(Anti) Social Development

Affordable WordPress Websites - Kim Woodbridge

WordPress – Enhance Your Archives by Using Optional Excerpts

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clothing optional (by Mahima Hada)

Earlier this week I discussed the Thumbnails for Excerpts Plugin, which adds thumbnails to the excerpts in all of your archives.

Today I want to discuss an alternative that doesn’t require additional plugins. This is the Excerpts field on your Write > Post page. What? What Excerpts Field? Kim, what are you talking about?

Go to Write > Post and scroll down to the “Advanced Options” section near the bottom. One of the areas is called Excerpts and is just a blank field (that is way too small but that’s another topic). The description says, “Excerpts are optional hand-crafted summaries of your content. You can use them in your template”. Umm … ok. What this means is that whatever you write in this field will replace the default excerpts used by WordPress.

If you use excerpts for your archives, and most templates do, your custom content will appear when you use this field.

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WordPress – How To Create a Delicious Bookmarks Page

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Bookmark (by deadeyebart a.k.a Brett)

Two weeks ago I wrote an article on how to exclude pages from appearing in your header or sidebar navigation bar. So, now that you’ve removed that page what do you do with it?

Vered, from MomGrind, wanted to remove her Legal page from the sidebar. She then added a link to the page in her footer.

I have a number of pages that aren’t in my header navigation. They are pages that I want to include on my site but aren’t important enough to warrant a prominent location. So, where are they? Most of them are on the sidebar under the headings “Bookmarks”, and “Lifestream”.

The list of links that starts at Bookmarks and ends with Tumblr are all links included in my Links or Blogroll section of WordPress. They are divided into segments because I have assigned categories to my Links. I know, I know – categories for links are different than categories for posts and using the same term for both is confusing.

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Stuff This In Your RSS – Blogging Without A Blog – 9/23/08

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stuffed animals (by tifotter)

This week I’ve selected Blogging Without A Blog by Barbara Swafford. She discusses blogging and provides information based on what she’s learned through her own blogging experience. Not only has she created a strong community but she highlights them in her posts and pages. Last Friday she asked what we would be doing if we weren’t blogging and she then integrated our answers into today’s article and linked back to our sites. I was surprised to be listed because I had just visited her site and commented for the first time last week.

Barbara ends each article with questions that make you think about why you are blogging, how in enhances or detracts from your life, and what we can all learn from each other.

And for me, at least, she compels me to open myself up more and tell somewhat personal stories about why I blog and what it has done for me.

In Barbara’s own words her site is about;

“Follow me down the path of blog creation. I’ll share lessons I’ve learned, hints and tips to make blogging easier, and links to great sites that both inspire and teach you more about blogging. “

If you are interested in blogging, want to become part of a supportive community and learn more about yourself, I highly recommend adding this feed to your feed reader.

RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/bloggingwithoutablog/DWWZ

photo credit: tifotter

WordPress – How to Improve the Archives with the Thumbnails for Excerpts Plugin

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archive_w_7295 (by Aureusbay)

In my article, Question for My Readers – What WordPress Tips Would You Like Me to Write About, Vered asked me a question about how to take the list of archives off of the main page. This is not as easy to do as you would think. I gave her a rough answer in the comments but will be writing a series of articles about archives. Interestingly enough, I am working on an archives issue with a client so it was timely that I was asked about it.

Today’s topic is how to make the archives more attractive and user-friendly with the Thumbnails for Excerpts Plugin. I tend to prefer coding rather than plugin solutions but this plugin provides a simple way to enhance your archives. Take a look at my archives here.

I am using excerpts, which is the default on most themes. Excerpts show the first 55 words of the post. Viewing a chronological list of posts that only contain the first 55 words is not a very useful way to review older content. The Thumbnails for Excerpts Plugin does not resolve the chronological issue but does make the archived post more viewable by pulling the first image from the post and creating a thumbnail of the image. You can see the images in my archives with the excerpts.

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(Anti) Social-Lists – 9/21/08

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This week’s (Anti) Social List covers healthcare coverage, blogger hate mail, an enormous list of links WordPress developers, a list of gorgeous icons from deviant art, RSS feeds for job seekers, and a beginner’s tutorial to using WordPress.

  • What US healthcare will look like: Obama vs. McCain – Siel discusses what we know about healthcare coverage under both presidential candidates. We know a lot about McCain’s policies but many of Obama’s are unknown. The article focuses on California but health care is an important issue for all.
  • Hate Mail: Apparently I’m a Bad Mom – Vered shares a piece of hate email she received and how the anonymous emailer accused her of being a bad mother because she doesn’t write about her children on her blog. Ridiculous!
  • WordPress Developer’s Toolbox – Smashing Magazine released the WordPress Developers Toolbox an organized list of development resources for WordPress. I have only started reading the articles but have already discovered SO much useful information.
  • 40+ Beautiful Icon Sets Hand-picked from deviantART- Part 2 – Noupe lists some gorgeous icon sets from deviant art. There is something useful for everyone on this list. Unfortunately, after reading the list, I went to deviant art and spent way too long looking at icons and wallpapers and photos and more.
  • Getting Started with WordPress – Theme Forest has a blog with useful WordPress information. This tutorial is tailored for beginners who need to become familiar with the WordPress interface.
  • 100 Best Feeds for Job Seekers – Are you looking for a job? Do you live in your feed reader? Well, then you’re in luck. Here is a list of 100 RSS feeds for job seekers.

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