Wordpress Communication Lecture

Lecture Sheet: Basic Wordpress
Prepared By Sharmin Sultana & Ridwanullah Yousuf

Overview of Wordpress

WordPress is an online, open source website creation tool written in
PHP. WordPress is an open source Content Management System
(CMS), which allows the users to build dynamic websites and
blogs. WordPress is the most popular blogging system on the web and
allows updating, customizing and managing the website from its back-
end CMS and components.

WordPress started in 2003 with a single bit of code to enhance the
typography of everyday writing and with fewer users than you can count
on your fingers and toes. Since then it has grown to be the largest self-
hosted blogging tool in the world, used on millions of sites and seen by
tens of millions of people every day.

Everything you see here, from the documentation to the code itself, was
created by and for the community. WordPress is an Open
Source project, which means there are hundreds of people all over the
world working on it. (More than most commercial platforms.) It also
means you are free to use it for anything from your recipe site to
a Fortune 500 web site without paying anyone a license fee and a
number of other important freedoms.

Describe Wordpress Environment

About WordPress.org
On this site you can download and install a software script called
WordPress. To do this you need a web host who meets the minimum
requirements and a little time. WordPress is completely customizable
and can be used for almost anything. There is also
a service called WordPress.com which lets you get started with a new
and free WordPress-based blog in seconds, but varies in several ways
and is less flexible than the WordPress you download and install
yourself.

What You Can Use WordPress For
WordPress started as just a blogging system, but has evolved to be used
as full content management system and so much more through the
thousands of plugins and widgets and themes, WordPress is limited only
by your imagination. (And tech chops.)

Connect with the Community
In addition to online resources like the forums and mailing lists a great
way to get involved with WordPress is to attend or volunteer at a
WordCamp, which are free or low-cost events that happen all around the
world to gather and educate WordPress users, organized by WordPress
users. Check out the website, there might be a Word Camp near you.

A Little History
WordPress was born out of a desire for an elegant, well-architectured
personal publishing system built on PHP and MySQL and licensed
under the GPLv2 (or later). It is the official successor of b2/cafelog.
WordPress is fresh software, but its roots and development go back to

2001. It is a mature and stable product. We hope by focusing on user
experience and web standards we can create a tool different from
anything else out there.

For a bit more about WordPress' history check out the WordPress
Wikipedia page or this page on our own Codex.

Themes

Themes define the templates used for each page. In
general, index.php in a theme is used for just about everything. You can
split that out and create a separate header.php and footer.php as well.
Then you can add a sidebar.php. I'm sure you've seen at least these four
files before - one to define the header, one to define the sidebar, one to
define the footer, and one to bring them all together and position them
around the main content. Further, you can define single.php to style a
single post, page.php to style individual pages, and so on. When your
site loads and a page or post is requested, WordPress routes the request
to the template file defined by your theme. Then it knows how to lay
things out on the page. Traditionally, themes are just for layout.

Plug-ins

Plug-ins, on the other hand, can add additional elements to be used by
the themes and elsewhere. A plug-in can add a Facebook Like button
that your theme can then add to posts and pages. Another plug-in can
add a widget to your admin dashboard for accessing and managing your
Google Reader feed - this is not reflected in the layout of your site, but

does add functionality. Yet another plug-in can automatically post to
Twitter whenever you publish a new post.
Themes can add functionality that is directly related to the layout and
performance of your site. Plug-ins can add functionality deeper in
WordPress - functionality that can also be used by a theme.

Describe Wordpress tools

WordPress.com offers many tools to help you get the most out of your
WordPress.com experience.

For more information please check out the support docs below.

1. Admin Bar

You may have noticed a gray or blue bar that appears at the top of your
pages when logged into your WordPress.com account. This bar is called
the Admin Bar and it is an easy-to-access toolbar with a few shortcuts
to some central WordPress.com dashboard pages.
My Site(s)

My Site (or My Sites) will take you to the Stats page, and main menu
for your primary site. From there you can create posts, pages, manage
settings, and switch to the same options for your other sites, if you have
more than one.

Reader

The Reader button takes you to the WordPress.com Reader where you
can see the latest posts from any sites that you follow, browse topics
(tags), or peruse Discover.

New Post, Profile & Notifications



On the right-hand side of your Admin Bar are the New Post, Profile and
Notification buttons.

