1. How do I login to my WordPress system?

This is the administraton login screen.

If you do not have access to your login details, please contact Concise Creative at http://www.concisecreative.com.au/contact-us.

Once you have entered your Username and Password you will be logged in to your website’s administration panel, where you can complete a variety of tasks.

2. How do I create a new post?

Posts are the entries that display in reverse chronological order on your home page. In contrast to pages, posts usually have comments fields beneath them and are included in your site’s RSS feed.
To write a post:

1. Log in to your WordPress Administration Panel
2. Click the Posts tab.
3. Click the Add New Sub Tab
4. Start filling in the fileds.
5. As needed, select a category, add tags, and make other selections from the sections below the post. Each of these sections is explained below.
6. When you are ready, click Publish.

The following fields will be avaliable for completion when editing your post:

Title

The title of your post. You can use any words or phrases. Avoid using the same title twice as that will cause problems. You can use commas, apostrophes, quotes, hypens/dashes, and other typical symbols in the post like “My Site – New Post.” WordPress will clean it up for the link to the post, called the post-slug.

Post Editing Area

The blank box where you enter your writing, links, links to images, and any information you want to display on your site. You can use either the Visual or the HTML view to compose your posts.

Preview button

Allows you to view the post before officially publishing it.

Publish box

Contains buttons that control the state of your post. The main states are Published, Pending Review, and Draft. A Published status means the post has been published on your blog for all to see. Pending Review means the draft is waiting for review by an editor prior to publication.

Draft means the post has not been published and remains a draft for you. If you select a specific publish status and click the update post or Publish button, that status is applied to the post. For example, to save a post in the Pending Review status, select Pending Review from the Publish Status drop-down box, and click Save As Pending. (You will see all posts organized by status by going to Posts > Edit).

To schedule a post for publication on a future time or date, click “Edit” in the Publish area next to the words “Publish immediately”. You can also change the publish date to a date in the past to back-date posts. Change the settings to the desired time and date. You must also hit the “Publish” button when you have completed the post to publish at the desired time and date.

Publish box

Visibility – This determines how your post appears to the world. Public posts will be visible by all website visitors once published. Password Protected posts are published to all, but visitors must know the password to view the post content. Private posts are visible only to you (and to other editors or admins within your site)

Permalink

After you save your post, the Permalink below the title shows the potential URL for the post, as long as you have permalinks enabled. (To enable permalinks, go to Settings > Permalinks.) The URL is generated from your title. In previous versions of WordPress, this was referred to as the “page-slug.” The commas, quotes, apostrophes, and other non-HTML favorable characters are changed and a dash is put between each word. If your title is “My Site – New Post”, it will be cleaned up to be “my-site-new-post” as the title. You can manually change this, maybe shortening it to “my-site-new”.

Save

Allows you to save your post as a draft / pending review rather than immediately publishing it. To return to your drafts later, visit Posts – Edit in the menu bar, then select your post from the list.

Publish

Publishes your post on the site. You can edit the time when the post is published by clicking the Edit link above the Publish button and specifying the time you want the post to be published. By default, at the time the post is first auto-saved, that will be the date and time of the post within the database.

Post Tags

Refers to micro-categories for your blog, similar to including index entries for a page. Posts with similar tags are linked together when a user clicks one of the tags. Tags have to be enabled with the right code in your theme for them to appear in your post. Add new tags to the post by typing the tag into the box and clicking “Add”.

Categories

The general topic the post can be classified in. Generally, bloggers have 7-10 categories for their content. Readers can browse specific categories to see all posts in the category. To add a new category, click the +Add New Category link in this section. You can manage your categories by going to Posts > Categories.

Excerpt

A summary or brief teaser of your posts featured on the front page of your site as well as on the category, archives, and search non-single post pages. Note that the Excerpt does not usually appear by default. It only appears in your post if you have changed the index.php template file to display the Excerpt instead of the full Content of a post. If so, WordPress will automatically use the first 55 words of your post as the Excerpt or up until the use of the More Quicktag mark. If you use anExplicit Excerpt, this will be used no matter what.

Send Trackbacks

A way to notify legacy blog systems that you’ve linked to them. If you link other WordPress blogs, they’ll be notified automatically using pingbacks. No other action is necessary. For those blogs that don’t recognize pingbacks, you can send a trackback to the blog by entering the website address(es) in this box, separating each one by a space.

Custom Fields

Custom Fields offer a way to add information to your site. In conjunction with extra code in your template files or plugins,Custom Fields can modify the way a post is displayed. These are primarily used by plugins, but you can manually edit that information in this section.

Discussion

Options to enable interactivity and notification of your posts. This section hosts two check boxes: Allow Comments on this post and Allow trackbacks and pingbacks on this post. If Allowing Comments is unchecked, no one can post comments to this particular post. If Allowing Pings is unchecked, no one can post pingbacks or trackbacks to this particular post.

