Tips, Expertise, Articles and Advice from the Pro's for Your Website or Blog to Succeed
The following Python 2.7 Calendar program works nicely with a Frame and a Panel, but when
I try to change to change the Frame to an MDIParentFrame and the Panel to an
MDIChildFrame (or MDIClientWindow) I cannot get it to work. I went to this because
I had trouble getting rid of regular frames when exiting prematurely.
Does anyone have have a solid solution for this without moving to Python 3? I have too
much invested in 2.7 code.
Thanks, Robin Randall
The Honeynet Project, a security research organization that focuses on internet risk mediation, has collaborated in the creation of a new open-source intelligence (OSINT) tool that collates threat information from a multitude of sources. This new resource dubbed Intel Owl provides developers access via API to the resulting threat analysis data.
Every day, the ProgrammableWeb team is busy, updating its three primary directories for APIs, clients (language-specific libraries or SDKs for consuming or providing APIs), and source code samples.
Yesterday, Automattic dropped version 4.4 of its popular WooCommerce plugin. The new release is a minor update with the biggest changes around the plugin’s blocks and coupon management in the admin. Two dozen people made 450 contributions to the release.
The WooCommerce team brought several updates to the plugin’s blocks. The biggest user-facing change is that the blocks will now use the WooCommerce thumbnail size instead of loading the full-sized image. This change means that images will respect the product image size settings that users can set via the WooCommerce > Product Images section in the customizer. This change will make sites using blocks more performant.
The block editor should be slightly speedier with this update. The team removed front end scripts that were not needed from the post-editing screen.
WooCommerce also updated its flagship theme, Storefront, yesterday. There is nothing in the release notes to suggest that the update corresponds with changes in WooCommerce 4.4, but it is a good idea for users to stay updated regardless.
In WooCommerce 4.1, the team added a new Marketing section in the WordPress admin. When it was initially launched, some users felt like WooCommerce had added a top-level menu item for little more than the purposes of upselling its extensions. The single admin screen also offered links backed to the WooCommerce knowledge base. Many comments on the launch of the marketing hub asked the team to reconsider making it a top-level menu item, at least until it offered something more than upsells and links back to the WooCommerce website.
Having a centralized marketing location in the WordPress admin makes sense for eCommerce websites though. Creating an online shop is only one part of the process. Successful stores need to have a marketing focus, and WooCommerce is seeking to create an experience that helps more store owners become successful.
While it is a minor change, moving the coupons screen to the marketing hub makes sense. For those end-users who make use of coupons, it should very much be a part of their marketing plan.
WooCommerce 4.4 still has the legacy coupons screen beneath the standard WooCommerce menu. However, clicking on the old link will generate an admin notice that migrates users to the new location. The notice provides a button to remove the legacy admin menu item.
Gary Murray, the Product Focus and Lead for WooCommerce, said the team had larger plans beyond the initial marketing hub in the announcement post. Coupons are merely a second stage in the longer-term roadmap. “Think automations, campaigns, customer segmentation, coupon management, marketing focused analytics, and reporting,” he wrote. While the roadmap for the marketing hub is not public, it will be interesting to see what tools the team adds in future iterations of the plugin.
Hi Guys,
I have been surfing the internet looking for a prompt app dev software because I have seen one of Appoly's and Red C's mobile applications which looked amazing.
I am currently creating a sports app that provides quizzes and information on athletes.
What would be the best mobile application software?
I’ve recently found myself reaching for Eleventy (aka 11ty) above all other tools when I want to develop a website. It’s hard to beat a static site generator that provides advanced templating opportunities while otherwise getting out of your way and allowing you to just create.
One of those sites is Style Stage, a modern CSS showcase styled by community contributions. Eleventy was perfect for this community-driven project in several ways:
The number one reason Eleventy is a great choice for creating a community-driven site is the ability to dynamically create site pages from data sources. We’ll review how to use this feature and more when we create our sample community site.
In the not-so-distant past, creating a community-driven site could potentially be a painful process involving CMS nightmares trying to create contributor workflows. Armed with Eleventy and a few other modern tools, this is now nearly fully automatable with a minimum of oversight.
Before we get to inviting contributors, we’ve got some work to do ourselves.
This will guide a lot of the other decisions. In the case of using Eleventy for Style Stage, I created a JSON file that contributors can use to create pull requests to modify and provide their own relevant metadata that’s used to create their pages.
Perhaps you also want to allow access to include additional assets, or maybe it makes sense to have multiple data files for the ease of categorizing and querying data. Or maybe contributors are able to add Markdown files within a particular directory.
Consider the scope of what contributors can modify or submit, and weigh that against an estimate of your availability to review submissions. This will help enable a successful, manageable community.