New Post simply takes you to the New Post Screen.

The Profile link (which shows your Gravatar if you have one) varies
depending on whether you are in the dashboard (with the blue bar), or
viewing a website (gray Admin Bar). If you are in the dashboard the
Profile link will take you straight to the My Profile page, with a menu to
other account-related screens. If you have the gray Admin Bar, hovering
over the Profile will give you a dropdown menu with all the options on
the My Profile dashboard page, including Sign Out, Account Settings,
Billing History (receipts) and Security.

Clicking on Notifications will open a dropdown that displays your latest
notifications, including recent likes and comments.

2. Apps for WordPress.com

Android, Apps, Blackberry, IOS, IPad, IPhone, Mobile, Mobile
App, TweetDeck

If you like, you can access and edit WordPress and WordPress.com
blogs using a variety of apps for both mobile and desktop.

To learn more, visit the app.wordpress.com Apps site.

3. Comic Strips on WordPress.com

The Panel theme on WordPress.com has some special features
specifically geared towards publishing a webcomic.

The instructions from this guide are referring to the WP Admin
dashboard. You can get to this dashboard by adding /wp-admin to the
end of your site’s url (e.g.: example.wordpress.com/wp-admin)

Comic Navigation

Your users can easily read through your comics by using the navigation
buttons underneath each comic. They’ll have easy access to the
beginning of your strip or to the latest entry, and they can instantly load
the next or previous installment by using the left (←) and right (→)
arrow keyboard keys.

Front-End Uploading

Panel allows you to upload a new strip just by dragging and dropping it
onto your site. The image will upload, and you’ll have a chance to add a
title, categories, and tags. After that, just click Publish to update your
site with the new comic.

Here’s a video showing how to drag and drop comics from the front end
of your site:

Importing Comics
If you’re moving your comic from another platform or from a self-
hosted WordPress blog, there are a few steps to take to get Panel to
properly showcase your comic.

1. Import your content.
2. Open the All Posts dashboard: Posts » All Posts.

3. Check the checkbox next to any posts that are comics and then choose
“Convert to Comic” from the Bulk Actions dropdown.

Your comic posts will now be listed under Comics » All Comics, and
Panel will show your latest comic at the top of your homepage.

Export

You can use the Export tool to backup all of your content or move your content to a new
WordPress site.

Manual export or Guided Transfer?

Free, self-directed exports are optimal for people who merely want to save a copy of their
content or who are comfortable migrating to other hosts without assistance. We also offer
a Guided Transfer service, which is a great option for people who find the migration process
intimidating and would like expert help to assure an effortless transition. We charge a one-
time fee of $129.00 for the Guided Transfer service.

If you like the sound of the Guided Transfer option, stop reading here, head over to
the Guided Transfer support page, and purchase the service from there. The purchase
process will take you through the next steps. If you’d prefer to download your own export
file, keep reading.

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Export Your Content to Another Blog or Platform

It’s your content; you can do whatever you like with it. Go to My Site → Settings and
select the Export tab to download a copy of your blog’s content. The content will be
delivered as a series of XML files, which will contain your posts, pages, comments,
categories, tags, and references to your site’s images.

If you’d like to export all of your content, just press the Export All button. If you’d like to
export a subset (a single author’s posts, for example, or a certain category or date range),
click the arrow next to the Export All button to see the advanced options.

Once you’ve selected the content you wish to export, press the Export Selected
Content button.
At this point, you can remain on the export page to wait for the export file to become
available. A handy notification will appear, offering you a download link.

The link will contain a download of a .zip file containing any export files (larger blogs will
include more than one export file). This ensures the completeness and fastest performance
of the export process. When importing back into another blog, you’ll need to unzip the file
and import each of the .xml files individually.

If you’d like to carry on with blogging, it’s safe to navigate away from the screen once the
export is in progress. We’ll also email you a link to the export file, which will remain
available for download for about a week.

Note: This will ONLY export your posts, pages, comments, categories, and tags;
uploads and images may need to be manually transferred to the new blog. The current
version of the WordPress.org installation gives you the option to import uploaded files, but
the blog you are importing from must be live and serving images properly in order for it to
work. So, if you intend to delete content (or the whole blog) here at WordPress.com, please
wait until after media files have successfully been imported into the new blog, and make
sure your site is not set to private!

