How to improve your blog without plugins
In this article, get to know how you can make changes to your WordPress blog without making use of plugins. WordPress is very flexible and here a few basic tips to start changing your WordPress code.
Introduction
In WordPress, plugins are a very big plus that makes an awful lot of bloggers use WordPress. Nevertheless, overloaded plugins can slow down your blog and thus scaring visitors away and degrade your SEO. Not to mention, of course, there many plugins available, but it is the difficulty of making the right choices, compatibility issues, etc. But what if you still want to do some changes on your blog and such features are not available in WordPress or in your theme? Well you can do this by knowing the files in your theme and changing the WordPress code. 1. Knowing the different files in your WordPress theme
The files in your theme a allow your blog to exist in its current form with the home page, articles, other pages, etc and are located at "Appearance --> Editor" in your admin panel .
Here is a small list of pages that you can find in your WordPress theme:
a )index.php: homepage
It allows you to manage the display of your articles in a loop, with excerpts, thumbnails and the number of comments.
b) single.php: article page
This page allows you to modify all the data displayed when you click on an item. The disposition of your articles, the translation of the theme (if no language files), adding images, forms, etc
c) comments.php: page comments
It contains the feedback form so that the loop will display. This is where you can set up information about your comments and customize your call to action.
d) sidebar.php: sidebar
This file contains your sidebar. It gives you the ability to manage your various sidebar widgets to add custom blocks.
e) header.php: top
This is the part that contains the entire top of your pages, titles, meta-description and often the logo and the top menu sometimes with RSS feeds and other social networks.
f) footer.php: footer
Similar to above, this file contains all the bottom of your page, with closing tags, copyright, sometimes with some sidebar widgets.
g) page.php: page for pages
It is from this file that you are able to create your Contact, About, etc pages. You can also modify them to create pages without sidebar, without logo, brief other templates that you can reuse.
h) 404.php: page 404
It is often present in the themes and you should certainly not forget to customize it. And a custom 404 page is less likely to leave the visitor.
i) functions.php: php functions used in the theme
This file simply contains all functions specific to your theme. Whether it's a different management comments or more technical, it's all there.
j) style.css: file containing the styles (colors, positioning)
Thanks to this file you can change the entire design of your blog, color menus, text size via the positioning of the blocks. 2. Use the power of code
1. Add a note in your comments
Several times you may have to edit comments to add a few lines of text, a link, etc but do not know where you have to go and what to change. To do this, first open your comments.php and find the following code "comment_form_title" . Just below you should have an H2 closing tag. This was the title of your feedback form. Below this you can add text, links (HTML) without fear. This text will appear just below the title. 2. Set up a form at the top of your article
Practice to implement a Aweber form to encourage your readers to subscribe, the location just above the item converts pretty well. To do this open your single.php and seek "the_title code ()" and then back up one line just before H1 (or H2) then paste it on your Aweber code form. It now appears on all your items just above the title. 3. Only display one item at a specific place in your blog
One can use this trick to show only on article page. For this use the code "is_single ()". Writing "if (is_single ())"it means "if it is an article," writing "if (! Is_single ())" it means the opposite, "if this is not an article." Other such codes exist as "is_category ()"to determine if you are on a category, or "is_home" to see if this is the home page. But in what context do we have to use this code? Well, it can be used to display information specific to each type of page. To set up two different "call to action" for example depending on whether you are on the home page or on a product page.
Read How to select the best theme for a WordPress blog
