About This Book p. 1
Foolish Assumptions p. 2
Icons Used in This Book p. 2
Beyond the Book p. 3
Where to Go from Here p. 3

Discovering Blogging p. 8
Understanding WordPress Technologies p. 10
Archiving your publishing history p. 10
Interacting with your readers through comments p. 12
Feeding your readers p. 12
Tracking back p. 14
Dealing with comment and trackback spam p. 14
Using WordPress as a Content Management System p. 15

Defining OpenSource p. 20
Understanding WordPress Licensing p. 23
Applying WordPress Licensing to Your Projects p. 25

Discovering WordPress Release Cycles p. 30
Upgrading your WordPress experience p. 30
Understanding the cycles of a release p. 31
Finding WordPress release archives p. 32
Keeping Track of WordPress Development p. 33
Downloading Nightly Builds p. 35

Finding Other WordPress Users p. 38
Finding WordPress news and tips on community websites p. 38
Locating users on social networks p. 39
Users Helping Users p. 39
WordPress support forums p. 40
WordPress user manual p. 41
Make WordPress p. 41
Discovering Professional WordPress Consultants and Services p. 42
WordPress designers p. 44
Developers Consultants p. 45
Contributing to WordPress p. 46
Participating in Live and Virtual WordPress Events p. 47

Comparing the Two Versions of WordPress p. 50
Choosing the hosted version from WordPress.com p. 50
Self-hosting with WordPress.org p. 54
Hosting Multiple Sites with One WordPress Installation p. 56
Discovering WordPress VIP Services p. 59

Establishing Your Domain p. 64
Understanding domain name extensions p. 64
Considering the cost of a domain name p. 65
Registering your domain name p. 65
Finding a Home for Your Site p. 66
Getting help with hosting WordPress p. 69
Dealing with disk space and bandwidth p. 70

Understanding SFTP Concepts p. 73
Setting Up SFTP on Your Hosting Account p. 75
Finding and Using Free and Easy SFTP Programs p. 77
Connecting to the web server via SFTP p. 78
Transferring files from point A to point B p. 82
Editing files by using SFTP p. 82
Changing file permissions p. 83

Exploring Preinstalled WordPress p. 88
Installing WordPress Manually p. 91
Setting up the MySQL database p. 91
Downloading the WordPress software p. 93
Uploading the WordPress files via SFTP p. 93
Running the installation script p. 95

Understanding the Basics of Web Security p. 104
Updating WordPress p. 105
Installing patches p. 106
Using a firewall p. 106
Using Trusted Sources p. 107
Managing Users and Passwords p. 107
Hardening WordPress p. 108
Enabling multifactor authentication using the Two Factor Authentication plugin p. 109
Limiting login attempts p. 111
Disabling theme and plugin editors p. 112
Filtering by IP address p. 113
Killing PHP execution p. 114

Getting Notified of an Available Update p. 118
Backing Up Your Database p. 120
Updating WordPress Automatically p. 122
Updating WordPress Manually p. 124

Migrating Your Existing Site to WordPress p. 128
Movin’ on up p. 128
Preparing for the big move p. 129
Converting templates p. 130
Moving your site to WordPress p. 131
Importing from Blogger p. 131
Importing from LiveJournal p. 133
Importing from Movable Type and TypePad p. 135
Importing from Tumblr p. 136
Importing from WordPress p. 138
Importing from an RSS feed p. 139
Finding other import resources p. 140
Moving Your Website to a Different Host p. 141
Creating a backup and moving manually p. 141
Moving the database and files to the new host p. 142

Logging in to the Dashboard p. 148
Navigating the Dashboard p. 149
Welcome to WordPress! module p. 150
Site Health Status module p. 151
At a Glance module p. 152
Activity module p. 153
Quick Draft module p. 154
WordPress Events and News module p. 155
Arranging the Dashboard to Your Tastes p. 156
Changing the order of modules p. 156
Removing Dashboard modules p. 158
Finding Inline Documentation and Help p. 158

