Stephanie Leary @sleary stephanieleary.com

The WordPress University

New book coming Fall 2014!

Content Strategy for WordPressdemonstrates how to build structured

content for higher ed sites.

Sign up to be notified when it’s out:http://sleary.me/list

Steph’s Stuff• @sleary

• stephanieleary.com

• profiles.wordpress.org/sillybean

• slideshare.net/stephanieleary

Why WordPress? 

Common Situation• No staff

• No budget

• No server

• Thousands of HTML files

• ... and broken links

• No search

• No RSS feeds

Advantages• Easy UI for managing posts and pages

• Scheduled publishing

• Clean URLs

• Feeds for everything

• One-click upgrades

• Widgets and menus

• Thousands of free plugins and themes

Weaknesses• Lacks native reusable content & network-

wide internal linking system 

• Requires caching plugin, not included, to optimize speed

• Critical plugins can fail as WP advances

• Disjointed and incomplete advanced documentation

• Heavy use of pages can be problematic

• Lacks robust native workflow

Compared to other CMSs

• Fast development cycles

• WP 3.0 to 3.1: 8 months

• 5-6 months more typical

• Drupal 6.0 to 7.0: 3 years

• Joomla 1.5 to 1.6: 3 years

• Cohesive, disciplined core developer group

• UI focused on ease of use

Compared to other CMSs

• Core features work very well

• Comments

• RSS and Atom feeds

• Permalinks

• File uploads

• Nonessential features relegated to plugins

WordPress Tour 

Media Uploads• Limited to unpublicized list of MIMEs

• Easy to add or remove MIMEs

• Size/space limited by PHP, site settings

• Grouped into folders by date:

• wp-content/uploads/2012/10/file.jpg

• files/2012/10/file.jpg

oEmbed

• YouTube

• DailyMotion

• Vimeo

• Flickr

• Twitter

• Scribd

Check this out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nTDNLUzjkpg

Hooray!

Basic Roles• Administrator

• Editor

• edits pages, publishes others’ posts

• Author

• publishes their own posts

• Contributor

• submits their own posts to editor

• Subscriber

Posts vs. Pages• Posts

• date-based

• non-hierarchical

• categorized and tagged

• Pages

• hierarchical

Custom Fields, Taxonomies, and

Post Types 

Custom Fields• Adding more information to posts

• Default input vs. custom meta boxes

• Examples: content audit notes

• Custom Meta Boxes class on GitHub

Taxonomies• Extra sets of categories and tags

• tags, people, locations, departments

• People

• Locations

• Departments

Taxonomies• Default taxonomies

• Categories

• Post Tags

• Menus

• Link categories

• Custom examples

• People

• Locations

• Departments

• Colleges

Custom Post Types

• Default post types

• Posts

• Pages

• Attachments

• Revisions

• Menu Items

• Custom examples

• Courses

• Faculty profiles

• Specimen inventory

• Reference catalogue

Post Types• Things that are not

• blog posts, news

• pages, information about your office

• Anything that needs to be catalogued and displayed separately

Course Post Type• Custom fields: arbitrary entry

• professor name

• email

• phone

• course code

• Taxonomies: selecting items from a list

• college

• department

Feeds

Feed Clean URL

Basic /feed/feed/atom

Comments /comments/feed

Category(slug: news)

/category/news/feed

Tag(slug: book)

/tag/book/feed

Multiple Tags(slugs: book, dvd)

/tag/book+dvd/feed

Feed Clean URL

Author(nickname: Joe)

/author/joe/feed

Post Type(slug: course)

/feed/?post_type=course

Taxonomy(genre: mystery)

/genre/mystery/feed

Search Term(wordpress)

/feed/?s=wordpress

5 Minute Installation!

Unless your campus infrastructure sucks.

Basic Installation• Gather database information: name,

username, password

• Unzip files to server

• View in browser

• Fill in values

• Pass Go, collect $200

Network Setup• Decide: subdirectories or subdomains?

• Wildcard DNS is not required if you are not letting people sign up for new sites on their own.

• Users already in the system can be added to the new site.