GitHub actions can make it possible to label or close a pull request with invalid files if you need advanced automated screening of incoming content.
Spending time upfront to think through your guidelines can help with your overall plan. You may identify additional needed features, or items that can be automated.
Once your guidelines are prepared, it’s best to include them in a special file in your GitHub repository called CONTRIBUTING.md. The all-caps filename is the expected format. Having this file creates an automatic extra link for contributors when they are creating their pull request or issues in a prompt that ask them to be sure they’ve reviewed the guidelines:
How to handle content licensing and author attribution are things that fall into this category. For example, Style Stage releases contributed stylesheets under the CC BY-NC-SA license but authors retain copyright over original graphics. As part of the build process, the license and author attribution are appended to the styles, and the authors attribution metadata is updated within the style page template.
You’ll also want to consider policies around acceptable content and what would cause submissions to be rejected. Style Stage states that:
Submissions will be rejected for using obscene, excessively violent, or otherwise distasteful imagery, violating the above guidelines, or other reasons at the discretion of the maintainer.
While Eleventy takes care of the site build, the other key players enabling Style Stage contributions are Netlify and GitHub.
Contributors submit a pull request to the Style Stage repo on GitHub and, when they do, Netlify creates a deploy preview. This allows contributors to verify that their submission works as expected, and saves me time as the maintainer by not having to pull down submissions to ensure they meet the guidelines.
All discussion takes place through GitHub. This has the added advantage of public accountability which helps dissuade bad actors.
If the contributor needs to make a change, they can update their pull request or request a re-deploy of the branch preview if it’s a remote asset that has changed. This re-deploy is a very small manual step, and it may not be needed for every PR — or even at all, depending on how you accept contributions.
The last step is the final approval of the PR and merging into the main branch. Once the pull request is merged, Netlify immediately deploys the changes to production.
Eleventy is, of course, a static site generator, and several hosts offer webhooks to trigger a build. Netlify’s build plugins are a good example of that. But if you need to refresh data more often than each time a PR is merged, one option is to use IFTTT or Zapier to set up daily deploys, or deploys based on a variety of other triggers.
It’s worth noting that what we’re talking about here does limit your contributor audience to having a GitHub account. However, GitHub contributions can be done entirely via the web interface, so it’s very possible to provide guidance so that other users — even those who don’t code — can still participate.
The first consideration here is to decide how critical it is for contributors to know about updates to your site by evaluating the likely impact of the change.
In the case of Style Stage, the core will be unchanging, but there is some planned optional functionality. I went with a weekly(-ish) newsletter. That way, it is something folks can opt into and there is value for contributors and users alike.
Matthew Ström’s “Using Netlify Forms and Netlify Functions to Build an Email Sign-Up Widget” is a great place to learn how to add subscribers to your newsletter with a static form in Eleventy. It also covers a function for sending the subscriber’s email to Buttondown, a lightweight email service. For an example of how to manage your Buttondown email template and content in Eleventy, review the Style Stage setup which shows how to exclude the newsletter from the published site build.
If you’re only expecting low priority updates, then GitHub’s repo notifications might be sufficient for communication. Creating releases is another way to go. Or, hey, it’s even possible to to incorporate notifications on the site itself.
Style Stage was an idea that I vetted by tossing out a poll on Twitter. I then put out a “call for contributors” and engaged with responders as well as those who retweeted me. A short timeline also helped find motivated contributors who helped Style Stage avoid launching without any submissions. Many of those contributors became evangelists that introduced Style Stage to even more people. I also promoted a launch livestream which doubled as promotional material.
This is what it means to “engage” with contributors. Creating avenues for engagement and staying engaged with them helps turn casual contributors into “fans” who encourage others to participate.
Remember that the site content is a great place to encourage participation! Style Stage dedicates its entire page to encouraging submissions. If that’s not possible for you, then you might consider using prompts for contributions where it makes sense.
Finally, ensure that your repository is published publicly and that it includes applicable “community health” files. These are meant to be documents that help establish guidelines, set good expectations with community members, define a code of conduct, and other information that contribute to the overall “health” of the community. There are a bunch of examples, suggestions and tips on how to do this in the GitHub docs.
While there are a half dozen files noted in the documentation, in my experience so far, the three files you’ll need at minimum are:
README.md file at the root of the project that includes the project’s name and a good description of what it is. GitHub will display the contents below the list of files in the repo.CONTRIBUTING.md file that describes the submission process for contributions. Be explicit as far as what steps are involved and what constitutes a “good” submission.Oh, and having a branch protection rule on the main branch is another good idea. You can do this by going to Settings → Branches from the repo and selecting the “Add rule” option. “Require pull request reviews before merging” and “Require review from Code Owners” are the two key settings to enable. You can check the GitHub docs to learn more about this protection.
