Thread: Getting started

The first thing to do is to change the administration password to something more memorable, so click the My Profile link in the upper right-hand comer of the page. Scroll down to the Update "'(our Password section, enter and confirm a password and click the Update Profile button. Before creating blog posts, there are many ways to customise Wordpress. Head to the Options section of the blog's administration pages and use the General tab to configure basic options, such as the name and URL of the blog, along with date and time formatting. The options available on the Writing and Reading tabs should be fairly self-explanatory, perhaps with the exception of the Update Services section.



By default, whenever a new blog post is made, Wordpress will automatically notify the Ping-OMatic service, which tells selected other sites when an update or addition has been made to your site. If this is not required, clear the text box at the bottom of the Writing tab and click Update Options. Alternatively, additional notification services can be added to the list to help increase blog exposure - a list of services can be found at. Getting people to visit a blog can be one of the hardest steps. A common strategy to attract visitors is to link to an existing popular blog and ask for a reciprocal link in return blogging friends can prove useful here. Wordpress features a 'blogroll' essentially a list of links that appears in a sidebar and can be easily customised. Move to the Manage Blogroll tab of the Blogroll tab and a list of default blog links will be displayed. This can be edited as required by clicking the associated Edit link, or deleted by clicking Delete. Use the Add Link tab to add custom links and the Categories tab to help keep them organised in groups.