Tag: Be A Blogger Series

Mizanur Rahaman Mizan / November 17, 2015

Be A Blogger Series – List of all Tutorials

If you want to learn WordPress Blog Maintenance and want to be a blogger, then you have come to the right place. We have completed our full Be a Blogger Series. Please read each articles listed below.

So we have ended the series successfully. Now wait for our Be a blogger video series 🙂

Mizanur Rahaman Mizan / October 26, 2015

Be A Blogger Series – Part 4: Everything You Need to Know about WordPress Media Manager

Introduction

In a blog post, we often need to insert images and videos . We might also need to attach certain files in the blog post. Videos and Images  are often used by bloggers to illustrate or demonstrate their points in a better way. This article going to deal with topic of  wordpress media manager.

How adding media works with Bloggers!

While writing a post in Blogger.com you can just use simple “Browse….” button to upload images and videos from local computer or from “Web Address URL”. In Blogger.com you can only add an image or video while you write a post.

Image below shows how to add images with Blogger.com

How it works with the popular WordPress!

WordPress gives us two options under Media menu “Flash Uploader” and “Browser Uploader“. WordPress shows you all the uploaded files in a list and you can also edit them. We can also use “File URL” multiple times in different posts and pages.

Note: A “File URL” is the URL of where uploaded file can be accessed.

Steps to Add media in WordPress:

  1. Login to WordPress dashboard panel.
  2. Go to Media menu on left sidebar of the dashboard and click on Add New.
  3. You will get two options for uploading media which are Flash uploader and Browser uploader. By default WordPress has Flash uploader selected (see image below).
  4. Click on Select Files button and then add file from your computer. :-)
  5. Now once the file is uploaded it will show us options to add title, description, alternate text, etc..
  6. Copy “File URL” and paste it into your post or page content where you want.
  7. Click on the Save All Changes button.
  8. You can see all the uploaded media files in the Library menu. Also by clicking on edit option you can find “File URL“.               

Bonus Tips

WordPress allows us to do the same as Blogger.com but with an added feature which lets us add files and store them like your personal media library. The URL of these files can be shared with friends who can view images or videos directly without the need to create a post. :-)

Summary

With both Blogger.com and WordPress you can add images and videos easily. But  the biggest difference is that you can upload and manage files without writing a post on WordPress. This doubles up by using  WordPress blog like your own personal FTP which can store files online. So just rock and roll with WordPress!

Previous posts in this Series:

Be A Blogger Series – Part 1: How to install WordPress

Be A Blogger Series – Part 2: Say Hello to WordPress Dashboard

Be A Blogger Series – Part 3: Writing and Editing posts with WordPress

 

Mizanur Rahaman Mizan / October 19, 2015

Be A Blogger Series – Part 14: Understanding Permalinks and Slugs in WordPress

Permalinks and slugs in WordPress play a very important role in any blog, specially in WordPress because it provides flexibility to change permalinks and slugs. These are used for URL of posts, pages, tags, categories etc.

How Permalinks work?

In Blogger.com you might be aware of permalinks structure but you can not change them or customize.

But WordPress provides that flexibility to modify according to our requirements. Permalinks is a pattern that we select for our blog posts and content’s URL. It is added at the end of blog domain name, where WordPress is installed.

For example “?p=id-number” is a permalink pattern and “yourdomain.com” is domain name. WordPress by default provides permalink in the following format “/?p=id-number“.

Note : id-numbers => id of posts and pages.

The end result is “http://yourdomain.com/?p=id-numbers”

You can also change this default structure with some other structure, like “/%postname%”, “/%year%month%postname%“, etc. You can find all the other structures of permalinks in Settings -> Permalinks option.

How are Slugs used in WordPress?

Slugs are used in permalinks structure. In the above example we are not using any slug. Confused? Let me explain. It is a simple id of posts and pages. WordPress by default creates slug for Posts, Pages, Categories and Tags as long as we have not created a specific Slug. Slugs are always created in small letters with “-” sign in between the words.

Example: your post name is -> “My First post In WordPress“  the slug of that post is “my-first-post-in-wordpress”.

