1. Creating a CMS Website
with WordPress
or how to make a department website without pulling too much hair out
ourenvironment.berkeley.edu
BY TRISH ROQUE, WEB & COMMUNICATIONS GAL
troque@berkeley.edu, @trishroque,
http://www.linkedin.com/in/trishroque

2. ABOUT ME
• Formal training in visual arts
• Been at UCB since 2001 (w/ a break b/w 2008-2011)
• Private industry, freelance web design, focus on WP
• Been designing websites for ~6 years
• Been working with WP for ~5 years, and exclusively w/ Genesis Theme
Framework for ~2 yrs
• Front-end developer; not really a programmer (but not afraid to take
other people’s code to make it work for my projects)

3. Why WordPress? SHORT ANSWER: I don't know Drupal. I know WordPress.
THE PROBLEMS (Design, Technical)
• ~200 Graduate Students, ~70 Faculty & Specialists = CMS component
• Chair wanted a visually appealing website (total rebranding of the dept)
• Had to complete before the beginning of Fall semester
• Use minimal plugins (decrease dependencies on other devs)
MY SOLUTIONS
Custom Post-Types, Custom Taxonomies, Custom Child Theme, Key Plugins

4. IT'S JUST CUSTOM CONTENT!!
(Should really be called Custom
Content Type!)
-or how to allow your users to
enter information without
confusing them by the use of
custom fields & custom
metaboxes
<?php
register_post_type( $post_type,
$args );
?>
WP Codex Page
Example: ESPM Member Page
RED = Custom Fields
BLUE = Custom Taxonomies

5. What users see (uses custom
on the backend metaboxes)

7. Power of WP Custom
Taxonomies is unleashed
with Custom Post Types
Taxonomy =
a way of grouping things
together
3 WordPress default taxonomies:
Category, Tag, Link Category
<?php register_taxonomy($taxonomy,
$object_type, $args); ?>
WP Codex Page
Example:
Custom Taxonomy of People Type
(hierarchical)

8. MORE EXAMPLES
(Non-hierarchical)
Research Groups

9. More Examples
Non-hieararchical
• Research Tags / Keywords
• By Alphabet

10. What's a Child Theme?
• A way of creating a theme where customizations are preserved whenever WP or the
parent theme is upgraded.
• Customizations are made in the stylesheet and functions file
• Inherits all functionalities of the parent theme
It needs a Parent theme
• Must be from a trusted source
• Assumption is that these themes will be compatible w/ WP upgrades
• I work with the Genesis theme framework (a robust theme that extends WP
functionalities)

11. How to make WordPress useful as a Content Management System
(or how to make your job easier by not having to maintain ~300 personal pages)
Role Scoper: Adminimize:
Excellent plugin! (but a little Buggy - but seems to work for
confusing to set up) my purposes
• assign various • minimizes the admin
permissions/restrictions interface that users see
to individuals when they log in
• assign individuals to • workaround for bugginess:
role groups pre-set up screen options
• assign various
permissions/restrictions
to groups
What admin sees
What typical users see

12. Peter's Login Redirect: Redirects users to a specific URL after login.
Before plugin, first thing users see after logging in With plugin, users are redirected to click on their
is WP built-in Profile section causing confusion. member's page.

13. THANK YOU!
QUESTIONS?
troque@berkeley.edu
@trishroque