Making WordPress Your CMS and Automatically Updating a Self Hosted WordPress Plugin

MAKING WORDPRESS
YOUR CMS
Remind clients that you exist
Provide support contact details
Provide helpful hints
Tell your clients what you’re doing
Automatically Update Your Plugin

CUSTOM
LOGIN
SCREEN
•Add clients logo
•Add link to your site
•Move Error messages above
the logo

LOGIN LOGO

<?php
function my_custom_login_logo() {
echo '<style type="text/css">
h1 a { background-image:url('.get_bloginfo('siteurl').'/wp-
content/custom-login-logo.png) !important; }
.login .message { margin-top:-150px;margin-bottom:
110px;}
</style>';
}

LOGIN YOUR LINK

<?php
function my_custom_login_credit() { ?>

<p style="position:absolute;top:428px;left:50%;margin-left:
5px;">served by <a href="http://www.yourdomain.com"
title="Your Name" style="text-decoration:none;">Your
Name</a></p>
<?php }

add_action('login_footer', 'my_custom_login_credit');
?>

CUSTOM
LOGIN
SCREEN
•Add clients logo
•Add link to your site

EDITOR
PERMISSIONS
•Allow editors to manage
menus and widgets

EDITOR PERMISSIONS

<?php
// get the the role object
$role_object = get_role( 'editor' );

// add capability to this role object
$role_object->add_cap( 'edit_theme_options' );
?>

‘PIMP’ THE
TITLE BAR
•Add your logo
•Add your name and link
•Add support contact details

‘PIMP’ THE TITLE BAR

<?php
add_action('admin_head', 'my_custom_logo');

function my_custom_logo() {
echo '<style type="text/css">
#header-logo { background-image: url(http://
yourdomain.com/logo.gif) !important; }</style>';
}?>

‘PIMP’ THE TITLE BAR
<?php
function fs_admin_link() { ?>

<span style="font:normal 14px Georgia;padding: 8px 8px
5px;margin: 0;ﬂoat: left;">served by <a href="http://
www.yourdomain.com">Your Name</a> | email: <a
href="mailto:you@yourdomain.co.uk" title="Email Your Name
Support">you@yourdomain.com</a> | tel: 000 0000 0000</
span>
<?php }
add_action('in_admin_header', 'fs_admin_link');
?>

‘PIMP’ THE
FOOTER
•Remove unwanted links
•Add your name and link

‘PIMP’ THE FOOTER
<?php
add_ﬁlter( 'admin_footer_text', 'my_admin_footer_text' );
function my_admin_footer_text( $default_text ) {
return '<span id="footer-thankyou">Website managed by
<a href="http://yourdomain.com">Your Name</a><span> |
Powered by <a href="http://
www.wordpress.org">WordPress</a>';
}
?>

DECLUTTER THE DASHBOARD

•Remove confusing widgets
•Add support information
•Add your RSS feed

<?php
// remove unnecessary dashboard widgets
function remove_dashboard_widgets(){

global $wp_meta_boxes;

// do not remove "Right Now" for administrators

if (!current_user_can('activate_plugins')) {

unset($wp_meta_boxes['dashboard']['normal']['core']['dashboard_right_now']);

}

// remove widgets for everyone

unset($wp_meta_boxes['dashboard']['normal']['core']['dashboard_plugins']);

unset($wp_meta_boxes['dashboard']['normal']['core']['dashboard_recent_comments']);

unset($wp_meta_boxes['dashboard']['normal']['core']['dashboard_incoming_links']);

unset($wp_meta_boxes['dashboard']['side']['core']['dashboard_primary']);

unset($wp_meta_boxes['dashboard']['side']['core']['dashboard_secondary']);
}
add_action('wp_dashboard_setup', 'remove_dashboard_widgets');
?>

<?php
add_action('wp_dashboard_setup', 'my_custom_dashboard_widgets');

function my_custom_dashboard_widgets() {

wp_add_dashboard_widget('my_note_widget', 'Your Name Support', 'custom_dashboard_me');
}

function custom_dashboard_me() {
echo '<p>Welcome to your WordPress Dashboard, from here you can edit all of the content on
your website.</p><p>Need help? For support please email us at <a
href="mailto:you@yourdomain.com">you@yourdomain.com</a>.</p><p>You can ﬁnd more
information on our <a href="http://www.yourdomain.com" title="Your Title">website</a>.</p>';
}
?>

<?php
add_action('wp_dashboard_setup', 'my_dashboard_widgets');
function my_dashboard_widgets() {
// add a custom dashboard widget
wp_add_dashboard_widget( 'dashboard_custom_feed', 'My News',
'dashboard_custom_feed_output' ); //add new RSS feed output
}
function dashboard_custom_feed_output() {
echo '
<div class="rss-widget">';
wp_widget_rss_output(array(
'url' => 'http://www.yourdomain.com/rss', //put your feed URL here
'title' => 'My News',
'items' => 3, //how many posts to show
'show_summary' => 1,
'show_author' => 0,
'show_date' => 1
));
echo "</div>
";
}
?>

RECAP
•Make the login screen look pretty
•Allow Editors to manage menus and widgets
•Add your details and logo to the title bar
•Put your name in the footer and remove confusing links
•Make the dashboard less confusing and more useful
•Add these codes to functions.php
•Or even better, your own plugin
•If you create a plugin and add it to all your client sites...
•... enable automatic updates before you start!

HOW TO - AUTO UPDATES

• Visit
http://w-shadow.com/blog/2010/09/02/automatic-
updates-for-any-plugin/

• Update plugin header

• Create metadata.json

• Zip your plugin

• Upload metadata.json and plugin.zip to web server

UPDATE PLUGIN HEADER

<?php
require 'plugin-updates/plugin-update-checker.php';
$MyUpdateChecker = new PluginUpdateChecker(
'http://yourdomain.com/plugins/yourplugin/metadata.json',
__FILE__,
'yourplugin'
);
?>

UPLOAD ‘PLUGIN UPDATES’

•Download the ﬁle from w-shadow.com
•Add the ﬁle to your plugin folder
•Have a beer
•This sets up the WordPress schedule
•Checks every 12 hours

CREATE METADATA.JSON

{
"name" : "My Plugin Name",
"slug" : "myslug",
"download_url" : "http://domain.com/plugins/pluginname/
pluginname.zip",
"version" : "0.5",
"author" : "Chris Witham",
"sections" : {
"description" : "Add a description here."
}

UPLOAD TO SERVER

•Upload metadata.json and plugin.zip to your webserver
•Manually update the plugin on client site
•Ensure client site plugin is looking at your server
•Wait... (now is a good time for another beer!)
•... an hour later, or 12!

MAKING WORDPRESS
YOUR CMS
+ Automatically Update Your Plugin

By Chris Witham
For South Yorkshire WordPress
October 2011

Making WordPress Your CMS and Automatically Updating a Self Hosted WordPress Plugin

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