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Professional WordPress: Design and Development 2nd Edition

by Brad Williams (Author), David Damstra (Author), Hal Stern (Author)
4.0 4.0 out of 5 stars 92 ratings
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Professional WordPress: Design and Development
Professional WordPress: Design and Development
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The highly praised resource returns with updated content, examples, and code downloads

WordPress is the most popular self-hosted open source website software in use today, and the latest version makes it even simpler to operate. Packed with real-world examples for load balancing and multiusers, this esteemed resource replaces some of the more basic material with more advanced content. Every single chapter has been reworked to provide the most current and proper methods for developing and designing in WordPress. Coverage of HTML5, CSS3, and JavaScript and new chapters on custom post types, custom taxonomies, Multisite, and extensions of themes bring the content of this book completely up-to-date and provides you with all you need to deploy successful WordPress sites.

  • Offers an overview of the WordPress system and describes what happens when a WordPress-generated web page is displayed
  • Demonstrates extending WordPress through plugins and customizing it via themes
  • Combines a developer view of user experience and optimization with the deployment requirements for performance, security, and measurement
  • Includes code downloads and code samples from the book's website

You'll be hard pressed to find a reliable resource with more advanced content than Professional WordPress, Second Edition!

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  1. ISBN-10
    111844227X
  2. ISBN-13
    978-1118442272
  3. Edition
    2nd
  4. Publisher
    Wrox
  5. Publication date
    January 4, 2013
  6. Language
    English
  7. Dimensions
    7.4 x 0.86 x 9.28 inches
  8. Print length
    456 pages
  9. See all details
Next slide of product details
Amazon First Reads | Editors' picks at exclusive prices

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

Harness the power of the latest version of WordPress

WordPress is the most popular self-hosted open source website software in use today, and the latest version makes it even simpler to operate. With this new edition, you'll find helpful examples, code downloads, and real-world tips from real-world developers, all of which reflect the current needs of developers. Each chapter has been reworked to provide the most up-to-date and correct methods for developing and designing in WordPress. This book covers WordPress development and design concepts above and beyond version features and provides a foundation for future development as WordPress is updated. This essential resource provides you with all you need to deploy successful WordPress sites.

Professional WordPress, Second Edition:

  • Offers a code overview and provides the most up-to-date advice for working with WordPress locally
  • Highlights custom post types, custom taxonomy, and meta data
  • Features coverage of plugin and theme development
  • Discusses WordPress as a content management system as well as its role in the enterprise and developer community
  • Combines a developer view of user experience and optimization with the deployment requirements for performance, security, and measurement

wrox.com

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About the Author

Brad Williams is the co-founder of WebDevStudios.com, organizes and speaks at WordPress events, and is the coauthor of Professional WordPress Plugin Development.

David Damstra is the Vice President of Professional Services for CU*Answers, where his team of developers empowers clients with WordPress.

Hal Stern is a VP at Juniper Networks and is the coauthor of Blueprints for High Availability.

Wrox Professional guides are written by working developers to address everyday needs. They provide examples, practical solutions, and expert education in new technologies, all designed to help programmers do a better job.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Wrox; 2nd edition (January 4, 2013)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 456 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 111844227X
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1118442272
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.7 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 7.4 x 0.86 x 9.28 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.0 4.0 out of 5 stars 92 ratings

About the authors

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  1. Hal Stern

    Hal Stern

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    Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

    Hal Stern dabbled in technical writing after discovering that Shakespeare, modern (but still dead) European writers and art history didn't stimulate any passion for a good nerd story. A breakfast meeting with Tim O'Reilly to discuss an idea for what became "Managing NFS & NIS" turned into nearly 20 years of books, articles, and tutorials. Every decade (give or take), Hal happens into some new technology area and becomes fascinated with its underpinnings: NFS in 1987, high availability in 1997, and WordPress in 2007. That's where the book ideas comes from. When not making his high school English teachers lament their wasted effort, Hal enjoys ice hockey, rollerblading, poker, yoga, photography, and heavy metal music.

    See more on the author's page
  2. David Damstra

    David Damstra

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    Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

    David Damstra is Vice President of Professional Services for CU*Answers, a credit union service organization. David manages a team of developers to create websites and web applications for the financial industry. David's team uses WordPress as the foundation for many web projects. David is also a Zend Certified Engineer for PHP5. You can find David online professionally at http://ws.cuanswers.com where he focuses on web technology and best practices for web development, especially pertaining to the credit union industry and personally at http://mirmillo.com where he talks about his family and home brewing.

