WordPress is an open-source content management system enabling you to create your own blog(s)/ website(s) with a combination of dynamic and static pages for free.

WordPress is available in two forms:  The first, from WordPress.org is a downloadable software, that must be loaded onto your own webserver.   The second form is from WordPress.com and is a completly free hosted instance of WordPress, although free, there is a limited range of themes and functionality, which can be extended by a yearly fee to WordPress.com.

Working with the hosted service at: WordPress.com

You can choose a theme from a range of different styles, many of which can be customised for your needs through adding ‘widgets’. Widgets are essentially tools that you can add to the sidebars of your blog – for example, a calendar, slideshow of pictures, Twitter feed, etc… Pictures, slideshows, maps and videos can also be embedded easily into your posts. Polls can also be added via ‘Polldaddy’ – you register with them once and can then add as many polls as you like to your site(s).  The biggest limitation to using this free service is that you only get a sub-domain of wordpress:  for example, http://yourname.wordpress.com, without having to pay a surcharge for your own domain name.

WordPress blogs can be private, with invited users only, or public. They can have one or multiple authors, with different permissions easily assigned to each contributor. Allowing people to comment also creates conversations around your posts (these can be moderated).

Stats provide you with details about traffic to your site – where people have come from, what they searched for and which posts are the most popular.

Themes also have a mobile interface, allowing you to view, write and add images to posts while on the move. Please see my example blog post.

Examples:

• http://www.fleapalmer.com/?p=581 – links to WordPress blogs created by BSc Cruise Management students as part of their ‘Showcasing Cruising’ assignment.

 

Working with WordPress.org software

The hosted service is brilliant, but does not offer you the whole possible functionality of the CMS, so if you want an even more enhanced site, with your own domain name,  embedded interactive SlideShare, Prezi and MindMeister presentations which need plug-ins in order to work, or you would like to create your own theme/design, you will need to dowload the software from WordPress.org. and upload it to your own webserver running a specified web-platform, normally including MySQL database and a PHP code interpretor (such as LAMP).

Installing wordpress on your own servers will take a certain amount of technical knowledge or support, but is by no means hard to do.

Plymouth University now supports WordPress and has installed it on webservers to allow the full version of this software to be used by staff. This is available from:  http://blogs.plymouth.ac.uk .

Whichever option you choose there is lots of online help and support, including forums for very specific queries.

Examples/ Case Studies:

• http://technologyenhancedlearning.net/
• http://hes.plymouth.ac.uk/ethics/
• http://hes.plymouth.ac.uk/childhoodwellbeing/
• http://hes.plymouth.ac.uk/plymuniprimary/
• http://hes.plymouth.ac.uk/autism/
• http://www.edu.plymouth.ac.uk/

Pros of using WordPress:

• Easy to use website comprising of static web-pages and a blog
• Free templates can be customised for an individual look
• Additional content can be added through ‘widgets’
• Lots of online help and support

Cons of using WordPress:

• Blogs may require moderation and editing
• If you establish your own instance of WordPress, care must be taken to insure you keep on top of security
• If you use the University supplied WordPress, there may be limitations in functionality or themes

Other blogging platforms:

Blogger, Tumblr provide similiar blogging capabilities  and are similar but simpler alternatives to WordPress.

Drupal, Joomla and Typo3 are more complex content management systems (CMS) that provide a similiar but wider level of functionality at the expense of being more complex to set up and support.

Examples/ Case Studies:

• http://discoveringecolecon.blogspot.co.uk/ – Dr Lynda Rodwell (Ecological Economics)
• http://plymouth-electron-microscopy-centre.blogspot.co.uk/ – Dr Roy Moate et al. (Microscopy)
• http://www.hydrographic-academy.co.uk/ – Dr Richard Thain et al. (Marine)

Find out more:

See ‘Set Up Your Blog With WordPress: The Ultimate Guide‘ from makeuseof.com