In my web development journey, WordPress was my first step. What is WordPress? WordPress is one of the most popular Content Management Systems (CMS). 44% of the internet is built on WordPress. In this tutorial we will cover everything you need to know about WordPress and how to build a wordpress website from scratch. If you’re new to the website development field and you want to know more about how a website works and what front-end and back-end works and more you can read our Website Development: Beginners Guide.
What is WordPress
WordPress is a free and open-source content management system (CMS) primarily used for creating and managing websites and blogs. It is written in PHP and paired with a MySQL or MariaDB database. WordPress page appearance is based on theme. There are a lot of themes and plugins which are free and paid available in the market based on your requirement. What is a Plugin? Plugins are used for expanding the WordPress functionality.
WordPress Themes?
Themes are collections of files that work together to produce a graphical interface with a unified design for a website. Themes control the overall look, feel, and style of a WordPress site, including things like layout, colors, fonts, and other design elements
WordPress Plugins?
The basic WordPress have limited capabilities. That’s why plugins are important. With the help of these plugins, we can extend WordPress capabilities. Plugins are collections of files written in PHP based on specific tasks. Overall, a powerful and flexible way to add new features and functionality to a WordPress site, making it a versatile platform for building websites.
Start Building WordPress
Even if WordPress is free there are some hidden charges for building a website. Like purchasing a domain and hosting plan.
How to Install WordPress in cPanel?
Open your cPanel and navigate to WP Toolkit. WP Toolkit is a latest WordPress Installer. In WP Toolkit click on install.
It will open with installing options. Fill all the options, choose a domain you want to install WordPress on. Give a website title and tagline, you can edit this later. Choose the language of your website, and also choose the WordPress version from the dropdown.
In ‘WordPress Administrator’ section you have to set up WordPress Username & Passwords. We will use these details for login to the WordPress dashboard. Other settings like Database and auto update sections you can choose if needed and then click on “Install”.
WordPress Dashboard
After completing the installation, you can access the WordPress dashboard in your-domain-name.com/wp-admin. Now you can see a login page of WordPress. Use the username and password you created when installing. after login you will redirect to the WordPress dashboard.
In fresh WordPress installation, you can see the following links:
- Posts
- Pages
- Media
- Comments
- Appearance
- Plugins
- Users
- Tools
- Settings
Settings
As a first step you have to configure some settings in the settings tab. In general settings, enter site title, site tagline, and site icon. Other settings you can leave it by default. Next open Reading, here you can set which page should be the front page and blogs page, how many posts should show in one page (pagination) and here you can see “Search Engine Visibility” option, this option should not enable if you want to index your page to google or other search engines. In permalinks settings select how your website URL should appear. These settings should not change after the website is indexed to google search engines. because it will affect SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
Themes WordPress Dashboard
WordPress is a theme based CMS (Content managing Software). Under the Appearance tab you can see the Themes menu, click on that. In this page you will see all the installed themes, you can manage it here. Add a new theme by clicking add Add New Theme Button on top. There are so many themes available online which are free and paid. You can choose the theme based on your needs.
Plugins WordPress Dashboard
Plugins are used for extending WordPress functionality. You can install official WordPress plugins from your WordPress dashboard. In admin links there is a tab called Plugins. Under plugins 3 options are available.
- Installed Plugins
- Add New Plugins
- Plugin Files Editor.
You can manage installed plugins in the Installed Plugins tab, you can add new plugins from the Add New Plugins Tab. If you know more about PHP then you can customize the plugins from the Plugins Files Editor tab.
Create Menu
Menu is very important for user experience. Because when a user visits your website, it’s important to make sure that user can easily navigate through pages. Lets learn how to create a menu in WordPress. Navigate to the menu tab under appearance, here first create a menu, after starting adding links. You can select pages, posts, or categories from left options. Also select the menu position for where you want to show this menu.
Manage WordPress Pages
In WordPress you can create multiple pages. Navigate to the Page tab in the dashboard. All created pages will be here. Create a new page by clicking on the Add New button.
For posts you can add same like how we add pages, hope you find this article useful.