If you would like to move your blog to a self-hosted WordPress.org installation, take a look
at these recommended web hosts.

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Exporting Media from Private Sites

If your WordPress.com site is marked “Private,” your media files will not export properly.
Part of the export process creates links to your media files which a WordPress.org site will
use to import your media. Before you begin your export process, you will need to make your
WordPress.com site public under My Sites → Settings → General in order for the media
files to work properly in your new imported blog. As soon as you have completed the import
into your new site and have confirmed your media has been successfully imported, you can
return your WordPress.com site’s visibility setting to “Private” again.

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Exporting Links

To learn how to export your Links (Blogroll), please see Import & Export Links.

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Backups

If your blog is hosted here at WordPress.com, we handle all necessary backups. If a very
large meteor were to hit all the WordPress.com servers and destroy them beyond repair, all
of your data would still be safe and we could have your blog online within a couple of days
(after the meteor situation died down, of course).

But if you want to back up your blog content manually, you are free to do so by using the My
Site → Settings, Export tab option described above. This is certainly still a good idea,
especially if you’ve assigned additional users to your blog. Editors and administrators have
the ability to delete any posts or pages, and there is no way to recover material that they
remove from your blog.

Note: This will ONLY export your posts, pages, comments, categories, and tags. If
you’d like to backup the media files as well, you will need to install WordPress.org locally on
your computer, and run the import from it. This process will download the media files to
your computer.

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Setting Up a Redirect to Your New Domain

Are you leaving WordPress.com? You can easily redirect yourgroovysite.wordpress.com (as
well as all of your permalinks) to your new domain name with the Site Redirect upgrade.

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Blogs Using Custom Fonts

As part of the WordPress.com Premium or Business upgrade, you are able to set custom
fonts for your site title, headings, and body text. Guided Transfers are not currently
available for blogs which use custom fonts. You can transfer your blog elsewhere by
following these steps.

Forms

Forms are an easy way to facilitate feedback from visitors, and enrich the functionality of
your site or blog. Here are the different options available at WordPress.com:

 Contact Form
 Polldadddy
 Wufoo
 JotForm
 Google Forms
To help users subscribe to your site, or directly interact with them, we also have:

 the Follow Blog widget, for WordPress.com users to follow you through their Reader,
or have non-WordPress.com users follow your site by email

 the MailChimp widget which allows you to have a mailing-list, and invite users to
sign-up for it

Forms »Contact Form

Use a contact form to let readers get in touch without exposing your email address. You can
also use a contact form for creating an RSVP form for an event by adding some dropdown or
checkbox fields to the form.
Note: This is not a secure method for collecting private information, such as credit card
numbers, bank account numbers, usernames, passwords, etc. To collect payments, please
use PayPal or a similar payment processing service that securely handles financial
transactions.
Watch the video below for a quick overview of how it works, and read below for more
examples and settings.

How to Add a Contact Form in your Posts or Pages

To add a contact form, go to My Sites and click on Pages → Add. You can also add a
Contact Form to existing Posts or Pages by editing them in the Visual Editor.
In the toolbar, click the ⌄ next to the ⊕ symbol, and then the option to add a contact form
will appear, like in the example below:

The contact form comes with four predefined fields: Name, Email, Website and Comment.
You’re free to edit, delete or add more fields to your form. Note that you can decide to make
your field required or not.

Each field requires a label and a field type. You can choose among the following field types:
 Checkbox: allows the user to tick a box to make a choice
 Dropdown: creates a dropdown of options
 Email Address: requires an email address format
 Name: text field
 Radio Button: similar to the checkbox field type
 Text: a single line of text
 Text Area: several lines of text
 Web Address: requires a URL format

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Notification preferences

When a user submits your contact form, it will be emailed to the author of the post/page (to
the email address that they have on file for their WordPress.com account), and the subject
line will be the title of your post. If you wish, you can change both the recipient and the
email subject of your emails by clicking the “Settings” tab. Separate recipient emails with a
comma to send to multiple recipients. You can also change the email address and subject
using the shortcode (see below).

