Professional WordPress: Design and Development

INTRODUCTION xxv

CHAPTER 1: FIRST POST 1

What Is WordPress? 1

Content and Conversation 5

Getting Started 7

Finishing Up 16

CHAPTER 2: FUNCTIONAL OVERVIEW 19

The Dashboard 19

Creating and Managing Content 22

Categorizing Your Content 26

Working with Media 28

Comments and Discussion 31

Working with Users 33

Extending WordPress 35

Content Tools 39

Configuring WordPress 41

CHAPTER 3: CODE OVERVIEW 49

Downloading 49

Exploring the Code 50

Configuring Key Files 51

WP-Content User Playground 61

CHAPTER 4: TOUR OF THE CORE 65

What’s in the Core? 65

Using the Core as a Reference 66

WordPress Codex and Resources 72

Don’t Hack Core! 76

CHAPTER 5: THE LOOP 79

Understanding the Loop 80

Putting the Loop in Context 81

Flow of the Loop 81

Template Tags 84

Customizing the Loop 86

Global Variables 95

Working Outside the Loop 98

CHAPTER 6: DATA MANAGEMENT 103

Database Schema 103

Table Details 105

Direct Database Manipulation 111

WordPress Taxonomy 114

Building Your Own Taxonomies 116

CHAPTER 7: PLUGIN DEVELOPMENT 121

Plugin Packaging 121

Know Your Hooks: Actions and Filters 127

Plugin Settings 132

WordPress Integration 143

Plugin Security 157

Creating a Plugin Example 160

Publish to the Plugin Directory 175

CHAPTER 8: THEME DEVELOPMENT 183

Why Use a Theme? 183

Installing a Theme 184

What Is a Theme? 185

Creating Your Own Theme 187

Creating Your Own Theme: Getting Started 189

Creating Your Own Theme: DRY 193

Creating Your Own Theme: Content Display 197

Creating Your Own Theme: Additional Files 208

Custom Page Templates 216

Theme Hierarchy and Child Themes 219

Premium Themes and Other Theme Frameworks 224

CHAPTER 9: CONTENT AGGREGATION 229

What is a Lifestream? 229

Getting Noticed 230

Social Media Buttons 231

Simple Social Networking Badges 232

Collecting External Content 233

Pushing Content from WordPress to Other Sites 240

Advertising 242

Privacy and History 247

CHAPTER 10: CRAFTING A USER EXPERIENCE 249

User Experience Principles 249

Usability and Usability Testing 256

Structuring Your Information 257

Getting Your Site Found 259

How Web Standards Get Your Data Discovered 264

Searching Your Own Site 269

Mobile Access 271

CHAPTER 11: STATISTICS, SCALABILITY, SECURITY, AND SPAM 273

Statistics Counters 273

Cache Management 278

Load Balancing Your WordPress Site 284

Dealing With Spam 286

Securing Your WordPress Site 288

Using WordPress Roles 294

CHAPTER 12: WORDPRESS AS A CONTENT MANAGEMENT SYSTEM 299

Defining Content Management 299

Workflow and Delegation 301

Content Organization 303

Interactivity Features 312

Other Content Management Systems 313

CHAPTER 13: WORDPRESS IN THE ENTERPRISE 317

Is WordPress Right for Your Enterprise? 317

When WordPress Isn’t Right for You 319

Scalability 319

Integration with Enterprise Identity Management 324

Content Integration via Feeds 326

CHAPTER 14: MIGRATING TO WORDPRESS 329

Planning a Migration 330

Content Identification 332

Media Migration 344

Moving Metadata 345

Moving Authors and Users 345

Theme and Presentation 346

Unique Functionality 346

Cleaning Up 346

Launching 349

CHAPTER 15: WORDPRESS DEVELOPER COMMUNITY 351

Contributing to WordPress 351

Sister Projects 357

Resources 358

INDEX 365