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Mega Collection of The Best Free Social Media Icons for Bloggers and Designers

Editorial Staff — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 14:53:26 +0000

Social Media Integration is becoming a must have feature for every website and blog. It is crucial for a website’s success that this feature is not overlooked. One of the ways to get user’s attention is having nice social media icons because they are attention grabbing and easily recognizable. In this showcase we are presenting to you a mega collection of beautiful Social Media Icons that you cannot resist adding to your collection.

Note: Please respect author’s Terms of Service when using these icons because if it weren’t for them, we would not have this amazing collection.

1. Vector Social Media Icons

2. Handy Icons

3. Cute Tweeters Icon Set

4. Web 2.0rigami

5. Extended Set of Social Icons

6. Social Media Mini Icon Pack

7. Social Icons Hand Drawn

8. The Leaves Fall

9. Web 2 Badges

10. Hand Drawn Doodle Icon Set

11. The Dellifeed Icon Set

12. The Polaroid Icon Set

13. Page Peel – Free Social Media Icon Set

14. Cheers – Free Social Media Icon Set

15. Social Post Stamps

16. FreeHand Color Stroked

17. Function Free Social Media Icon Bonus Pack

18. Sweet and Unique Twitter Badges and Buttons

19. Handycons

20. Social Media Icons Made of Wood

21. Socialize Icons

22. Circular Social Media Icons

23. Heart My Website Icons

24. Social Bookmark Iconset

24. Set of Social Icons No. 2

25. Web Social Icons

26. Loon Social Icons

27. Handycons 2

28. Social Glow Icon Set

29. Social Glow Icon Set

30. Cafe Icon Set

31. 53 Brand New Twitter Icons

32. Wood Social Networking Icons

33. Sketchy Social Bookmarking Icons

34. Pixel Perfect Social Media Icons

35. Glossy Social Media Icons

36. SocioLego Icons

37. Experimental Social Icons

38. Rivet Social Icon Set

39. Free Twitter Bird Icon Set

40. It’s Twitter Time Icon Set

41. Nurture Icon Set

42. Plechi’s Social Media Icon Set

43. Stitch Styled Social Media Icons Set

44. 3D Social Media Icons Set

45. Birdies Icon Set

46. Birdies Icon Set

47. Sleek Tabbed Social Icons

48. PC Social Media Icons

49. Panda Social Media Icons

50. Panda Social Media Icons

51. Stickynote Social Media Icons

52. Curly Vector Social Icons

53. Jeans Social Media Icons

54. Black and White Social Media Icons

55. Social Network Icon Pack – KomodoMedia

Mega Collection of The Best Free Social Media Icons for Bloggers and Designers is a post from: WPBeginner which is not allowed to be copied on other sites.

Best WordPress Tutorials of 2009

Editorial Staff — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 16:39:08 +0000

2009 has been a great year. It was the year this site was formed, it is the very same year that WordPress 2.9 was launched. During the year, many helpful articles were written on this site. In this article we will be highlighting Best of Best WordPress Tutorials of 2009.

Pre-WordPress

The articles in this category are for those users who have not yet started with WordPress. The resources below will be a great help in terms of getting started.

Why use WordPress – This article will highlight some of the best features of WordPress.

Tips and Tools to Pick the Best Domain for Your Blog – When starting up, this article will be a good resource for beginners in terms of finding the right domain for their site.

Choosing the Best Web Host for Your Blog – This article lists few good WordPress web hosts as well as tell you what you need to look in a web host.

How to Install WordPress on Your Site – A simple tutorial that will guide you through the installation process.

Selecting a Perfect Theme for WordPress – A guide on how to pick the perfect theme.

Recommended Plugins for WordPress – Few recommended plugins that will enhance your WordPress experience.

Publishing Your Blog to the World – Once you have setup your blog, how will you get it out to the world.

15 Unconventional Uses of WordPress in Action – WordPress is not just a Blog. You can use it in many other ways as well.

WordPress Beginners

These articles are for new users who just started using WordPress.

