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Spider
07-07-2010, 02:09 PM
Thought you guys might like to know (after all your badgering and arm-twisting! :) ) that I have been working in/on Wordpress - the free version.

I have been asked by the chief officer of my Toastmasters district to be the chairman of the district's speakers bureau. As I had created that Wordpress blog a little while ago, which I then did nothing with, I thought to build a Wordpress site for the Spreakers Bureau and let my WP blog be my speakers page, and create WP pages for other speakers in the district.

The beginnings of it are here - Houston Area Speakers Bureau (http://d56speakers.wordpress.com)

Comments, critiques and advice are welcomed. (Laughter and ridicule wil be tolerated silently!)

vangogh
07-07-2010, 02:47 PM
Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. Sorry I couldn't resist based on your last thought.

So far it's looking good. I recognize the theme and it doesn't look like you've done much customization yet. Similar for your blog. Both off to good starts and I'll ask what you think of WordPress so far. If you do want to try a different theme I can recommend all sorts of places to look. Be forewarned I can point you to enough free themes that it'll take a few days to look through them all. The theme you're using was developed a few years back and I don't think it's been updated to reflect some recent changes and functionality in WordPress. For example WP 3.0 comes with a much better and more flexible system for creating and maintaining navigation. You might want something newer that takes advantage of it and other new features.

A few ideas. There's a great plugin for creating forms called Contact Form 7. You might want to install it and then add a contact form to the Become a Speaker page. You can install plugins directly from the admin side of WordPress. I'm guessing you know how, but if not let me know and I'll tell you where to look.

I see you set permalinks. Good. Definitely better than the default ?pid=

The What is Toastmasters page shows third-page in the URL. You might want to change the page slug to reflect the actual title of the page.

I have a challenge for your own blog. It would probably be a good idea to try to customize the theme so it looks the same as your main site. It's not really hard, but I say that with years of experience working with WordPress. Having them look the same will be better branding for you and once you have a theme looking like your site you could have WordPress running both your site and blog with one install. It'll take some work to get there, but it really is worth it.

I notice the comments are set to show the newest on top. Your choice, but I think it reads better to have newest at the bottom. Makes it easier to follow any conversation that develops within the comments.

So far so good and again I'm curious to know what you think of WordPress.

Harold Mansfield
07-07-2010, 07:19 PM
Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. Sorry I couldn't resist based on your last thought.

So far it's looking good. I recognize the theme and it doesn't look like you've done much customization yet. Similar for your blog. Both off to good starts and I'll ask what you think of WordPress so far. If you do want to try a different theme I can recommend all sorts of places to look. Be forewarned I can point you to enough free themes that it'll take a few days to look through them all. The theme you're using was developed a few years back and I don't think it's been updated to reflect some recent changes and functionality in WordPress. For example WP 3.0 comes with a much better and more flexible system for creating and maintaining navigation. You might want something newer that takes advantage of it and other new features.

A few ideas. There's a great plugin for creating forms called Contact Form 7. You might want to install it and then add a contact form to the Become a Speaker page. You can install plugins directly from the admin side of WordPress. I'm guessing you know how, but if not let me know and I'll tell you where to look.

I see you set permalinks. Good. Definitely better than the default ?pid=

The What is Toastmasters page shows third-page in the URL. You might want to change the page slug to reflect the actual title of the page.

I have a challenge for your own blog. It would probably be a good idea to try to customize the theme so it looks the same as your main site. It's not really hard, but I say that with years of experience working with WordPress. Having them look the same will be better branding for you and once you have a theme looking like your site you could have WordPress running both your site and blog with one install. It'll take some work to get there, but it really is worth it.

I notice the comments are set to show the newest on top. Your choice, but I think it reads better to have newest at the bottom. Makes it easier to follow any conversation that develops within the comments.

So far so good and again I'm curious to know what you think of WordPress.

I think you are thinking that he is using self hosted Wordpress , he's using the hosted version...wordpress.com.

Spider
07-07-2010, 11:32 PM
...So far so good and again I'm curious to know what you think of WordPress.Thank you. I'm not sure you really want to know what I think of Wordpress after using it for only five days - but you did ask twice! Also, as Harold points out, I am using the free blog service at Wordpress.com - a different program than the one you use, I imagine.

In a nutshell, I am not at all impressed. It appeared easy to set up initially. After that it was very clunky and not at all intuitive. It reminded me of Netscape Navigator 1.0. What I have managed to accomplish in these past five days, I could have accomplished in five hours using plain HTML in Notepad.

True, the Wordpress application has a lot more to it than I could create in plain HTML, but all that funtionality is in the suite of applications, widgets, etc., not in the building process of my pages.

I'm not encouraged to use Wordpress again, and I wonder whether I should even continue this Speakers Bureau project in this format.

Harold Mansfield
07-07-2010, 11:58 PM
Wow. I'm really surprised that your first impressions are so bad. I mean, you really have only seen the basics with the free hosted version and but if you are that unimpressed and would rather hack it out on notepad then I say go with what you like.

