WordPress Essentials Training

Essentials

Course Information

This training course focuses on the use of WordPress as a blogging and web platform and provides the skills necessary to install and manage your site.

Duration

2 Days

Cost

£595 +VAT

Schedule

Course Dates

Prerequisites

This course is for students new to web design and development and who want to use WordPress as a blogging or web platform. Before taking this course, students should be familiar with the basic functions of their computer’s operating system

Additional Notes

Courses can be run on Windows and Macintosh platforms and tailored to meet customers’ requirements.

Courses run in Edinburgh and at client sites in Glasgow, Scotland and throughout the UK.

Related Courses

• HTML Essentials
• CSS Essentials
• JavaScript Essentials

Exams

N/A

Course Outline

WordPress Essentials

Introduction to WordPress

• What is WordPress?
• Advantages of WordPress
• Examples of WordPress Sites
• WordPress Site Demo

Setup and installation options for WordPress

• Server requirements for running a WordPress site
• Installing WordPress locally:WAMP
• Using Dreamweaver CS5 with WordPress
• Configuring the config file for local setup
• Getting rid of comment spams with Akismet

Installing a theme

• Downloading and installing Themes using WordPress theme previewer
• Themes overview

Installing plugins

• Installing plugins
• Editing plugins with the WordPress built-in Plugin Editor

Import and export

• Backing up WordPress database
• Exporting database
• Importing database

Managing authors and users

• Managing authors and users with the User Manager
• Setting permissions
• WordPress MU overview

Media Library and managing media

• Managing media files with the Media Library
• Using gallery plugins: gallery reloaded and NG gallery

Getting to know your WordPress Theme

• Modifying your theme css
• Editing themes with the built-in Theme Editor
• Editing themes with Dreamweaver
• Using firebug to find and target your theme’s components
• Creating and integrating a favicon
• Integrating your own logo and branding

Integrating Social media tools and plugins

• Adding social bookmarking buttons to your theme
• Integrating Feedburner feeds on your theme
• Integrating Twitter on your theme using the Twitter Tools plugin

Page templates

• Customizing WordPress admin login page
• Displaying content on specific pages
• Creating an archive page and Creating a custom 404 error page
• Using a static page as a homepage
• Creating a Featured Posts block on your homepage
• Making your new posts stand out with “sticky posts” feature

Plugins and Widgets

• Installing widgets
• Modifying widgets
• Popular plugins

Templates

• Using page templates in your theme
• Creating templates

Sidebar

• Configuring the sidebar
• Make your sidebar widget-ready

Posts & Pages

• Difference between pages and posts
• What are Tags and Categories?
• Using WYSIWIG plugins for editing pages and posts

Creating Pages

• Specifying page order
• Customising the homepage
• Displaying thumbnails on your homepage
• Using WordPress shortcodes
• Using shortcodes

Multi-Author Blogs

• Creating an author page template
• Adding redirects for changed Permalinks
• Configuring author roles
• Displaying author-related information on posts
• Displaying author picture on posts
• Displaying the author’s gravatar picture on posts
• Allowing multiple authors on posts

Securing your WordPress Blog

• Creating manual backups of your WordPress blog
• Restoring a MySQL backup
• Creating backups of your WordPress files
• Securing your plugins directory
• Getting rid of the Administrator account
• Retrieving passwords from the database
• Automatically forbid login after some failed login attempt
• Protecting the wp-admin directory brute force with the help of AskApache
• Restricting wp-admin directory to your IP address
• Testing your blog security

SEO Tips and Tricks

• Optimizing your permalinks for SEO
• Optimize your title tag for SEO
• Create Meta descriptions for your posts
• Avoid duplicate content with a robots.txt file
• Adding a sitemap to your blog
• Using Google Webmaster Tools and analytics
• Adding a blog roll
• All in One SEO Pack plugin