Here are 5 little WordPress tips and features that can make you 1000% more productive:
1. Pending Review - Before this feature came out in WordPress 2.3, Contributors had two options - save and continue editing or save. Their drafts looked no different from any other draft, so it was hard for editors to tell if a post could be published. Starting with version 2.3, Contributors now have a third option - submit for review. All posts that are pending a review are put into a separate section and are easy for editors to spot. Although this isn’t useful for blogs with one author - it will save hours and hours of lost time for bloggers that run blogs with multiple contributors.
2. Plain Text Editor And WYSIWYG Editor - WordPress has two different types of editors - a plain text editor and a what-you-see-is-what-you-get (visual) editor. The plain text editor is useful if you post lots of source code or you like to manually tweak everything - since the visual editor can and will mess up that sort of stuff. The visual editor on the other hand is much cleaner and isn’t nearly as scary for new users to use. You can set which editor you use on your Users page. I don’t think I can stress enough how important it is to figure out which editor you like. Don’t forget about the 3rd option either - use an application for blogging like Ecto.
3. Finding And Installing Plugins - It never fails to amaze me how many new WordPress users have difficulty finding plugins. Despite the fact the top plugin directories show up at the top of the search results for “wordpress plugins” - many of them can’t seem to figure out what they are looking for. The two biggest (and most popular) directories are wp-plugins.net and the official wordpress plugin directory. Simply go on those sites, search for the type of plugin you’re looking for, and then install it. Plugin installation isn’t hard either - just upload the plugin to the /wp-content/plugins directory (follow the installation files - some are one file and some are an entire folder), and enable it on the WordPress plugins page. I am also trying to get into plugin development as well - although I don’t know for how long, since I probably won’t be using WordPress for much longer (I’m working on a custom system).
4. Strict Comment Moderation - While it might seem a bit odd to list strict comment moderation on a list like this - I do think it belongs here. For starters, you do not, I repeat, you do NOT want your blog to be known as one that allows spammers and trolls to reign free. While most publicity is good publicity - that sort of attention is an example of awful publicity. It takes much longer to fix your reputation than it does for you to maintain your reputation. Fortunately for us comment moderation is extremely easy with WordPress, and there are plugins to make it even easier. I tend to moderate based on the content of the comments, and the personal info (name, e-mail, and URL) the person entered. Use your own gut feeling - does the comment seem out of place? Are they responding to someone else? Is it adding any value to the post? And finally, does the commentator seem like a spammer or a bit too troll-like?
Oh, and don’t forget to install an anti spam plugin like Akismet.
5. Getting WordPress Themes - Finding and installing themes is as easy as finding and installing plugins. Find one you like that is compatible with your WordPress version, upload it to /wp-content/themes via FTP, and set it as your theme on the Presentation page, and boom - you’re done. Theme development isn’t very hard either. If you are interested in the creation of your own blog layout, I’ve written a few articles on the subject: Modern Web Design, Blog Theme Design, WordPress Theme Design Part 1 - The Boring Stuff, and WordPress Theme Design Part 2 - Coding.
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December 14th, 2007 at 2:01 pm
Running a multi-author blog, 2.3’s Pending Review feature is great. Except, the editor isn’t notified that someone has put something up for review. I have to go in and manually check. I’m there daily anyway, but I may not go to the Write screen very often unless I’m writing something.
There was a plugin long ago that sent an email, but that sent an email every time a draft was saved and I was flooded with emails.
I wonder why they left that last notify step out and why someone hasn’t done a plugin yet. Multi-author blogs aren’t that common, but they are out there. Or maybe I’m missing something?
December 14th, 2007 at 3:09 pm
Yeah, i noticed that too when I tested it a few weeks back.
When I get some free time I could look into writing up a quick plugin - doesn’t seem like it’d be hard to make - just check if a post is currently pending a review when it is submitted and send it to a specific list of users.
It does seem like something that would already exist though…. a bit odd that is doesn’t. Oh well.
Thanks for your comment
December 14th, 2007 at 3:15 pm
Actually- looks like someone wrote a comment on the draft notification page ( http://www.dagondesign.com/articles/draft-notification-plugin-for-wordpress/all-comments/ ) about reviews - just change a single line. According to the comment all you need to do is change the line “if ($result->post_status == “draft”)” to “if ($result->post_status == “pending”)”
December 15th, 2007 at 12:35 am
I made the change and tested it and it works! Something so simple! Thanks for checking up on that.
December 15th, 2007 at 1:12 am
Glad to hear it worked, let me know if you need help with anything else.