Just know that it's not the post editor that makes Wordpress so used across the web...that's probably the least of the functions...you can write a post on anything..but I see no reason to try and sell it to you. It seems your mind is made up.

vangogh
07-08-2010, 01:13 AM
You're right I was thinking it was self hosted. My bad.

I'm surprised too that you aren't liking it, but to each his own.


What I have managed to accomplish in these past five days, I could have accomplished in five hours using plain HTML in Notepad

That's not a fair comparison. You have to expect to put in a little time learning a new system. It might take you longer right now, but in a month or two it'll be the opposite. Right now it would take me days to compose a sentence in Italian that I could compose in under a minute in English. Does that make English a better language or an easier one to work with? Of course not. It's simply I know English and don't know Italian. It's easier for you in html and notepad right now only because you're more familiar working with them.

It sounds like you're going to give up. I won't bother trying to convince you to use WordPress again. Personally I think it's your loss and I think the main reason you're losing out is not because html and notepad is the better system, but because you're unwilling to try WordPress long enough to learn it. It's your choice and your right, but I think you'd be better off in the long run sticking it out with WordPress. And do keep in mind you're only seeing a limited set of what it can do using the WordPress.com version.

By the way all of the above is being said, because I genuinely want to help. I know WordPress (in fact most any CMS) is better than building static html pages and I want you to see that too. I think if you stick it out you'll be surprised how much more you'll be able to do with your site. Just moving your content to a database makes your site so much more dynamic and flexible.


Just know that it's not the post editor that makes Wordpress so used across the web

The only time I use the WordPress editor is when I'm doing a last check before publishing. And I wouldn't say I'm really using the editor. I just happen to be in it for that last check for typos and grammatical errors. I use a blogging editor to write all my posts, which I then publish as drafts. It doesn't look like the editor can publish something as a page instead of a post, though it would be fairly simple to cut and paste.

By the way Frederick were you using the WYSIWYG editor or did you use the html editor in WordPress. I think the .com version has both just like the self hosted version. It shouldn't be that much different using the html editor in WordPress as it is using Notepad.

Harold maybe we should have walked Frederick through setting up a site using php includes first so he could get a feel for how a site is developed that way before working with a theme.

Harold Mansfield
07-08-2010, 01:50 AM
Yeah, maybe. I'm a little disappointed because I know how much more beneficial it would be in just about every way once you get the hang of it..and light years faster., but I also am not in the habit of trying to get people to change their minds.

But from a business stand point. There is just no way that you can compete with other people and companies in your niche doing everything by hand. There aren't enough hours in the day for you to code every thing by hand and get the same SEO, Syndication and Design benefits that a competitor will using a CMS like Wordpress.

But you have to be comfortable with your tools, after all you are the one that has to use them.

Just to give you some perspective...I didn't know what I was doing when I first started using Wordpress and I have a whole catalog of terrible mistakes and websites under my belt because I had to learn on my own. It took me at least 3 months to learn what I was doing..and then I could get a PR 4 and 200 visitors a day like clockwork in a matter of one update period ( back when it was easier to get Page Rank and it actually mattered).

I'd say it took me 6 months before I made my first dollar from a Wordpress site.
Soon after that I was opening files and hacking my way through edits. Before that I had never seen a line of PHP (or any kind of code) in my life.

But it took me 3 years to get good enough at it to do it for other people. and I still learn something new almost every week.

It won't do you any good if you don't want to learn it and you can't learn what it can do for you in 5 days. You haven't even scratched the surface.
It's probably hard to fathom because you haven't had the options open to you before so you don't even know they exist or what to do with them..that's why we are here.

Think of it like this. Free hosted WP is like Drivers Ed..just enough to get you familiar with the controls but you are not going to win any street races.
Self Hosted WP is the Formula One car.

Spider
07-08-2010, 10:48 AM
I accept everything you have both said, and I'm sorry to have disappointed you. We are looking at this from a different point of view. I am not planning to go into business as a website developer, and I am not interested in learning Wordpress to such a level. Especially as Harold said, it took 3 years to get to that point.

Wordpress.com is put out there "... to bring the WordPress experience to a larger audience. So we created WordPress.com, a hosted version of the open source package where you can start a blog in seconds without any technical knowledge." [Quoted from the Wordpress.com About page.]

That's all I want, because that's all I need. I want to be able to put up a webpage on occasion for myself, and I do not want to take an age to do it. If that means limiting the capabilities of the site itself, fine. When I want something more elaborate, I'll hire either or both of you chaps.

I started with the WYSIWYG editor, VG, because that was on top. I switched to the html editor when I realized it was available and wanted more control of the font.

Regarding the Wordpress app itself and my five days/five hours comment.

- As to five days being a fair comparison, I did say at the outset, "I'm not sure you really want to know what I think of Wordpress after using it for only five days - but you did ask twice!"

