Archive for the ‘plug-ins’ Category

Why would you want to add this to your site? Well the biggest reason is to help your readers share what you have to say with the world by adding either of the plugins discussed here you will be able to add some great interaction to your website and encourage the sharing of information with others.

The two main plugins that I have tested out are Digg Digg and Sociable. Both these plugins work well but take different paths to accomplish similar goals. The biggest difference between the two is that with Digg Digg you will get large icons on your posts and with Sociable you will get a nice row of small icons linking off to the social websites.  See the image below for a comparison of the different icons.

Sample of what social bookmarks look like

Installing them is a breeze if you are on a properly configured web server, as I recently discovered when working on a clients website hosted on a different server. Not all servers are created equal and not all installations of WordPress allow for instant install and updates.

So if you are lucky enough to have instant easy install simply go to the add new link under your plugins menu and do a search for the following plugins “sociable” & “Digg Digg” once you locate them simply install them into your site.

Now you need to configure them to show the buttons you want shown on your WordPress website. With Sociable, you get a choice from 99 different bookmark sites. I do not recommend choosing them all but choose about 5 to 10 of your favorites. They will show on your site as in the image above.

Choice of social bookmark sites with Sociable

With Digg Digg you only get a choice of 11 social bookmark sites but they are the most desired ones available. You make the settings for Digg Digg as shown in the image below. One of the issues with Digg Digg is that you only get a choice of 2 sizes for most not all icons and the larger ones are the best. So if you’re looking for something with smaller icons then sociable is what you want. They will show up on you site as shown in the image above.

Choice of social bookmark sites from Digg Digg

I have opted on this site to use the Digg Digg plug in simply because I like the larger icons and don’t want at this time the extended choices from Sociable. Your mileage may vary experiment with them both on your site to see what you prefer and what your users may like.

So you have found that perfect template but there is one thing missing. You have a flash header you want installed into your WordPress Template well as the saying is starting to go “there’s a Plug-in for that.”  

Installing a flash header or any other piece of flash into word press has gotten simpler with the addition of a great plug in called “Kimili Flash Embed”—Provides a full WordPress interface for SWFObject – the best way to embed Flash on your site.

Here is what you need to do too embed a flash header into your site.

1. Copy the flash file into your root directory for your WordPress install.
2. Download and activate the plug-in “Kimili Flash Embed”. You can get the plug in from the plug-in manager in your WordPress dashboard.
3. You now need to make an edit in your header.php file enter the following code removing the space after the bracket [ kml_flashembed movie="flas-file-name.swf" height="x" width="y"/] don’t forget to add your correct file name and the proper width and height for the file.
4. To place the code in your header you need to find the following code <div>Place code here</div> or similar and place it there
5. You can make this edit inside your dashboard area under the –Appearance>>Editor and choose your header.php file.
6. Save or upload your changes and do a quick check on it all should be well as I have done here www.thornandoak.com

This plug-in also adds a new button to your editor for entering posts or pages that will allow you to place flash files in any page or post on your site. All in all this is a great little plug-in for solving the issue of wanting to have flash on your site. You can view the screen shots below on the areas of the dashboard you need to focus on.

Enjoy and if you are looking for templates that use the code I am talking about here please visit my free template download area and check out the templates I currently have for download. I am adding new ones every week so check back regularly and have some fun with your site.

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Are you looking for an easy to embed video into your WordPress installation? Then this is a great plug in for you. The Video Sidebar Widgets plug-in is an easy to install and use plug in that allows you to easily embed videos into your WordPress install as well as to have up to five random videos showing in your sidebar.

This plug is located in the WordPress plug-in library and you can easily locate it by doing a search for “Video Sidebar Widgets” in the install plugins section of your dashboard in WordPress. Once you have located it you simply do an install of it and then setup the configuration of the widget.

This plug-in has two parts first, there is a widget that you will use to place videos in your sidebar. It holds up to five random videos in this widget. When using the side bar widget you will want to know the max width of your side bar so you can set up the widget correctly. This is great plug-in if your WordPress install is about movies or other videos. I have used this plug in on this excellent site for a local video store here in Victoria/Langford BC. You can check it out here at www. Nikovideo.com

This plug-in also make it easy to embed videos into your posts with a simple button that is added to your tools area of your posting box (see the picture below). To show how easy this is I have added a video I created on how to install WordPress from a hosting company such as mine that offers Fantastico.  

 Are you looking for free WordPress templates then check out our selction that is growing on a weekly basis here.

This is where you can easly inset your YouTube Video using easly generated short code.