WordPress CMS modifications

I made a presentation at WordCamp UK 2008 entitled ‘WordPress is not a blog‘ - slightly controversial, which was the idea! It ended up with the alternative title of ‘WordPress is a blog… and a whole lot more!‘. It centered around using WordPress as a Content Management System (CMS).

New developments since presentation

Nothing stands still in the world of web development! Since making this presentation the following developments have occurred:

Cloak plugin - This hides areas of the write page and write post panels, and I think is very useful for de-cluttering the interface. The developer has moved on to bigger and brighter things now, so he has kindly passed over to me for development and maintenance - and I will be making an announcement about this shortly! The old plugin still works fine, and is tested upto WordPress v2.6

Fresh Post plugin - The ‘fresh post’ plugin has evolved a little into ‘Flutter’ - which now allows (if you wish!) more CMS type control over the layout of your site. It still creates custom write panels, which most people would be interested in (thanks to Chris Garrett for pointing this one out… Twitter is good!)

Relevant links and further reading from presentation

PLUGINS

• Cloak - Hide unwanted write post/page items.
• Fresh Post/Flutter - Create custom write panels and hide default ones.
• Audit trail - Some functions now obsolete due to 2.6 roll-back functionality.
• Role Manager - Complete control overs user privileges.
• wp-dbmanager - Database backup tool.
• CForms - Great form building tool.
• Simple Tags - Very powerful tag management tool.

DISPLAYING CONTENT

• query_posts - (for use with loop) WordPress codex article
• get_posts - (outside of loop) WordPress codex article
• get_post - (outside of loop) WordPress codex article

Presentation slides

I have just had a chance to start catching up on stuff after attending WordCamp UK 2008 this weekend (19-20th July) - and what a weekend it was!

Around 60 bloggers and developers from all around the UK (and some even from beyond!) descended on Birmingham to meet up and talk about all things WordPress. It was the first WordCamp to be held in the UK - and I think it went 99% right, which is amazing considering how quickly it was organised with Tony Scott as the coordinator of many, many individuals that helped make this event a reality.

My personal thanks goes out to all the speakers that where kind enough to prepare good quality, well thought-out presentations and share their expertise with the delegates of WordCamp UK 2008. I think we can all agree that there was a-lot of thought-provoking discussions generated by some of these presentations. People use WordPress for so many different things and it’s great to learn about someone else’s experiences of WordPress.

I sadly missed the opportunity to talk to many people at the conference, it flew by! However, those people I did get to catch-up with where great - and I hope to forge some new partnerships in the coming months.

Read more »

The main blog for WordCamp UK 2008 has now going live! This will provide a central resource for bloggers to the event, with a number of authors helping out. If you want to keep up-to-date with what’s going on - go check it out!

I’m pleased to announce that this site is sponsoring the hosting, and I am personally maintaining and administering the blog - just a little helping hand for WordCamp UK 2008!

After a couple of days down over the weekend for the WordCamp UK 2008 ticket sales system, I’m please to see that it is now back on-line and tickets can be purchased here.

Tickets went on sale for WordCampUK a few days ago, they are priced at £35, which covers the two day conference and a goodie bag! Tickets can be purchased here - make sure you secure your place at WordCamp, admission is by ticket only!

It has been decided that the previous venue (Aston University) is not really suitable for WordCamp UK, and it has been officially announced today that the venue has been changed to The Studio in Birmingham, right in the heart of Birmingham City Centre.

This is a very positive move from the organisers, as I personally know this venue - and it is FANTASTIC! Details of how to book tickets for the event, to be held 19-20 July 2008, will be released shortly.

Relevant links and further reading

The Studio - The new venue for WordCamp UK 2008
WordCamp UK Wiki - Signup and contribute!

The Humphrey Awards (or the Humphreys for short) is a competition being run as part of WordCamp UK - to find the WordCamp UK delegates’ favourite blogs, content and code.

The competition is open to all WordCamp UK delegates and includes categories for favourite blog theme design, favourite blog content, favourite single blog post and favourite WordPress Plugin.

Relevant links and further reading

The Humphrey Awards - UK WordPress blog awards
WordCamp UK Wiki - Signup and contribute!

WordCamp UK organisation is going very well - it seems a venue has been decided on - Aston University in Birmingham.

For those that don’t know, WordCamp is a great opportunity for WordPress developers, designers and bloggers to get together and talk about their favourite subject… WordPress! It’s sure to be a ram packed couple of day, with presentations and developer break-out groups.

It is going to be held on Saturday/Sunday July 19-20th 2008 - see you there!

Relevant links and further reading

WordCamp UK Wiki - Signup, contribute and help make the event want you want!
WordCamp Mailing list - Keep up-to-date with discussions

Wordcamp events are a great opportunity for WordPress developers to get together and discuss the best blogging (and website/CMS!) platform in the world!

There is an event in the process of being organised in Birmingham UK - the current scheduled date is Saturday/Sunday July 19-20th 2008.

So if you are in the UK and want to hook-up with like-minded developers, get contributing to the wiki and spread the word - not too long to go! I have listed all the relevant links below DONT MISS OUT!

Relevant links and further reading

WordCamp UK Wiki - Signup, contribute and help make the event want you want!
WordCamp Mailing list - Keep up-to-date with discussions