How to Add a New Post and Utilize all features – This article will show you how to write a post, and some features that might be helpful.

How to Add Categories and Subcategories to WordPress – Another Admin Panel tutorial showing how to add categories and subcategories.

21 Most Useful Time Saving WordPress Shortcuts – Essential shortcuts that you must know in order to speed up your blogging process.

How to Remove Visual Editor mode in WordPress – This tutorial will show you how you can get rid of the visual editor mode in WordPress.

How to rename the Uncategorized Category – Every post that you write and did not associated a category with, goes in Uncategorized category, but you can change it to something more user friendly like “Other”.

How to Schedule your Posts in WordPress – Are you going away for a vacation? Pre-write your articles and use this feature to schedule them, so they can auto publish.

Ultimate Guide to Upgrade WordPress [Infograph] – Upgrading WordPress is essential for site security.

12 Vital Tips to Combat Comment Spam in WordPress – Use these tips and tools to your advantage and reduce SPAM.

How to Make a WordPress Database Backup – Keep backups to your site for security reasons.

18 Useful Tricks to Speed Up WordPress and Boost Site Performance – Simple things that you can do with your site that will increase site performance.

WordPress World Map – Since you have started using WordPress, you are now part of the community. Tag yourself.

13 Vital Tips and Hacks to Protect WordPress Admin Area

New Theme Designers

WordPress Theme Cheat Sheet for Beginners – Must know before you take any further steps into WordPress Theme development.

Installing WordPress on a Local Server – Testing online can be tedious sometimes because a lot of time is wasted in uploading. Installing a local server is fast, easy, and does not require internet connection.

Moving a WordPress Installation from a Local server to a Live Site – Once development is over, you may transfer the site from a local server to a live site.

Create a Custom Page in WordPress – One of the most essential tutorial for your theme developing process.

Create a Custom Homepage in WordPress – One of the most desired tutorial by new theme designers.

How to Create an Archives page in WordPress – Few useful snippets for your Archives Page.

10 Most Wanted Category Hacks and Plugins

15 Killer Hacks for WordPress that are Extremely Useful

Social Media Cheat Sheet for WordPress – Embedding Social Media is becoming almost a necessity in themes. Using these will save you from using plugins.

How to Add a Favicon to Your WordPress – Favicons are the identity of a website. If you are designing a theme for your own site, we suggest that you give your site a unique identity with a favicon.

Display Feedburner Subscriber Count as Text – When it comes to styling, feedburner chicklets are not the most fancy ones. Therefore this tutorial will show you how you can display the count as text and then style it to match your theme.

How to Exclude Pages from the Navigation Menu

How to Add a Custom Author Profile Page

How to Display Any Number of Posts in a WordPress Loop

WordPress Showcases

We made several showcases throughout the year which are worth looking.

14 Truly Artistic WordPress Header Designs

23 Eco Friendly Sites that are Using WordPress

Best Practices of Contact Form-Page Designs

Best of Best WordPress 404 Error Page Designs

Best of Best WordPress Custom Login Page Designs

Top Notch WordPress Footer Designs

Top 10 Must Have iPhone Apps for Bloggers

Miscellaneous Tutorials

21 Great Plugins to Manage Multi-Author WordPress Blogs Efficiently – Very useful list of plugins if you are running a blog with multiple authors.

15 Plugins to Unleash the Power of jQuery and WordPress

Excellent Tutorials to Utilize the Power of WordPress and Facebook

Must See SEO Guide for WordPress Bloggers – In order to increase your search engine traffic, you must check out this article.

Create a Free Email Newsletter Service Using WordPress

If you recently joined us, these are some of the most important articles this blog published this year, and you should check it out.

Best WordPress Tutorials of 2009 is a post from: WPBeginner which is not allowed to be copied on other sites.