- I also acknowledged at the outset that, "... the Wordpress application has a lot more to it than I could create in plain HTML, but all that funtionality is in the suite of applications, widgets, etc.,"

- It's not a question of writing in a different language, like Italian as opposed to English. It is a question of writing something in a text file - something.txt - or in a word processor - something.wps (or whatever.) I expect the writing to amount to the same work in both files. The .wps file will allow me to change font, size, color, justification, line-spacing, check spelling, grammar, and so on, none of which is available in a plain .txt file. But the writing should take the same time and effort in both.

There's no doubt that the Wordpress application plus all the widgets and doodads is a marvelous engineering feat. Clearly it has captured some enthusiastic knowledeable adherents who can work its magic. Obviously, it has proven popular with non-nerds who only want to stick some comments on the web in the form of a blog (not to mention non-nerds who wish to post useless drivel for all to see!)

But Wordpress does not serve the semi-nerd who knows enough to be dangerous but not enough to prevent his own frustrations. Perhaps nothing will!

Harold Mansfield
07-08-2010, 11:02 AM
When I want something more elaborate, I'll hire either or both of you chaps.


Sounds good to me.

In the mean time. It's good to play with. If you putz along with it for a while, every now and then you will come across something new that you didn't know, or have a question about something and we are hear for ya.

vangogh
07-08-2010, 01:41 PM
We are looking at this from a different point of view. I am not planning to go into business as a website developer, and I am not interested in learning Wordpress to such a level. Especially as Harold said, it took 3 years to get to that point.

I wasn't looking at it from the point of view of you developing sites for people. All I'm saying is that if you took a week or two to learn WordPress you'd be able to create new pages or posts much quicker than you could coding the html from scratch. I don't think you need to spend 3 years learning WordPress before you're using the system well.

If you wanted to spend the extra time great, but if not that's fine too. I assume the only sites you would be running are your own. If that's the case you probably would want to learn something about how themes are put together since you currently do that work on your sites. It took me about a week of an hour or two a night (call it under 20 hours total) to develop my first theme, which matched the design of my site at the time. Now I can take the html/css for a page and turn it into a theme in a couple of hours.

I'm not thinking you need to spend 3 years learning. I'm thinking you need a week to a month.

And again I'm not trying to convince you to use WordPress. I think I know you well enough to know that you've made up your mind and aren't planning on changing it. I'm writing more so anyone reading doesn't get a false impression of WordPress and how long it takes to learn. I've walked clients (rather unsavvy ones too) through using WordPress in about an hour.

Harold Mansfield
07-08-2010, 02:37 PM
I was just trying to give some perspective that you have to learn how to use things before you rush to judgment. I'm pretty sure you didn't learn HTML, SEO, and how to make tables in a couple of hours.
I'm not trying to get you up to developers snuff, but the technology is there to make your life easier. It's free and it is pretty much the industry standard at this point.

I just think that if you want to be successful online, you need to learn how to use the tools. Not saying that it has to be Wordpress...I just suggested it because it's easy to learn and there are plenty of people here to help, suggest and bounce ideas off of.

The bottom line is , if you are going to publish a website and do your own work, and want to at least start on a somewhat even plane as your competitors and others vying for that same traffic, you are going to at some point, have to learn how to use the tools that they are using to be competitive or you will always be playing catch up and working twice as hard as the others.

It's the equivalent of using a printing press, and slide rulers to publish a magazine while every one else in your niche or industry is using a Mac publishing program that does 10x's the work in half the time.

But again, I say that you have to do it your way, not my way or VG's way. We just thought that we could offer some advice to help you ascend to the next level...or I should say the current level.

vangogh
07-08-2010, 02:55 PM
Yep. Everything new comes with a learning curve. How big the curve is depends on what you want to do. Naturally the more experience you have with anything, the better you're going to be using it.


The bottom line is , if you are going to publish a website and want to at least start on a somewhat even plane as your competitors and others vying for that same traffic, you are going to at some point, have to learn how to use today's tools or you will always be playing catch up and working twice as hard as the others.

So true. That applies to everything, but even more so when it comes to things online. The technology changes fast and frequently. Certain areas where I was on the cutting edge even a year or two ago, I now lag in because I haven't been able to update my skills. Part of the challenge, frustration, and joy of working on the web.

Spider
07-08-2010, 04:25 PM
Please don't get the impressions I won't change my mind. I am very adept at changing my mind when I find a good reason to do so. Hey - I started using Wordpress, didn't I?!

And I appreciate your perspective and your suggestions. I will be back for more, as time goes on.

billbenson
07-08-2010, 05:09 PM
I think all of you may be looking at this wrong as well. Spider knows how to write an html web page in a text editor. He has a site with the style he likes. I don't think his site is huge (about how many pages do you have Spider?) What he has now and the way he does it is fast, functional, and has no learning curve. Spiders business and web site are really a hobby as well, although its one heck of a hobby!

Compare that to a small business that needs a site, but they don't know html etc. Wordpress becomes the perfect solution, even for a small site because you don't need to learn html.

Spider IMO there may be a couple of objectives you may be missing in converting or using WP. For starters, your ramp up time to being able to use WP effectively is short. You already have the skill set to figure it out. Eborg does a lot of fancy stuff. Thats what took him a couple of years to get to this point.