What we covered here is a starting point for creating a community-driven site with Eleventy. The point is that there are several things that need to be considered before we jump straight into code. Communities need care and that requires a few steps that help establish an engaged and healthy community.
You’re probably getting anxious to start coding a community site with Eleventy! Well, that’s coming up in the next installment of this two-parter. Together, we’ll develop an Eleventy starter from scratch that you can extend for your own community (or personal) site.
The post A Community-Driven Site with Eleventy: Preparing for Contributions appeared first on CSS-Tricks.
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The other day I stumbled upon this fantastic animation by Akram Khalid which he also coded up as part of a tutorial on page transitions with React Router and Framer Motion. The GitHub repo can be found here. It’s a really beautiful design and I wanted to have a go on experimenting with it and animating the initial thumbnail view to a full image (with article), using only scale transforms.
I also wanted to add some smooth scrolling and on-scroll animations, so I’ve used Locomotive Scroll. The beautiful images are by DeMorris Byrd.
This is highly experimental and it turned out to be a complex process. But I hope it gives you some of sort idea and entry point of how to pull off these kind of animations without touching the width and height of an element.
The main idea behind this technique is to scale an element and then counter-scale the child. Paul Lewis and Stephen McGruer show how to do that on a menu using expand and collapse animations. Avoiding animating the width and height of an element helps keep performance in check.
So what we do is to initially set the scale of the content__intro wrapper to a value that will make it shrink to an exact size. Then we set a counter scale to the image. This will make the image maintain the same size as before. Then, we add another scale to the image, shrinking it also the to the target size.
<div class="content__intro content__breakout">
<img class="content__intro-img" src="img/1.jpg" alt="Some image" />
</div>Having the initial width and height of an element and also the target dimensions, we can calculate the scale values of the outer wrapper based on this:
let introTransform = {
scaleX: imageSettings.imageWidthEnd / imageSettings.imageWidthStart,
scaleY: imageSettings.imageHeightEnd / imageSettings.imageHeightStart,
y: (winsize.height/2 - introRect.top) - introRect.height/2
};We also move the element to be centered on the screen (y).
We define these initial (start) and target (end) dimensions as variable in our CSS:
body {
...
--image-height-start: 555px;
--image-width-end: 260px;
--image-height-end: 320px;
}Our starting width is 100% of the viewport width, so we don’t need to set that here. The image will then have the following scale applied:
gsap.set(this.DOM.introImg, {
scaleX: 1/introTransform.scaleX * imageSettings.imageWidthEnd / this.DOM.introImg.clientWidth,
scaleY: 1/introTransform.scaleY * imageSettings.imageHeightEnd / this.DOM.introImg.clientHeight
});1/introTransform.scaleX is the counter scale of the outer wrapper. The second value that we multiply makes sure that we scale the image down to our desired size, just like we did with the outer wrapper before.
And that’s the main idea behind the scaling magic.
I hope this gives you a starting point for these kind of tricky animations! Thank you for checking it out 
The post Thumbnail to Full Width Image Animation appeared first on Codrops.
We have compiled a huge collection of amazing CSS effects for you to check out. Have a look and use these examples to help you learn the nitty-gritty details so you can create more beautiful and engaging web sites. When you’re done, you can also take a look at our other articles on CSS effects for even more ideas. Enjoy!
This awesome website consists of more than 100 different CSS effects like 2D transitions, background transitions, icon CSS effects, border transitions, shadow and glow transitions, speech bubble CSS effects, and cool CSS curl effects. Check it out!
You will find more than 50 CSS animation examples on this simple website. Text CSS animation effects like bouncing, fading, flipper, zoom entrances, and more.
Use the basic features of CSS3 Transform: rotate. And the combination of Javascript frameworks like jQuery can produce a cool CSS3 clock.
Analogue clock created using webkit transition and transform CSS. JavaScript is only used to pull in the current time.
You can use up, down, left, and right keys to navigate the 3D cube. This 3D cube is built using -webkit-perspective, -webkit-transform and -webkit-transition.
Multiple 3D Cubes using CSS3 and proprietary “transform” and “transition” properties. I thought it was amazing. You can see the writing on the 3D object.
An accordion effect using only CSS. Proprietary animation in WebKit based browsers.
Auto-Scrolling Parallax is an animated parallax effect using WebKit’s CSS transition property, no need for JavaScript.
Isocube is like 3DCube but a little different. Isocube can load images on one side.
The Matrix is one of the best sci-fi films of all time. CSS3 capable of making such an amazing animated film made
Seven examples of alternatives to the Javascript effect using CSS3. Various effects such as Fade Block, Block Pulsate, Nudge, Expand Block, Block Bounce, Spin Block, and Accordion are covered here.