Best Practices of Contact Form-Page Designs in WordPress

Editorial Staff — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 21:06:49 +0000

One of the things that many bloggers shy away from is giving their users an ability to contact the author. The reason why contact pages are important is because users can be very helpful in terms of getting feedback, new ideas, and suggestions. Also contact forms provide a way for your potential advertisers and clients to reach you therefore everyone should have a contact form or page. In this article we will be showcasing the collection of some of the best contact forms and pages implemented within WordPress as well as showing you how you can create your own contact form in WordPress.

Best Practices and Trends of Contact Forms in WordPress

Each designer has their own approach to their design. In here we will be highlighting some of the popular trends that you can follow, and some very unique contact pages for your inspiration. These forms and pages are well aligned, and most of all well incorporated within the site. If you know of a contact page design or a trend that is not in this list, then feel free to share it in the comments.

Maps and Address

Maps and Address trend is something that is getting very popular. Most businesses list their physical address on their contact page, but these designers have done an outstanding job in embedding the contact form and their address.

Hand-Drawn / Realistic Touch

Having a retro / sketch look in the design is not something new, but it is getting more and more popular. These contact forms follow this trend and they do a great job in it.

When words like hand-drawn and creativity comes up, Carsonified always seem to be there. This contact page design on their site is one of a kind design that is very unique and a true representation of creativity at work.

Notepad style designs are very common but Bert Timmermans did a stunning job on the contact form. It is one of the most complete and creative contact page that list the social media networks, website, other personal information as well as a well-aligned contact form all put together in the best possible way it could’ve been.

One of a unique design real life type design that got our attention was by Rustin Jessen. This fill in the blank type contact form is a great idea and not very hard to implement.

The following two designs shows a retro post card style in their contact form. This trend gives their contact form a real life touch.

Simple yet Elegant

You don’t really have to go out of your comfort zone to get a super creative contact page design. Some of us just are not the artist type. You can still make simple yet elegant contact forms like the ones below.

Well incorporated within the Design

Sometimes you are limited with what you can do with the contact form because of your design. In that case you need to be creative and try to find a work around, so you can have a good contact form that is well incorporated within the design.

How to Create a Contact Page in WordPress

One of the things that we have noticed is that a lot of WordPress bloggers do not have a contact form on their website because they do not know how to implement one using WordPress. Some users rely on a third party program to create a contact form outside their blog and then have that. But it does not have to be that way. There are plenty of great plugins available that lets you create your own contact form in WordPress. These plugins have SPAM protection built-in such as Captcha images, security questions and others.

There are many plugins that are available for you to create a contact form in WordPress. The plugins we recommend are:

You can download either one of these plugins and activate them. Each plugin has their own set of directions to follow, but they are all very easy to implement. If you need help implementing or configuring one of these plugins, you can contact us for help. You would have to start by creating a new page. If you want to create a custom page and follow one of the trends mentioned in this post, then you would have to look into creating a custom page in WordPress. But by simply having a contact form is enough if you want to keep things simple.

If you have any advices that you would like to share, or a great contact form that we might have missed then please feel free to post it in the comments.

Best Practices of Contact Form-Page Designs in WordPress is a post from: WPBeginner which is not allowed to be copied on other sites.

Best of Best WordPress Custom Login Page Designs

Editorial Staff — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 22:32:37 +0000

There are so many things that you can customize in WordPress, but one of the things that does not get a lot of attention is custom login page designs. WordPress is being used as a membership site, or site where user registration is allowed. In those cases it is wise for businesses to brand the login page with their logo and other aspects to give it a unique touch that it deserves. In this article we will be showing you how you can create a custom login page design in WordPress as well as showcasing some of the best WordPress login page designs.

How to Create a Custom Login Page in WordPress

Download and install the plugin called Custom Admin Branding.

Browse the following directory to download Admin panel PSD template to guide you while designing :

/wp-content/plugins/custom-admin-branding/psd_image_templates/

Then upload your images in this folder or simply replace the current ones. Remember to make your header and footer images in the .png format while your other login images should be in .jpg format:

/wp-content/plugins/custom-admin-branding/images/

Once uploaded you are done.