Word Press is both a dynamic (php) and database system. This gives you a lot of power. WP packages it with a nice user interface (admin panel), but this gives you the option to do things you may never have thought of. I'm always thinking of things I would like my site to do. Most of these would be impossible on a static site. WP has a lot of them built in. You could also have a programmer build something specialized if the need be.

Take something really simple that word press can do. Lets say you have a recipe site. You can sit down and enter 365 recipes. WP can put up a different one every day. You don't need to work on it for another year. In your case it could be small business tips? Thats just an example.

Its a case of you don't know what you can do. That's why books are often a better place to start when learning a subject than web searches. A book gives you a boilerplate so you know what you should research more on the web.

You will probably never want custom software written as I mentioned above, but I bet that over time you will find things that it can do that you would really like to do. Doing it the way you are doing it now won't allow for that very easily.

Harold Mansfield
07-08-2010, 05:28 PM
..and 2 other things that may interest you.
I know you have a newsletter, or used to send one out and I also know you are active on Facebook and probably Linked In.

I just recently configured an email program on a clients site that sends out newsletters when they post. Not every post, just the ones that they want to send as a newsletter. It kills 2 birds with one stone. you still populate your website with fresh content, but you can pick and choose which posts go to your newsletter people just by checking a category box( of course it doesn't have to go to the front page of the blog if you don't want it to) ...nicely designed with HTML (which you already know) with company colors, logo, links to social media and your book and all the other good stuff that shows your professionalism.

You can also separate that list so certain people get certain newsletters or blog posts...running multiple groups at once from the same website with not a lot more work...just posting as usual.

The other is, you can have your posts go directly to your Linked in profile and Facebook page at the same time.

That's 3 things you can do at once, getting the information where it needs to go. One post, 3 different functions. If you have your feed submitted to other services and readers, it will go across the web all at once. you don't have to manually submit each post to each place. So feasibly, when you make 1 blog post, it can go to 100 different place, all of your social profiles and 1000's of subscribers at the press of a button and you can go back to your morning coffee.
You of course can mix and match it however you wish.

When I say the web is all about syndication...those are the types of things I am talking about and that stuff is Wordpress 101

vangogh
07-08-2010, 07:06 PM
Bill I understand Frederick knows html and notepad. He's welcome to continue using both with his site and I know I won't be offended in any way. Over time both Harold and I have been telling Frederick some of the reasons we both think WordPress would be a good solution. For example we may not have convinced him that updating his site with new content is important, but it's something we talked about. Updating your site with new content becomes easier to do with a content management system. WordPress is the one we're recommending.

I know when I first started developing sites they were html. Then I learned a little php because I discovered how using includes made development and maintenance easier. That eventually let me to content management systems, specifically WordPress. I think even for a small site it makes sense. Small sites aren't necessarily small sites for long and using a CMS will allow a site to grow more easily.

Naturally when you first approach something like WordPress there's a learning curve. If you only want to work with it as a site owner that curve is pretty shallow. If you want to get into development even if only on your own sites the curve is a little steeper. I think it's worth getting through that curve, whichever level.

No one, Frederick included has to use WordPress. I simply think there are advantages to doing so.

prova.fm
07-08-2010, 07:51 PM
I started using WordPress.com in the beginning too. I understand Spider's point of view, because I didn't like it either. But I realized it was great for a reason, so I stuck with it. Looking back, I realize I didn't like it because it has sooo many options. It's complex. I recently switched over to self-hosted WP because .com was too slow. I couldn't take the slow speed. I agree, that CMS's are amazing, once learned. However, their opensource nature makes the learning curve excruciating. Developers love coding, but hate documenting.

Vangogh, you made mention that you have mountains of theme links.... I don't want to get lost in that mess, but do you have plugin knowledge? I've been looking for a plugin that allows anyone to add a post to my blog, from the frontend. Obviously they would go to draft/pending mode. I've only seen a handful, & for whatever reason, they insert a pretty old looking form in the sidebar - of every page. I'm curious if you know of one that creates a page (that can be linked to) with the same backend post WYSIWYG editor.

Also, do you have any examples of the new fancy menu stuff in WP3.0? I've upgraded to the latest version, but I'm just using a standard template.

-David

Spider
07-08-2010, 11:47 PM
My initial frustrations with Wordpress.com were not so much about learning it as it was getting it to do what it was told. I don't have to learn how to drag a widget from a List area to a Use area. But when it won't 'stick' where you put it until the fourth attempt, that gets annoying. Another thing I found annoying was when the app added code to produce something I did not ask for. It also put in spaces I did not want.

At one point, the text editor window added about an inch of space between a table (for tabular arrangement of names) and its title. I spent a good half an hour trying to remove that gap. Finally, I copied the code I had written to my clipboard, deleted it from the editor and saved the empty page. I turned off my computer, waited a few minutes, turned it back on, logged back in and pasted the same code from my clipboard and the page was produced perfectly. (That is what reminded me of Netscape Navigator 1.0 because that was the sort of thing that happened back then.)