Image Hover Effects is an example of using CSS to replace Javascript. The image will shrink when you put your mouse pointer on top of it.
Polaroid Gallery is animated pile of photographs utilizing a ton of new CSS3 commands. It’s interesting to watch: when your mouse cursor is above an image, it will enlarge.
Take a list of links and change them into an OS X icon dock. It’s nothing short of amazing.
With CSS3 effects and property Drop In Modals, you can make quick animations and subtle design cues.
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The vinyl effect can be created by using CSS3 transitions and a little HTML. This can make for a standard album cover with an eye-catching style
Polaroids lets you display images in boxes that are shuffled and spun as though lying in a pile. It relies on CSS3 techniques to create. You can also insert text and an alt attribute.
Animated Rocket uses CSS effects to transform the appearance of an element in the browser, by moving, rotating, or through other means.
Poster Circle. is an animated spinning column consisting of a row of colored boxes and text . The overall effect is cool and undeniably dizzying.
Morphing Cubes can be used to display your most interesting content using 3D transformations, animations, and transitions.
This is the example of another Polaroid Gallery. Piles of images appear at random and when the cursor hovers over an image, it enlarges.
When the cursor moves, it’s like a lamp spotlight leading up to the writing and casts a shadow.
Colorful Clock is a colorful jQuery & CSS3 effect for creating countdowns or timers.
Lightbox Gallery is an awesome image gallery which leverages the latest CSS3 and jQuery techniques. Lightbox Gallery uses jQuery, jQuery UI (for the drag and drop) and the fancybox jQuery plugin for lightbox display capability in addition to PHP and CSS for interactivity and styling.
Elastic Thumbnail Menu is an alternative method for smoothing the menu, in particular by increasing the menu items when the mouse is hovering over it.
This animation mimics Apple’s style and combines CSS transformations and jQueryUI. This one truly animates between two half states, resulting in a slider like that featured in iTunes.
DJ Hero uses an interesting combination of CSS3 with jQuery. You can use on-screen controls to control the pace.
This effect features a dynamic stack of index cards that simply use HTML and CSS3 features such as change and transition (for the dynamic effects) and the @ font-face, box-shadow and border-radius (for styling).
This is an example of another image gallery that uses the CSS3 transforms property and property transitions.
CSS3 animation can also be used in the package list price of a product. Animated Column Pricing can be applied in such cases.
Slick jQuery Menu is achieved through a combination of CSS3 and jQuery.
CSS animation can animate almost any property on the item and do funny things, such as rotate and tilt.
Like Autumn. Animated falling leaves are made using CSS3.
This is an image gallery with a rotating build with CSS transform transitions and CSS features. To see the effects of rotation, click the small image
Dropdown Menu is a very nice navigation menu made using the CSS3 transition property.
Star Wars opening crawl, using only HTML & CSS. It only works in Snow Leopard in Safari 4.0.4 and the WebKit.
This is another fisheye that uses CSS3.
The first demonstration requires you to keep clicking the image to see the next frame, and it wraps around to the start when you reach the last frame. The second demonstration just needs you to keep the mouse moving over the image in MOST browsers. But the BIG drawback to this method is that the speed of movement of the mouse governs the speed of animation.
This AT-AT Walker is not flash-based but only CSS3. Amazing!
Now that most browsers support the majority of the features CSS3 offers, it’s important for developers to catch up and be aware of the power of CSS3. Photoshop and JavaScript are slowly losing their significance because it’s become possible to echo the same results with just a few lines of code easier and faster than ever.
The techniques that were new a year ago have become standard now. CSS3 is evolving fast and for that reason we’ve prepared 50 cool CSS3 tutorials.
The idea in this tutorial is to rotate a part of a sentence. You’ll be “exchanging” certain words of that sentence using CSS animations.
In this tutorial you’ll walk through texturizing type from scratch – beginning with basic HTML and CSS, then creating a semi-transparent texture in Photoshop and implementing it on some headline text within a web page. You’ll finish it off by adding some extra CSS and JavaScript love.
While CSS3 allows us to rotate letters, it is quite complicated to arrange each letter along a curved path. Arctext.js is a jQuery plugin that let’s you do exactly that. Based on Lettering.js, it calculates the right rotation of each letter and distributes the letters equally across the imaginary arc of the given radius. This is not a tutorial but you can play with the plugin, break it down and learn new techniques.
In this tutorial you are going to look at some of the new CSS3 features for dealing with text colors.
With CSS3, a whole host of text shadow effects are available for us to play with. In this article, you’ll see some of the effects you can make with relatively little CSS code.