• http://codex.wordpress.org/Create_A_Network

Domain Mapping• snoopy.wordpress.com ->

snoopycorp.com

• snoopy.webserver-1.school.edu -> snoopy.school.edu

• WordPress MU Domain Mapping

Network Sites

U ofFoo

LiberalArts

Science

Business

Agriculture

Law

Network Domains

U ofFoo

LiberalArts

Science

Business

Agriculture

Law

foo.edu

law.foo.edu

arts.foo.edubusiness.foo.edu

science.foo.edu

ag.foo.edu

Child Themes

ParentTheme

Law Child Theme

Arts Child ThemeBusiness Child Theme

Science Child Theme

Ag Child Theme

Campus Network

Colleges

Clubs

Administration

Blogs

Sports

Break 

Themes 

Basic Theme Setup• styles.css and index.php

• More specific files for each archive type:

• Single post, page, or custom post type

• Category and tag archives; custom taxonomies

• Date-based archives (day, month, year)

• functions.php turns on feature support; works like mini-plugin

• header.php, footer.php, sidebar.php -- basic includes

• comments.php

get_header()

Loopwhile (have_posts()): the_post(); the_title(); the_content(); comments_template();endwhile;

get_sidebar()

get_footer()

The Loop• while (have_posts()) ... endwhile;

• Translation:

• if the invisible query found posts, then for each post, print the following:

• the_title();

• the_content();

• etc.

Have Posts?

• What was requested?

• What was returned?

• How many posts were returned, and how many are displayed on this page?

global $wp_query;var_dump( $wp_query );

How this comes together...

• You click a category link on a post.

• Based on your permalink structure, WordPress knows you are requesting a list of posts in that category. It queries the database.

• It finds 53 posts. Your Reading setting says 20 per page.

• WordPress assembles the first 20 posts' data, plus links to two more pages.

Which template?• Which theme file is used?

• category-slug.php

• category-id.php

• category.php

• archive.php

• index.php

• See Show Template plugin

Advanced ThemesPage templates

Conditional tags

Multiple sidebars

Widget areas

Theme options

Editor styles

Tips:

handling subcategories without tons of files

conditional sidebars

Child Themes/* Theme Name: My Child Theme Description: A child of Parent Theme Version: 1.0 Author: Stephanie Leary  Template: parent */   @import url(../parent/style.css); /* Overrides: */

Other Child Theme Files

• If template is present in child theme, it will be used instead of parent theme’s file

• BOTH functions.php files will be used

get_header()

Loopwhile (have_posts()): the_post(); the_title(); the_content(); comments_template();endwhile;

get_sidebar()

get_footer()

Child theme contains sidebar.php

get_header()

echo do_shortcode('[gallery]');get_sidebar(

)

get_footer()

Child theme contains page templateor loop template part

Theme Frameworks

• A complete theme with many options• Page templates• Specific archives• Many widget areas• SEO features

• custom fields for keywords• title filters• Genesis Google snippet preview

• Can be overridden by child themes  

Building a Theme1.Craft your HTML structure2.Drop in WordPress template tags

• the_title()• the_content()• etc.

3.Move common elements into include templates• Header• Footer• Sidebars• Search form

Building a Theme4.Create widget areas5.Handle comments and comment

forms6.Don't forget 404.php!

Conditional TagsConditional ID Slug Title Array Other

is_single X X X X

is_sticky X

is_page X X

is_page_template Filename

is_category X X X X

in_category X

is_tag X X X

has_tag X X X

is_tax X X X

is_author X Username Nickname X

has_excerpt X

Conditional Tags

is_home is_search is_day is_feed is_404 is_comments_popup

is_front_page is_time is_month is_attachment is_trackback is_active_sidebar

is_archive is_date is_year is_singular is_preview is_admin

comments_open pings_open is_paged in_the_loop

Developing for WordPress

Hooks• Actions: places you can run your own

functions

• wp_head

• wp_footer

• Filters: things that can be altered with your own functions

• the_title

• the_content

Using Hooks

Excerpts for Pagesfunction excerpts_for_pages() {

add_post_type_support( 'page', 'excerpt' );

}

add_action( 'init', 'excerpts_for_pages' );

[rules]function the_rules( $atts ) {

return "These are the rules!";

}

add_shortcode( 'rules', 'the_rules' );

Capital P, dangit!function capital_P_dangit( $text ) {

return str_replace( 'Wordpress', 'WordPress', $text );

}

add_filter( ‘the_content’, ‘capital_P_dangit’);

add_filter( ‘the_title’, ‘capital_P_dangit’);

Admin Bar Linkfunction linkme( $admin_bar ){

$admin_bar->add_menu( array('id' => 'my-item','title' => 'My Item','href' => '#','meta' => array(

'title' => __('My Item'),

),));

add_action( 'admin_bar_menu', ‘linkme', 100 );

Settings API• Register settings

• form action=”options.php”

• update_option(‘foo’, ‘new value’);

• get_option(‘foo’);

Troubleshooting• define('WP_DEBUG', true);

• Debug Bar plugin

• View hooks

• See Nacin on debugging WordPress

Evaluating Themes and Plugins

• Search code for:

• base64()

• eval()

• include(../../wp-config.php)

• include(../../wp-load.php)

• Does it use updated libraries?