Configuring the Settings p. 162
General p. 162
Writing p. 166
Reading p. 166
Discussion p. 169
Media p. 175
Permalinks p. 176
Privacy p. 181
Creating Your Personal Profile p. 183
Setting Your Site’s Format p. 186
Posts p. 187
Media p. 187
Pages p. 188
Comments p. 188
Appearance p. 189
Plugins p. 189
Users p. 189
Tools p. 190

Understanding User Roles and Capabilities p. 194
Allowing New User Registration p. 194
Adding New Users Manually p. 196
Editing User Details p. 197
Managing a Multi author Site p. 199
Tools that help authors communicate p. 199
Tools to promote author profiles p. 200
Tools to manage multi author blog posts p. 201

Deciding to Allow Comments on Your Site p. 204
Positive aspects of allowing comments p. 204
Reasons to disallow comments p. 205
Interacting with Readers through Comments p. 206
Tracking Back p. 206
Managing Comments and Trackbacks p. 207
Tackling Spam with Akismet p. 209
Activating Akismet p. 210
Configuring Akismet p. 212

Archiving Content with WordPress p. 214
Building categories p. 215
Changing the name of a category p. 216
Creating new categories p. 219
Creating and Editing Tags p. 221

Using the Block Editor p. 226
Discovering available blocks p. 226
Discovering core blocks p. 228
Inserting new blocks p. 236
Configuring block settings p. 239

Composing Your Post p. 253
Refining Your Post Options p. 256
Publishing Your Post p. 260
Being Your Own Editor p. 262

Understanding the Difference between Pages and Posts p. 265
Creating the Front Page of Your Website p. 266
Creating the static page p. 268
Setting page options p. 269
Assigning a static page as the home page p. 270
Adding a Blog to Your Website p. 272

Adding New Files to the Media Library p. 276
Getting to know allowed media file types p. 276
Uploading a new file to the Media Library p. 276
Uploading multiple files at once p. 279
Understanding Media Library Features p. 281
Filtering options in the Media Library p. 281
Other Media Library view settings p. 287
Viewing and Editing Media File Details p. 288
Editing file details on the Edit Media page p. 288
Editing images in the Media Library p. 290
Discover Some Great Plugins to Manage Media p. 292

Inserting Images into Your Content p. 297
Uploading an image from your computer p. 298
Inserting an image from the Media Library p. 301
Using the Columns Block to Insert Multiple Images in a Row p. 307
Inserting a Cover Image into a Post p. 310
Inserting a Photo Gallery p. 311
Inserting Video Files into Your Posts p. 312
Adding a link to a video from the web p. 316
Adding video from your computer p. 319
Adding video using the embed block p. 321
Inserting Audio Files into Your Blog Posts p. 322
Inserting Audio Using the Embed Block p. 325
Podcasting with WordPress p. 327

Understanding the Importance of Analytics p. 331
Exploring the Options for Tracking Data p. 334
Understanding Key Analytics Terminology p. 334
Adding Google Analytics to Your WordPress Site p. 336
Signing up for Google Analytics p. 337
Installing the tracking code p. 337
Verifying that you installed the code properly p. 337
Using the data from the plugin p. 341

Exploring Reasons for a Social Media Listening Hub p. 342
Eavesdropping on yourself p. 342
Keeping tabs on your brand p. 344
Exploring Different Listening Tools p. 344
Monitoring with Google Alerts p. 344
Tracking conversations on Twitter with RSS p. 346
Searching communities with Boardreader p. 347
Creating Your Own Personal Monitoring Mix p. 348
Editing the Dashboard to Create a Listening Post p. 350

Understanding the Importance of Search Engine Optimization p. 354
Outlining the Advantages That WordPress Presents for SEO p. 354
Understanding How Search Engines See Your Content p. 356
Using links as currency p. 359
Submitting to search engines and directories p. 360
Optimizing Your Site under the Hood p. 360
Metadata p. 360
The robots.txt file p. 361
Researching Your Niche p. 361
Creating Search Engine Strategies p. 363
Setting up your site p. 363
Improving your site’s SEO practices p. 364
Dealing with duplicate content p. 366
Creating an editorial SEO list/calendar p. 367
Establishing a routine for publishing on your site p. 367
Creating a link-building strategy p. 369