Another plugin that does the same job is called BM Custom Login

For those users who are looking to avoid using the plugin then try this method shared by Michael from Problogdesign which is also a great substitute.

Showcase

We used BM Custom Login Group on Flickr as our source. If you create a custom login page using this method, then make sure that you upload your screenshot in that group.

Best of Best WordPress Custom Login Page Designs is a post from: WPBeginner which is not allowed to be copied on other sites.

Top 10 Must Have iPhone Apps for Bloggers

Editorial Staff — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 20:17:34 +0000

The web is going mobile and it is going faster than anyone can think. Majority of the bloggers are now using their iPhone or similar style phones to jot down ideas, write entire posts, stay connected and so much more. In this showcase we will be highlighting some of the most essential iPhone Apps for bloggers.

1. WordPress for iPhone

Introducing the only iPhone app that lets you write posts, upload photos, edit pages, and manage comments on your blog from your iPhone or iPod Touch. With support for both WordPress.com and self-hosted WordPress (2.7 or higher), users of all experience levels can get going in seconds.

2. Shape Writer

Store notes and send email using ShapeWriter on your iPhone. ShapeWriter is a revolutionary text input technology that enables you to enter text into the iPhone by tracing word shapes rather than typing letters. Each shape traced on the soft keyboard with your finger is recognized as a word. Error correction is fast and easy. For rare names and acronyms, type only once and you will be able to shape write the next time. Shape writing is many times more efficient than letter-based handwriting recognition.

3. Twitterrific

A fun application that lets you read and publish posts (called “tweets”) on the Twitter social network. Stay connected with friends, family, and co-workers through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing?

4. EverNote

Evernote helps you remember everything from your real and digital life using whatever device or platform you find most convenient.

Evernote for iPhone is part of the Evernote service. With it, you can take notes, snap photos, create to-do lists. and record audio. Everything is seamlessly synchronized with the web, and made available across all the devices and platforms you use, including iPhone, Evernote for Mac, Evernote Web, and Evernote for Windows.
Snap photos of any thing from whiteboards to business cards to wine labels, and Evemote will make the text within those images searchable.

Need something from last week or last year? Evernote instantly connects to the Evernote web service so you can get what you need. Find what you’re looking for by searching or filtering by tag, date, location. and more.

5. Jott for iPhone

Jott is a voice-to-text transcription service. Instead of typing out your long emails using iPhone’s keyboard, with Jott all you have to do is start speaking into the recording interface, and it’ll show up in your Jott notes. You can then forward the Jott e-mail to whomever you want. This is a real time saver.

6. Byline

Simply use your free Google Reader account to subscribe to websites you’d like to keep track of. Byline will automatically bring you new content, putting thousands of RSS and Atom feeds at your fingertips. When you read an item, it stays read. The same goes for the items you star: Byline will let Google Reader know the next time you have an internet connection. Even when you have no internet connection, Byline’s offline browsing feature gives you instant access to complete web pages. Perfect for flights, subway journeys, and (if you’re an iPod Touch owner) those long dry spells between Wi-Fi zones. Byline will cache the web pages linked to by your notes, starred items, and (optionally) new items. This allows you to save any news item you read and any website you visit for offline browsing.

7. Omnifocus

OmniFocus for the iPhone brings task management to your fingertips.

Keep track of actions by project, place, person, or date.
Bring up a shopping list, agenda items to discuss at work, tasks for home, and any other lists you need.
Using your location, OmniFocus can create a custom list of actions to complete nearby.
Buying groceries? OmniFocus can show you the closest grocery store and create an instant shopping list.

8. Fring for iPhone

The best IM/messaging client that combines Google Talk, AIM, Skype, MSN, Yahoo, ICQ, Twitter, plus VoIP calls over Wi-Fi in one lightweight app. So now you can tweet, call your clients over skype, chat on your favorite IM tool and get your work down when you are outside with your iphone.

