Discovering the WordPress back office

Dashboard

Once logged in, you’ll be redirected to the WordPress dashboard. From here, you can control all aspects of your website. Here are some of the basic features you’ll find on the dashboard:

• Overview: You’ll find an overview of your site’s statistics, such as the number of articles, pages, comments and users.
• Navigation Menu: On the left-hand side of the screen, you’ll see a navigation menu containing several options, including articles, pages, media, comments, extensions, settings, etc.

Main features

Once logged in, you’ll be redirected to the WordPress dashboard. From here, you can control all aspects of your website. Here are some of the basic features you’ll find on the dashboard:

Posts

Posts are the main content of your WordPress site. They are used to publish news, blog posts, tutorials and other types of editorial content. In the WordPress back office, you can manage your posts efficiently through a user-friendly, intuitive interface.

Creating a new article

To create a new post, go to the “Posts” menu in your WordPress dashboard, then click on “Add”. You’ll be taken to the post editor, where you can enter the title of your post, write the content in the visual text editor or in plain text mode, and add media such as images and videos.

Publishing and Planning

Once you’ve written your article, you have several options for publishing it. You can publish it immediately by clicking on the “Publish” button, schedule it for publication at a later date and time, or put it in draft form for later review.

Editing and updating

WordPress makes it easy to edit your posts after they’ve been published. You can access the post editor by clicking on “Posts” in your dashboard menu, then selecting the post you wish to edit. Once in the editor, make the necessary changes to your article and click on “Update” to save your changes.

Categories and Tags

To organize your articles, you can assign them to categories and add tags. Categories are used to group articles according to specific themes or topics, while tags are used to identify specific keywords or concepts addressed in the article.

Deleting an item

If you wish to delete an item, you can do so by accessing the list of items in the “Items” menu of your dashboard, hovering over the item you wish to delete, then clicking on “Trash”. The item will be moved to the recycle garbage can, where you can restore it at a later date or delete it permanently.

Pages

Pages are static content on your WordPress site, such as home pages, contact pages, about pages and other permanent content. In the WordPress back office, you can manage your pages in a similar way to managing posts, but with a few important differences.

Creating a new page

To create a new page, go to the “Pages” menu in your WordPress dashboard, then click on “Add”. You’ll be taken to the page editor, where you can enter the title of your page and write the content in the visual text editor or in plain text mode.

Page templates

WordPress offers various predefined page templates to meet different design needs. You can choose a specific page template in the “Page attributes” section on the right of the page editor. Some custom WordPress themes may also offer their own page templates.

Publishing and Planning

As with articles, you have the option of publishing a page immediately, scheduling it for publication at a later date, or placing it in draft for review. Use the publication options to the right of the page editor to choose the publication status of your page.

Page hierarchy

You can organize your pages into a hierarchical structure using parent and child pages. To assign a parent page to a page, select it from the “Parent page” drop-down menu in the “Page attributes” section. Child pages will then be displayed as subpages in the navigation menu.

Deleting a Page

If you wish to delete a page, you can do so by accessing the list of pages in the “Pages” menu of your dashboard, hovering over the page you wish to delete, then clicking on “Trash”. The page will be moved to the recycle garbage can, where you can restore it or delete it permanently.

Media

The “Media” section in WordPress is where you can upload, manage and organize all the multimedia files used on your website, such as images, videos and audio files.

Media downloads

To upload new media, go to the “Media” menu in your WordPress dashboard, then click “Add” to open the media uploader. You can drag and drop your media files into the upload area, or click the “Select Files” button to choose files from your computer.

Media Library

Once you’ve uploaded media to your site, it will be listed in the media library. You can view all your media, or filter media by type (images, videos, audio) using the tabs at the top of the page. You can also search for specific media using the search bar.

Edit Media

You can edit the details of a media item by clicking on it in the media library. This allows you to modify the media’s title, caption, description and tags. You can also crop or rotate an image, as well as change its size, using the media editor options.

Media deletion

To remove media from your media library, click on the media to open its details, then click on the “Permanently Delete” link in the bottom right-hand corner of the window. Once media is deleted, it cannot be restored, so be sure to back up important media before deleting it.

Use of Media in Content

Once you’ve uploaded media to your site, you can use them in your articles, pages and other content by inserting them directly from the content editor. Use the “Add media” button in the editor to access your media library and insert media into your content.

