IP address

Mapping a domain to a site

Mapping a Large Volume of Domains

Apache configuration

Hiding the original installation domain

Setting Up Multiple Networks

Cheat Sheet

Introduction

WordPress is the most popular blogging software on the planet. Between the hosted service at WordPress.com and the self-hosted software available at WordPress.org, millions of bloggers use WordPress today! That’s impressive. And with WordPress, you can truly tailor a blog to your own tastes and needs.

With no cost for using the benefits of the WordPress platform to publish content on the web, WordPress is as priceless as it is free. WordPress makes writing, editing, and publishing content on the Internet a delightful, fun, and relatively painless experience whether you’re a publisher, designer, developer — or just blogging as a hobby.

About This Book

WordPress being free and accessible to all, however, doesn’t make it inherently easy for everyone. For some, the technologies, terminology, and coding practices can be a little intimidating or downright daunting. WordPress All-in-One For Dummies eliminates any intimidation about using WordPress. With a little research, knowledge, and time, you’ll soon have a blog that suits your needs and gives your readers an exciting experience that keeps them coming back for more.

WordPress All-in-One For Dummies — a complete guide to WordPress — covers the basics: installation and configuration, the Dashboard, publishing content, creating themes, and developing plugins. Additionally, this book provides advanced information about security, the WordPress tools, using the multisite features, and optimizing your blog for search engines.

Foolish Assumptions

I make some inescapable assumptions about you and your knowledge, including the following:

You’re comfortable using a computer, mouse, and keyboard.

You have a good understanding of how to access the Internet, use e-mail, and use a web browser to access web pages.

You have a basic understanding of what a blog is; perhaps you already maintain your own blog.

You want to use WordPress for your online publishing or use the various WordPress features to improve your online publishing.

If you consider yourself an advanced user of WordPress, or if your friends refer to you as an all-knowing WordPress guru, chances are good that you’ll find some of the information in this book elementary. However, this book is for the beginner, intermediate, and advanced user — there is something for everyone.

Conventions Used in This Book

Throughout the book, I apply the following typography conventions to guide you through some of the information I present:

When I ask you to type something, the text you’re supposed to type is bold.

I also use bold in step list instructions.

When I suggest a keyword that you may want to enter in a search engine, the term appears in italics.

I apply italics to terms you may not be familiar with to let you know that I’m defining them.

When the text that you see onscreen may be different from what I write in the book, depending on your settings and preferences, I apply italics to that text to indicate that it’s a placeholder.

Text that appears in this special font is certain to be a URL (web address), an e-mail address, a filename, a folder name, or code.

In some instances, I provide blocks of code to use on your WordPress website. Code looks like this:

<html>

<head>

<title>This is my website</title>

</head>

Icons Used in This Book

The little pictures in the margins of the book emphasize a point to remember, a danger to be aware of, or information that you may find helpful. This book uses the following icons:

Tips are little bits of information that you may find useful — procedures that aren’t necessarily obvious to the casual user or beginner.

When your mother warned you, “Don’t touch that pan — it’s hot!” but you touched it anyway, you discovered the meaning of “Ouch!” I use this icon for situations like that. Out of curiosity, you may very well touch the hot pan, but you can’t say that I didn’t warn you!

All geeky stuff goes here. I use this icon when talking about technical information. You can skip it, but I think you’ll find some great nuggets of information next to these icons. You may even surprise yourself and find you enjoy them. Be careful — you may turn into a geek overnight!

When you see this icon, brand the text next to it into your brain so that you remember whatever it was I thought you should remember.

Beyond the Book

I have a lot of extra content that you’re not going to find in this book. Go online to find:

Bonus content: Here you can find additional information about WordPress at

www.dummies.com/extras/wordpressaio

The cheat sheet for this book at

www.dummies.com/cheatsheet/wordpressaio

Any updates to this book at

www.dummies.com/go/wordpressaiofdupdates

Where to Go from Here

From here, you can go anywhere you please! WordPress All-in-One For Dummies is designed so that you can read either one or all of the minibooks between the front and back cover, depending on what topics interest you.

Book I is a great place to get a good introduction into the world of WordPress if you’ve never used it before and would like to find out more. Book II is also extremely helpful in giving you insight into the programming techniques and terminology involved with running a WordPress website — and that information is extremely helpful when you move forward to the other minibooks.

Above all else, have fun with the information contained within these pages! Read the books on topics you think you already know about — you might just come across something new! Then dig into the books that contain topics that you really want to discover more about.

Book I

WordPress Basics

Visit www.dummies.com for great For Dummies content online.

Contents at a Glance

Chapter 1: Exploring Basic WordPress Concepts

Chapter 2: Exploring the World of Open Source Software

Chapter 3: Understanding Development and Release Cycles

Chapter 4: Meeting the WordPress Community

Chapter 5: Discovering Different Versions of WordPress

Chapter 1: Exploring Basic WordPress Concepts

In This Chapter

Discovering blogging

Publishing and archiving content

Interacting through comments

Syndicating through RSS

Using WordPress as a content management tool to create different types of sites

By providing regular, nontechnical Internet users the ability to publish content on the World Wide Web quickly and easily, blogging has taken the world by storm. These days, blogging is considered mainstream. Regular Internet users are blogging, but so are major corporations, news organizations, and educational institutions. Over the past decade, the question went from “What the heck is a blog?” to “What do you mean you don’t have a blog?” Blogs have become a part of everyday life.