9. Pixel Pipe

PixelPipe is a free and most complete photo sharing app that lets users easily send and geotag their photos to any of 50 supported sites including Twitter, Flickr, YouTube, Seesmic, Facebook, FriendFeed, Tumblr, WordPress, and others.

10. Air Sharing

Mount your iPhone or iPod touch as a wireless drive on any Mac, Windows, or Linux computer, so you can Drag-drop files between your iPhone or iPod touch and your computers. This app is very handy especially if you do not have your cord.

If you are an iPhone user, which app do you use? Share them with other bloggers if you think your apps are useful.

Top 10 Must Have iPhone Apps for Bloggers is a post from: WPBeginner which is not allowed to be copied on other sites.

23 Eco Friendly Sites that are Using WordPress

Editorial Staff — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 23:12:52 +0000

In this showcase, we feature 18 23 Eco Friendly sites that are using WordPress. It is an odd showcase as you might think, but the idea is to raise awareness and get more people to be eco-friendly. Here at WPBeginner, we support Eco-Friendly companies that is why we use Host Gator’s Green Reseller Hosting. We are doing our part of the share, are you doing yours? Check out these blogs and see how you can live an eco-friendly life.

1. Ecofabulous

2. Ecoki

3. Inhabitat

4. Ecoki

5. Inhabitots

6. GOOD.is

7. Real Climate

8. EcoWorld

9. Eartheasy

10. Worsted Witch

11. Lighter Footstep

12. Ecouterre

13. Green Blog

14. Green Girls Global

15. Fabulously Green

16. Environmental Graffiti

17. Green Options

18. Modern Eco Homes

19. TreeHugger

Note: #19 Treehugger is not powered by WordPress, but we believe that it is best to give treehugger an honorary mention because of the credibility and authority they have earned in the industry.

From User’s Suggestion

These are the blogs that users suggested in the comments, via contact form, or in social media networks.

20. Biofriendly Blog

21. Living Rainforest

22. Earth First

23. 1800 Recycling

Do you know any Eco-Friendly site that is powered by WordPress? If so feel free to suggest it in the comments.

23 Eco Friendly Sites that are Using WordPress is a post from: WPBeginner which is not allowed to be copied on other sites.

Top Notch WordPress Footer Designs (Best Practices & Tips)

Editorial Staff — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 05:01:01 +0000

Most footer designs are boring and the reason behind it is because Footer designs are often ignored. Users do not realize that footer designs are just as important as the rest of the design. Footers are more than just a place to put copyright information. There are endless benefits of allocating your footer space, and it can be used for your advantage. In this article we will display a collection of top notch WordPress footer designs and share why some of these designs qualify to be in our list. We will also share some tips and snippets that you can use to improve your footer design and use it to your advantage.

Collection of Best WordPress Footer Designs

Below is the list of the best WordPress footer designs that we found across the web. We probably have missed a lot others. If you know a footer design on a WordPress powered site that you think will be worthy to be mentioned at WPBeginner please share it with us in the comments.

1. David Hellmann

2. I primi dieci

3. Boagworld

4. Productive Dreams

5. Torrance Web Design

6. Carsonified

7. Ritchie Linao

8. John Cow

9. Branded07

10. Bcandullo

11. Wire Roses

12. Problogger

13. Jonas Hellwig

14. GoMediaZine

15. Mr. Diggles

16. CSS-Tricks

17. Starseite

18. Blog me tender

19. Colorburned

20. Iemai

What to add on a footer design?

As you can see in the showcase above, your possibilities are limited by your imagination. Some of the features site displayed in our showcase have:

Contact form
Author’s Biography
Author’s sites
Resources
Search Area
Tag cloud
Archives
Recent Posts
Sponsors
RSS Subscribe Reminder
Social Media Profiles
Calendar
Reader showcase
Featured/Popular posts

Now these should be not the limit to your footer. You do not need to have all of these elements in your footer. Although it would be a test of your creativity if you can put them all in and make it look good.

