What exactly is a Blog?
Blogging is an awful term I find, and it really doesn’t explain very well what it actually is and how useful it can be to oneself. Let me see if I can explain this. The word blog is short for weblog and has started as an online journal many years ago. All you could do was write up a diary entries and share them with the world. Many people still do it just for that, but of course you can share any writing / picture / video combination nowadays. What made blogging popular was the addition of a comment field at the bottom, so other people could...
read moreHow to use the image widget on the Blogum Theme
So you have the Blogum Theme and you want to use the image widget. Here’s how to do that: Once you’ve dragged the image widget to your sidebar you’ll see an empty dialogue like this: I know what you’re going to say: too many options, and what on earth do they all mean. Let’s go through them one by one. Widget Title is the heading above this image that will be displayed. You can leave it blank if you like. The next space “Image URL” is the important one – that’s the direct link to your...
read moreHow to offer Social Media Sharing Options
There are several bookmarking plugins you can try – it’s personal preference really. My favourite is Sexy Bookmarks which can present sharing options at the top or bottom of ever post and page. You can select which sharing options you’d like to display, and of course it’s free 😉 Another one is Add This and yet another one is Share This. They all work basically the same way, they just have a different look and feel to them. Some themes (like the WooThemes) have this option built in so there’s no need to use a...
read moreWordPress.com vs WordPress.org self-hosted
WordPress is my life and my passion – I wouldn’t know what to do without it. I often recommend it, I often install it and I teach people about it. One of the question I often get asked by beginners is “what’s the difference between WordPress.com and this self hosted thing”? Let me explain. WordPress.com is a free for all hosted service with a good choice of Layouts (called Themes) and Plugins (those are sidebar widgets and little programmes to add functionality to your blog). You get 5GB of web space and don’t have to worry about finding a...
read moreWhich blogging platform should you go with?
There are so many content management systems (or blogging platforms) on the market, many of them offer a free service. Some of them that spring to mind are these: Blogger (by Google) WordPress Live Spaces (by Microsoft, now defunct) Movable Type Type Pad Joomla Drupal The choice is endless and the list could go on – but only two are serious candidates, at least for me. This comes down to personal preference and I encourage you to try them all… but who has the time to do that? Let me explain some of the differences. WordPress Before we begin:...
read moreHow to create a Screen Grab
It depends on your operating system: Mac OS X Press Command + Shift + 4, then draw a window of what you’d like to capture. Your screenshot will be saved on your desktop. Windows 7 On Windows 7 there’s something called the Snipping Tool – I think you find it under Accessories. Easiest way is to search for it (via the Start Menu). I believe this also works on Windows Vista. Windows XP On XP and previous versions the Snipping Tool is not available. You’ll have to buy one to make it happen – Snagit is such a tool,...
read moreThank you for the good job
Hi Jay, I forgot to thank you for clear and kind answer to my question. It’s been really helpful and I believe countless people must have gotten so much help from you. Again thank you for the good job and wish you all the best Sean
read moreHello world!
This site isn’t quite ready yet. I’m working on it though, so please come back soon. This will be the place where you can sign up for the best WordPress Hosting there is this side of the Atlantic. In the meantime, why don’t you check out my UK site called The WP Guru (that’s me) for plenty of tips around WordPress, Plesk and Linux – and a bit of Theme Tweakage. See you there 😉
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