Implement a subtle texture over text with just a few lines of code.
The word-wrap property has been removed from the CSS3 spec but other related properties have been added. Find out what they are and how to use them.
In this tutorial you will learn how to code a pure CSS3 navigation dropdown menu.
You probably have already seen animated menus with the LavaLamp effect (based on jQuery plugin). In this tutorial you’ll learn how to repeat the same behavior using only CSS3.
Using hidden inputs and labels, you will create a CSS-only accordion that will animate the content areas on opening and closing.
This tutorial will show you how to create a content navigator with CSS only. The idea is to have several slides or content layers that will be shown or hidden using the :target pseudo-class.
This tutorial will show you how to create a pure CSS3 content accordion. This will work on all browsers and devices that support the :target selector.
In the last few years, we’ve seen a lot of single page websites, most of them using JavaScript for some transition effects. This tutorial teaches you how you can have your own, but instead using CSS transitions and the :target property to do all the magic.
In this tutorial, you will create an image accordion that will expand an item on click. Using the sibling combinators and a nested structure you can control the opening of the items/slides with radio buttons.
Thanks to CSS3, we can create effects and animations without using JavaScript. We must be careful to avoid abusing CSS3 because old browsers do not support all of its properties. In any case, we all see the potential of CSS3, and this article will discuss how to create an infinitely looping slider of images using only CSS3 animation.
Recreate Orman Clark’s Vertical Navigation Menu with CSS3 and jQuery while using the minimum amount of images possible.
In this article you’ll learn how to build some new CSS3 and jQuery tabs inspired by Google Play‘s design.
In this tutorial you’ll learn how to create an interactive menu using CSS3 goodness and jQuery’s power.
This tutorial will show you how to create an accordion menu using CSS3. There are many CSS3 accordion tutorials around on the web, this version is using the :target pseudo-class and works on browsers that support the CSS3 properties.
In this tutorial you will be creating a slider with “Nivo Slider jQuery Script” and CSS3.
A breadcrumb navigation allow users to know where they are in a hierarchical structure and navigate back to higher-level pages. In this tutorial you’ll learn how to create your own cool CSS3 breadcrumbs.
CSS3 Responsive Slider is, as the name implies, a responsive CSS3 slider without Javascript. The actual slider is much like any JavaScript slider. It floats all of the content areas (articles) next to each other. Not a tutorial but you should check out this awesome slider.
In this tutorial, you’ll learn how to build a teaser page using just CSS, no images or even a Photoshop design.
Timeline is a jQuery plugin specializing in showing a chronological series of events. You can embed all kinds of media including tweets, videos, and maps, and associate them with a date. Learn how to tweak the template with some CSS3 tricks.
A product page is any page on your website that showcases a product. It has to describe its features, have some screenshots, and be descriptive. Learn how to create one with CSS3 and a little touch of jQuery.
Hopefully you’re familiar with the use of the :before and :after pseudo-elements in order to create some interesting effects with CSS. This tutorial will show you how you can create a simple “stacked” look to some images.
This tutorial will teach you how to create this pricing table with the CSS scaling effects. Improve a look of a PSD just by using CSS.
In this tutorial, you are going to create two HTML5 forms that will switch between login and registration using the CSS3 pseudo class:target.
If you’re about to launch a new web product or you just need to improve the user experience for an existing web form, then this tutorial is for you.
A tutorial on how to create a fullscreen slideshow with a twist: the idea is to slice open the current slide when navigating to the next or previous one. Using jQuery and CSS animations you can create unique slide transitions.
In this tutorial you’ll be creating Premium Pixels’ Tagtastic Tag Cloud. As an experiment in alternative approaches, you’ll create the tags using gradients, shadows, and (most importantly) CSS transforms, which will form the point of each tag. After completion you’ll have to even take a step further and cater for IE.
In this tutorial you’re going to code up Orman Clark’s Elegant Login Form using CSS3 and HTML5, plus some of Dan Eden’s CSS Animations to Embellish the Experience.
Create a sleek and functional video player using HTML5 and CSS3.
This tutorial will show you how to create a fancy image gallery with CSS3 transitions. The techniques used are mainly CSS3 transitions combined with CSS :hover pseudo-class.
Making media display consistently on your site can be a problem, especially with multiple content authors. Opera’s Chris Mills shows you how object-fit and object-position can solve it.
Using the general sibling combinator and the :checked pseudo-class, you can toggle states of other elements by checking a checkbox or a radio button. This tutorial will be exploring those CSS3 properties by creating a experimental portfolio filter that will toggle the states of items of a specific type.
In this tutorial, you’ll learn how to create an animated 3D bouncing ball using only CSS3 transitions, animations, and shadow effects.
