The growth of the smart-phone market has made mobile web surfing a part of daily life.  For this reason, it’s increasingly important that your web content is easily accessable for the mobile market.  If budget weren’t an issue, I would recommend creating dedicated mobile applications for the major mobile platforms (iphone, windows mobile, blackberry, and android).  Unfortunately, development of custom mobile apps accross multiple platforms can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, and it’s not always easy to take your app mainstream.

Luckily, there are a few plugins for WordPress that make your site ‘behave’ as if it were a dedicated application on smartphones.  MobilePress formats your content for Windows Mobile, Blackberry, and Android.  iWPhone provides excellent formatting for iPhone.  If you’ve got a WordPress site already, I would strongly suggest installing these plugins.  

If you’ve got a mobile smartphone feel free to view pull up IndyAwesome dot com to see what I’m talking about.

Today I though I’d walk you through a typical wordpress install, as well as a little about how wordpress works. Though some web experience and tech-savvy is helpful, I believe that virtually anyone who has any knowledge of how the web works should be able to figure out a wordpress installation.

Note: There is a ‘five minute install’ procedure at wordpress.org. I do it a little bit differently, because I think my way is a little faster, but feel free to try it either way.

1 – You can download wordpress for free from worpress.org. This packet includes all the software you’ll need to run wordpress
for your site.

2 – Like most content management systems, wordpress runs off of a database that’s stored on your hosting server. This
database stores your blog posts, the pages on your site, your users, meta information (bits of information that describe and add context) for all the previous, comments, blog categories, and links for your blogroll. Setting up your wordpress database is easy, because the software basically does it for you.

In the back-end of your hosting service (I use godaddy currently), go to the ‘databases’ section and create a database. You’ll be asked to make up a name for the database as well as a username and password.

3 – Next you want to upload the wordpress packet you downloaded to your hosting server. I do this with the ‘file manager’ tool in godaddy, and most server back-ends will have such a tool.

4 – Unzip the wordpress packet. Inside there is a file called wp-config-sample.php. First you just rename the file so it says wp-config.php (I really don’t know why they do it that way). Then you open the file in the editor (all the hosting services I’ve used have a basic code editor built-in, if yours doesn’t, then you can open it in notepad on your PC). You’ll see a place where you can enter your database password, user-name, password, and hosting location (in godaddy they provide you with this after you create the database. If you’re not given any info regarding a host location, leave it at ‘localhost’ and try step 5). Make sure you save the file when you’re done.

5 – Here’s where it gets fun. Open a new browser window and type in http://your domain.com/wp-admin/install.php . It will ask you to name your new site, then it will finish creating the database and after that you’re are done!

The wordpress people say that the process should take 5 minutes. I would say that it’s moderately easy to do. Don’t be afraid, just embrace the power of wordpress.

I’ve decided to dedicate this next week’s posts to my favorite website platform, wordpress. A few months ago wordpress 2.7 was released and I think that with the updates it has truly crossed the chasm into the mainstream.

I began using wordpress during the 2.6 release era and I was fairly impressed with the power and ease of use of the platform. I initially regarded the release of 2.7 as a primarily cosmetic advance. The user interface was indeed greatly enhanced, but it took me a few months of using the new wordpress to realize the tremendous improvements bundled in the new package.

The biggest improvement in wp 2.7 is that you can now install plugins from within wordpress. In 2.6 you had to upload them directly to your hosting server. So, for example, if I wanted to install a calendar plugin I would have to download the plugin, log into my hosting server, upload the file to the wp-content/plugins folder, unzip the file, then log into wordpress and activate and set up the plugin. With wp 2.7 you simply click on the plugins function and you can search for the plugin you want and install it right there. It’s so much easier!

Another problem with 2.6 was that it was difficult to update to a new version of wordpress when it was released. One solution I found was to install the ‘automatic upgrade’ plugin, but it didn’t always work and it took several steps and a significant amount of time to upgrade. The other option was to backup your theme and database and install the new version on the backend, which I never even tried because it seemed like such a pain. With wp 2.7, automatic upgrade is built in and it takes maybe 10 seconds to get the upgrades you need.

The improvements in wp 2.7 make wordpress so easy to use that I can see it gaining even more popularity in the future. My only request would be that they make it just as easy to install new themes as it is to install plugins. That would really make the whole package complete.

What is wordpress?

WordPress is an open source website and blog management tool that is extremely popular right now.  WordPress was first released as a blogging tool in 2003, and has since evolved into a full featured content management system with amazing functionality. It is coded in .php and runs on a mySql database, which means it is compatible with virtually any web hosting service.

What are the benefits of using wordpress to manage your website?

The biggest benefit of any open source software application is that there is a massive community of developers working continually to improve and expand the platform. In addition, most open source software (like wordpress) are free-of-cost to anyone who wants to use them. What this means in the case of wordpress is that there are literally thousands of free templates available on which to build a website. The only cost for anyone who wants to use wordpress to manage their site is to have a wordpress developer design and customize a template so it works for you.

WordPress also benefits from an active community of plug-in developers. Plug-ins are small software packets that extend the functionality of the platform. For example, if you want to have a calendar function on your site, there is a plug-in that will allow you to easily implement it. If you want an image gallery, contact form, or survey, there are plug-ins that allow that to happen. In addition there numerous back-end plug-ins that can help ensure that you’re ranking on search engines (like google, msn, or yahoo). A wordpress developer can help you choose which plug-ins are best for your website.

Are there any drawbacks?

Worpress is not appropriate for every website. Sites that are extremely complex with custom applications and and large numbers of pages might not be the best fit. Also, worpress sites are extremely flexible as far as custom designs, but certain designs might not be right for this platform. A qualified wordpress developer can help you evaluate if it’s a good choice for your website.

For information on how to get a customized worpress site at a great value check out my forum post on SmallerIndiana.

It’s sometimes hard being a serious blogger, especially if you track your traffic religiously.  I find that the old George H.W. Bush adage of ‘stay the course’ is the best advice.  I’ve learned to forgive myself for not always writing the most compelling content.  At the end of the day, it’s much more important to be persistent and be yourself.

‘Be persistent and be yourself’ … that’s not a bad line.  It’s at least as good as ‘stay the course’ when it comes to blogging.  Life and business are a series of ups and downs and hopefully you grow along the way both in money and in spirit.  I like to think that I get a little better every day.

The road is long, and the road is rough, but I know that I always try to do the best that I can.  I trust in the faith that I have for the things that I believe strongly about and I rarely give up.  It’s a long life after all and we should all find a little happiness.