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Professional WordPress 1st Edition

by Hal Stern (Author)

4.0 69 ratings

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Professional WordPress: Design and Development
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An in-depth look at the internals of the WordPress system. As the most popular blogging and content management platform available today, WordPress is a powerful tool. This exciting book goes beyond the basics and delves into the heart of the WordPress system, offering overviews of the functional aspects of WordPress as well as plug-in and theme development.

What is covered in this book?

WordPress as a Content Management System
Hosting Options
Installing WordPress Files
Database Configuration
Dashboard Widgets
Customizing the Dashboard
Creating and Managing Content
Categorizing Your Content
Working with Media
Comments and Discussion
Working with Users
Managing, Adding, Upgrading, and Using the Theme Editor
Working with Widgets
Adding and Managing New Plugins
Configuring WordPress
Exploring the Code
Configuring Key Files
wp-config.php file
Advanced wp-config Options
What's in the Core?
WordPress Codex and Resources
Understanding and customizing the Loop
Building A Custom Query
Complex Database Operations
Dealing With Errors
Direct Database Manipulation
Building Your Own Taxonomies
Plugin Packaging
Create a Dashboard Widget
Creating a Plugin Example
Publish to the Plugin Directory
Installing a Theme
Creating Your Own Theme
How and When to Use Custom Page Templates
How to Use Custom Page Templates
Pushing Content from WordPress to Other Sites
Usability and Usability Testing
Getting Your Site Found
How Web Standards Get Your Data Discovered
Load Balancing Your WordPress Site
Securing Your WordPress Site
Using WordPress in the Enterprise
Is WordPress Right for Your Enterprise?
and much more!

ISBN-10

0470560541
ISBN-13

978-0470560549
Edition

1st
Publisher

Wrox
Publication date

March 19, 2010
Language

English
Dimensions

7.38 x 0.92 x 9.25 inches
Print length

408 pages
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Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

Explore the power and possibilities of WordPress from the inside out

As the most popular self-hosted blogging software in use today, WordPress is remarkably simple to operate and can be extended and tailored for a wide variety of applications. This guide focuses on the internal structure and flow of the core code, as well as the data model on which that code operates, so that you can harness the power of WordPress to meet your specific needs. The author team pulls together developer and deployer expertise, as well as knowledge of popular open source plugins, themes, and tools for WordPress, to provide an in-depth guide suitable for all WordPress users, from self-hosted bloggers to enterprise content management system applications.

Professional WordPress:

Offers an overview of the WordPress system and describes what happens when a WordPress-generated web page is displayed
Discusses the core of WordPress, describing internal code flow and data structures
Demonstrates extending WordPress through plugins and customizing it via themes
Combines a developer view of user experience and optimization with the deployer requirements for performance, security, and measurement
Provides practical examples of integrating WordPress with enterprise and social networking tools

Wrox Professional guides are planned and written by working programmers to meet the real-world needs of programmers, developers, and IT professionals. Focused and relevant, they address the issues technology professionals face every day. They provide examples, practical solutions, and expert education in new technologies, all designed to help programmers do a better job.

wrox.com

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Join our Programmer to Programmer forums to ask and answer programming questions about this book, join discussions on the hottest topics in the industry, and connect with fellow programmers from around the world.

Code Downloads
Take advantage of free code samples from this book, as well as code samples from hundreds of other books, all ready to use.

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Find articles, ebooks, sample chapters and tables of contents for hundreds of books, and more reference resources on programming topics that matter to you.

About the Author

Hal Stern is a vice president at a technology company and uses WordPress to blog about his adventures in golf, ice hockey, and food.

David Damstra is the Manager of Web Services for CU*Answers, a credit union service organization, where he manages a team of developers to create web sites and web applications for the financial industry.

Brad Williams is the CEO and Co-Founder of WebDevStudios.com. He is also a co-host on the SitePoint Podcast and an advisor on SitePoint Forums.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Wrox; 1st edition (March 19, 2010)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 408 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0470560541
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0470560549
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.6 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 7.38 x 0.92 x 9.25 inches

Customer Reviews:
4.0 69 ratings

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Hal Stern
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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.
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David Damstra
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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.
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Brad Williams
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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.
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Customer reviews

69 global ratings

How customer reviews and ratings work

Customers say

Customers find the content excellent, with good information and resources. They also say the book covers content building, navigation, search optimization, migration, and the ins and outs of WordPress. Readers describe the writing quality as very well-written and easy to read.