Password Protect This Post

To password protect a post, click Edit next to Visibility in the Publish area to the top right, then click Password Protected, click Ok, and enter a password. Then click OK. Note – Editor and Admin users can see password protected or private posts in the edit view without knowing the password.

Post Author

A list of all blog authors you can select from to attribute as the post author. This section only shows if you have multiple users with authoring rights in your blog. To view your list of users, see Users tab on the far right.

3. How do I add an image to a page or post?

Images can be a great way to add an extra layer of depth to your page or post. You can use images to show a lifestyle shot, give more precise instructions, give a better view of your products or simply break up and fill out your content.

To add an image to your post, please complete the following steps:

1. Open the edit post page for the post that you would like to attach the image to.
2. Just above the area where you edit the text you should see the words Upload/Insert, with a number of icons next to it. Click on the first icon.
3. A new box will pop up, click on the Select Files button.
4. Navigate to and select the image that you would like to use in the dialog that appears.
5. The image will now upload to the server.
6. Once the image has finished uploading, a page with the details of the image will appear. In the Title field, enter what you would like to have appear when you hover over the image.
7. Navigate to the bottom of the box and click on the Insert into Post button.
8. Your image should now appear in your post.

4. How do I set a post’s featured image?

Setting a featured image can sometimes be necessary, depending on the configuration of the site. This allows for you to add a picture that represents your post. This could be a picture of one of your products or a lifestyle shot reflecting the nature of the content that you are creating.

To set a featured image, please complete the following steps:

1. Open the edit post page for the post that you would like to attach the image to.
2. On the right hand side of the page, there will be a box names Featured Image (you may have to scroll down to see this, as it is usually the last box on the left). Click on the Set Featured Image button.
3. A new box will pop up, select the Select Files button.
4. Navigate to and select the image that you would like to use in the dialog that appears.
5. The image will now upload to the server.
6. Once the image has finished uploading, a page with the details of the image will appear. In the Title field, enter what you would like to have appear when you hover over the image.
7. Navigate to the bottom of the box and click on the Use as featured image button.
8. Click on the Save all changes button and close the window.
9. Your featured image will now be set, you can now continue to edit the page as per usual.

5. How do I manage the comments on my posts?

In WordPress your visitors have the option to leave comments on your site. This feature creates a dynamic interchange between you and your readers.
You can moderate your visitors’ comments via the Comments menu in the WordPress administrator backend.

When a user posts a comment, they will be able to see their own comment and a line telling them that their comment is awaiting moderation. By default, you will receive an e-mail to the administrator’s e-mail account advising you that a comment is waiting to be approved (this e-mail can be turned off) and you can click directly on a link within the email in order to approve the comment.
Once signed in you will be asked for confirmation – click yes and the comment will now be visible to all site visitors. You can also carry out bulk moderation by going to the Comments link.
If you have comments to moderate the tab will show the number of comments waiting. Click it and you’ll see a list of comments awaiting moderation in the queue.
Here you’ll have a set of options for each comment (‘Approve’, ‘Reply’, ‘Quick Edit’, ‘Edit’, ‘Spam’ and ‘Trash’) which you can also access by placing the mouse pointer over each comment. You can also edit comments to remove unsuitable words or information, and you can delete individual comments.

6. What are categories? How do they work?

Each post in WordPress is filed under one or more Categories. This aids in navigation and allows posts and to be grouped with others of similar content.
Each Category may be assigned to a Category Parent so that you may set up a hierarchy within the Category structure. In creating Categories, recognize that each Category Name must be unique. Thus, even if two Categories have two different Parents, they must still have different names.

Links to your Categories are, by default, shown in two different places on your blog (assuming you are using the WordPress Default 1.6 Theme “Kubrik” theme). First, WordPress lists these Category as links in your sidebar. Second, WordPress shows all the Categories to which a given post belongs under that post. When someone viewing your blog clicks on one of these Category links, an archive page with all the posts belonging to that Category, will be displayed.

This SubPanel allows you to create new Categories, edit or delete existing ones, and organize your Categories hierarchically.

Next to the Manage Categories text at the top of this panel is an (add new) link to jump to the bottom of this panel to begin adding new Categories. To the right is a search box where you can enter a word, or series of words, and click the “Search Tags” button to search and display all the Categories meeting your search words.

Table of Categories

This table lists all of your categories by row. Categories are displayed hierarchically and alphabetically; subcategories are displayed beneath their parents and are prefaced by long dashes. These dashed are not part of a category’s name; they are there only to show hierarchy.

At the top of the table is the Delete button. Any Category that has the checkbox set will be deleted when the Delete button is clicked. Deleting a category does not delete the posts in that category. Instead, posts that were only assigned to the deleted category are set to the default Post Category (see Administration > Settings > Writing) . When the Categories are deleted, a splash message will appear at the top of the screen saying “Categories deleted”.