That is not about learning how to use an app. That is a malfunctioning app. - at least, an app. that does not live up to expectations.


Bill, there are 40+ pages on my main site. And, I'm sure there are all sorts of things that I could do with my site if it was created (or re-created) under WP. As you say, I don't know what those things are, and until I hear of something that sounds like it would be productive, learning how to make the change would be a waste, for me.

Harold Mansfield
07-09-2010, 12:17 AM
My initial frustrations with Wordpress.com were not so much about learning it as it was getting it to do what it was told. I don't have to learn how to drag a widget from a List area to a Use area. But when it won't 'stick' where you put it until the fourth attempt, that gets annoying. Another thing I found annoying was when the app added code to produce something I did not ask for. It also put in spaces I did not want.

The Widgets can be a pain. They are not merely slide and drop, you have to pay attention to see if they have been recognized before you let go of them...usually indicated by a dotted outline where you are trying to place it..or shifting of other widgets in the same area,



At one point, the text editor window added about an inch of space between a table (for tabular arrangement of names) and its title. I spent a good half an hour trying to remove that gap. Finally, I copied the code I had written to my clipboard, deleted it from the editor and saved the empty page. I turned off my computer, waited a few minutes, turned it back on, logged back in and pasted the same code from my clipboard and the page was produced perfectly. (That is what reminded me of Netscape Navigator 1.0 because that was the sort of thing that happened back then.)
It's difficult to copy from another source and paste into the visual editor. Different programs and editors add different formatting things that doesn't translate well. Wordpress reads things simply.
For instance, you can't copy and paste from MS Word into..well anything that isn't a Microsoft product. And you can't do it with Worpdress. It's not Wordpress' fault. It's MS fault for adding so much unnecessary and proprietary crap to the code.

Creating tables is a pain on every word editor. You don't notice it on Notepad because note pad is not a program or a word processor. It's plain white sheet of paper.

To single space hit Control-Return (0r Enter)

Turning the computer off and back on again...probably could have accomplished the same thing by just clearing your browser cache (Tools->Options) or doing a hard refresh (Control->F5)

Also, if your computer is waiting for updates, it will gradually slow until nothing works anymore. Sometimes that coincides with other things and makes it seem like it's the other thing, when in fact it's not.


That is not about learning how to use an app. That is a malfunctioning app. - at least, an app. that does not live up to expectations.
It's not malfunctioning. It doesn't behave like MS Word or other editors that you are running on your own computer..within your own closed system if you will. You are editing on another server so there are bound to be minor connection hiccups. I have yet to see the app or web tool that is 100 percent all of the time.

Too many variables in between the app and your fingers... computer RAM and Speed, intermittent internet connection hiccups, server relay adjustments. Nothing is 100% all of the time unless you have it in your home and are connected directly to it.

That has nothing to do with Wordpress. I am sure you have felt the same frustration with Facebook and I don't see you calling for the King's head every time it happens.



Bill, there are 40+ pages on my main site. And, I'm sure there are all sorts of things that I could do with my site if it was created (or re-created) under WP. As you say, I don't know what those things are, and until I hear of something that sounds like it would be productive, learning how to make the change would be a waste, for me.

I don't know if anything like that is going to find you, sit you down and hit you over the head. You have to want to know to use it and how it can benefit you. You can read about the basic features (http://wordpress.org/about/features/)anytime you want. There is information everywhere online.

It's not like we all knocked on your door to sell you a vacuum cleaner. We aren't trying to sell you Wordpress. Wordpress is free.
We are just here to help you learn it if you want it.
You don't need us to tell you that your carpet needs vacuuming and show you all of the attachments and suck up a bowl full of marbles to impress you enough to make the sale.

It's your carpet. You see it everyday. You know if it needs to be vacuumed or not.

But there is nothing we can tell you that is going to make you buy the vacuum cleaner, if you are dead set on sweeping that carpet with an old straw broom.

At this point in the game, it's not about just getting through the day. It's about being competitive.

Personally, whether or not you use Worpdress, Joomla, Drupal, Mac Publishing, or anything other kind of CMS or publishing platform is not going to get me extra points to get into webmasters heaven, nor will it make me any extra money..any more than if you use a yellow legal pad, an old scanner and a dot matrix printer.

It s a forum. I'm here to share, learn and help when I can.

The bottom line is. If you want to move your web publishing project into the 21st century and compete, you have prime access to free tutorials, troubleshooters and consultants right here, for free, that will accelerate your trip through the learning curve tremendously.

Just like you did with Facebook and that didn't take you long at all to get the hang of.

vangogh
07-09-2010, 03:03 AM
Developers love coding, but hate documenting

Unfortunately that's true. However all my early learning about developing themes was reading the WordPress codex. There are also plenty of blogs that offer great tips and tutorials and I've generally found the WordPress community to be helpful and friendly. I know the folks behind WordPress would like to see the documentation improve. I've even been thinking of volunteering.

WordPress.tv (http://wordpress.tv) has some good videos when it comes to learning WordPress


I've been looking for a plugin that allows anyone to add a post to my blog, from the frontend. Obviously they would go to draft/pending mode.

