Interview with Stefan Esser

I think the WordPress software is the best blogging software around from an end user’s perspective. Its GUI is full of eye-candy and features that are not present in other blog software. But wearing my security hat, I see past this eye-candy onto the code and see several bad design decisions.

Esser, Stefan. Blog Security (2007). Articles>Content Management>Security>WordPress

Introducing WordPress

In this lesson, you learn the basics of WordPress, different ways you can run WordPress, and ways to create your account on WordPress.com.

Tomasi, Chuck and Kreg Steppe. InformIT (2010). Articles>Content Management>Blogging>WordPress

Open Source and Usability: Joomla vs. WordPress

If Joomla! is Linux, then WordPress is Mac OS X. WordPress might offer only 90% of the features of Joomla!, but in most cases WordPress is both easier to use and faster to get up and running.

Playing With Wire (2009). Articles>Content Management>Open Source>WordPress

Technology vs. Content, or Why Teaching WordPress Is Frustrating

Over the past several years, I’ve trained a lot of people on WordPress, through individual one-on-one training, seminars, workshops, and conference events. Most of the people who want to learn WordPress have plans for blogging. They think blogging requires you to understand the technology before they can jump in. But the technology is easy — learning how to navigate and publish content with WordPress is a no-brainer. The hard part is creating regular, interesting content. I’m not sure how to teach content creation.

Johnson, Tom H. I'd Rather Be Writing (2010). Articles>Content Management>Education>WordPress

Ten Reasons Why I Like WordPress

When choosing a blog platform, you have a variety of options: Drupal, Movable Type, Typepad, Blogger, Joomla, Expression Engine, WordPress.com, self-hosted WordPress, and others. But when you start researching the options, WordPress seems to have at least 10 main strengths over its competitors.

Johnson, Tom H. I'd Rather Be Writing (2009). Articles>Content Management>Blogging>WordPress

Tutorial: Turning WordPress into a CMS using WPML

WordPress is fairly simple to set up as a CMS ‘out of the box’, but where it needs a lot of customization is for setting up ‘smart’ navigation and being able to serve up pages or posts in multiple languages.

Life @ iStudio (2009). Articles>Content Management>Software>WordPress

What Would a WordPress Template for Chapter Sites Look Like?

I think the idea of providing a site template from WordPress is ingenious. It made me think about exactly what a chapter WordPress template would look like. I wish I could say our Intermountain-STC site is a perfect example, but it’s not (not yet anyway). I spent a good chunk of time this weekend tweaking a few things. Here are several elements that I think a chapter WordPress template would have.

Johnson, Tom H. I'd Rather Be Writing (2010). Articles>Content Management>Organizational Communication>WordPress

WordPress as a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde Application

I'm amazed at how easily people can make sites look both professional and functional in a short period of time using WordPress. Clyde Parson, the STC-Suncoast chapter in Tampa, just redid the Suncoast STC with a new WordPress theme. It looks pretty cool.

Johnson, Tom H. I'd Rather Be Writing (2008). Articles>Content Management>Blogging>WordPress

WordPress Usability Testing Report  

Very interesting usability study of one of the most popular blog authoring tools. Provides detailed description of the usability testing method and results, including the use of eye-tracking. Provides a wealth of ideas for those designers who develop publishing platforms.

Ball State University (2008). Articles>Content Management>Usability>WordPress

WordPress’ Biggest Mistake

For a company that recently secured $29 million in funding, has grown from nonexistence to worldwide popularity in just four years, and which has the reputation of being the platform for serious bloggers, it’s kind of bold for me to call attention to its biggest mistake in a post. But I’m convinced that it’s a huge miscalculation on the part of Automattic (the company that leads WordPress). The Automattic team, led by Matt Mullenweg, has about 25 engineers and …. not one technical writer.

Johnson, Tom H. I'd Rather Be Writing (2008). Articles>Writing>Technical Writing>WordPress

Install WordPress, Just Not at the Root

I run several class blogs as subdomains on ryanhoover.net (2325.ryanhoover.net, 13o2.ryanhoover.net, etc.). Before this solution, I’ve been installing each class blog as its own instance of WordPress. Of course, with the near-daily updates to WordPress, I’ve been updating 8+ blogs routinely. A network installation would make my life so much easier. But here’s the kicker. I don’t want the root page at ryanhoover.net to be a WordPress blog. I’ve got a fun little setup there that I don’t want to lose. Plus, I use that page as a playground for new html tricks I want to try.

Hoover, Ryan S. Power of Persusasion, The (2011). Articles>Content Management>Software>WordPress