WordPress – Getting started without getting startled

WordPress is an amazingly effective tool for allowing users to generate a cohesive, feature-rich web site very quickly and efficiently without necessarily knowing any kind of programming or coding.

Having said that, the manual installation procedure does require that you know how to upload files to your server, how to create a MySQL database using MyPhpAdmin, how to set the variables in the wp-config.php file, and in some cases how to set file and folder permissions on your server.

If you don’t feel up to what I’ve just described, you still have options. If you already have a web hosting company, check your control panel to see if they have an automatic installer for WordPress. I personally recommend Lunarpages. They use a program called Fantastico, which allows you to install a long list of scripts simply by filling in a few variables (i.e. the folder name for the installation and other simple information).

Your third line of defense is to create your blog on the wordpress.com web site. The advantage here is that it’s the quickest and easiest way to get your blog going. You don’t even need a domain name or a host. The bad news is that if you do have a domain name and you don’t have your blog hosted on that domain name, you’re not contributing to your search engine ranking for that domain. Blogs are a great way to generate content, and having more content does help your search engine ranking.

Watch this site for more info for WordPress bloggers!

This article copyright © John Nasta 2009 – All Rights Reserved

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