Have you ever seen a website showcasing image thumbnails that are slightly rotated? It’s a simple effect that adds a layer of visual personality. That said, if you’re not achieving the rotation effect with CSS, you’re working too hard. Learn how to do it right!
In this tutorial you will be driven through the basics of rotating in three dimensions and will combine these transforms with the scale and translate transforms for more complex results. You will also add a basic level of interaction to animate the effects as the user interacts with the page.
This tutorial will show you how to create a neat thumbnail proximity effect with jQuery. The idea is to scale thumbnails when hovering over them and also scale their neighboring thumbnails proportionally to their distance. You’ll also make a description appear.
This tutorial will show you a quick and easy way to incorporate a shine effect transition to your images with CSS3, useful in making your user interface elements look like they’re a real Polaroid photo.
Learn how to style the image element with CSS3 inset box-shadow and border-radius so it works for responsive design.
In this tutorial you’ll learn how to use some fancy techniques like how to incorporate icon fonts into a design and how to insert objects using pseudo elements.
create a direction-aware hover effect using CSS3 and jQuery. The idea is to slide in an overlay from the direction we are moving with the mouse.
In this beginner tutorial you will be making some cool CSS3 buttons.
Enhance required fields in a form with this little effect. The idea is to allow better visibility for obligatory fields while de-emphasizing optional ones.
Create an animated bird that animates each time you hover it. This is a very simple CSS3 trick and doesn’t require any advanced knowledge of HTML or CSS.
CSS3 Multi Column Module is perhaps one of the most interesting and exciting things that has happened to CSS in a long time. It’s not a gimmick or design trick like box-shadow or animation. It’s a real, tangible device which we can use to make designing websites easier. Check out what it does and see examples.
In this article you’ll learn how to add some CSS3 fine tuning to your ordered lists, using a semantic approach.
This tutorial will show you how to show product information with cube style using CSS3 3D Transform.
Editor’s note: This post was last updated on August 19, 2020
WordPress is the world’s most popular website builder. It allows you to easily create websites, blogs, eCommerce stores and more.
If you have been wondering what is WordPress, how does it work, and what you can use it for, then you are in the right place.
In this beginner’s guide, we will explain what is WordPress, how you can use it, and answer some of the most frequently asked questions about WordPress.
WordPress is a website builder and content management system. It is an open source software that anyone can use to make any kind of website imaginable.
It started out as a blogging platform in 2003 but soon transformed into a CMS and later a full-fledged website building platform. Today it powers more than 38% of all websites on the internet.
To learn more about its evolution, see our complete guide on the history of WordPress and how it changed over time.
To summarize, WordPress is a software that you can use to build blogs, websites, and stores to sell products online.
In this article, when we say WordPress we are talking about WordPress.org.
WordPress.com is a separate website that offers website and blog hosting service. It was launched by the WordPress co-founder, Matt Mullenweg.
Most beginners often confuse the two due to their similar names.
WordPress.org is the open-source software used by millions of websites (including WPBeginner). On the other hand, WordPress.com is a website and blog hosting platform.
For more details, see our guide on the difference between WordPress.org vs WordPress.com.
You need a web hosting account and a domain name to start using WordPress.
All websites need web hosting. It is the place where all your website files are stored, so that others on the internet can access your website.
A domain name is your website’s address on the internet (example, wpbeginner.com).
If your website was a house then web hosting will be the building you live in and domain name would be your street address. For more on this topic, see our beginner’s guide on the difference between web hosting and domain name.
To get a web hosting account, you’ll need to sign up with a WordPress hosting provider. These are third-party companies that sell hosting solutions.
We recommend using Bluehost. They are one of the largest hosting companies in the world and an officially recommended WordPress hosting provider.
Normally, a domain name costs $14.99 per year and web hosting starts from $7.99 per month.
Bluehost is offering WPBeginner users a discount on hosting with a free domain name. Basically, you can get started for just $2.75 per month.
→ Click Here to Claim This Exclusive Bluehost Offer ←
For step by step instruction, see our complete guide on how to make a website it will walk you through complete WordPress set up.
You can make any kind of website imaginable using WordPress.
Users from all over the world use WordPress to make money online. It is flexible enough to run eCommerce operations and simple enough to quickly make small websites.
The following are just some types of websites you can make using WordPress.
Once you have installed WordPress, you’ll see an easy to use dashboard with links to different areas in the left column. From here, you can create pages for your website or write blog posts.
You can also choose a website design template (Theme) for your website. There are thousands of free WordPress themes that you can choose from. You can also choose premium WordPress theme that comes with more advanced features.
All these WordPress themes allow you to set up your website using a simple theme customizer interface. From here you can edit and customize your site design.
But the real power of WordPress comes from the plugins.
