Ask a stupid question - how easy is it to set up a wordpress site?

PlacidCasual

PlacidCasual

PlacidCasual

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Joined
13 May 2003
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As per the title really despite having used computers and the internet since 1994 I've never had my own website. I'd like to do a little blog on my own domain name (this I already have) and in the longer term maybe next few months to a year my wife would like to use the site for a bit of online sales of some craft tat she makes and sells.

I intend just to put up occasionals stories about little projects I'm doing and stuff in the garden or our varied attempts at diffeerent crafts. I'm not after loads of hits it's just a fun side project.

With respect to any future etailing any traffic will probably be driven by my wifes presence at craft shows we're not looking to grow a significant business or anything, we both havefulltime jobs.

I've been considering Krystal witha basic package and it won't cost me much to dip my toes in I'm just a touch apprehensive having never done anything like this before.
 
PlacidCasual said:
As per the title really despite having used computers and the internet since 1994 I've never had my own website. I'd like to do a little blog on my own domain name (this I already have) and in the longer term maybe next few months to a year my wife would like to use the site for a bit of online sales of some craft tat she makes and sells.

I intend just to put up occasionals stories about little projects I'm doing and stuff in the garden or our varied attempts at diffeerent crafts. I'm not after loads of hits it's just a fun side project.

With respect to any future etailing any traffic will probably be driven by my wifes presence at craft shows we're not looking to grow a significant business or anything, we both havefulltime jobs.

I've been considering Krystal witha basic package and it won't cost me much to dip my toes in I'm just a touch apprehensive having never done anything like this before.
Click to expand...

Can you use Word? Then you're already 50% of the way to using wordpress.

With Krystal you'll have 2 options to setup wordpress, you can download the files from the Wordpress site, create a database via the cpanel, upload your wordpress files and when you go to the web address it will be on the setup screen. Second option is that Krystal can install it for you via their Cpanel Web Apps.

It's well documented on how to use it, lots of help on here, if you get stuck you can create an admin account for someone here who can login and help. You can download theme's to customise the look, SEO plugins to help writing pages etc.

It really is the beginners go to content management system but it's also capable of a lot more. Regarding selling, there are plugins to help but you may be better using a dedicated selling site such as ebay/etsy/amazon etc and linking to them from your site.
 
PlacidCasual said:
Thx for that @AHarvey are their any pros and cons between the 2 setup methods. I assume the database is set up on the host server.
Click to expand...

In my experience, the built-in version is the easiest as I think it does the database side for you automatically but I can't remember as it's been a while since I've used Wordpress.

Normally, the built-in installer may not be the most up to date versions so you'll need to update it once installed.

Doing it manually you'll have a better understanding of the process and it'll be the latest version out of the box.
 
Hello again peeps.

After months of faffing around I finally (as in last night) got my Wordpress site up and running in the barest most correct only in a technical sense meaning of the word. I'm still reading through a tutorial but my first hurdle is I used the Krystal cPanel to install my wordpress database and in ignorance created a sub directory mywebsite.co.uk/wordpress/ where all my files live. But it means when I enter my url mywebsite.co.uk I don't get my wordpress site, I have to go to the directory address. Now in the dashboard it explains how to move from the root directory to a subdirectory but not how to point to the url I want if everything is already in a sub-directory.

As usual any help would be much appreciated. I expect I'm going to be back quite a lot asking daft questions.
 
Remove the install, go back to the installer, look for the option where it lets you choose the folder to install in (it'll probably say 'wordpress'), set it to nothing then install again ;)
 
@Beansprout I had considered that option but it requires a reasonable amount of work down a well defined path, I was hoping that I from the place I am there were might be just a few files and changes that I need to make to achieve the same aim. But thank you for your response much appreciated.
 
PlacidCasual said:
@Beansprout I had considered that option but it requires a reasonable amount of work down a well defined path, I was hoping that I from the place I am there were might be just a few files and changes that I need to make to achieve the same aim. But thank you for your response much appreciated.
Click to expand...
If you mean you set it up and have worked on the site and don't want to start again, you can move the files....depending on what you've done it's a slight pain as wordpress can hardcode certain things.

But first steps, dashboard - settings - change the site URL to remove the /wordpress/.

Then login to your hosting control panel and use the file manager to move all the files from public_html/wordpress/ to just public_html/ or ask your host for help.

Then just check over each page and make any necessary updates, eg if there's a broken image the URL probably needs updating to remove the /wordpress/.

This script is handy but not entirely beginner-friendly, again your host may help:

https://interconnectit.com/products/search-and-replace-for-wordpress-databases/
 
Well sorted the directory problem on rereading some of the WordPress help pages I recognised only needed to move the index and some other file into my public html folder and rename the path in WordPress dashboard. So very much in line with your comments Beansprout.

I've still got a lot of reading on design to do. I have a question though, currently posts appear on the home page and I have a categorisation hierarchy set up for naming them and file path. Is it possible to create pages where all the posts of that category type are shown in date order so they are still easily visible once they get supplanted on the home and also as a themed repository?
 
I think what you are looking for is an archive page.
In your theme files, you should have a home.php, that is the file for the showing all the news posts on one page, you can normally use the same template and just rename it to archive.php if there isn't one already. I though there was be default tbh.
Have you tried going to the category page to see if it already works? You can do this by going to the category section of Posts in the Dashboard and selecting 'view' on the categories on the right..

With regards to date order, that will require coding the template file. It should have something that looks like this in it.


<?php
$args = array(
'posts_per_page' => 9,
'orderby' => 'date',
'order' => 'DESC',
);
$query = new WP_Query( $args );
if( $query->have_posts() ) :
?>

Putting in the 'orderby' => 'date', is obviously the important part.
 
@ChroniC Thx for the response didn't notice it for a few days. I see what you're getting at might be beyond my current very limited skill set, but I'll get there. Also very little content so not a worry yet.

My current problem is I'm trying to write new posts and the sodding Yoast Tool Bar is covering up the paragraph so I can't see what I'm writing. Scratching my head, there will obviously be a damn easy solution just haven't spotted it yet.

edit: might be a browser issue, serves me right for logging in from work. Will test when at home on my own PC.
 
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It turned out to be a browser issue, I was pootling in my lunch hour at work and it wouldn't play nice but we're still on Internet Explorer!! When I got home and used Edge or Firefox it played as expected it to.
 
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