WordPress gives you the ability to add custom post types and taxonomies easily with some simple code in your functions.php file, or through the use of a plugin like CustomPress. That means, you can quickly turn your WordPress site into a fairly well-featured CMS.
The only problem is, out of the box, WordPress does not automatically take your newly created custom post types and add them to the archive pages for existing taxonomies ‘categories’ or ‘tags.’
The standard menu in WordPress, while powerful and easy to add onto almost any theme, leaves a bit to be desired when it comes to styling.
Not to mention, the built-in WordPress menu classes can be quite confusing. There’s menu-item-type-taxonomy, current-menu-parent, current-menu-ancestor, and a whole bunch of other confusion selectors you can choose from to make styling your menu about as fun as pulling out your hair.
A standard WordPress menu looks like this:
Gray bar with a darker gray hover. Not too much to look at right?
This week on Best in WordPress we bring you posts focused on admin functions and a few tips and tricks for web designer and developers. Of course, we’d never leave out the WordPress newbies, so we’ve also included a few posts about great plugins and a fantastic new jQuery slider.
1. Customizing the WordPress Admin Area for Clients: WPTuts
If you want to capture information from your website visitors, having user-friendly forms is a necessity. On the other side of the coin – having clunky, hard to use forms will almost certainly assure your visitors never submit any information.
That’s why so many site admins turn to Gravity forms, a premium form plugin that works amazingly well with WordPress.
In today’s daily tip, we’re going to show you one simple adjustment you can make to your standard gravity forms that will make them more user-friendly, and more in-line with what users expect to see with online forms today.
Anyone running an e-commerce site knows the challenge of finding a good merchant gateway; one that provides an efficient checkout process, a quick transfer of funds, and the ability to plug it easily into your website without the need for lengthy code or expensive developers.
Thesis 2, the premium WordPress framework, was launched with much anticipation, and even some controversy. But overall, Thesis users have become accustomed to its new features and have started to make skins available for download.
One such entry to the market is a responsive skin called Thesis Eleven40, from ICustomizeThesis.com.
1140 Responsive Grid
Welcome to another edition of WPMU’s Best in WordPress. In this article, we’ll look at 7 of last week’s best WordPress posts from around the web, including topics covering translating WordPress, plugins for running giveaways on your blog, and a list of 25 of the image and video best sliders.
1. 25 + Cool WordPress Sliders: CreativeCan.com
Your organization puts on events and you need a way to create, manage, and display those events for maximum exposure. You need a place to collect RSVP’s, spread the word about your events through social networking channels, maybe even charge for those events and collect payments online – not just at the event. We’ll, we’ve got you covered – with the Events + plugin.
Placing maps to your posts and pages adds a graphical flair to your site, breaks up long blocks of text, and makes the experience better for your readers.
In this daily tip, we’re going to focus on two easy ways you can add map functionality in just a few minutes:
Direct embed from Google Maps
Google Maps plugin from WPMUDEV
Direct Embed Method
Visit Google Maps and type an address in the search box. Google finds your address. In this example, I’m using: 1000 5th ave, seattle, wa 98101. Here’s what we get:
WordPress makes it easy to export content from one site and then import it into another. This is done through the import/export setting, which you can find in the TOOLS menu in your WordPress admin dashboard.
But before you can import or export all that fancy data, you need to create those new posts and pages. Designers and developers know what a chore it can be to constantly create content just for the purposes of testing the site before it goes live. The developers or WordPress know this too, which is why they created the Theme Unit Test.