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How to Add a Contact Form with Shortcodes

You can add a basic contact form using the following shortcode:
[contact-form]
[contact-field label="Name" type="name" required="true" /]

[contact-field label="Email" type="email" placeholder="Your Email Address"
required="true" /]
[contact-field label="Website" type="url" /]
[contact-field label="Comment" type="textarea" required="true" /]
[/contact-form]

Each contact form shortcode must start with [contact-form] and end with [/contact-form]

Fields can be added or removed from the shortcode manually. For instance, if you wished to
remove the website textbox, you’d simple remove that line, like this:

[contact-form]
[contact-field label="Name" type="name" required="true" /]
[contact-field label="Email" type="email" placeholder="Your Email
Address" required="true" /]
[contact-field label="Comment" type="textarea" required="true" /]
[/contact-form]

Each field is wrapped in a [contact-field /] tag.

The available field attributes are as follows:

label Gives the field a descriptive label.

type Available options include:

 text – Displays a regular single line text box
 textarea – Displays a multi-line text box
 radio – Displays radio options
 checkbox – Displays a single checkbox
 select – Displays a drop down with multiple options
 email – Displays a single line text box

 name – Displays a single line text box
 url – Displays a single line text box
placeholder Sets placeholder or descriptive text inside an input field until it is filled. This
text disappears when you start typing in the field. Not available for radio, select, and
checkbox fields.

required If you’d like the field to be required, add required=”true” or required =”1″ if not,
simply leave this out.

options Select and radio fields have a fourth option called “options”. This is a comment
separated list of all the options available within the drop down or radio field. An example
would be:

[contact-field label="Sex" type="radio" options="Female,Male" /]

You can also change notification preferences for an embedded contact form by adding the
following parameters to the opening contact-form tag:

 to=’email address’ – The email address where the submitted form notifications
should be sent.

 subject=’email subject’ – What appears in the subject line for email notifications.
For example, [contact-form to='[email protected]' subject='Form
Submitted']] would send an email notification with the subject line “Form Submitted” to the
email address [email protected].

submit_button_text Allows you to change the contact form button text from “Submit” to
anything you like. In the example below, the button would display “Contact me!” inside the
button:

[[contact-form submit_button_text='Contact me!'][contact-field label='Name'
type='name'/][/contact-form]

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Tips

 Add to Pages, Posts, or Widgets – Contact forms can be added to pages or posts, or
if you copy the generated code, you can add your contact form to a text widget.

 Forms are customizable – Contact forms can be customized. You can add and
remove fields, choose which fields are required, change the email address, or change the
subject settings. The form’s appearance can be further customized with CSS.

 Edit an existing form – To edit an existing form, edit the post or page from WP
Admin, then click “Add Contact Form.”

 One per page – Each post, page, and text widget will only display one contact form.
 Remember, email is not secure – Do not use contact forms for sensitive information

like credit card numbers, as the information will be transmitted by email.
 Built-in spam filter – We filter submissions through Akismet to fight spam, then add

them to your feedback management area, which is accessible to Editors and
Administrators on your site. We also email a copy to you.
 Available on WordPress.org – If you’re running your own copy of WordPress.org,
you can use Jetpack to get the same functionality.
 Reply back – If you would like to reply back to a contact form submission, you will need
to use your own personal email to do so. You can reply back with a custom email address
by creating an account with an email provider listed here.

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Feedback Management

Note: The instructions from these steps are referring to the WP Admin dashboard. You can
get to this dashboard by adding /wp-admin to the end of your site’s url (e.g.:
example.wordpress.com/wp-admin)

You can read all feedback sent through your contact form in your feedback management
area. Just click the Feedback tab in your left-hand menu in WP Admin.

Feedback is managed much like comments. If a feedback is spammy, hover over it and
click Spam. If you want to delete a feedback, hover over it and click Trash. Or, if legitimate
feedback is marked as spam, you can click the Not Spam link.

Forms »JotForm

JotForm is an online application to quickly create custom online forms, which you can
embed at WordPress.com. It offers a variety of form templates, and themes. To learn more
about its features and capabilities, please check the JotForm FAQ.

To integrate JotForm on your WordPress.com website, you’ll first need to sign up for an
account, and can then start creating forms (see JotForm user guide).