AI-generated from the text of customer reviews

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Content quality Writing quality

19 customers mention "Content quality"15 positive4 negative

Customers find the content quality excellent. They say it provides a good overview, concepts are explained well, and it covers content building, navigation, search optimization, migration, and resources. Readers also mention it's a great technical guide to WordPress that is well organized and in-depth.

"...It's really one of the best beginner books I've ever read. In first chapters you will learn history of Wordpress and how to use it as end customer...." Read more

"...Overall, I found this book to be very good. It covers just about everything in detail, with clear examples...." Read more

"...It clearly explains the installation directory structure and role of all the files there. It continues with Plugin and Theme development and beyond...." Read more

"Did they run the code to see if it works? Maybe not. The concepts were explained well but I could not get a lot of the code to run...." Read more

5 customers mention "Writing quality"5 positive0 negative

Customers find the book well-written, easy to read, and organized. They appreciate the clear explanation of how WordPress works.

"...unusable as a reference, because the index, which actually is written very well, is not linked to the items listed...." Read more

"...Then it quickly moves into a clear and well written explanation of how WordPress works (the Loop, etc)...." Read more

"...It got me up and running in no time. Well written, easy to follow...." Read more

"...It was very well written and has good examples." Read more

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Top reviews from the United States

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Reading Rob

Excellent Book

Reviewed in the United States on December 8, 2011

Verified Purchase

I got this book to learn how to create themes for Wordpress from scratch. I can already take an existing theme and modify it. The book only has one chapter on this, and really only tells you to use a framework. So the book was a little disappointing for the main reason I purchased the book.

However, the book contains very little filler, and covers the in-and-outs of Wordpress, and provided a lot of resources I didn't know about. The first couple chapters were kind of dumb, since most people buying this will already know how to install wordpress and make a basic post. I can see why the author might do this though. Ease people into the book so they get comfortable with it before dropping raw code on them. It also goes against his claim of showing how wordpress works from the core working out.

Really minor complaints, just wanted to give a balanced review. With no good books on the market about making themes, this makes the perfect companion to one of those books. After reading it I doubled my knowledge of Wordpress, and I have been working with it for a couple years now. Solid 5 stars.

3 people found this helpful

Helpful

Ivan Ilijasic

Must have Wordpress book

Reviewed in the United States on January 10, 2012

Verified Purchase

If you want to be a Wordpress developer, buy it and read it. I believe all WP newbies and beginners like to install WP, try playing with it and modifying code without proper knowledge how to create proper WP theme, WP plugins and WP widgets.

This book is perfect for every developer who wants to learn Wordpress architecture, how to organize theme code, plugin code, create shortcodes and use them. It's really one of the best beginner books I've ever read. In first chapters you will learn history of Wordpress and how to use it as end customer. Then you'll learn code architecture, how to use basic functions, how to search code, create themes, plugins, customize dashboard. Final chapters are about integrating Wordpress with RSS services, how to handle security, migrate your existing website to Wordpress.

It's really fantastic to see how this book can help anyone - PHP beginners and PHP pros. It contains lot of useful information, tips and tricks, security info, plugin recommendations. Plugin demos and examples are really nice. There's some space to fill in but I assume that's why you have to buy Wordpress Plugin Development by Wrox. I have both books and I'm really happy for it.

4 people found this helpful

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John M. Hobbs

Good Overview

Reviewed in the United States on June 26, 2011

Verified Purchase

Takes you through what you need to know, explains some stuff that the online docs don't do a good job of (plugin options for instance).

Helpful

Mrs. CyberDad

Excellent book, hampered by unusable index

Reviewed in the United States on September 23, 2011

Verified Purchase

This review is about the Kindle version of this book.

Overall, I found this book to be very good. It covers just about everything in detail, with clear examples. It is the sort of book I would like to use over and over again in my development work.

However, the book is almost unusable as a reference, because the index, which actually is written very well, is not linked to the items listed. There is no way to pass directly from the index to a referenced item. This is a severe shortcoming for a book that will be used mostly as a programming reference, especially at this cost--approximately $30.00, a high price for an e-book.

A simple system of putting hyperlinks between the index and the chapter references would make this Kindle version of the book ever so much more usable. For example, the PHP Cookbook by Adam Trachtenberg has an excellent hyperlinked index, which I find very useful.

