WordPress How To: 5 Tips and Tricks
Yesterday I discussed support on the WordPress forums and discovered that most commenters have had a negative experience using them. I would like the WordPress forums to change but I’m just one person and I’m not even sure if WordPress wants them to change. It seems like something would have been done by now.
For today I have gathered 5 of my best WordPress howto articles for this post. Many of them were written before you were reading - or before really anyone was reading for that matter.
I’ve worked at making the search on my site more useful so you can always search on WordPress howto or WordPress tips to locate additional information.
How to List Recent Posts from One Category
This article provides a code example on how to list recent posts from a single category. There is an example on the sidebar on my About page, which lists my last 5 articles in the WordPress Tips Category.
How to Upgrade WordPress Manually
I’ve mentioned many times that I’m not a fan of the Automatic Upgrade Plugin. It works fine for many people but I prefer manual upgrades as it is easier for me to troubleshoot the problems if something goes wrong. The upgrade guide in the WordPress Codex is, in my opinion, confusing so I wrote my own. I now use my own guide when upgrading and haven’t had a single problem.
How to Customize Gravatars in WordPress
A short tutorial on how to customize the appearance of the gravatar images in your WordPress comments. It’s a lot easier than you think it would be.
WordPress: How to Create a Static Front Page
More and more people want to use WordPress as a CMS, or Content Management System. By doing this they are creating a website with WordPress and the blog is just one part of it. The first step in using WordPress in that manner is to create a static front page rather than having the blog be the main page.
How to Exclude WordPress Pages from the Navigation Bar
This tutorial provides a code solution on how to exclude pages from your navigation or sidebar. Many of us have a lot more pages than we want to use in our navigation area and this is a way to remove them from being displayed. I use this technique in my header and footer.
I hope you find this round-up useful. Let me know what you think. Are these tutorials too easy, too hard, just right? Are there other topics that you would like to have covered?
photo credit: Falcifer
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17 Responses to “WordPress How To: 5 Tips and Tricks”
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December 4, 2008 at 9:03 am
HI Kim,
Thanks for the Wordpress “Greatest Hits”. Its really useful for me to have these articles in one spot.
They’re definitely not too easy for me. I think they’re great.
Thanks!
Jim´s last blog post - The Most Important Moment in Television History
December 4, 2008 at 10:40 am
I agree with Jim, definitely a list to bookmark, adding to del.icio.us, stumbling and retweeting, great job.
Dee Langdon - BloggerNewbie´s last blog post - Do You Think Blogging Is Becoming Over Saturated?
December 4, 2008 at 10:51 am
Doesn’t the last one happen automatically? If there’s a page one doesn’t want listed, simply don’t list it… or so I thought, but perhaps I’m wrong about that.
Wesley´s last blog post - Yep, definitely something strange going on there.
December 4, 2008 at 12:08 pm
very impressive: The upgrade guide in the WordPress Codex is, in my opinion, confusing so I wrote my own. I now use my own guide when upgrading and haven’t had a single problem
I can do a manual upgrade just by overwriting the files in the folders of whatever changed since the last time. another blogger already laid out what those changes were..but since i use fantastico for my blog, i just wait for the script to be available in my control panel. i do have one blog that i did a manual installation and i got an automatic plugin from marelisa’s site that i will try or maybe i should do it on my test blog first. in time. way backed up. will have to go back to your article for upgrading later. thanks.
NaTuRaL´s last blog post - The Day of the Fight
December 4, 2008 at 12:32 pm
@Jim - Thanks! When you were asking me questions, I realized I’d written on a lot of the topics so I thought I should gather them into one place.
@Dee - Thanks! I’m glad you found it useful.
@Wesley - The navigation area in many headers is often created with
?php wp_list_pages();?This will list all of the pages you have created. Frequently, this is more pages than you would want to list in the header or that will fit in the header so you would want to exclude some of the pages from appearing in the navigation.
@Natural - Thanks! There are many ways to upgrade - auto-upgrade plugin, fantastico (which is often behind) and manually. I’m just a fan of the manual upgrade because I like to have control of what is happening.
December 4, 2008 at 12:38 pm
Great! I cant wait to get started (saving to del.ici.ous)
December 4, 2008 at 12:56 pm
@Carla - Great! I hope the articles are useful. If you want to follow my bookmarks on delicious I’m kwbridge. I have about 4000 so be wary. ;-)
December 4, 2008 at 3:27 pm
Hi KW,
Thanks for putting my to-do list together for the next day or so. Appreciate it.
Really though, thanks for these - some of the WP how to stuff at the WP.org site is written in Martian.
George
Tumblemoose´s last blog post - Write, write, rewrite
December 4, 2008 at 4:51 pm
This is helpful, thanks. Recently I added a favicon and found that the instructions to do that are scattered over at different places. Maybe you can write about that if you get some free time.
December 4, 2008 at 6:46 pm
Great Wordpress articles. I think I am going to use with your upgrading guide… I really need to upgrade, but have been paranoid that something would go wrong.
~ Kristi
Kikolani | Poetry, Photography, Blogging Tips´s last blog post - Thursday Things
December 4, 2008 at 7:16 pm
@George - Seems like I’m always giving you stuff to read ;-)
@Manshu - That’s a really good idea. Making a favicon should be straightforward and it really isn’t. I’ve made a quick draft to remind me to write it up.
@Kristi - Thanks! If you follow the upgrade should be fine. You could even skip the maintenance mode plugin part - I often do.
December 5, 2008 at 1:19 am
wonderful!! I loved ” to Exclude WordPress Pages from the Navigation Bar” tutorial the most, probably because it was what I was looking for!!
Btw, which plugin are you using for Top Commentators widget?
Raju´s last blog post - Very IMP: Any Problem with TechPP Theme?
December 5, 2008 at 8:32 am
@Raju - Great! It’s a really useful tutorial.
I am using ZD Top Commentors Widget - http://www.zen-dreams.com/en/2008/08/06/new-wordpress-plugin-gravatar-top-commenters/
It uses gravatars to add the images. I like it ok - there are some things I don’t like about it. I haven’t found a top commentors plugin that I love. Maybe I should talk to Statos ;-)
December 6, 2008 at 5:39 am
I found out an old plugin “Show top commentators” and activated it on my blog. Nothing great about it, but I liked the flexibility it offers!
Raju´s last blog post - Technically Personal Gets a Makeover!
December 6, 2008 at 7:42 am
Hi Raju - Thanks for the info. I’ll head over and take a look at it.
December 9, 2008 at 8:57 am
For more tips & tricks you can take a look here:
http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/40-most-wanted-wordpress-tricks-and-hacks/
Deca´s last blog post - HostDime.com
December 9, 2008 at 9:35 am
@Deca - Thanks for visiting and commenting. And thanks for the additional information.