Steps to embed a JotForm

1. Once the form is created, click on “Publish”.

2. Click on “PLATFORMS”, then choose “WordPress.com”.
3. Click on “COPY CODE”.

4. Go back to WordPress.com, create a new Post or Page, select the HTML tab, and paste
the code.

5. Once you’re ready, click on “Publish”. Here’s an example of how a JotForm will appear
at WordPress.com.

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Extra

JotForm also supports autoresponder email, which can be used in conjunction with the
WordPress.com Post by Email feature to automatically post forms to your site. (Note: using
a customized Sender Email instead of the default JotForm ones might prevent Post by Email
to work correctly.)

Forms »Polls

The instructions from this guide are referring to the WP Admin dashboard. You can get to
this dashboard by adding /wp-admin to the end of your site’s url
(e.g.: example.wordpress.com/wp-admin)

Polls are another great way to enhance your blog with an interactive element or feature.
WordPress.com is directly integrated with Polldaddy, a popular online poll creation service,
so adding them to your blog is very easy. Here is an example poll:

Do you use polls?

No
Yes

View Results

You can access all poll functions/options from the Feedback → Polls menu in your
Dashboard.

Creating a New Poll

To add a Polldaddy poll to a post or page, just click on the Add Poll icon above the editor.
If you are using polls for the first time on WordPress.com you will be prompted to create or
import an account. Choose either option and follow the instructions presented to you.

After your account has been set up, you can create a new poll.

Configure the poll options to suit your needs. After you have configured the poll, click
the Save Poll button.



A message will appear at the top letting you know the poll has been created. Click
the Embed Poll button to insert the poll into your post or page.

After publishing the post, the poll will appear on your blog.

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Creating a New Poll by Email

You can also send polls by email using the WordPress Post by Email feature and the
special [poll] shortcode. Full details can be found on the Post by Email support page.

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Inserting an Existing Poll

To insert the poll you’ve already created, click the Add Poll icon above your editor while
creating/editing a post or page.

Then, you will see a list of your polls.

Click on the Embed in Post button to add the poll to your post/page. You can then publish
or update the post/page.

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Adding a Poll to your Sidebar

You can add a Polldaddy poll to your sidebar using a Text Widget. Go to Feedbacks →
Polls from your dashboard, and you will see a list of any polls you have created. Under the
appropriate poll, click on the Embed & Link button.

Copy the code which appears in the WordPress Shortcode field at the top left. You can
then paste this code into a new Text Widget in your sidebar from Appearance →
Widgets.

Important: When adding a poll to your sidebar, you may need to update its design to use
the Narrow style to ensure that it properly fits. You can do this by editing a poll.

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Troubleshooting

Why aren’t my polls showing up?
Each poll can only be displayed once on a post. So, if you have a poll in a post and in the
sidebar, only the first instance of the poll will show. You can show 2 or more different polls
on one post, however.

Forms »Wufoo

Wufoo is an Internet application that helps anybody build amazing online forms. When you
design a form with Wufoo, it automatically builds the database, backend and scripts needed
to make collecting and understanding your data easy, fast and fun.

If you want to use a Wufoo form on your WordPress.com website, you can first create a free
account, and then build your form.

Embedding with a Shortcode

Once you publish your form, you can embed it into your WordPress.com site using a handy
little shortcode. To get the shortcode you first need to find the form you want to embed.
Then click the code button which will take you to the Wufoo Code Manager.

Once there click on the Embed Form Code tab and copy the WordPress shortcode.

The shortcode will look something like this:
[wufoo username="exampleuser" formhash="x7w3w3" autoresize="true"
height="458" header="show"]
Paste the shortcode into the WordPress editor for a post, page or text widget.

Finally publish your post, page or widget to see your Wufoo form in action.

Google AMP (Accelerated
Mobile Pages)

AMP is an open-source framework that allows browsers and apps to load your sites quickly
on mobile devices. Check out the Google AMP site for more details on how it works.

For all WordPress.com sites, AMP is enabled by default. While the main advantage to
Google AMP is a fast-loading mobile experience, your site’s results in Google will be
marked by the AMP badge on mobile-based searches.

For most users, there’s no need to disable AMP; doing so will revert your site to show the
theme’s responsive view to Google, and will remove the AMP badge in search results.
Regular visits to your site from mobile will still show the regular non-AMP responsive
theme; the AMP view is shown only from a mobile visit that originates from the Google
search results.