I don't know any off the top of my head. Sometimes I just find something close to what I want and then customize it so it does my bidding. Of course that means you can't always upgrade the plugin. I try to do my modifications in the theme if I can. I know there are plugins that let you edit posts from the front end. I'm not sure about posting from the front end. There are also plugins that allow you to create more roles and privileges so you could let an ordinary subscriber post a draft. They would be doing it from the back end in that scenario though. What you might need is a combination of some existing plugins and then a little custom code.

Here's a link to my delicious profile for WordPress 3.0 posts (http://delicious.com/vangogh99/3.0). It's going to be more about what the new features are and how to develop for them. I don't think I've bookmarked specific themes. The biggies changes are:

The merge with mu. I have at least one post bookmarked for how to get the multisite thing working. Just a few lines to wpconfig.php and .htaccess and some clicks on the backend.

The new navigation system. Again I have stuff bookmarked. It's basically adding a small bit of code to functions.php and then using the new menu hook. Really not that much different than how navigation is coded now.

Custom post types. Again bookmarked. These most people won't necessarily need to use, but it will make things better for end users. For example say you want an events calendar. Until now each event might have been coded as a post. Now you can create a custom post type called events and define a new page template for how they'll look. There will be a new menu option on the backend for adding and editing events, much like there is now for adding and editing new posts and pages. The new post type is basically the same thing as a post, except it'll be much easier to tell clients when you need a new event select the menu option to add a new event…

vangogh
07-09-2010, 03:27 AM
But when it won't 'stick' where you put it until the fourth attempt

I'm guessing it's what Harold said about not hitting the exact area. Agreed it could be better, but still a lot easier than having to code the widget from scratch and coding the sidebar too. And once you realize what you need to do to get it to stick it really isn't that hard. One think I'll say about the WordPress team is they take usability seriously and are usually making improvements from version to version. Maybe soon they'll make the widgets easier to drag and drop.


At one point, the text editor window added about an inch of space between a table

Yeah, the editor isn't all it could be. You're not the first person to complain about it. Hopefully improving it is on the radar. I believe there are some plugins to improve it, but don't know how much.

I never use it like I said before. I write everything in a blog editor and publish from that editor. That may not work for you, but if you're interested Windows Live Writer (http://explore.live.com/windows-live-writer) is the best one for Windows and probably the best one in general. It's also free. I've never used it myself being on a Mac, but I've only heard good things about it. It's not just for WordPress either. I don't know if it's something you'll find useful, but the price makes it worth a look.


That is not about learning how to use an app. That is a malfunctioning app

I think that's a little harsh. WordPress isn't perfect, but what is. You won't find any piece of software that's perfect. Everything has bugs. Sure it malfunctions at times, but I wouldn't characterize it as a malfunctioning app. Overwhelmingly it does things well.


until I hear of something that sounds like it would be productive, learning how to make the change would be a waste, for me.

You have to figure out what that something is more than we do. I've offered plenty of suggestions over the years. For one start a blog. That alone is reason enough to learn Wordpress. I think you could do well at blogging too. You write well and have interesting things to say. Pretty much the two main ingredients to blogging. Not to say that blogging is easy, but done well, it's the best marketing tool you'll ever have.

WP is generally coded search engine friendly. You'll want to add a plugin or two and make a few easy setting tweaks, but for the most part your site will have a good foundation out of the box.

The extensibility through plugins is amazing. You'll be able to add all sorts of functionality to improve your site without having to write a single line of code.

The downside is you'll have to get through the initial learning curve of using WordPress and then the somewhat bigger curve of learning to develop a theme assuming you want to do that yourself. The pros far outweigh the cons.

vangogh
07-09-2010, 03:31 AM
At this point in the game, it's not about just getting through the day. It's about being competitive.

Harold summed it up nicely at the end of his post. None of us gain anything by you using WordPress. We're just here to help if you'd like the learning curve to become a little more shallow.

We think it's good CMS and use it. You don't have to use it or any CMS if you don't want. But do understand your competition is likely using a CMS and probably WordPress and they're going to take advantage of what it has to offer.

Spider
07-09-2010, 09:45 AM
You guys are great - and I truly appreciate all the time and help you are giving me. I wouldn't generally make a big deal of initial frustrations of any program - that's part of getting aquainted. But you did ask and I'm sorry if my intial experience wasn't up to your hopes. I'll adapt and do things the way WP expects, in order to get what I want from it. If you ask for the description of an old dollar bill, I'll describe it for you - including all the nicks and creases, coffee stains and bubblegum stickiness - even though we all know it buys exactly what a mint bill buys.

And, yes, you all have made many suggestions and offered wonderful advice, and I am grateful. I still have to weigh the time costs against perceived benefit. You see, I don't do this web-stuff because it's the most enjoyable thing in the world. I enjoy it in small doses but I much more enjoy working with people on their businesses or helping individuals make a better life. The first is a means to the second. It is not productive for me to spend so much time on the former that it steals time from doing the latter.

