WP 101 – Exercises

WordPress 101 Exercises

These exercises should take about 30 minutes.

Notes before you begin:

Please verify that the website you will request access to upon completing this course does run on WordPress.

Browsers

The following web browsers are supported on WordPress

• Microsoft Internet Explorer versions: 9, 10, 11
• Mozilla Firefox versions: ESR 31, 33, 34, 35
• Google Chrome versions: 37, 38, 39

Apple Safari versions (Mac OS X Only): 6.x, 7.x, 8.0.x

We encourage users to access their WordPress sites via Chrome, Firefox or Safari. Although Internet Explorer is supported, it can sometimes cause issues when editing pages.

Accessing WordPress

You can connect to WordPress and these exercises anywhere you have an internet connection. However, if you are off campus and/or out of the Vanderbilt network, you’ll need to log in via the Vanderbilt VPN. Instructions for setting up a VPN client are on the VUIT website.

Getting Started

1. Open a ticket and request a user account on the WordPress test environment
2. Access will be granted in 24-48 hours – look for an email from Vanderbilt Web Communications.

After You’ve Received WordPress 101 Access

Step 1: Log into WordPress

1. Go to the WP 101 sandbox
   (If the site does not load, verify that you are connected directly to the Vanderbilt network or via VPN. More details are in the “Accessing WordPress” section posted above.
   Browser security notice – Until the WP101 course is live and out of development, you may receive a security notice when attempting to access the site for the first time. Ignore this notice and confirm the security exception. More instructions can be found in the WP 101 Exercises – Before you start page)
2. Log in using the copyright symbol
   
3. Enter in your login credentials (your VUnetID and ePassword)
   

Step 2: Create and edit a Page

1. Create a new page
   Go to Pages in the left menu. Click on the “Add New”.
2. Copy/paste content
   – Go to sample content 1.
   – Copy the main body content (the lorem ipsum text only. You should NOT have the sidebar, navigation or footer text in your text copy).
   – Go back to your page.
   – Click the T button.
   
   (this enables the “paste as plain text” filter to the next content you paste in will be plain text)
   – Paste your content into the page.
3. Title
   Enter a title for your page. Call it “vunetid test page”
   (e.g. “UserT test page” would be the title if your VUnetID was “usert”)
4. Permalink
   Click on the edit button and change the permalink to be your VUnetID-testpage.
   (e.g. user-testpage)
   Note: This section will not appear until you have clicked into the main content field
5. Apply text styles 
   Click the toggle button if you don’t see the second row of controls in your editor.
   Select the first line of text.Make that a Heading 1 (H1).
   You will find the text styles section in the paragraph dropdown box. If the first sentence is not on its own line, hit return so that it is.
   

   Select the third paragraph.
   Make this a block quote by clicking on the block quote button .

6. Create links
   Select the “website link” text and create a link to http://vanderbilt.edu
   
   
   Select the “email link” text and create an email link to your Vanderbilt email address.
   (in the field you will need to write “mailto” followed by a colon. For example, to create an email link going to www@vanderbilt.edu, you would need to write mailto:www@vanderbilt.edu )
7. Media links
   Select the “media link” text.
   Click “Add Media”.
   Select the
   Select the “sample-text.pdf” from the Media Library.
   

   Click “insert into post”
   Edit the link you just created so that the link text says “today’s date media file link”(e.g. 8-3-16 media file link)
   

8. Save
   Click the “Save draft” button. Once you publish a page once, it will auto save for you.
9. Preview
   Click the Preview button to review your work in another tab. Note that until you publish the page that your changes will not be viewable unless you are a logged in userNote the preview string (preview ?=) that indicates that this work in not yet publicly viewable
10. Publish
    On the Preview page, click “Edit” to edit the page againClick Publish. If you have already published the page once, click “Update”.
    Click the “view page” link at the top of the page to view your page.On the published page, notice that your page doesn’t not have the preview ?= in the URL.
    Copy the page URL

Step 3: Create a Post

1. Log in
   Go to the WP 101 sandbox
   Scroll to the bottom of the page and click on the copyright symbolAt the login prompt, enter your VUnetID and ePassword
2. Create Post
   Click on Posts in the left sidebar on the Dashboard page.
   Click “Add New” to add a new Post.
3. Title
   Set the title to be your VUnetID followed by First Blog Page
   (e.g. Webbk First Blog Page)
4. Permalink
   Make sure the URL slug matches the title with words separated by dashes
   (e.g. /blog/webbk-first-blog-page)
   
5. Content
   Go to sample content 2
   Copy the main body content (the lorem ipsum text only. You should NOT have the sidebar, navigation or footer text in your text copy).
   Click the T button (The Paste as Plain Text button. This enables the text filter. You will still need to paste your content)
   Paste the content into your post.
6. Add a picture
   Click the “Add Media” button. Select the red book or blue globe image
   Align the image to the right
   Click Insert into Post
7. Category
   In the category section, select either “tutorial” or “test” as your category
8. Create a Tag and assign to your Post
   In the tags section, type in your last name followed by your first initial. Click “Add”
   (e.g. Jane Smith would be “smithj”)
   
9. Pick an existing tag
   Start typing the season of the year (e.g. fall, spring, winter, summer)
   As you type, an entry should autocomplete in the field. Click Enter to accept the tag suggestion
10. Save
    Click the “Save draft” button. Once you publish a post once, it will auto save for you
11. Publish
    Click “Publish”. If you have already published the post once, click “Update”.
12. View your work
    Click the “view page” link at the top of the page to view your page.

Submit your work

You have completed your WordPress  training exercises; now you must open a new ticket for someone to review your work.
Please include the following information in your ticket:

1. The URL of your completed PAGE on the WordPress test server.
2. The URL of your POST on the WordPress test server.
3. The website URL you would like access to once you’ve completed the course.
4. The first and last name and email address of the primary website contact, or the manager that needs to approve your site access.

Once review of your exercises is complete, and your site access request approved, you will be given access to your website. You will then receive a ticket update or email letting you know that you now have access to your website.

If you do not hear an update regarding your access request within two business days, please submit a followup ticket.

Still need help?

If you need additional help, you may open a ticket with our help desk, review the WordPress tutorials or stop by Web Communications for open office hours.