If you’d still prefer to show the non-AMP version of your site to Google (and potential
visitors to your site), you can disable it using the AMP controller. Clicking on My Sites, and
then choose Settings → Traffic.

Private/Hidden Sites

Google AMP is only available to public sites that are not blocking crawlers; if the AMP box is
not available, please check the Site Privacy setting and set it to Public.

Customization

You can click on Edit Design from the AMP module in your Settings page to alter the
appearance of the AMP version of your posts. Because the AMP spec requires a minimal
page design, you’ll see options to change the Header Text Color, Header Background and
Link Color, and the background color scheme.

Import

Note: Some of the instructions from this guide are referring to the WP Admin dashboard.
You can get to this dashboard by adding /wp-admin to the end of your site’s url (e.g.:
example.wordpress.com/wp-admin)

Importing Content from Another WordPress Blog

To import the content of another WordPress blog into your current site, go to My Site →
Settings and select the Import tab. For the import to work, you’ll need a valid .xml file.
Note that you can also import the content of a self-hosted WordPress blog.

To import content, drag your .xml file in the box

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Importing Content from Another Platform

Note: The instructions from this guide are referring to the WP Admin dashboard. You can
get to this dashboard by adding /wp-admin to the end of your site’s url (e.g.:
example.wordpress.com/wp-admin)

It is possible to import your blog content from a variety of other blogging platforms,
including Medium, Blogger, Israblog, Movable Type, LiveJournal, Tumblr,
Typepad, Xanga and more. To reach the import screen, simply log into your WP Admin
dashboard, then go to Tools → Import, choose your platform and follow the instructions.

Don’t See a Specific Importer for Your Blog’s Service?

For SquareSpace imports, make sure you’ve made an xml export (and confirm the file has
the .xml extension at the end), and use the WordPress importer from your Tools
→ Import screen.

If we do not have an importing tool for your particular platform, you will need to try and
convert it into one of the accepted formats so that you can use the proper importer. This
means you first convert your blog to one of the services mentioned above (such as Blogger),
and then import your blog from Blogger to WordPress.com.

Import »Import from Medium

To import from Medium, first visit the Medium settings page, scroll down to Export
Content, and select Download .zip to start the export process from Medium. You should
receive an email from Medium with an export of your posts in an archive .zip file.

Next, head over to the import tool on WordPress.com and click Start Import in the
Medium row:



This is where you will upload the .zip file you downloaded from Medium. Simply drag the
file into the import window, or manually navigate to it. Click Continue once the file has
been uploaded. The import will take approximately 15 minutes to complete.

You will receive a notification from us when the import completes. All of your Medium
content will now appear as posts on your site under the original date of the post, along with
their original tags. Also, published posts will be automatically marked as published on
the site but drafts will remain unpublished. You can also run the import tool multiple times
to retrieve newer posts without duplicating your old ones.
Happy blogging!

Import »Import from Tumblr

Are you making the switch from Tumblr to WordPress.com? This page explains how to
import your blog in four easy steps.
The instructions from this guide are referring to the WP Admin dashboard. You can get to
this dashboard by adding /wp-admin to the end of your site’s url (e.g.:
example.wordpress.com/wp-admin)

Step One: Sign up for an account at WordPress.com

If you don’t already have an account here on WordPress.com, head over to the home page
and get started!

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Step Two: Authenticate with Tumblr

To bring your Tumblr content to WordPress.com, go to your WordPress.com
blog’s Dashboard (accessible in the drop-down menu under your blog’s name in the admin
bar) and in the left-hand column of the Dashboard, go to Tools → Import.
Choose the Tumblr importer:

That link will begin the import process. Click the “Connect to Tumblr to begin” button:

You will then be directed to your Tumblr account to connect it to WordPress.com (or to the
Tumblr login page if you’re not already logged in at Tumblr):

Once you click Allow, your Tumblr account and WordPress.com account will be connected.

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Step Three: Import your content

The importer will then fetch a list of your Tumblr blogs and let you pick which one to
import. Click Import this blog to get going.

Once you start the import, progress will be shown on the import page and you’ll receive an
email when the import is finished.
We try super hard to make sure that all your Tumblr content, including your videos, are
imported into your WordPress.com blog. Videos you had uploaded to Tumblr are imported

into VideoPress and other embeds are converted to use shortcodes. Sometimes the importer
finds an embed it can’t convert and a list of these is included in the import completion email
for you to check.

