Uploading Multimedia to Your Blog, Lesson # 11

WordPress allows users to upload images, documents, videos, and even audio files into blog posts. YouTube videos can also be incorporated. WordPress has a comprehensive tutorial and support area focusing on adding media to your blog. Another page in this area lists the approved file types.

Image from WordPress support site.

Locate the upload insert media menu — icons just above the editing bars and to the right of the words Upload/Insert. Moving from left to right, the symbols are for uploading images (inside the red square), video, audio, general media, polls, and custom forms.

Attending to You Blog’s Settings, Lesson #10

On the left hand side of the WordPress dashboard is a long list of links that you can use to accomplish various tasks on your blogs – new posts, links, comments, new tags, etc. If you mouse over some of them you’ll discover an arrow on the right-hand side of each link that expands the category. For instance, if you click on the arrow next to the word post, the menu expands to include five additional links that relate to making posts on your blog. The dashboard is filled with all sorts of activities to do, and as you become more experienced you can expand your skills and learn about more  of the dashboard opportunities.

The most important dashboard menu for you to explore is settings. Below I’ve explored a few of the most important settings, General, Reading, and Discussion. Read the tutorial at WordPress for more detailed information.

Adding Links to Your Post, Lesson #9

Several people have e-mailed me with questions about making links in posts. They’ve requested a set of simple but clear steps. So here we go. To learn more go to this Word Press Links Tutorial.

Four Steps to Link Making

Step #1

A link name is much better if it has descriptive words rather than an address. Thus Visit GDS is a better name Visit GDS http://www.gds.org.

What Makes a Good Post? Lesson #8

Thanks to those of you who have sent e-mails about your blogs. Great work! I’ll be happy to take a look at these and others anytime during this online class, but you can also feel free to share anytime the summer. I’ll always try to get back to you promptly, though when I am traveling, it may take a bit longer.

Read this WordPress document that explains how to start a new post.  My GDS tech colleague, Laura Loftus, discovered this blog post, Advice for New Bloggers: 12 Tips on Writing for Your Blog. While this document was originally written as advice for not-for-profit agencies  that hope to blog build up a large readership, many of the tips are great for beginners.

Tips on Posts

Getting Started With Your Blog, Lesson #7, Part 2

If you seriously get started setting up your new blog, please send me the link so I can check it out!

Your Blog – Getting Started: Lesson #7

Look for this image and click the get started button.

It’s time to start your blog. At WordPress.com look for the illustration on the right to help you start building your site. Before setting up the blog, however, please read through the following steps.

Step #1

Your blog needs to have a name to use as a part of the blog’s address (or URL — letters that stand for universal resource locator). The words you choose will be a semi-permanent part of the address. For this course our blog address is http://familyblogclass.wordpress.com. Think carefully about what name to use for your blog site’s address. For instance, if you are making a family reunion blog, personalize your address just a bit. (I expect that FamilyReunion.wordpress.com was taken long ago). In a web address you seek a combination of short and descriptive. It’s possible to edit this later on, but that means notifying your readers of a change of address.