Some of the suggestions are, perhaps, falling on untuned ears. If you tell me WP makes a great cup of coffee, I might be amazed but not interested in getting it to do so because I can make coffee quite easily in my own kitchen. If I don't seem to appreciate the benefits of WP coffee, feel free to explain. For example. you all often mention content management as being a prime feature of WP. Well, I don't feel any difficulty managing the content of my 40-page site, so cannot appreciate what I might gain from taking the time to learn and implement a CMS. "Try it, you'll like it!" is not an advertising slogan that has much effect. Perhaps I should be living in Missouri - that's the "Show me!" state, isn't it?!!

BTW, I do have a specific question for you. I want to add a 'Contact' link to the menu, but no matter what I enter for the link, WP adds "htpp" at the beginning of it. (Here we go again, adding stuff I don't want!) How can I add a mailto "Contact" link to a WP menu?

prova.fm
07-09-2010, 11:15 AM
Thanks for the links, I'm checking them out now. I found one plugin that operates as a separate page. I think I'll start with that & customize it. It doesn't have a WYSIWYG editor, or image uploader.

Another curious question for anyone: Do you use your WP sites to let people register/login? I don't see how people would want to do that. I would see logging in only to perform some "member" actions.

Harold Mansfield
07-09-2010, 11:46 AM
BTW, I do have a specific question for you. I want to add a 'Contact' link to the menu, but no matter what I enter for the link, WP adds "htpp" at the beginning of it. (Here we go again, adding stuff I don't want!) How can I add a mailto "Contact" link to a WP menu?

When you go to add link it adds "http" in the field as a default just to make things easier. You can either click in the box away from it and use it, or just highlight it and erase it (or backspace it away) and type your own code.

vangogh
07-09-2010, 11:58 AM
Frederick no need to apologize. Your impressions are your impressions and they're all perfectly valid. And I understand that you want to understand why you should use WP or a CMS in general before diving in. Nope WordPress doesn't make coffee.

Being a content management system is one advantage of any CMS over a static site. I know you say you're doing fine managing your content as it is now. I'm not really sure how to convince you moving thing to the database is better. I didn't see it myself until I started using a CMS. I was handling my content fine too. Let me try to get at this by taking a step back.

Right now your site is static html. You have a menu and that menu is hardcoded into each page. So if you wanted to do something like change a menu item like About into About Us, you need to open every file on your site and add the word Us in the appropriate place. Not a difficult change, but even over 40 pages that adds up. It takes some time and it increase the chances you could make a mistake. A better solution is to use something like php (any server side language will do) and use an include statement. You would take your menu code and place it in one file and then replace code in your pages with a single line of php that says when you get to this point grab what's in the file over there and place it here. Your files would need to be php now instead of html so run the php code.

Now when you want to change About to About Us you make the change in one file and all 40 pages of your site are updated. It doesn't have to only be your menu that you include. Most sites have a lot of information that stays the same from page to page. Generally what you have in your header, footer, and maybe sidebar stays consistent. The main thing that changes from page to page is your content. The header, footer, and sidebar are called boilerplate or sometimes it's just template.

By using include statements you move all the boilerplate to a couple or 3 files, which are then included in your pages where you want them to display. I hope you can see how that's a much better approach to building a site than having everything hardcoded directly on each page.

A content management system takes this a step further. Instead of your pages now being code wrapped around the text that's your content, you can take the content part out and store it in a database. You might have pages where you use the same paragraph of content. Your bio might be an example. Your bio might be on your about page, a contact page, your portfolio, maybe in the footer. Instead of having to add or change that content in all those places it could be stored in a single location in the database and then included where you want it.

What you'll see as you start moving things into the database is you no longer need 40 files to create a 40 page site. The reality is most of those pages are going to look similar if not the same. You have the boilerplate, a page heading, some paragraphs of text, whatever. Your pages though will mostly look alike. Take this forum. The information itself changes from thread to thread and post to post, but otherwise everything is pretty much the same. So instead of needing 40 files or 1000 files we need 1 file that is coded to know which part of the database to grab content from under different conditions. That's makes it much easier to maintain the code.

What you end up with is a separation of content and code. Keep in mind most people prefer not to much around in code. With a CMS they don't have to. Even if you're fine mucking around in the code, it's still easier to work with when code and content are separated.

As fa as your contact link, it's probably not going to work on WordPress.com. The themes are going to be set up to only display pages or posts in the navigation so you would need to use a self hosted WordPress install and change the way the navigation is coded. I wouldn't recommend placing an email link in your navigation though. That breaks user expectation. When people click on a link in a menu they expect to be taken to a page and not have their email program open.

vangogh
07-09-2010, 12:01 PM
David I have registration turned off at the moment, but you might turn it on for any number of reasons. One would be to force registration before commenting in the hopes of cutting down spam. You might also build some functionality that only registered users can take advantage of. An easy example is where you display some content to everyone and some content only to registered users. You might then charge people for the additional content. You could build a community with BuddyPress or bbPress and again registration would be required much like you needed to register to post here at the forum.