Media Optimization

To ensure optimum performance of your site, it’s important to optimize your media for the web. This includes reducing image size, compressing video and audio files, and using appropriate file formats. WordPress offers media optimization plugins that can help you automate this process.

Comments

Comments are an important part of the interaction between visitors and your WordPress site. They allow you to gather feedback, opinions and questions from users about your content. In this section, you can manage all comments received on your site.

Overview

In the “Comments” section, you can view a list of all comments received on your site. Comments are displayed in a table with columns such as the author of the comment, the content of the comment, the name of the associated article or page, the date of the comment, and so on.

Approval of comments

WordPress lets you moderate comments awaiting approval. When a visitor leaves a comment on your site, it’s usually placed on hold to be approved by an administrator before being published publicly on the site. You can approve, reject, edit or mark as spam pending comments in this section.

Reply to Comments

You can reply to comments directly from the “Comments” section of your WordPress dashboard. By clicking on the “Reply” link under a comment, you can write and publish your response. Replies to comments are displayed below the original comment, making it easy to keep track of discussions.

Spam management

WordPress has a built-in spam filter that automatically filters out potentially unwanted or malicious comments. Comments identified as spam are placed in the trash and can be reviewed and deleted by an administrator. You can also manually mark comments as spam if required.

Comments settings

In the WordPress discussion settings, you can configure several options related to comments, such as whether moderation is required before publication, whether links are allowed in comments, whether comment pagination is displayed, and so on. These settings allow you to customize the commenting experience on your site.

Comment notifications

WordPress can send you e-mail notifications every time a new comment is published on your site. You can enable or disable these notifications in the discussion settings. Notifications help you stay informed about commenting activity on your site and react quickly to user comments.

Appearances

The visual appearance of your WordPress site is crucial to delivering an attractive and professional user experience. In the “Appearance” section, you can customize your site’s theme, modify navigation menus, add widgets and much more.

Themes

Themes determine the overall appearance of your WordPress site. In this section, you can browse, install, activate and customize the themes available. WordPress offers a wide variety of free and premium themes to suit all design needs. You can also download and install custom themes from external sources.

Customize

Customization is a powerful tool that lets you modify various aspects of your theme in real time, such as colors, fonts, headers, backgrounds and much more. You can preview changes to your site live before publishing them.

Menus

Navigation menus allow users to easily navigate your site by accessing different pages, categories or external links. You can create and manage multiple menus in this section, then assign them to the appropriate locations in your theme.

Editor

The Site Template Editor is an advanced feature introduced in WordPress for Full Site Editing (FSE) themes. This feature allows users to create and customize complete site templates directly from the WordPress back office, offering more granular control over site design and layout.

Template creation

With the Site Template Editor, you can create templates for different elements of your site, such as headers, footers, archive pages, individual pages and so on. You can add blocks, styles and dynamic elements to your templates to customize their appearance and operation.

Advanced Customization

The Site Template Editor offers advanced customization features, such as the ability to add custom CSS styles, style variables, flexible layout options, conditional display conditions and much more. This allows users to create unique, dynamic designs for their WordPress site.

Live preview

One of the key features of the Site Template Editor is the ability to preview your changes live before publishing them on your site. You can instantly see how your changes affect the look and feel of your site, allowing you to fine-tune and adjust your templates with precision.

Block integration

The Site Template Editor integrates seamlessly with the WordPress block system, which means you can use all the blocks available in the block editor to create and customize your templates. This offers great flexibility and a variety of design options to suit your specific needs.

Accessibility and SEO Optimization

When creating templates with the Site Template Editor, it’s important to consider accessibility and search engine optimization (SEO). Make sure your content is properly structured and that your templates are accessible to all users, including those using assistive technologies.

The Site Template Editor is a powerful feature that opens up new design and customization possibilities for WordPress users. With this feature, you can create dynamic, eye-catching websites that stand out from the competition and deliver an exceptional user experience.

Extensions

Extensions, also known as plugins, are an essential part of the WordPress ecosystem. They enable you to add extra functionality to your WordPress site, whether to improve its performance, add new features or customize its appearance.

WordPress extensions offer a host of additional features to meet a variety of needs. Among the most common features are advanced forms management, enhanced security, SEO optimization, social networking integration, e-commerce, advanced image galleries, discussion forums, analytics tools and much more.