WordPress plugins are like apps for your website. Similar to the apps you install on your phone, WordPress plugins allow you to add new features to your website.
For instance, you can add a contact form to your site, or display a lightbox popup to announce a sale.
You can convert your site into an online store using plugins like WooCommerce, or use a membership plugin to make a subscription-based website.
There are 56000+ free WordPress plugins in the WordPress plugin directory alone. There are also premium WordPress plugins that offer full support and guaranteed updates.
You can see some of the best WordPress plugins hand-picked by our expert team to help you grow your WordPress site.
Note: If you want to see how WordPress works behind the scenes from a technical point of view, then please check out our infographic on how WordPress works.
WordPress is not just for beginners. It is used by many of the fortune 500 companies, universities, non-profits, governments around the world, and more.
The following are some of the top brands and organizations that are using WordPress.
The official website of the White House is built using WordPress. It features a large header on the top followed by the latest updates, news, and resources.
Facebook uses WordPress for their corporate website. It is a typical business website with a homepage showcasing key characteristics of the brand along with its flagship products. It also has a blog section called the Newsroom.
New York Times uses WordPress on its corporate website showcasing the company behind the iconic newspaper.
Microsoft uses WordPress to run their blogs website. It features company news, information, and product highlights.
Sony Music is one of the biggest music producers in the world representing top artists and labels. They use WordPress to power their corporate website.
To see a full list, check out our complete list on the most popular brands using WordPress.
Now, if you are thinking about starting a blog or a small business website, then you may be wondering why you should use WordPress as your website platform?
There are dozens of website builders and potential WordPress alternatives on the market that you can use to make your website. However, we believe that WordPress is the best platform for beginners and small businesses.
This is why over 38% of all websites use WordPress.
But here are just some of the reasons to choose WordPress for your website.
1. WordPress gives you the freedom
WordPress is free (as in freedom) and open-source software. Anyone can use it to create and launch a website. It is not owned by a single company, and it is protected by the WordPress Foundation, a non-profit organization.
This means you have complete freedom to use it in any way you see fit. You will have full control and complete ownership of your website and all of its content.
2. WordPress is easy
One of the reasons that make WordPress the #1 website builder is that it is incredibly easy to use.
There is a slight learning curve when you familiarize yourself with the software, but most beginners pass it quickly and easily manage their own websites.
Pro Tip: See our guide on how to learn WordPress for free in a week.
There is also a ton of free WordPress help and support available. You can ask questions on any tech community website and you’ll find answers from other users who started out just like you.
You can also join our WPBeginner Facebook Group to ask all your WordPress related questions and get free help from our experts and other WPBeginner users.
3. WordPress is super-flexible
WordPress allows you to use third-party themes and plugins. This means you can choose from thousands of professionally designed templates for your website.
Using plugins, you can add any feature to your WordPress website. Most of them are available for free, but you can also purchase premium plugins to get priority support from developers.
There are drag & drop WordPress page builder plugins that lets you completely customize your design and make custom templates without writing any code.
4. WordPress is multilingual
WordPress is fully translated into more than 65 languages. You can easily choose your website language during the installation or change it from the settings page.
You can keep the WordPress admin area in one language and create a website in another language. You can also use a WordPress multilingual plugin to create a website in multiple languages.
WordPress themes and plugins can also be translated and many of the top WordPress plugins are already translated into many languages.
5. WordPress is cost effective
With proprietary website builders and hosted platforms, you have to pay a monthly fee for a fixed set of features.
With WordPress, you pay a monthly fee for hosting and add any feature to your website using plugins. Most of them are free or have free alternatives, which gives you the freedom to control the cost of your WordPress website.
Once your website starts growing and making money, then you can spend on upgrading your hosting service or buying premium WordPress themes and plugins.
For more reasons, see our article on why you should use WordPress.
We made WPBeginner to help WordPress beginners. Since 2009, we have helped millions of beginners get started with WordPress and have been answering WordPress related questions every day.
Here are some of the most frequently asked WordPress questions that we hear from beginners.
1. Why is WordPress available for free?
WordPress is an open-source software available for anyone to use. It is free (as in freedom), but there are other costs involved. For instance, you’ll need WordPress hosting and domain name to make your website.
For a more detailed explanation, see our article Why is WordPress free which explains the philosophy behind free software and WordPress.
2. What are the disadvantages of using WordPress?
Like everything else in the world, there are pros and cons to using WordPress. We have mentioned the advantages in detail, and they are enough to outweigh any disadvantages. However, here are some of the cons of using WordPress.
3. How can I learn WordPress?
WordPress is easy to learn, and there are a lot of learning material out there. You can learn WordPress right here on WPBeginner.
