Introduction on Wordpress - Part 6

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Plugins

There are other ways you can play around with the way your WordPress site looks and works. Plugins add functionality to your site rather than merely changing its appearance. They range from very simple add-ons which enhance the inner workings of your site, to full-blown e-commerce solutions that enable you to you use WordPress for your online shop. Ultimately, you can even make your own Plugins (but that will come later in your web-creating career)!

Installing a plugin is as easy as installing a theme (which we did in the previous section). It’s possible to install them from within your admin area, or you can upload them manually. Let’s try installing a popular plugin as an exercise. This one is called NextGEN Gallery, and it makes adding fancy-looking image galleries to your posts or pages simple.

In the admin area, navigate to Plugins > Add New from the left hand menu.

In the search box type “NextGEN Gallery”, click Search Plugins and the first result should be the correct Plugin – click Install Now and then Activate Plugin.

 
You will notice that on the left hand menu a new link Gallery has appeared. From here you are now presented with a huge array of options for inserting images and galleries into posts or pages. This is one of the more abundant Plugins available, so there is much to play around with.

Once you have uploaded some images through the Plugin’s admin tool, you might want to add a gallery to a post or page. NextGEN Gallery has made this like child-play, and you will notice that when adding or editing a page or post there is a new button in the format menu along the top of the main text area. Clicking this will give you the option to select a gallery and insert it into a post. Update the post and your image gallery is now online.

 
Some more Plugins that we recommend:
• Contact Form 7 – add forms without all the complicated programming.
• All in one SEO pack – optimize your site for search engines.
• Google Analytics – track the way people use your site.

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