One thing you should keep in mind when reorganizing your footer is that you want to make it look good and clean. The more organized your footer is, the better it is to go through by your users. You can go to great deal of customizations for your footer design in WordPress, as far as making your entire footer widget-compatible.

Below we will provide you with snippets or other options that you can use to add all the features that we listed from the top notch WordPress Footer Designs. Note: That most of these jobs will require knowledge of HTML and CSS. If you don’t have that knowledge this is the end of post for you.

Contact Form

Adding a contact form is possible with the cforms plugin. Simply download/activate the plugin and modify the settings to your need. Once you have the settings set up, you will need to paste the code provided by the plugin in your footer.php. Make sure to style it and make it fit with your design.

Author’s Biography

You can simply edit footer.php and add the text in the codes, or you can actually use the author’s description feature from WordPress and display your author biography. This will only work if it is a one man blog. When editing your profile under the Users Tab in WordPress admin area, you have a field that says Biography. You can write the text there and instead of typing the text out in the .php file just add this snippet:

Replace the number 1 with the user id.

External Links

This will include resources, social media profiles, or author links. You can either insert the links manually in your footer.php and add and remove the link each time by modifying your php file, or you can simply use the links category feature in WordPress and modify links via admin panel. First you need to create a blogroll category named resources, and add all resource links there. The name of the category does not really matter, but be sure to add only the links you want to be placed in the footer there.

Add the following code where you want to place it:

Simply change the category id to specific category where your social media links, resource links, or other external links are.

Read our article about organizing blogroll links for details.

Display Recent Posts

’, ‘’); ?>

For further details check out our tutorial.

Do you think you have a footer design that is worth showing, then share it with us in the comments. Remember that it must be powered by WordPress.

Top Notch WordPress Footer Designs (Best Practices & Tips) is a post from: WPBeginner which is not allowed to be copied on other sites.

Best of Best WordPress 404 Error Page Designs

Editorial Staff — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 18:00:09 +0000

Every single user on the web has landed on at least one 404 page in their entire user surfing experience. The truth is that the number that users land on 404 pages is significantly higher than just one. Often when a user arrive on a 404 page, they end up leaving your site thus increasing your bounce rate. High bounce rate can negatively impact your website by decreasing your revenue from advertisers and more. You can reduce the bounce rate and increase pageviews by simply optimizing your 404 Error Page. In this article, we will highlight best of best WordPress 404 Error Page Designs, and we will give you our insights on creating a beautiful and highly usable 404 page design for your WordPress.

Showcase for Inspiration

Before we show you how you can design your own 404 page design for WordPress, we will highlight some of the best 404 Error Page Designs being used on WordPress for your inspiration. The criteria we used to pick these designs were creativity and usability. Some designs have both, and some only have one aspect.

1. WPBeginner

2. Catalyst Studios

3. Jamie Huskisson

4. 45royale Inc.

5. Carsonified

6. CSS Tricks

7. Techkultura

8. Inspiration Bit

9. Catswhocode

10. Ba.pe

11. Cut and Taste

12. CSS Remix

13. Ateaseweb

14. Koller Media

15. Expansion Broadcast

16. Function

17. Retard Zone

18. Kidmondo

19. Devlounge

20. Chris Jennings

Best Practices and Lessons You Should Learn from these

In the above showcase you probably saw some 404 pages that were very creative, whereas others that were just weird but memorable, and some that were simple yet elegant and usable. When creating a 404 page you need to remember to combine all three elements: creativity, usability, and the ability to leave a lasting impression.

When creating our 404 page, we actually looked at a lot of these above to get inspiration and combine the best elements from these into one. Most of the time, when people land on the 404 page, they are frustrated. So you need to assist them in finding what they are trying to reach, but in the most creative way possible.