If your Tumblr site has a custom domain (like you.com instead of you.tumblr.com), then
you’ll need to disable the custom domain temporarily while the import is processed. You can
do this by going to your Tumblr Dashboard, clicking on the Settings button and then un-
ticking the “Use a Custom Domain” checkbox:

Then you’ll want to set up Domain Mapping on your WordPress.com blog so that your
readers can use the same domain to reach your site as before.

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Step Four: Start using WordPress and create your own unique style

 Learn about WordPress
There’s a great tutorial just for new users coming from Tumblr
at Learn.WordPress.com, which walks you through the basics of setup, importing,
customizing your blog, and posting. There are also tutorials to assist you
with changing your blog title and getting the right look for your blog, as well as more
in-depth topics such as using WordPress on mobile devices.

 Customize your theme and design
You can customize the design of your site by picking one of our post-format-enabled,
Tumblr-ready themes. If you purchase the Custom Design upgrade, you can also

modify your new WordPress.com blog’s colors, fonts and even your CSS if you
choose.
 Post to your blog by email
To post by email, you just need to generate an email address for your blog within
your dashboard and then you can get started right away. Our post by
email document will walk you through the process. You can add galleries, tags,
videos, slideshows, polls, and so much more, all via email!

 Upload or embed other file types

 Add audio to your WordPress.com blog You can add mp3 files to your blog by
in a number of ways; using a handy shortcode, the SoundCloud player, or
alternatively, to upload an audio file directly to your blog’s media library you can
grab the Space Upgrade, included in the WordPress.com
Premium and WordPress.com Business plans.

 Add video to your WordPress.com blog We currently support adding videos
from a variety of sources, such as YouTube, Vimeo, Ted, Flickr and many more.
Furthermore, you can get the VideoPress feature, included in the WordPress.com
Premium and WordPress.com Business plans, which enables you to upload your own
videos directly to your blog.

 WordPress.com has support for a multitude of filetypes. Additionally, you can embed
documents for viewing within your posts using a service like Cloudup.

Import »Import from Xanga

Are you making the switch from Xanga.com to WordPress.com?

This page explains how to import your blog from Xanga to WordPress.com and set things up
just the way you’d like them.

The instructions from this guide are referring to the WP Admin dashboard. You can get to
this dashboard by adding /wp-admin to the end of your site’s url (e.g.:
example.wordpress.com/wp-admin)

Step One: Sign up for an account at WordPress.com

If you don’t already have an account here on WordPress.com, head over to the home page
and get started! You will need to create a WordPress.com username and a blog address for
your Xanga import.

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Step Two: Create a Xanga export file.

Log into Xanga.com and then navigate to your Xanga Dashboard, which should be located
at the following address:
http://xanga.com/wp-admin/index.php
Once there, you will see a page that includes a message about your Xanga archives. It also
includes a download link. Click on the link labeled “Click here to download them!”. You
should receive a .zip file in your downloads.

Double click on, or otherwise extract, the .zip file, which should convert to a folder. Inside
you should have a few files with the .xml extension.

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Step Three: Import your content

To bring your Xanga content to WordPress.com, go to your WordPress.com
blog’s Dashboard (accessible in the drop-down menu under your blog’s name in the admin
bar) and in the left-hand column of the Dashboard, go to Tools → Import. Choose the
“Xanga” option.

Click on the button “Choose File” and find the first of your .xml files from Xanga on your
computer. Once you have chosen the file, click on the button “Upload file and import”.

There will be a short delay (depending on how much content you have), and then you will
receive confirmation of the import. You will then need to do this with each of the
import files you received from Xanga.com, which could be three or more
separate files.

Note: the importer does not work with Internet Explorer 9.0 or previous versions. Please
update your browser or try a different browser (Firefox or Chrome) if you are having
difficulty importing your content.

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Step Four: Start using WordPress and create your own unique style

 Learn about WordPress
There’s a great tutorial just for new users at Learn.WordPress.com, which walks you
through the basics of setup, importing, customizing your blog, and posting. There
are also tutorials to assist you with changing your blog title and getting the right look
for your blog, as well as more in-depth topics such as using WordPress on mobile
devices.

 Customize your theme and design
You can customize the design of your site by picking one of 200+ themes. If you