Giving Up on WP MU

So I gave up on the idea that I can ever install Wordpress MU in my webhost account. I only signed up for a webhosting plan that gives me Cpanel and I am on a shared web server. I can’t touch my DNS settings and I can’t get support from my webhost to edit my httpd.conf file.

So I cancel the hosting plan I dedicated for Wordpress MU and I am still waiting for the refund. I don’t know if I’ll be interested to install Wordpress MU again but it is not likely so. Two days of trying to install it and fighting with an unsupportive webhost didn’t exactly inspire me to continue.

Getting a Paid Web Hosting Plan

Having your blog in a paid hosting gives you 100% control of your blog that is why I always advise my readers and my friends, even those who are neophytes when it comes to blogging, to transfer or to start their blog in a paid hosting.

Getting a web hosting plan and installing your own wordpress blog in it seems scary sometimes specially to non-computer –and-internet savvy persons because they are afraid that they won’t be able to manage to do those. If you have the same problem don’t worry because there are a lot of solutions out there.

You can read articles about it because there are hundreds of how-to articles about managing your web hosting and as for the installation of wordpress blog, you’ll also find some webhosts who are willing to install a wordpress blog in your hosting for free or for a minimal fee. When looking for a webhost,  I advise you to drop by at WebHostingRating.com because they offer a list of top web hosting companies based on costumer rating. WebHostingRating.com should help you in your quest of finding the perfect web hosting  plan and package because they are the biggest searchable web hosting directory featuring complete information on all web hosting providers, their web hosting plans, promotional and discount coupons, and unedited reviews by real customers.

Uploading Photos to Your Blog

When uploading a photo to your blog, be sure that you had it resized specially if you are going to display just the thumbnail of the photo. In this manner you are saving a lot of web space. Another reason why you should resize your images before uploading them is because your blog will load faster. A blog that needs to display a 3.2MB photo will take more time to load compared to a blog that only needs to display a 150KB.

If you are afraid that your images will lose vividness and colors when resizing, then you are not using the right software. Photoshop is an excellent software. It has a more major purposes but it is also great for resizing photos. If you don’t have the budget for the software or if Photoshop is too complicated for you, there are other photo editing software in the net that that you can download for free. Don’t depend on Microsoft Office Picture Manager when to resizing your photos because is an awful software for this purpose.

The above photo is resized using Microsoft Office Picture Manager and below photo is resized using Photoshop.

Switching to Wordpress?

I started this blog to give short Wordpress blog tutorials to my friends who just started using the Wordpress platform. I was actually the one who installed their blogs for them and because I didn’t have enough time to teach them individually, I created this blog and I told them to visit this blog every now and read about how to use their Wordpress blogs.

But after a few times of logging in to their Wordpress blogs, they told me that it wasn’t difficult at all to blog because the platform is user friendly. They find it as easy as using MS Word and I agree. I think that it doesn’t take a scientist to use Wordpress. As long as you are not afraid to navigate the platform and as long as you can easily learn from your mistakes, learning how to use Wordpress for blogging should be a piece of cake.

Wordpress is the best blogging platform out there because other than it is user friendly, it is also flexible. Free themes are scattered all over the net and there are free plugins for each purpose.

So if you are unhappy with your blogging platform, don’t be afraid to switch to Wordpress.

Embedding Multimedia in your Blog

If you are not embedding enhancements such as music, pictures, and videos in your blog then you are left behind. Multimedia has been in the mainstream blogging since the rise of YouTube and free photo hosts like PhotoBucket and Flickr. More advance bloggers even create podcasts and vblogs to voice out what they normally just write.

Now since this blog caters to beginners, I will explain how to embed videos and photos to your wordpress blogs but first there are two things you need to know. When you go to “Write”, you’ll see that there are two tabs on your editor’s page. I’ve explained use of these tabs earlier in one of my posts so I suggest you should read it as well. Now going back to our topic, you should click on the “HTML” tab (or “CODE” tab in earlier wordpress versions) and paste the third party codes there. DO NOT paste the third party codes in the “VISUAL” tab.

What are third party codes, some might ask so below is a photo showing where you normally get third party codes. YouTube or Photobucket provide these codes for users to easily embed the multimedia in their blogs.