A good structure that you can follow is:

Creative Image
List of Popular Posts
List of Recent Posts
List of Archives
Search Bar
Offer more help by giving contact options

Now you do not need to have all of them, but you should certainly have more than two of these options in your 404 page.

Analyzing our 404 page, some people say we do not have a search bar. We have our search bar in the sidebar, so there is no reason to display it twice. We are displaying archive by month, by category, and we are displaying the popular tags. Ofcourse the creative image is to make it all look friendly rather than dull.

Now we understand that not everyone is a great artist and cannot come up with some of the illustrations and cartoons above, but you can see the Devlounge example or Function’s example above to see how simplicity can also work. Devlounge has a very organized 404 page, no image, no nothing, but it is very organized and helpful. Function has a simple icon and other resources, but nothing super graphic.

When creating your own 404 page, keep that in mind.

How to Create a 404 Page in WordPress

In your WordPress theme directory there is a file called 404.php, if you don’t have that file then you might want to create one. You can add any HTML in that file to fit your needs. But it is recommended that you use the default parameters, so the page looks like it is part of the design.

Now wrap around the styling HTML around it. If you want you can even copy your page.php content in 404.php and just remove the content area and add your customized tags.

Here are some of the tags that you can use:

Display Archive by Months:

This code will display archive by months, but it will list all months. So it might become a mess if you have a blog that is three years old. To learn how to limit the count of months displayed check out the tutorial.

Display list of Categories

This code will list all categories on your blog. Ofcoures you can style them however using list tags or others.

Display Most used Tags

This will show the most used tags like how we have on our 404 page.

Display Recent Posts

', ''); ?>

There are more codes that you can use, you will just have to search the documentation and find it. If you have a specific question feel free to ask us at anytime.

Further Sources:

These lists has a lot more 404 examples. We only featured the WordPress ones.

404 Error Pages Reloaded

More 404 Pages

60 Creative 404 Page Designs

Best of Best WordPress 404 Error Page Designs is a post from: WPBeginner which is not allowed to be copied on other sites.

Evolution of WordPress User Interface (2003 – 2009)

Editorial Staff — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 12:12:38 +0000

WordPress we see now is the product of the love the community has provided it with. Without the suggestions, tips, and new ideas of the valued users, and the hard work of WordPress staff implementing these ideas, it would never be where it is. Right now we see WordPress as a power house script that is so versatile, and adaptable to any use. In this post we will show you how WordPress evolved to what it is now by showing you the changes of admin panel user interface in each version.

Since 27 May, 2003 when WordPress was launched, there have been a total of 52 releases so far. In this post, we will only highlight the ones that we see a huge change in admin panel user interface. You can see the releases on the Official WordPress Site, and you can also download them.

WordPress 0.71 – Gold (May 2003)

The landing page of WordPress 0.71 admin panel was directly the write post page. As you can see there was no dashboard. Features were very limited, and it was kept simple. You could only assign one category to each post. This version of WordPress had a tedious installation method where you would have to change a lot of information manually.

WordPress 1.0.1 – Miles (Jan 2004)

Starting this version, WordPress started naming its major releases after Jazz musicians. As you can see this release was named after a famous musician, Miles Davis. In this version, WordPress stopped using the b2 file structure and moved toward its own style of filing structure. In this version, the feature of assigning multiple categories to a post was added. You could also make Search Engine Friendly Permalinks using mod_rewrite. The installer in this version got a lot simpler then the first version. Edit this page / Edit this comment links were introduced. Also comment moderation feature was highlighted.

WordPress 1.2 – Mingus (May 2004)

This release was named after Charles Mingus. One of the most important upgrades in this version was “Plugins”. WordPress plugin architecture was introduced in this version, and to this latest release is still the same. Sub categories were included in this version’s feature list. In this version we also had custom fields, thumbnail creation, post preview, encrypted passwords, and an ability to ping more then one service at a time.

