A Guide to Learning– what? Sounds a bit redundant, doesn’t it? You can say that again. While this post won’t teach you WordPress directly, it will guide you through getting the most from your time online in learning the platform.

Back in May, I redesigned my website. It used to be a static html website, with the cliché thickbox technique for displaying my portfolio pieces. The design wasn’t too bad, it managed to get on Design Meltdown, but I didn’t like it. So I redesigned it, using Blogger to publish my posts to my server via ftp. Two months of using Blogger and I quickly grew tired of it. There was no dynamically updated information with the ftp publishing, so the recent posts section in a newer post would show different links than that of an older post. Very aggravating.

At the same time, I began a personal side project, Superhuman Mind. I set it up in WordPress, and, having never used it before, I was scrambling to learn it as I went, both admin and development. After I got used to the admin, I was hooked since it completely blew Blogger out of the water in usability and control. I ended up installing WordPress on my server and redesigned my website, again. Now, after everything was all said and done, I began researching WordPress to learn more about it. Had I known better, and had I these resources, I would have done things differently to learn it.

One would think that the first place to go to learn WordPress is their website. For me, someone who is an html/css guru yet has weak programming skills, that was too much too soon. Had I not jumped into it head first, this would be the process I would take, outlined for those of you who are new to it or wish to get into it:

Step 1: Installing WordPress Locally

First you need a database application. I used MAMP for mac and followed this process. PC users can use XAMPP and follow this process. You’ll also need to download WordPress. Once you’re done with those tutorials, proceed to Step 2.

Step 2: Installing Database Content

When you first install WordPress, you’ll see that it comes with a sample posting, page, and comment among other minor things. Everyone knows that is nowhere near enough content to build a site accurately. Which is why I suggest downloading a sample database. Visit and follow this tutorial and you’ll have an instant fake website. With tons of information to play around with. Once you’re done, come back and proceed to Step 3.

Step 3: Learn What Does What

One of the bad things about diving face first into WordPress development was that I didn’t know what code performed what actions. WPDesigner has a great, bare bones, extremely toned down, easy to understand walkthrough on what does what. It may go a little slow for the html/css guru, but it is extremely simple to understand. Even to the non-programmer. Go follow the tutorial and come back for Step 4.

Step 4: WordPress Code

The folks over at DBS Interactive have just recently posted a cheatsheet of WordPress php calls (a.k.a. template tags). After following the tutorial in Step 3, this cheatsheet was a lot more comprehensible. Go bookmark it. I downloaded it for future, local reference. Anything after this step is optional, I actually haven’t gotten that far yet, but I plan to research the information found in Step 5.

Step 5: Further WordPress Information

I hope this guide helps in learning, I know I could have used it. If you have any good resources to add, please do so in the comments, and supply what step it would fall under.