Spider
07-09-2010, 12:32 PM
When you go to add link it adds "http" in the field as a default just to make things easier. You can either click in the box away from it and use it, or just highlight it and erase it (or backspace it away) and type your own code.Well, I'll try it again, but when I erased the http and entered my own code, WP added the http back again (and, of course, my link was made inoperative.) But I'll try it again.

Harold Mansfield
07-09-2010, 12:34 PM
I'll be honest, I'm kind of operating in the dark. I haven't used Wordpress.com in along time.
If all else fails add it to your links section or blog roll but I really can't see why it would prevent you from creating a link.

Off the subject a little...don't you know that placing a live email link is just an open door for bots and scrapers to add that email to a spam list?

Spider
07-09-2010, 01:08 PM
I tried it again and this time http was not added back after I erased it. So now it works. Thank you. But....

re: VG's comment not to have a contact link in the menu. I thought that was given - let people contact you and make the link easy to find. What am I not understanding here?

Re: spam - yes, but my next step is to see if I can make the link using ascii code. I have an e-mail link at the end of the text of What Is Toastmasters page. I'll try to insert that into the menu and see what happens.

vangogh
07-09-2010, 01:10 PM
Frederick read the comment at the end of my post above. I don't think you're going to be able to add the link the way you want using WordPress.com. You're going to need a self hosted WordPress install. What you're trying to do kind of goes against user expectations of what a menu is. It depends on where you're trying to add it, but I think it may not be possible where you're trying.

The http:// addition is necessary for external links so WP adds it. Your email should work with http anyway so I'm not sure why it would be a problem.

Spider
07-09-2010, 05:52 PM
The mailto link was accepted into the menu without the http piece being added back but it converted my ascii code into characters thereby destroying my anti-spam device. So, I have removed the contact link from the menu.

See. This is the bit that I find frustrating. They (and others) have this great gizmo, then change what you input. Now that didn't happen by itself - they must have gone to the trouble of adding some code to their app. to do that. Why? What do they gain by preventing us from entering things in a certain way?

And I have just wasted some more time.

Okay. On to the next item

Harold Mansfield
07-09-2010, 06:54 PM
The mailto link was accepted into the menu without the http piece being added back but it converted my ascii code into characters thereby destroying my anti-spam device. So, I have removed the contact link from the menu.

See. This is the bit that I find frustrating. They (and others) have this great gizmo, then change what you input. Now that didn't happen by itself - they must have gone to the trouble of adding some code to their app. to do that. Why? What do they gain by preventing us from entering things in a certain way?

And I have just wasted some more time.

Okay. On to the next item

You have to remember that you are not on your own server or on your own computer. You are using a free service and most free hosted platforms have restrictions on adding any code other than links. So any outside code will not be allowed. To have that type of control you would need self hosted Wordpress.

Since Wordpress.com doesn't allow any monetization there is probably a block on anything outside of basic HTML.
I assumed that they free version would be for testing and getting familiar with the system.

I didn't think you would use it for a real website. For that I would have recommended against it and helped you install your own platform.

billbenson
07-09-2010, 07:01 PM
Some of those types of things are done for security reasons, Frederick. Security is a downside of using a popular program like this. People will be more likely to try to hack it, so they try to prevent that.

Spider
07-09-2010, 09:48 PM
I guess so. Not to worry. Toastmasters is a charity, will not be paying for anything, and as what I'm doing for them is a charitable contribution, the free version serves well. I presume the free version is less complicated than the paid version, so that fits the need, too.

Who knows, maybe I'll go to the self-hosted version later.

Harold Mansfield
07-09-2010, 10:05 PM
I guess so. Not to worry. Toastmasters is a charity, will not be paying for anything, and as what I'm doing for them is a charitable contribution, the free version serves well. I presume the free version is less complicated than the paid version, so that fits the need, too.

Who knows, maybe I'll go to the self-hosted version later.

Just to be clear. Self Hosted Wordpress is also free.You just need your own hosting to run it on. You can get hosting at Go daddy as cheap as $7 a month.

vangogh
07-13-2010, 02:35 AM
You might also be able to host it under your own site for no additional cost. If your host offers add on domains in your account then you set up the Toastmasters site as an add on domain and not pay anything extra. The add on domain gets created as a directory inside the root directory of your main account (probably a folder named public_html or httdocs, where your current site lives). Through your hosting control panel you set up redirection so the Toastmasters domain points to that new directory and you point the nameservers for the domain to the same nameservers as your current site.

Nothing difficult, though a few tricky steps if you're unfamiliar with the above. The end result s you host both sites under the same hosting account at no additional cost. As long as neither site is too demanding of the server there shouldn't be any issues.

Spider
07-13-2010, 08:43 AM
Thank you, guys, for your technological encouragement. Simplicity rules, though, and WP-hosted WP is doing all I need (and probably a lot more than I need) at this time. I can see no advantage in taking on the complexity you propose. I'm sure I could handle it, especially with your guidance, but see no gain in being more advanced in this venture. I can look at self-hosting for the next project.