Intro to WordPress

By Adrian Mikeliunas

adrian@mikeliunas.com

Class # 1

Content Management Systems (CMS)

History, Architecture and features

Blogging Basics, Types of blogs

Automatic Installation

Manual installation

Class #1 Agenda

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3036/2913018697_ccbb33e993_b.jpg

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WordPress is a free and open source blogging tool & a content management system (CMS) based on PHP& MySQL, which runs from a web server

Open Source

CMS

PHP

MySQL

Apache (or IIS)

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What is WordPress?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wordpress

2014

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CMS Architecture

Web Server

APACHE

ClientApp

ServerPHP

Database ServerMYSQL

2014

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Content Management Systems (CMS)

2014

CMS

Templates

Themes

Plugins

Extensions

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CMS vs Web Site

Web Site

HTML

CSS

JS/PHP/ASP

DB?

DYNAMIC STATIC/COMPLEX

2014

WordPress Joomla Drupal SharePoint

Popularity #1

Architecture AMP AMP AMP IIS/ASP/SQL

Strength Blog Flexible

Weakness Simple Moderate Complex $$

Community Yes Yes Yes Moderate

Market Bloggers Enterprise

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CMS Comparison

AMP = Apache, MySQL, PHPIIS/ASP/SQL=Microsoft Server

2014

Started version 1.0 on May of 2003

Current Version is 3.6.1

More than half of top 20 blogs sites use WordPress

Over 60 million people have chosen WordPress to power their web pages!

Hall of Fame CMS category in the 2010 Open Source Awards

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History, Architecture, Features

http://wordpress.org

2014

Open Source Content Management System

Multi-user Multi-blog

Extended via Themes & PLugins

3 Folders and 14 top PHP scripts: wp-admin

wp-content

wp-includes

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3d/Wordpress_Template_Hierarchy.png

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WordPress Features

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Blogging Basics

Blog Types

Web Log = blog

is a discussion or informational site published on the Web, consisting of discrete entries ("posts")

Typically displayed in reverse chronological order

Entered by 1 or more persons

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blog

Examples:

http://www.hcplibrary.org/teen/wordpress/

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What is a Blog?

2014

One article or post

Multiple comments to the post

Comments to the comments

Unusual blogs:

Youtube comments

WashingtonPost comments

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Blogging Basics

2014

Take responsibility not just for your own words, but for the comments you allow on your blog

Label your tolerance level for abusive comments Consider eliminating anonymous comments Ignore the trolls Take the conversation offline, and talk directly, or find an

intermediary who can do so If you know someone who is behaving badly, tell them so Don't say anything online that you wouldn't say in person

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blogger%27s_code_of_conduct

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The Blogger's Code of Conduct

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You create content Content stored in a database You pages get indexed by search engines…

User clicks on a link or directly Pages don’t ‘exist’ until requested by web server WordPress application

Retrieves content from database CSS used to style page Page is built “on the fly” by PHP resulting in HTML &

JavaScript

Page is displayed to user’s browser

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How it works

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Add Content – Web Based Interface

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Stored in a database

the_title

the_content

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Same Content – Different Themes

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Fuzzy line between “blog” and full web site

http://thegrovelibrary.net

http://stillwater.sals.edu

looks more like a magazine than a blog

http://tamworthlibrary.org

Nice website – put together by Lichen Rancourt

Other Sample Sites

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WordPress Installation

Local or Hosted?

Automatic or Manual?

Cost?

Storage capacity?

Bandwidth?

Tech Support?

Install software yourself

http://wordpress.org

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Hosting on your own server?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jamisonjudd/2433102356

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Often under $10/month

Tech support available http://wordpress.org/hosting

One Click Install!

Your Hosting Provider will have: QuickInstall

Fantastico

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Commercial Hosting

For more hosts: http://wordpress.org/hosting/ 2014

WordPress.com provides hosting service for blogs and standard configurations; Staring at $18 per year! Support included...

Upgrades $99 and more…

WordPress.org offers blogging software, documentation, features & support

WordPress MU (multi-user), a relatively complex program that allows you to run thousands of blogs

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Which Version?

2014

Download from http://wordpress.org/download/Or http://wordpress.org/latest.tar.gz

Bitnami: http://bitnami.org/stack/wordpress

WordPress on a USB stick! http://portableapps.com/apps/development/xampp

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Manual installation

2014

Content Management Systems (CMS)

History, Architecture and features

Blogging Basics, Types of blogs

Automatic Installation

Manual installation

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Class #1 Review

2014