WordPress can be intimidating the first time you log in. This powerful content management system is waiting on you to add content but where do you start? Hopefully learning some of the common terms in the WordPress admin will help point you in the right direction.
Admin Toolbar
The toolbar at the top of the page when you are logged into a WordPress website. The toolbar appears on the front and back end and can be turned off of the front end.
Categories / Tags
Organization for posts. Categories are like topics (eg Website Development) Tags are like keywords (eg WordPress)
Child Theme
A WordPress theme that inherits the functionality and styling of another (parent) theme.
Comments
Comments give your readers an opportunity to interact with you and your blog.
Media Library
Media is any image, video, music and file you upload and use in your website. The media library is the location and structure of the upload directory that stores all your files. By default, the system stores your uploads by year and then a month folder.
Menus
Navigational menus that can be created, edited and adjusted in the admin with a drag-and-drop interface.
Page
Static content like an About or Contact page. Pages are not time stamped and do not have categories or tags.
Permalinks
A permanent URL to individual pages, posts, categories and media.
Plugins
Additional code that extends the native functionality of WordPress. Popular plugins can add search engine optimization fields and monitoring, contact forms or shopping cart functionality.
Post
Your blog entries. Each post supports text, images and multimedia. They are time stamped and can be categorized.
RSS (Really Simple Syndication) Feed
A way for visitors to subscribe to your site and view your content in an aggregator such as Feedly.
Theme
The visuals, aesthetics or layout of your website. You should be able to change your theme without affecting your content.
Users
How members of your site interact with the admin. Many user accounts can be created and given privileges such as Admin, Editor, Author, Contributor and Subscriber
Visual Editor
The content editor that most closely resembles a Word document. Users man not need to know HTML to use the visual editor.
Widgets
Smaller bits of code that display a direct, visible result on your blog like displaying categories, tags and/or related posts.