In short, creating a good e-book requires more than simply transferring the text of a printed book to an electronic format. A well-hyperlinked index, which allows the reader to go directly to the areas of interest, is absolutely essential for any e-book that will be used as a reference.

The text of this book is worth five stars, but the lack of usable reference hyperlinks reduces the actual working value of this book to two stars.

17 people found this helpful

Helpful

Raffi M.

Easy to read and well organized guide to the technical side of WordPress

Reviewed in the United States on November 27, 2012

Verified Purchase

I found this book to be excellent for my needs. I am a programmer (Java, HTML5, CSS, Javascript, PHP, etc). I needed a book to help me learn enough WordPress so that I could assist a friend of mine with his site which had been heavily customized by a developer who suddenly fell off the planet. This book was up to the task. It covers the basics that anyone using WordPress will need such as how to make a post, review of the Dashboard controls, etc. Then it quickly moves into a clear and well written explanation of how WordPress works (the Loop, etc). It clearly explains the installation directory structure and role of all the files there. It continues with Plugin and Theme development and beyond. I have no complaints about this book. If you find yourself in a similar situation, get this book. You will not regret it.

One person found this helpful

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Kenneth Sumerford

Good Concepts but some Bad Coding

Reviewed in the United States on April 23, 2014

Verified Purchase

Did they run the code to see if it works? Maybe not. The concepts were explained well but I could not get a lot of the code to run. It is hard enough learning WordPress with PHP, without code that does Not work. Chapter 5 The Loop was a key chapter but I could not get about 3/4 of the code to work. Chapter 6 Data Management has code that does Not work on one of our WP Websites. For example, the While statement does not work in their coding. There is no solution listed on their Website for the book.

2 people found this helpful

Helpful

Jeroen Thibaut

Very thorough guide to WP

Reviewed in the United States on March 25, 2014

Verified Purchase

"Professional WordPress - Design and Development" is really good book on WordPress. It shows you how WP works (starting from the loop, to hooking etc... which makes it outlive the WP version it was written for (I thought 3.0). I guess this is very useful for everyone who wants to take his WP skills from just running WP to hacking it to his/her own wishes.

Starting from a top-level view on WP, it then diggs down into the Loop, database, queries, taxonomies, plugin development, shortcodes, theming and, very important as WP grows: security. It also covers content building, navigation, search optimization, migration, ... more than you could wish for.

I am just a small-time developer on WP (made some 30 sites to date) but this book has been a good reference for me in a lot of darker moments. It also led me to develop a working routine that now saves me a lot of time.

Highly recommend for everyone serious about WordPress.

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

Ayush Arora

Five Stars

Reviewed in India on June 10, 2015

Verified Purchase

Excellent Book. Teaches a novice as well as an expert. Excellent delivery by Amazon

Marianna

Good.

Reviewed in Italy on March 8, 2015

Verified Purchase

The book arrived on time. Though it's second handed, I didn't find it excessively ruined (just a few crinkled pages).

pattypilates

Great book to read

Reviewed in Canada on March 24, 2012

Verified Purchase

I find this book very easy to understand. It helped me much more to learn wordpress than other books I bought. I am pairing this book with pro wordpress plugin development. Would recommend these 2 books to everybody.

The Art Gear Guide

From SquareSpace to Wordpress

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 24, 2012

Verified Purchase

I found this book incredibly helpful to me. The first site I ever built was through SquareSpace, who run a fantastic service and make it very easy for newbies to build a very professional looking site. However for someone who couldn't code very well, there was not a lot of tweeking I could do, so I decided to give Wordpress ago. I had heard a lot of excellent things about Wordpress but when I actually started with it I found myself getting lost very quickly.

So I had a look on Amazon for a Wordpress book and found this one, quite expensive, however if I got the results I was looking for it would be a small price to play. I read the book from front to back in about 3 days and when I came back to actually building my site everything was so much more clear. I obviously still referenced the book during certain periods of the building process and still now that the site is up and running and has been for the past 10 weeks, I still look at the book. So for me it turned out to be very well spent money. My site Techmedia Fusion has gone from strength to strength and I feel it has a lot to do with this book. I would certainly recommend buying the book.

Harry

Amazon Customer

Four Stars

Reviewed in Canada on March 8, 2017

Verified Purchase

quite a good quality of the book

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