Head on over to the new WordPress video tutorials page to check out my latest video tutorial on installing a WordPress theme. I know this is probably something most know how to do, but hopefully it will be helpful to beginners just starting out with WordPress. I also want to thank all the people who provided feedback on this post.

One plugin which I use frequently on my WordPress development projects is the Top Level Categories plugin. What this plugin will do is remove the /category/ from the URL upon activation. For example:

http://www.example.com/category/uncategorized/ will change to http://www.example.com/uncategorized/

No other configuration to the plugin is needed, all you need to do is activate. This plugin is best used in combination with a permalink structure like /%category%/%postname%/.

Another week gone by, another week of WordPress community links and resources.

Creating a dynamic sidebar - Richard Hooper of WP Project goes over a simple and manageable method of dynamically managing your sidebar, without widgets. It requires some basic knowledge of WordPress conditional tags and PHP includes.

Is that really WordPress? - Another recent post over at WP Project lists a few websites that you probably couldn’t tell were powered by WordPress at first glance. WordPress can be used as a very flexible CMS and this post just further proves the point.

Creative Examples of WordPress Themes Modifications - This post by Pavel Ciorci of WPZoom goes over some creative customizations of WordPress themes. I always love to see WordPress theme customizations and it’s nice to see some of the themes available here on Theme Lab customized beyond recognition.

Have You Created Your Gravatar? - This really isn’t anything new, but still important. Ever since I implemented Gravatars here on Theme Lab, I’m seeing many commentators here lacking their Gravatar. It’s really simple to make, as gone over in the post. For WordPress blog owners, it’s very easy to add Gravatar support to your comments.

31 People To Follow On Twitter - Possibly inspired by WPCandy’s post on following Twitter users, this list at Weblog Tools Collection goes more in depth by providing 31 Twitter users who frequently “tweet” about WordPress news. My Twitter profile is themelab in case you want to follow me.

WordPress Weekly Episode 19 - A new episode WordPress Weekly airs tonight, where they will be discussing several WordPress-related topics. More information on the link.

That’s all for this week, happy blogging!

Today we have another free WordPress theme, original template designed by Styleshout. It features native Gravatar and tagging support, as well as 4 widgetized areas (one sidebar, and three footer).

Live Demo | Download

My friend Nick of Pancak.es recently released a very cool free WordPress theme called Syrup and I thought I’d go over all of the features of it in a video. I’ll list a few here…

• Control the color scheme manually or with built-in presets
• Choose where your sidebar goes (left, right, footer)
• Choose which page links appear in the header

All controlled through a convenient theme options page in your WordPress admin panel. Watch my video review below…

Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve been wanting to do some video tutorials for a while now and finally managed to make one. It’s a video version of my first tutorial on installing the latest version of WordPress. I was looking for some feedback on it, and whether you’d like to see more of these video tutorials like this in the future or not.

Update: Now available on the WordPress video tutorials page.

I know the quality is poor, thanks to YouTube - but hopefully it’s not too bad. Let me know what you think in the comments.

We’re starting of June with a fresh WordPress theme, originally designed by DemusDesign. The theme has a widgetized sidebar and footer. It also has native Gravatar support (WordPress 2.5+) and tagging support.

Live Demo | Download

If you get an error like this, there is a plugin or other function called in your theme which you don’t have. How do you fix this? There are a few ways: remove the code, error proof it, get the necessary plugin, or upgrade WordPress if necessary. In this quick WordPress tip post we’ll go over how to error proof these with a conditional tag and PHP function known as: function_exists.

If you get an error such as Fatal error: Call to undefined function the_title_attribute() you can simply replace any instance of the_title_attribute with the following:

<?php if (function_exists('the_title_attribute')) { the_title_attribute(); } ?>

In this case, you could also take it one step further by adding an else statement.

<?php if (function_exists('the_title_attribute')) { the_title_attribute(); } else { the_title(); } ?>

Before trying a new theme on a production site, make sure to preview your theme first, and then work out all the errors (if any).

Another week over, another set of weekend resources. Let’s get started…

45 Free Premium WordPress Themes - A great list at WPZoom of some really amazing free WordPress themes, most of which with magazine or grid style layouts. Some of these you probably haven’t seen before. I know I saw a few that I didn’t recognize myself.

Creating a Featured Articles Section - This guide by WP Project goes over a simple method of listing “featured” posts in a certain category by creating a small loop and displaying the list. Interesting technique for intermediate WordPress users. Best part is, no need for any plugins.

Creating a YouTube Video Tabber - In this guide by Adii, you’ll learn how to create a YouTube video tabber. This is a pretty useful tutorial for those who want an efficient way to display videos on their blog.

That’s all for this week. If anyone has any other useful WordPress guides or information published recently, feel free to let me know in the comments.

Today we have a very light free WordPress theme (hence the name) adapted from a design by Solucija. The theme contains no images and is pure CSS, ideal for fast loading websites. It has a widget-ready footer with room for about 3 items. Comments are equipped with native Gravatar support for those using WordPress 2.5 and above.

Live Demo | Download