We are the largest WordPress resource site for beginners in the world. All of WPBeginner resources are available for free.
For beginners, we recommend starting out with our WordPress video tutorials. It is a series of videos that walks you through WordPress basics and how to manage your website like a total pro.
Our WordPress glossary section explains all the technical WordPress terminology in plain English for beginners.
You can also find answers to your WordPress questions by clicking on the search icon at the top.
Need a little more help from real users? Join our WPBeginner Facebook group to get answers from other WordPress users and our experts. It’s free to join, and there are over 50,000 members.
You can also subscribe to our YouTube Channel for regular WordPress video tutorials and guides (over 500 free video tutorials).
4. Which WordPress hosting company to choose?
You’ll need WordPress hosting to start your website, and there are thousands of them out there. Due to fierce competition in the hosting industry, it becomes quite confusing for beginners to make up their minds.
Don’t worry, we did the research for you. You can read about it in our complete WordPress hosting guide for beginners.
For beginners, we recommend starting with Bluehost. They are offering a generous discount and a free domain name.
More importantly, they are one of the biggest names in the business and an officially recommended WordPress hosting provider.
If you have a slightly larger budget to afford premium hosting, then we recommend SiteGround or WP Engine.
5. How do I start a WordPress website?
Getting started with WordPress is easy. You can simply follow our step by step tutorial on how to make a WordPress website for detailed instructions.
It will walk you through the whole process, and you’ll be up and running with a brand new WordPress website in no time.
If you need assistance, you can take advantage of our free WordPress blog setup service, where our expert team will setup your WordPress blog for free, without any costs.
We hope this article explained what is WordPress, and how you can use it. You may also want to see our guide on things to do after installing WordPress, or head over to check out these practical online business ideas that you can start with WordPress right away.
If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.
The post What is WordPress? A Beginner’s Guide (FAQs + Pros and Cons) appeared first on WPBeginner.
In just one week since WordPress 5.5 was released, the Enable jQuery Migrate Helper plugin has passed 10,000 active installs, as users look for a fix for broken sites. The plugin was developed by the WordPress Core team to mitigate jQuery-related problems users may face after updating to 5.5. WordPress has removed jQuery Migrate 1.4.1, but many themes and plugins are now broken because they use outdated/deprecated jQuery functions that relied on the script.
The official support forums are inundated with reports of broken sites after updating to 5.5, as most users who don’t follow core development are not aware that jQuery Migrate has been deprecated. Because it’s related to jQuery, many of the sites have very visible problems or broken functionality that prevents users from doing things like viewing and editing content. Those who are still using the Classic Editor have been particularly hardest hit by the 5.5 update, since older plugins that hook into the old editor are more likely to be using deprecated jQuery functions.
The Enable jQuery Migrate Helper plugin has racked up 34 five-star reviews, as it instantly fixes most users’ problems:
“After updating to 5.5 my hero slider images disappeared and this plugin fixed the problem immediately.”
“After updating to WordPress 5.5 my edit a post page and several other things ended up breaking despite having all plugins and my theme updated. This plugin fixed my issue!”
“As a newspaper, not being able to see the content of our posts is a pretty big deal. This fixed it. Thank you.”
The plugin gives users time to figure out which themes or plugins are causing the problems and request the authors of those extensions to update them for compatibility with the latest version of WordPress.
One user, David Halchester, reported a problem with a vanishing navigation menu to the support forums before discovering the Enable jQuery Migrate Helper plugin.
“Voila,” Halchester said in his review. “It worked like magic. My beautiful custom page is working again. That said — if WP does not want to lose customers, it needs to make sure its updates are compatible with older sites.
“Thank you to the people who created this plug-in. I just saved myself about $300 or more in fees to have someone ‘fix’ it.”
He makes a solid point about the plugin saving users’ money that might otherwise have gone to developers to fix the problem. For those who discover the plugin as a fix, it only costs them the time and frustration of seeking help from their hosting company or volunteers on the support forums. Others who may not be as persistent will likely have to pay for professional troubleshooting.
Justin Tadlock published a post last week that outlines WordPress’ three-stage plan for updating jQuery to the latest version. The plan outlines how a new version of jQuery Migrate will be added in WordPress 5.6 to help users update from jQuery 1.12.4 to 3.5.1 (or later). The tentative plan is to remove the script once more in WordPress 5.7, which is expected in 2021.
In the meantime, the Enable jQuery Migrate Helper plugin functions as a temporary bandaid. Looking ahead towards the prospect of opt-in automatic updates for major Core releases, which is expected to land in WordPress 5.6, it will be important to consider how wide-reaching these breaking changes can be along to path to updating jQuery, especially for those hanging back with the Classic Editor plugin.