Then this slug is used in permalink if you are using permalinks structure “/%postname%”  then your post URL will be “http://yourdomain.com/my-first-post-in-wordpress” . This permalink pattern will be used for all the posts and pages.

How to change post slug?

  • Click on posts menu OR when we write new post at that time also we can edit slug.

  • Below is the text box where we will write post title, and there is an Edit button.

  • Click on that you will find the complete slug of post.
  • Change that slug into what you want and then Click on OK button.
  • You can also get the short URL by clicking on Get Shortlink button. (see above image).
  • Pop up window will open, add new short URL there.

How to Change Slug for Categories and Tags

We can also change slugs for Categories and Tags. WordPress by default provides slugs if we have not created it while adding Category or Tag. Method to change slug for Categories and Tags is quite similar.

  • Click on Categories menu.

  • You will get a list of Categories that you have created for the blog.
  • As mouse hovers on the Category we can click on Edit or Quick Edit.

  • Change the slug name that you want.

  • Similarly we edit slug of Tags. Follow all the above steps but instead of clicking on Categories menu Click on Post Tags.

Bonus Tip

Most of the time post name is too long. Here we can also change slug of post to make it short and hence make it useful for search engine to look up.

Example: Lets say the post title is “How to change the permalink structure of WordPress blog that will be useful for Search Engine”. This is a long post name, we can change its slug to – “change-permalink-structure-wordpress-blog-useful-search-engine”.

Summary

WordPress provides such a great feature to edit slugs for post, pages, category and tags. By that you can make post URL short. Permalinks structure is also helpful to readers to remember post.

Mizanur Rahaman Mizan / October 14, 2015

Be A Blogger Series – Part 6: Writing and Editing a Page on WordPress

Blogs will mostly have posts on it. But in some cases, we do need to have some stand alone pages like About Us and Contact Us etc. These types of pages are a great source of information for new readers and also to let new users know about the dynamics of certain blogs. So pages and posts are essential in a blog.

How Page(s) works with Blogger!

In Blogger.com you to need look up the Edit Pages option under the Posting menu in order to create pages (consider the  image below for an idea). We can similarly create new pages with WordPress quite easily. Creating a post and creating new pages is very similar in Blogger.com.

How Page(s) works with WordPress!

  • WordPress dashboard provides us with a separate menu for Pages (see image below). Click on Add New option under Pages Menu.

  • Just like we create content in a post, we can also upload images,videos and media in a page.

  • We can Publish a page or save it as a draft. Changing the date for publishing allows us to schedule the page to be published sometime in the future (See image below).

We can assign any parent page and also templates for page if the WordPress theme supports it. Pages are usually displayed alphabetically in navigation but you can change the order of pages by using the order field. These options are up to the end user’s preferences.

  • We can also allow comments as well as “trackbacks and pingbacks” for pages. We can change Author of the page. Scroll down along the page and you will get two options Discussion and Author as seen in the image below.

 

So, as like Blogger.com,  we can easily create and manage static pages on WordPress also. But the main advantage of pages in WordPress over Blogger.com is, in Blogger.com usually there is a restriction of creating only 10 static pages whereas with WordPress the options are literally unlimited. WordPress unlike Blogger.com can also be used for static portals instead on of only blogs.

We hope you got an idea about the WordPress pages in this post. Until the next post of the “Be a Blogger Series”, I wish you all a very Happy New Year 2013!

 

Previous posts in this Series:

Be A Blogger Series – Part 1: How to install WordPress

Be A Blogger Series – Part 2: Say Hello to WordPress Dashboard

Be A Blogger Series – Part 3: Writing and Editing posts with WordPress

Be A Blogger Series – Part 4: Everything You Need to Know about WordPress Media Manager

Be A Blogger Series – Part 5: All about Links in WordPress

Mizanur Rahaman Mizan / September 19, 2015

Be A Blogger Series – Part 1: How to install WordPress

Dear friends, I hope you are doing great in your personal and professional lives. We want you to feel happy in your life by being able to do lots of creative things. Now to the point of  writing today’s article.  I know lots of you already blog or write in various websites or even in your personal sites but you don’t know how things work or at least how to set up a platform by yourself to blog. Well, I here am to help you by providing you with a series of articles to make you an expert from the very beginning to how you can monetize your pages. I would like to suggest first of all that you invest some bucks by learning things from us which are posted here and at the same time write for other blogs & even for us ! Then when you are ready,  just jump on your site and start blogging there. So it’s very simple!

