Got Wordpress questions? I've got answers (hopefully)

[willilance]

Anyone who has ever heard Bill talk has no doubt heard the word "Wordpress" come out of his mouth. Since I've been working with Bill for quite some time, I've gotten quite familiar with Wordpress. So, in the spirit of this site and Bill's show, I'll try and answer whatever Wordpress questions you've got. I'm sure the rest of Bill's staff can help out as well, as we're all pretty familiar with the CMS. So throw em on up here and we'll do what we can to get them answered.

[junior555]

Hi willilance,
I would like to know how to download themes to use on a Word Press blog;I have watched a few videos yet this thing really is a challenge for me.Thanks!

[tonyknuckles]

You first have to access via ftp your domain and subdirectory structure of blog site. Then upload unzipped them files to wp-content/themes. Usually when you see ths subdirectory you will see default theme. That's how you tell you are in right place.

[willilance]

Ok, well I'll try and do a quick tutorial here on themes:

1. Get a theme you want. You can find these all over the place. I usually go to wordpress' theme directory and just look through them or search for something specific.

2. Once you've found a theme you like, you'll need to download it, unzip the contents and then upload those contents to your site. I'm going to assume a knowledge of ftp and how to use it here, but if you don't have an ftp program, I'd recommend Filezilla.

3. Log in to your site through your ftp program and navigate to your blog directory. Go to your wp-content directory and then the themes directory.

4. Upload the unzipped theme files inside a folder with the name of the theme (if the theme is called Blix, then you would have a folder called Blix and inside of that folder would be the theme files like index.php, header.php, footer.php, etc.). Make sure you don't have the .php files 2 folders deep as this can cause problems.

5. Log in to your Wordpress site (http://www.yoursite.com/wp-admin) using an Admin user name and password and go to either the Presentation or Appearance tab (depending on which version of Wordpress you're using). From there you will see a list of available themes for your website. You should see a screenshot of each theme so you know what they look like. Select the one you want to use and it'll either automatically update or show you a preview of it and you hit the "Activate" link on the top right (again, depends of the version of Wordpress you're using).

I hope that helps