Exploring MustUse Plugins for SEO Best Practices p. 372
Yoast SEO p. 372
XML Sitemap Generator for Google p. 375
Redirection p. 377
WPOptimize Cache Clean Compress p. 379

Getting Started with Free Themes p. 386
Understanding What to Avoid with Free Themes p. 388
Previewing Themes on the Themes Page p. 390
Installing a Theme p. 393
Browsing the free themes on the Dashboard p. 396
Previewing and activating a theme p. 397
Exploring Premium Theme Options p. 399

Discovering Block Themes p. 403
Why block themes are different p. 404
Finding block themes p. 404
Finding available options in block themes p. 405
Exploring the Site Editor p. 407
Using the Site Editor p. 409
Navigation screen in the site editor p. 409
Applying styles in the site editor p. 413
Managing pages in the site editor p. 416
Working with and creating templates p. 418
Understanding Block Patterns p. 423

Discovering Block Patterns p. 425
Synced and unsynced block patterns p. 426
Block patterns and template parts p. 428
Using Existing Block Patterns p. 429
Creating Block Patterns p. 432
Finding New Block Patterns p. 436

Extending WordPress with Plugins p. 442
Identifying Core Plugins p. 443
Distinguishing between Plugins and Themes p. 444
Finding Plugins on the WordPress Website p. 446
Searching for plugins from the Dashboard p. 447
Finding plugins through WordPress.org p. 450
Evaluating Plugins before Installing p. 450
Details p. 450
Ratings p. 451
Active installations p. 452
Advanced View p. 453
Support p. 454
Finding Plugins Outside the WordPress Website p. 454
Comparing Free and Commercial Plugins p. 456

Installing Plugins from the WordPress Dashboard p. 459
Manually Installing Plugins p. 461
Finding and downloading the files p. 462
Reading the instructions p. 464
Upgrading Plugins p. 465
Updating on the Plugins screen p. 465
Updating on the WordPress Updates screen p. 467
Updating manually p. 468
Activating and Deactivating Plugins p. 469
Deleting Plugins p. 470
Deleting via the Dashboard p. 470
Deleting manually p. 472

Exploring Activate-and-Go Plugins p. 475
Discovering Settings Screens p. 476
Akismet p. 477
XML Sitemap Generator for Google p. 478
Yoast SEO p. 481
Using Widget Blocks p. 483
Yoast SEO Breadcrumbs p. 483
Spotlight Social Feeds p. 483
Additional widgets to try p. 485
Enhancing Content with Shortcodes p. 486
Gallery shortcode p. 486
Embed shortcode p. 487
Embed Twitter links p. 489

Deciding When to Use the Multisite Feature p. 494
Understanding the Difference between Sites and Blogs p. 496
Setting Up the Optimal Hosting Environment p. 496
Checking out shared versus dedicated hosting p. 497
Exploring subdomains versus subdirectories p. 498
Choosing Linux Apache MySQL and PHP server environments p. 498
Adding a virtual host to the Apache configuration p. 500
Configuring PHP p. 502

Enabling the Network Feature p. 504
Exploring the Difference between Subdirectories and Subdomains p. 505
Installing the Network on Your Site p. 506
Disabling the Network p. 509

Exploring the Network Admin Dashboard p. 511
Managing Your Network p. 513
Settings p. 514
Sites p. 520
Users p. 524
Themes p. 527
Plugins p. 527
Stopping Spam Sign-Ups and Splogs p. 530

Setting Default User Permissions p. 532
Registering users p. 533
Controlling access to sites p. 534
Importing users p. 535
Changing Defaults p. 538
Site-specific sign-up p. 538
User role management p. 539
Exploring Default Site Settings p. 540

Using One Theme on Multiple Sites p. 542
Enabling themes for individual sites p. 543
Installing themes for network use p. 545
Setting the default theme for sites p. 546
Gathering and Displaying Network-Wide Content p. 547
Adding posts from network sites p. 548
Listing network sites p. 548
Using and Installing Network-Wide Plugins p. 550
Discovering Handy Multisite Plugins p. 552

Finding Your Way with Domain Mapping p. 553
Setting up a custom domain p. 554
Editing DNS records p. 556
Setting the Site Domain p. 559
Setting Up Multiple Networks p. 560