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Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Satellite Studies

University of Wisconsin-Madison

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WordPress Help

If you need help with WordPress or your website you can contact the SSEC Webmaster.

Additional documentation (top)

Please refer to the

SSEC WordPress Help

page for general WordPress help as well information that is relevant to all SSEC/CIMSS WordPress sites.

Below is information specific to CIMSS WordPress websites.

How to edit the blue navigation menu (top)

  1. Login to your WordPress site
  2. Navigate to the Dashboard for your site (hover over your site name in the gray admin bar at the top and select Dashboard from the drop down menu)
  3. Under the Appearance menu on the left, select Menus
  4. Make sure primary_menu (Primary Menu) is the selected menu
  5. use the Add menu items to select a Page (or create a custom menu link) then click on the Add to Menu button to add the menu item to the menu list on the right
  6. Click on the menu item you added on the right to edit (for example the text) if needed
  7. Use the mouse cursor to drag menu items up and down to get the desired order – this is the order they will be displayed in the blue navigation menu on your site. Do NOT drag menu items so that they are nested underneath another menu item – the CIMSS WordPress Theme doesn’t support drop-down / nested navigation menus

How to add a Hero Image (top)

A Hero Image is a full width image at the top of your page – example.

Instructions

  1. Insert an Image Block. You should insert an image that is at least 1026 pixels wide and has a landscape aspect ratio (i.e., the image is wider than it is tall).
  2. On the right under the Block tab (while you have your Image Block selected), under Styles, choose CIMSS Hero Image, No Crop (or select CIMSS Hero Image if you want the image to always be 100% width but cropped to a fixed aspect ratio).
  3. On the right, set Image Size to either Full or Large size – whichever is closest to 1026 width (refer to the Width field that will update when you select the Image Size). Set the percentage to 100%.

    If the width is significantly less than 1026, then the image may appear blurry. If the width is significantly larger than 1026 then the browser will unneccessarily download an image larger than necessary and your web page will take longer to view/download than necessary.

Banner site title – how to edit (top)

  1. Login to WordPress
  2. Go to the Dashboard (hover over your site name in the upper left and select Dashboard from the drop down menu)
  3. Hover over the Settings menu on the left and select General
  4. Update the following fields:
    • Site Title: this is only used in the Dashboard for the name of your site
    • Tagline: this is the sub-heading displayed in the header of your site.
    • Site Display Title: this is the primary heading displayed in the header/banner of your site.
  1. Login to WordPress
  2. Click on the Customize link in the WordPress navigation bar at the top.
  3. Click on Site Identity
  4. Use the Logo field to upload a custom logo – make sure to upload a logo that is around 70 pixels tall.
  5. Click on Publish to save your changes.

Nice List (top)

A nice list that has extra vertical spacing between items. And other options.

  1. In the editor select your list
  2. on the right in the Block tab, click on Advanced
  3. in the Additional CSS class(es) text field, put the following class(es):nice-listThe base class. This is required.-no-bulletsRemove the bullets from each list item. Optional.-no-indentRemove indentation. Optional.

Blog, news, … how to add (top)

  1. Create a Page that will serve as the home page for your blog / news Posts
  2. In the Dashboard, go to the Settings -> Reading page and make the following changes:
    • Your homepage displays – Posts page:
      select your blog / home page you created in step #1
    • Blog pages show at most:
      set this to the number of blog Posts you want to show at a time on your blog home page that you created in step #1
  3. (Optional) Create Post Categories that you can use to organize your Posts into – this can be done anytime, even after you’ve published Posts
  4. (Optional) Add a sidebar to your blog / news Posts home page and all individual Posts pages

OK, you can now create Posts and they will appear on the Page you created in step #1 above.

Blog Sidebar – how to add (top)

  1. In the Dashboard go to the Appearance -> Widgets page
  2. Under the Posts Sidebar, click on the + button (or you can use the blue + button in the upper left) to add Blocks you want to appear in your blog Sidebar. If you don’t add any Blocks, no blog Sidebar will appear.
  3. Click the Update button

Recommended Blocks:

  • Calendar Block – this will show a calendar with links to your blog Posts
  • CIMSS Posts Category Menu ACF Block – this will display drop down navigation menu that can be configured to list the following:
    • Blog Post Authors – when a user selects one of these options, they will go to a page that displays all Posts by that author (it’s recommended that authors add their first and last name in their WordPress profile – click on your username in the upper right)
    • Year / Month – a drop down menu of all year, months that have Posts
    • Category – a list of all blog Post Categories

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