Installing a WordPress extension is a quick and easy process. You can search for and install extensions directly from the dashboard of your WordPress site in just a few clicks. Find out more in our tutorial.

Accounts

In the WordPress back office, account management is essential for determining who can access and perform actions on your website. Here’s an overview of the main features related to accounts in WordPress :

Users

Users are the people who have access to your WordPress site. They can have different roles, each with different permissions. Here are some common user roles:

• Administrator: Administrators have full access to all WordPress features. They can add, edit and delete content, install themes and plugins, and manage other users.
• Editor: Editors have the power to publish, modify and delete their own content as well as that of other users. However, they cannot install themes or plugins.
• Author: Authors can publish, modify and delete their own content, but cannot access other users’ content.
• Contributor: Contributors can write and manage their own content, but must submit their articles to an editor or administrator for publication.
• Subscriber: Subscribers are registered users of your website. They can leave comments and subscribe to updates, but have no access to other publishing features.

Add a new user

To add a new user, go to the “Users” section of the dashboard menu. Click on “Add” to create a new account. You’ll need to provide a username, e-mail address and role for the new user.

User profile

Each user has a profile containing information such as name, e-mail address and role. Users can edit their own profile by accessing the “Edit profile” page from the “Users” menu.

User management

As administrator, you can manage existing users by modifying their details, resetting their passwords, or deleting them if necessary. You can also change users’ roles to grant them more or fewer authorizations.

Tools

In the WordPress back-office, the “Tools” section brings together various tools and functionalities to help you manage your website. Here’s an overview of the main tools available in this section:

Import

The import tool lets you transfer content from other platforms to your WordPress site. You can import posts, pages, comments, media and other types of content from platforms such as Blogger, Tumblr, and even other WordPress installations.

Export

Unlike the import tool, the export tool lets you save and transfer content from your WordPress site to other platforms or WordPress installations. You can export posts, pages, comments and other content data.

Site health

The “Site Health” tool is an integrated WordPress feature that lets you check the health of your site and diagnose any problems. It offers detailed information on your site’s configuration, performance, security and compatibility with WordPress standards.

1. Site status
   The “Site status” section provides an overview of the general health of your site. You can see whether essential components are activated and working properly, such as automatic updates, SSL certificates, and other important features.
2. Server information
   This section provides detailed information about the server on which your WordPress site is hosted, including PHP version, available memory, MySQL version, and other technical details. This information can be useful for diagnosing performance or compatibility problems.
3. Plugin health
   The “Plugin health” section checks the compatibility and stability of the plugins installed on your site. It warns you if any plugins are experiencing problems or are obsolete, which may affect your site’s performance and security.
4. Theme health
   In the same way as for plugins, the “Theme health” section evaluates the compatibility and stability of your WordPress theme. If your theme is out of date or experiencing compatibility problems, you’ll be notified so you can take the necessary steps to resolve the issue.
5. Debugging
   The “Debugging” section provides detailed information about your WordPress site’s environment, including PHP constants, cookies, SQL queries, and other technical details. This can be useful for diagnosing compatibility problems.

Export data

The “Export Data” tool lets you create a backup of your WordPress content in the form of an XML file. This typically includes your posts, pages, comments, categories, tags and other content types. This feature is useful if you want to migrate your site to another server, make a regular backup of your content, or simply keep a copy of your data.

To export your data, simply select the content types you wish to include in your export, then click on the “Download export file” button. Once the process is complete, you’ll be able to download an XML file containing all your data.

Delete data

The “Clear Data” tool lets you permanently delete data from your WordPress site. This can include posts, pages, comments, media, and other content present on your site. This feature is useful if you want to clean up your site and remove obsolete or unwanted content.

Before deleting data, WordPress will ask you to confirm your action by checking a box to confirm that you understand this action is irreversible. Once you’ve confirmed, WordPress will delete all selected data permanently.

It’s important to note that deleting data is an irreversible operation, and we recommend that you proceed with caution. Be sure to back up your important data before proceeding.

Parameters

Finally, “Settings” allow you to configure various aspects of your website, including general settings, permalinks, reading, writing and so on. Be sure to browse these settings and configure them to suit your needs.

The WordPress back office is a powerful tool that allows you to manage your website efficiently. By understanding the basic features and learning how to use them, you’ll be able to create and manage a professional website with ease. Feel free to explore and experiment with different features to discover all that WordPress has to offer!