CSS-Tricks is a Poster Child WordPress Site

A presentation about WordPress and stuff.

Transcript

1. is a Poster Child
   WordPress Site
   

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2. By Sarah Drasner
   

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3. Let us wax philosophic
   for a moment.
   

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4. Websites are amazing.
   I really like writing things so that
   other people can read them.
   

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5. I could write something on
   a piece of paper and hand it
   to you, but that's laaaame.
   
   

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6. Writing into s
   is way cooler.
   

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7. 
   Even cooler than that is saving
   what you write to a database and
   barfing it out onto a website. ❤
   

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8. https:/
   /urls-are-way.cool
   URL's are the best thing to happen
   to the world in a hot while.
   
   

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9. Anybody in the world with internet
   access can read what I wrote!
   

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10. I don't even
    have to
    directly tell
    people about
    it. They can
    just find it.
    

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11. That's straight up amazing. It
    makes all of us a zillion times
    more resourceful.
    

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12. So. Writing.
    

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13. WordPress does writing and publishing
    super well. Word. Press. Get it?
    

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14. 
    Through the power of
    computer programming!!
    

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15. WordPress is more
    like this tho.
    
    (because it's also a website.)
    

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16. If I do my writing on a
    public website that makes
    websites, how do I keep evil
    villains out?
    

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17. This is perhaps one of the
    most important things about
    WordPress.
    WordPress is an auth system.
    

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18. Bad Guy
    Prevention
    System
    

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19. If the only thing WordPress did
    was be a nice auth system where
    you log in and leave secret
    messages for your friends, it
    would still be amazing.
    

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20. But of course it does a
    billion more things. Like
    have a front end where
    those things I type are
    published at URLs.
    

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21. You know where I've
    written almost every
    single word I've ever
    written on the internet?
    

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22. Right there.
    

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23. To be fair, it's a slightly nicer
    
    

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24. Some of my favorite
    features of this fancy
    textarea is that it saves
    me from myself.
    

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25. [has 833 tabs open in web browser]
    self: now seems like a pretty
    good time to restart.
    

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26. Oh shucks I forgot to save.
    NBDDDDD.
    

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27. FINE. it's a lot nicer
    than a textarea.
    

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29. Automatic revision saving
    is great. If you turn that off
    because you think it makes
    your database slow I think
    you maybe probably have
    bigger problems maybe.
    

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30. UNSOLICITED
    OPINIONATED HOT TIP
    For the long-term health and
    happiness of your content:
    1. Turn off Visual Editor
    2. Write in Markdown
    

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31. bye bye
    

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32. yes plz
    (This is the
    awesome
    Jetpack
    plugin.)
    

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33. I think WordPress kinda
    tries to fight the
    "WordPress is for blogs"
    thing. But whatever, it's
    kind of a blog.
    

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34. It's really good for
    blogging. Own it.
    

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35. 1. You log in
    2. You type some crap
    3. You publish it
    4. It looks fantastic at some URL
    5. It barfs out to RSS
    6. It's dated
    7. It has an author
    

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36. The WordPress auth system
    isn't just nice because it
    exists and works, it offers
    levels of authentication that
    is wicked useful.
    

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38. Author
    Archives
    

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39. Chronological, Paginated Homepage
    

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40. Sensical
    Taxonomies
    by Default
    Like
    Categories
    

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41. and
    Tags
    

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42. 1. Featured images!
    2. Title!
    3. Relevant Dates!
    4. Author!
    5. Excerpt!
    6. Tags!
    

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43. But what if you wanna do
    really customized pages?
    

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44. Custom
    Functionality
    Custom
    Styling
    

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46. One-off page styling via the Art Direction plugin
    

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47. Named
    Page
    Templates
    let you do
    whatever the
    heck you
    want for any
    given Page.
    

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51. ✅ Posts are obviously useful.
    ✅ Pages are obviously useful.
    But there is more!
    Custom Post Types means you
    really do whatever makes
    sense for your site.
    

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56. Custom Post
    Types can even
    have their own
    sets of
    taxonomies.
    

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57. The real HOT CMS ACTION
    starts when you customize
    all the content types with
    custom fields.
    

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59. A recent thing I've done is to
    create a Custom Post Type of
    "Guides", which are programatic
    groupings of other content.
    

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63. Hand-crafted, hand-ordered
    groupings of content!
    

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65. Surfacing (even evergreen)
    content is a challenge.
    Content recirculation is a
    challenge.
    

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66. With blog posts, pages, custom
    post types, customizations of
    the admin, customizations of
    one-off pages....
    Clearly, WordPress is a CMS.
    

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68. Comments are yet another
    thing you get out of the
    box with WordPress.
    

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70. CSS-Tricks uses pretty
    much run-of-the-mill
    WordPress comments.
    

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71. Owning the comments feels
    good to me. Having the
    comments right in the HTML
    seems right.
    

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72. To be fair the Disqus plugin is
    pretty well done, also, because it
    syncs the comments to your DB.
    

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73. I'm prettttty sure that's
    good for SEO.
    85,888 Comments
    

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74. Things I do in comments:
    • Markdown / Preview (Jetpack + Plugin)
    • Feature/Bury (Plugin)
    • Heavily moderated and 

    encourage good behavior
    • Offer notifications for follow ups
    • Offer newsletter signup
    • One-level threading
    

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76. Wishlist for WordPress
    Comments
    • Ajax
    • Attached to Users
    • Log in from front end
    • Editability
    • Voting / Sorting
    

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77. Forums!
    bbPress is pretty sweet
    

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78. It's a plugin! You just
    activate it and now you
    have public forums. That's
    extremely powerful.
    

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80. As much as we publish, there is
    10✕ more forums content.
    

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81. Congrats your a publisher and
    community manager now.
    Time for dolla bills.
    

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82. WordPress makes you a
    powerful publisher. You
    can build whatever the
    heck you want.
    

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83. • Primary Site Sponsor
    • Sponsored Content
    • BuySellAds
    Some of the ways I monetize:
    

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84. Another obvious way
    to make money is to
    sell things.
    

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85. Members-only area of the site
    called The Lodge.
    

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87. Restrict Content Pro
    makes it trivially easy
    to lock down any
    content you like behind
    a paywall.
    

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88. 
    This content is restricted to active
    subscribers. Probably sign up form.
    
    Show video and stuff!
    
    

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91. Selling physical or digitally-
    delivered projects is nbd too.
    

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96. What's bad about WordPress?
    1. It's on you to keep it
    performant and secure.
    2. Default search is pretty bad.
    

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97. The best thing
    about WordPress?
    The future looks bright. The
    last 10 years have been pretty
    great, and it looks like the
    next 10 will be even better.
    

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98. @chriscoyier
    

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