    See more on the author's page
  3. Brad Williams

    Brad Williams

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    Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

    Brad Williams is the Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of WebDevStudios (WDS). Brad has helped grow WDS from a coffee table startup to one of the oldest and most respected WordPress Agencies working with clients like Microsoft, Viacom, Campbell Soup Company, Starbucks, and the NBA.

    Twitter:

    https://twitter.com/williamsba

    Website:

    https://webdevstudios.com

    Brad is a co-author of the Professional WordPress Book Series, which are some of the highest rated advanced WordPress Development books on the market. He is the co-organizer of WordCamp Philly 2010 – 2015 and the Philadelphia WordPress Meetup. Brad was also a co-organizer for the Inaugural WordCamp US in 2015 and again in 2016. He has been developing websites for over 20 years. In the last 10, Brad has specifically focused on open-source technologies like WordPress.

    Brad lives in Philadelphia with his wife and son. He’s obsessed with cheesesteaks, Raider’s football (it’s complicated), podcasting, Halloween, LED lights, and all things technology.

    See more on the author's page
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Customer reviews

4 out of 5 stars
92 global ratings

Customers say

Customers find the book's content excellent, comprehensive, and useful. They also appreciate the clarity, saying it's written concisely in plain language. Readers say the text and examples are clear in theory. Overall, they describe the book as a quality read and should be on any WordPress developers' bookshelf.

AI-generated from the text of customer reviews

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Book contentClarityCode content
38 customers mention "Book content"33 positive5 negative

Customers find the book content excellent, comprehensive, and useful. They say it provides great information for intermediate users of blogging software. Readers also mention it's a good book to start with for developers who are interested in learning how to become one.

"...and an in-depth look of each subject, including great information for intermediate users of blogging software and experienced web designers who are..." Read more

"...This is an EXCELLENT book, with only a few drawbacks.First, let me reinforce THIS IS NOT A BEGINNERS' BOOK...." Read more

"...This is a minor complaint. The rest of the book is excellent...." Read more

"...Here are my few thoughts on the book.1. This is a fairly comprehensive book covering not only Theme development, but plug-ins, multisite..." Read more

12 customers mention "Clarity"12 positive0 negative

Customers find the book concisely written in plain language. They say it's well-structured and detailed. Readers also mention the text and examples are clear in theory.

"...a blogging novice to grasp, the book on the whole is written concisely in plain language, providing a great resource for designers, developers, or..." Read more

"...While the text and examples are clear in theory, there really aren't any real-life (troubleshooting) examples. Perhaps I was expecting too much...." Read more

"This book is fairly comprehensive and understandable to anyone who has a basic knowledge of WordPress basics and PHP/MySql...." Read more

"There is an intro section for greenies that is very clear. Another section for programmers...." Read more

3 customers mention "Code content"3 positive0 negative

Customers find the code content in the book excellent. They mention it provides plenty of example codes and goes into depth of source code. Readers also appreciate the author's descriptions of handy plugins to get the job done.

"...3. The book provides plenty of example codes, but they are meant to be examples, not snippets...." Read more

"...Code snippets are scattered throughout and the author describes some very handy plugins to get the job done more easily...." Read more

"...covers everything you need to build a WordPress websites, goes into depth of source code, teaches how to properly use codex. Basically #1 WP book" Read more

Top reviews from the United States

DesignGeek
5.0 out of 5 stars The Best Guide to WordPress Development
Reviewed in the United States on August 12, 2013
Verified Purchase
This is the best, most thorough, and most up-to-date guide about WordPress development on the market.

Don't let the advanced topics and php code examples included in the book deter you. If you are already familiar with HTML/CSS but are nervous about designing or developing with a content management system (CMS), this is the book for you. I've found this book to be an excellent resource for anyone who would like to personalize their blog theme, use WP as a CMS, create themes from scratch, enhance their WP site's security, learn how widgets and plugins work, set up a development/test WP site on a local server, make a living using WordPress, or simply explore the capabilities of this amazing software.

Each chapter contains an overview and an in-depth look of each subject, including great information for intermediate users of blogging software and experienced web designers who are new to WordPress. I love that this book explains how to make the most of WordPress, even if you don't want to delve into hard-core development (just skim the php coding sections). This book contains what you need to understand WP at the most basic level, quickly gives you an opportunity to peak under the hood if you would like to take it a step further, and then provides the advanced developer a comprehensive guide to understanding and manipulating the inner workings as well.

