This post is a continuation from the first part of the WordPress Dashboard Tutorial found here. In this part, we will cover the rest of the tabs not covered in part one.
An Introduction to the WordPress Dashboard Tabs, Continued
Continuing were we left off, the Appearance Tab is up next.
Appearance Tab
The Appearance Tab is another very important section, but you won’t need to use it very often, once you’ve set the look for your WordPress blog or website. It contains many sub-sections and each allows you do customize your site in a different way.
Here’s a quick breakdown of all the sub-sections of the Appearance Tab in your WordPress dashboard.
- Themes – This tab contains all your uploaded themes and allows you to add a new theme.
- Customize – Here, you can customize the many parts of your theme and website.
- Widgets – You can add widgets to the sidebars, footer, header and other areas associated with your theme through this section.
- Menus – This section allows you to create and use custom menus for your blog.
- Header – The header section allows you to upload a custom header and adjust the appearance of your header.
- Background – You can add a custom color or image for your background here.
- Editor – This section allows you to edit the actual code of each part of your WordPress site.
The sub-sections of this tab may change a little bit, depending on the theme you’re using. Some themes will even create a tab of their own in your WordPress dashboard.
Plugins Tab
Within the Plugins Tab, you will be able to install, activated, deactivate, edit and delete plugins. If you don’t know how to install a plugin in WordPress, our WordPress Tutorial about Plugin Installation covers the process, here.
Along with the “Installed Plugins” and the “Add New” sections you will also have an “Editor” section for your plugins. You should only use this section if you understand how to write code for WordPress plugins. If you don’t, you won’t need to use this section at all.
Users Tab
When you need to add a new author, contributor, administrator or any other type of user, the Users Tab is the section you need to use.
You can edit any user from the “All Users” section or add a new one from the “Add New” section. The “Your Profile” section will allow you to edit your own user profile.
Tools Tab
The Tools Tab won’t get much use, unless you install a plugin that creates a sub-section, here. It’s mainly used for moving a WordPress website from one domain to another. However, some plugins will install a sub-section here or add a tool in this area of your WordPress Dashboard.
Three sub-sections come in the Tools Tab, by default. They are the “Available Tools”, “Import” and “Export” sections. Any tools you have installed with show up in the “Available Tools” section, while the “Import” and “Export” sections will allow you to import and exports different items, such as posts, pages, RSS and other items.
Settings Tab
The final tab found in your WordPress dashboard is the Settings Tab. This tab will grow with many new sub-sections as you install plugins. Most plugins will provide their settings menu in this section of your dashboard.
By default, you will have the following sections:
- General – This section provides an editing screen for basic information, such as the site title, tagline, time zone, date format and more.
- Writing – You can adjust how emoticons display, the default post category, default post format and other settings from this section.
- Reading – In this section you can adjust the display of your front page, post page and other settings.
- Discussion – This section allows you to change all your comment settings.
- Media – The media section allows you to change the size of the images created, by default, when you upload a new image to WordPress.
- Permalinks – In this section, you can change the way your URL displays for posts, pages, categories and more.
Along with these default sections, you will see new sections from any plugins you install.
Now you have a basic understanding of your WordPress dashboard. You should be able to work within your dashboard and start learning each tab and section as you build your new blog/website.