 

Now lets come back to my article. Today I am going  to show you how to install a WordPress blog. This will be  the start of a series of articles covering the basics of installing and using WordPress aimed at new-comers to WordPress and to CMS usage also.

In this tutorial article, I am going to:

  • Show you from where you can get WordPress ( Even if you already know !)
  • Upload the latest WordPress release via FTP or Web based up-loader by your web host.
  • How to create a database on some popular web hosts.
  • How to create a username and give the proper permission for the database.
  • Install WordPress !

One more thing. In most cases, probably your web hosts going to provide you a one click Installer from where you can install it also. Just take a look at your hosting control panel and you will get it! In future, we will include articles on this in this series also.

 

Downloading WordPress

Go to the official WordPress site and click the Download button on the right. At time of writing, the latest version is 3.4.1.

Once download completed , extract the wordpress folder. Using your preferred FTP client, transfer these files to your web host. You can also use the web based up loader.

If you are not familiar with FTP, or forgot  the login details for your account, please consult your web host’s documentation as the details can vary between hosts.

Alternatively, you could use the File Manager provided in your web host’s Administration area.

For this example, I will be uploading the WordPress files to a folder named blog on my website – which will make my installation accessible at http://www.example.com/blog.

Creating a Database

WordPress requires a database to store all information generated by it such as posts, pages, comments and settings.
The next few steps can vary between host-to-host, but the basic steps involved will be the same. If you cannot find a certain option, please consult your web host’s documentation or contact their customer support.

Login to your web-hosting account page. On there, you should see a ‘Manage Databases’, ‘MySQL Databases’ or similar button.

One of the most-used control panels for web-hosting accounts is ‘cPanel’. If your host uses this, it should look:

 

Here, you will need to create a new database. Enter a name for it and click ‘Create’. You will then be presented with a success screen with the full name of your new database.

WARNING: Take special note of your new database name. Most web hosts will add a prefix to the beginning of its name – making wpdata become mysite_wpdata (for example).

Database User

You will now need to assign a new database user to your database so WordPress and read and write to the database.

Under where you created a database, you should see the heading ‘Current Users’. Here, enter a username and password for your database and click ‘Create’. You will then see a success screen confirming these details.

WARNING: As before, take special note of your database username. Most web hosts will add a prefix to the beginning of it – making wpuser become mysite_wpuser (for example).

The All-Important Bit!

On the same page as before, there is a heading ‘Add Users To Your Databases’. From the two drop-down boxes in this section select the database and username we created.

Ensure ‘ALL’ is selected for the Privileges and click ‘Add’.

Database Hostname

Again, on the same page is a heading ‘Access Hosts’. On probably 99% of hosts, you should see ‘localhost’. If not, take special note of this, it’s your hostname.

Installing WordPress

It’s all straight-forward from here. In your web-browser, go to the location on your site you uploaded WordPress, eg. http://www.example.com/blog.

You should be asked to create a WordPress Configuration file. Click the button to continue and then ‘Lets Go!’ on the next page.

On this page, you will need to enter the database name, username, password and hostname which we created in the previous steps.
You can leave Table Prefix as it is.

On the next page, press ‘Run the install’.
Enter your a name for your Blog and your email address and press ‘Install’.

You will now be taken to the Success page with your Administrator login details. Make special note of these details, and hit ‘Log In’ to get started with your brand-new WordPress Blog!

Summary

Congratulations!  You have just learnt how to install WordPress. Please don’t forget to give your feedback so that we can continue to help you in your learning and development.

Read More: Be A Blogger Series – Part 2: Say Hello to WordPress Dashboard

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