WordPress For Dummies, 9th Edition

Introduction

It was 2003 when I discovered the WordPress blogging software. Way back then (and in Internet years, that’s actually quite a lot of time), I used Movable Type as my blogging platform. A friend introduced me to the WordPress software. “Try it,” she said. “You’ll really like it.”

As a creature of habit, I felt reluctant to make the change. But I haven’t looked back. I’ve been with WordPress ever since.

WordPress started as a tool for blogging. Authors, students, parents, business owners, academics, journalists, hobbyists — you name it — use blogs as a matter of course. Over the past decade, WordPress has emerged as the premier content management system (CMS) available on the Internet. WordPress software currently powers 35 percent of the websites you see.

Today, WordPress is much more than a blogging tool. Individuals, organizations, and corporations are using WordPress to build their entire web presence. WordPress has grown into a valuable solution for everything from selling products on the Internet to running membership sites and blogging. Pretty much anything you think you can do with your website, you can accomplish with WordPress.

To a brand-new user, some aspects of WordPress can be a little bit intimidating. After you start using it, however, you begin to realize how intuitive, friendly, and extensible the software is.

This book presents an insightful look at WordPress. In the book, I cover managing and maintaining your WordPress-powered website through the ...