• wp_deregister_script( ‘jquery’ )

Evaluating Themes and Plugins

• Are wp_head() and wp_footer() missing?

• Does it insert links you can’t remove?

• Does it pester you for commercial upgrades?

Writing Secure Themes and

Plugins• Use the Settings API

• Check user capabilities

• Check nonces and referrers

• Validate user input

• Escape output

Developer References

• Mark Jaquith’s WordCamp Phoenix presentation

• Professional WordPress Plugin Development

Theme & Plugin Q&A

???

Performance and Security

 

Backing Up• WP DB Backup (single sites, database

only)

• Backup Buddy (network, database and files, $$)

Upgrading• Do it! (But back up first.)

• If the FTP Settings screen appears, add direct file method to your config file. (See Codex page on wp-config.php.)

• Upgrading via Subversion

Caching• WP Super Cache

• W3 Total Cache

• Hyper Cache

• Batcache

Security Precautions

• Make sure WP files are group-writeable, not world

• directories: 644 or 664

• files: 755 or 775

• Set up permalinks and caching, then make .htaccess not writeable

• Change admin username

• Change database table prefix from wp_

• Create a database user other than root

Security Precautions

• Move wp-config.php up one directory

• Limit administrators

• Use Members to create less privileged roles

• Prevent bogus login attempts with Login Lockdown

• Run WP Security Scan and Exploit Scanner

• Monitor filesystem with File Monitor Plus

More With WordPress

 

BuddyPressSocial Network Layer

BuddyPress• Campus wide social network

• Company-wide internal communication tool

• Niche social network for interest topic

BuddyPress Plugins

• Welcome Pack

• Achievements

• BuddyPress Share It

• Group Suggest Widget

• Simple Google Map Plugin

ScholarPressA Learning Management System for

BuddyPress

Content Audit"Now we’re talking real CMS capability!"

The WordPress Community

 

Development Philosophy

• 2.9, 3.0, 3.1, 3.5 are all major releases.

• 3.3.1 is a bugfix and security update.

• Old releases do not get security updates.

• Core developers set feature agenda for major releases based on Trac tickets, known problems, and user surveys.

Development Philosophy

• Development schedule kept on make.wordpress.org/core.

• Meetings once a week in #wordpress-dev.

• If it can be covered by a plugin, let it. Core is for features most people need, or frameworks developers can build on.

• If you want it fixed sooner, patch it yourself.

Documentation• Codex

• Forum

• WP StackExchange

• Trac

• Developers’ blogs

Support• Active user forums on wordpress.org

• Individual plugin & theme developers

• Groups on LinkedIn

• huge Twitter population

• IRC channels

Support• VIP Automattic (core creators) 

• Third party vendors such as MUSupport.net

• Core developers are also consultants

• WP-only hosts

• WP Engine

• Page.ly

• Sucuri.net security specialists

DiscussionIRC channels

• #wordpress

• #wordpress-dev

• #buddypress

• #bbpress

Mailing Lists

• WP-Hackers

• WP-Edu

wp-edu.org

Development blogs

• make/core 

• make/ui 

• make/themes 

• make/accessibility

• make/wppolyglots

News               EventsWordCamps

• San Francisco

• New York

• local: central.wordcamp.org

• WP Candy

• Planet WordPress

• wpMail.me

• wpBeginner

• wpTuts

Making the Case for WordPress

 

LAMP   vs.   IIS 7• mod_rewrite

• .htaccess

• PHP-FPM

• Postfix

• URL Rewrite 1.1

• PHP running as FastCGI

Nginx

Open Source vs. Commercial

Open Source

Low or no initial budget outlay

Premium support options available

Variety of custom development options--------------------------------Shelley launched in 2009 with $2k

Commercial

High startup costs

Enterprise support contracts available

Often contracted to the CMS company for customization

-------------------------------Texas 2yr launching OmniUpdate this year: $52k+

Importing• Many importers other than built-in list

• Writing your own MySQL-based import

• HTML Import

• Merging single installs into networks

Q&A 

Demos?• Network administration• Plugins

• BuddyPress• Content Audit• HTML Import