WordPress 1.5 – Strayhorn (Feb 2005)

This version of WordPress was named after Billy Strayhorn. In this version we see the first glimpse of a dashboard. Now WordPress is no longer just about posts, you can also have pages. Multiple theme support was also included in this version. This admin panel was not powered by Ajax, so it was slower then the ones we use now.

WordPress 2.0 – Duke (Dec 2005)

Named after Duke Ellington, this version was the first version that we see a major change in the user interface. We have a big blue header, which you will see through out for a while. This version was the first one to include the full WYSIWIG editor. Akismet Spam Protection was introduced in this plugin. Other features in this release were: Image/File Uploading, Theme preview via thumbnail (screenshot.png), Improved Administration abilities via AJAX, Improved Posting Speed, New Hooks for Developers, and more.

WordPress 2.1 – Ella (Jan 2007)

This release was actually named after Ella Fitzgerald. WordPress had a lot of new features included in this upgrade. Some of the notable ones was the fast admin panel interface. Other features were Spell Check, Comments with its own menu and more.

WordPress 2.3 – Dexter (Sep 2007)

WordPress 2.3 was named after Dexter Gordon. In this release, there were a lot of security fixes. There was a few admin panel changes as well. Users were now able to add tags to WordPress. Update notification was added in this version, so now we see plug-in and WordPress upgrade notification, if the version we were using was outdated. WordPress added a feature where it will redirect users to the right URL automatically such as the one with www. if that was the one you chose. Also they added advanced visual editor button.

WordPress 2.5 – Brecker (Mar 2008)

This version of WordPress was named after Michael Brecker. Developers actually skipped version 2.4 to 2.5, so this version contained twice the amount of new stuff. We see a completely new admin panel interface. The dashboard got much better as they added more useful information there. This was the first version where we saw one click upgrade for plug-ins which were in WordPress plug-in directory. Much better visual editor and a built-in gallery was also included in this release.

WordPress 2.6 – Tyner (Jul 2008)

McCoy Tyner was the person which this version was named after. They added a word count in the post writing section, and Turbo feature was included which let you use Google Gears.

WordPress 2.7 – Coltrane (Dec 2008)

This version was named after John Coltrane. We see another huge admin panel makeover which is liked by majority of the community. The dashboard is much more resourceful and there are multiple other options included in this release. This version included automated installation for plug-ins through the WordPress admin panel. Reply to comments from the admin panel, threaded comments, sticky posts, keyboard shortcuts, comment paging, and much more were added in this release.

WordPress 2.8 – Baker (Jun 2009)

This version was named after Chet Baker. The reason why there is no screenshot of this one is because we want you to upgrade right now if you haven’t and check it for yourselves. Really in the admin panel, look wise not a lot has changed, but it has certainly got much faster.

As we look back, it seems that WordPress has come a long way to be what it is. We have had a lot of success until now and more to come in the future. WordPress could not have done it without the support of the community. We urge you to join the Beta Release List and test new versions, so you can help WordPress grow by reporting bugs and suggesting features.

Sources

WordPress Versions and Changelog

Wikipedia WordPress Page

A Journey Through Five Years of WordPress Interface

Evolution of WordPress User Interface (2003 – 2009) is a post from: WPBeginner which is not allowed to be copied on other sites.

17 Popular Universities That Are Using WordPress

Editorial Staff — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 00:42:07 +0000

WordPress is an excellent software for managing content and blogging. In one of our showcase about 21 Popular Brands That are Using WordPress, we tried to prove that WordPress is a reliable software because it can be trusted by top class brands listed in there. But one article is not good enough to convince those who think that open source software are not reliable, therefore we have compiled a list of 17 popular universities that are using WordPress.

1. University of Florida

2. Duke University

6. MIT

14. Boston College

15. University of Berlin

16. University of Calgary

17. Azusa Pacific

17 Popular Universities That Are Using WordPress is a post from: WPBeginner which is not allowed to be copied on other sites.