The table of categories contains the following columns:

• [ ] – A checkbox that when clicked (checked), ‘selects’ that particular Category to be deleted when the Delete button is clicked.
• Name – The name of the Category. Remember each Name must be unique. Click on the Category’s Name to edit the Category.
• Description – Categories may have an optional description. By default, the description is shown to viewers when they hover over the category’s link.
• Posts – The number of posts which are members of the category.

7. How do I add a new category?

This part of the SubPanel, which is conveniently linked to from the top of the Table of Categories, allows you to create a new Category. There are four pieces of information associated with each new Category: the name, slug, category parent, and description.

Category Name

To reiterate, the Category Name must be unique.

Category Slug

The Category slug must be unique. The Category Slug is used in the URL. For example, setting a Category Name of “Recipes” and a Category Slug of “food” would show all “Recipes” posts with a URL like example.com/blog/food.

Category Parent

Use this drop-down if you want to make this Category a sub-Category; you will select the sub-Category’s Parent here. For example, you may have a Category called “Photos” but want to add further clarification about the subject of a particular “Photos” post. You could add “Oregon Coast” and “Ice Storm” as sub-Categories to the “Photos” Category; “Photos” would be the Parent of these two new sub-Categories.

Sub-Categories show up on your blog’s page just like Categories, except they will typically be nested under their Parent Categories. When someone visits your site and clicks the “Photos” Category link, all posts in “Photos” and all its sub-Categorieswill be displayed. Clicking the “Oregon Coast” Category link only displays those post in that sub-Category. If you assign a post to a sub-Category (e.g. “Oregon Coast”), you can choose to assign that post to the sub-Category’s parent (“Photos”) or not. Either way, all “Oregon Coast” posts will show up in the “Photos” Category page. The only difference is that the list of Categories of which a particular post is actually a member. In the WordPress Default 1.6 Theme (Kubrick), this list is shown below the text of each post.

Description

Category Descriptions are optional. Some themes take advantage of Category Descriptions, others do not, so having Descriptions may or may not modify the way Categories are displayed for your site. Even if they are not used by your site’s theme, you may still find them useful from an administration point of view.

Add Category

The most important part of the Add New Category box. Once you’ve entered in all the information about your new Category, use this button to save it.

8. How do I edit a category?

This part of the SubPanel only displays when you click on a Categories’ Name in the Table of Categories. It is possible to edit four pieces of information associated with each Category: the name, the slug, the parent, and the description.

Category name

To reiterate, the Category name must be unique.

Category Slug

Again, the Category slug must be unique.

Category Parent

Use this drop-down if you want to make this Category a sub-Category; you will select the sub-Category’s Parent here. For example, you may have a Category called “Photos” but want to add further clarification about the subject of a particular “Photos” post. You could add “Oregon Coast” and “Ice Storm” as sub-Categories to the “Photos” Category; “Photos” would be the parent of these two new sub-Categories.

Description

Category descriptions are optional. Some themes take advantage of Category descriptions, others do not, so having Descriptions may or may not modify the way Categories are displayed for your site.

Edit Category

Once you’ve changed the Category information, use this button to save the changes.

9. How do I manage my website’s gallery?

If you have a gallery installed on your site , you’ll see the following menu at the left of the dashboard:

Click on “Gallery” > “Overview” in the left menu to get an overview:

In this overview you can see how much Images you uploaded, and how many Galleries and Albums you created.

Before we can upload images, we have to create our first gallery.

To add a new gallery go to “Gallery” > “Add Gallery / Images” in the left menu. The following screen will appear:

If you haven’t created a gallery before, then you’re in the right tab (“Add new gallery”). If you allready have created other galleries, then you have to select the “Add new gallery”-tab.

Fill in the name of your new gallery and click the “Add gallery” button.

There are 2 ways to upload images to a gallery. You can upload images from a folder on our computer or you can upload a zip-file with images.

This is the easiest way to upload images:

• Go to “Gallery” > “Add Gallery / Images”
• Select the “Upload images” tab
• Click the “Browse” button
• Select the images on your computer and click the “Open” button
• Choose a gallery and click the “Upload images” button
• This way we can select 1 zip file containing a lot of images. I’m not a fan of this way of working because depending of your server settings the size of the zip file can be very limited.

To upload a zip file:

• Go to “Gallery” > “Add Gallery / Images”.
• Select the “Upload a Zip-file” tab.
• Select a zip file on your computer.
• Choose you gallery or create a new one (“in to”).
• Click the “Start upload” button.

After you created a gallery and uploaded some images into that gallery, it’s time to display the gallery into a page or a post:

• Open an existing page / post, or create a new page / post.
• (Put the cursor on the place where you want to display the gallery).
• Click the “Add NextGEN Gallery” button.
• In the popup screen that appears you select “Gallery” tab, choose a gallery and select how you want to show the gallery.
• Click the “Insert” button.