While some of the book's topics may be too advanced or technical for a blogging novice to grasp, the book on the whole is written concisely in plain language, providing a great resource for designers, developers, or website owners who want a comprehensive WP reference. (There are some typographical errors throughout the 2nd Edition, but the publishers considerately provide a web address to submit any errata found.) Readers of this reference work need not worry that they are missing out on any crucial or useful information.

I recommend this book specifically for web and graphic designers who need to customize or create branded themes for clients.

List of Chapters

Introduction
1 First Post
2 Code Overview
3 Working with WordPress Locally
4 Tour of the Core
5 The Loop
6 Data Management
7 Custom Post Types, Custom Taxonomies, and Metadata
8 Plugin Development
9 Theme Development
10 Multisite
11 Content Aggregation
12 Crafting a User Experience
13 Statistics, Scalability, Security, and Spam
14 WordPress as a Content Management System
15 WordPress in the Enterprise
16 WordPress Developer Community
Index
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David in Mississippi
4.0 out of 5 stars Good Intermediate-to-Advanced Book; NOT For Beginners
Reviewed in the United States on January 10, 2015
Verified Purchase
I agree with the total average rating to date of 4.4 stars.

This is an EXCELLENT book, with only a few drawbacks.

First, let me reinforce THIS IS NOT A BEGINNERS' BOOK. To get the most out of this book, the reader should already have an intermediate background in using Wordpress, as well as an intermediate level of understanding of the basics of building an open-source tools website -- i.e. HTML, CSS (preferably CSS3), and PHP. The reader should also have at least a basic understanding of javascript, MySQL (or any equivalent database), and object-oriented programming.

For example, if the statement "using a method of a new instance of the WP_query class" doesn't make perfect sense to you, then you should probably not expect to be able to get the most out of this book.

If you have this background, then you will find PROFESSIONAL WORDPRESS to be an excellent book to allow you to grow from being a Wordpress user to a Wordpress developer.

The book covers most of the essential areas necessary to become a Wordpress developer, but as other reviewers have stated, it seems to start in the middle - it leaves out a number of things I would consider essential to the target audience.

Most notably, it does not address WordPress core function naming conventions. For example, many of the functions available start with "the_" or "wp_" or "WP_" (uppercase vs. lowercase) ... the authors never give a clear explanation of why and how these are used. (Note: I am still reading the book, so perhaps this is explained later - but why explain it long after it is needed?)

There are multiple references throughout the book to the Wordpress Codex, the online documentation for Wordpress. This is good because we don't need to deal with (or pay for) duplicate content that is easily available and frequently updated. But it is also frustrating in that it interrupts the flow of the book to go look something up, when a summary could save us that effort.

If I knew what I know now before I bought the book, would I still buy it? Definitely yes.
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Top reviews from other countries

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Alex B.
5.0 out of 5 stars A great tool for budding Wordpress professionals
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 23, 2016
Verified Purchase
This really is a good book - the authors have clearly thought carefully about what information to include, which basically covers all the essential workings of the Wordpress CMS, giving you a good grounding to develop sites using it. I come from a design background, and the last few years have been hard learning a lot about coding in HTML, writing CSS stylesheets etc, and now trying to learn more about PHP. I won't lie, there are sections of this book I struggled to understand because my coding knowledge is more rudimentary, but I don't think things here could be explained much clearer unless you have that sort of background yourself. It's become an essential reference guide for me now, and I can now create my own custom post types, taxonomies and have a clearer understanding of what's under the bonnet when it comes to Wordpress. I still have plenty more to learn from it, and I hope to eventually start creating themes from scratch, but I think that goes to show what good value it is. If you want to became a professional designer of Wordpress sites, then I highly recommend it.
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Mayank
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in India on September 6, 2015
Verified Purchase
Use full
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Sheila
5.0 out of 5 stars I am a new user
Reviewed in Canada on February 9, 2014
Verified Purchase
This book got me up and site was published with no problems - I did purchase a template but the book answered all of my questions.
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angelo71
4.0 out of 5 stars Tutto ok, grande Amazon.
Reviewed in Italy on May 28, 2014
Verified Purchase
Buon libro per chi deve imparare ad utilizzare Wordpress, e anche per chi vuole addentrarsi nella programmazione dei plugin. Consigliato.
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Sha
4.0 out of 5 stars Bon livre pour apprendre le développement WordPress
Reviewed in France on March 11, 2014
Verified Purchase
Un livre que je recommande pour apprendre le développement de plugin wordpress.
Un accompagnement sur l'installation de wordpress, le développement de thèmes etc est aussi bien détaillé dans le livre.

Dommage qu'il n'existe pas une version française du livre.
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