I found it to be the best, most flexible, way to build a dynamic navigation structure. I need dynamic navigation to adjust the menu to reflect the changing importance of different pages. More importantly, I need it to present a customized navigation menu for each user.

I experimented with other formats, but nothing was as easy to use, and as easy to recognize as a strip of buttons across the top of the page. WordPress also saw how good this was, and continued to evolve the Admin Menu Bar. I felt this was too good to keep for administrators, and resolved to replace my shrewdBar with the WordPress Admin bar, enhanced by functions to add and remove menu items based on the visitor, and my page priority process.

This is very easy to do, and there are hundreds of websites with articles about amending the Admin bar. The codex page on the add_menu() function is quite clear, and so you probably do not need to read articles about it. In any case, it is deprecated from WordPress version 3.3, to be replaced with the add_node(), and Admin bar is now called Toolbar.

There is additional functionality in add_node() compared to add_menu(), but the function calls for my menu manipulation work just the same, so all you need to change in any example code is to replace add_menu with add_node. Then everything works OK, except it doesn’t.

It might work OK in simple cases, but it is unlikely to work in most practical cases where you want to add a useful menu navigation system for your visitors. I have worked on, and with, menu systems for many years, in many forms. I do not like the approach of many programmers who dictate that they will group links to features as they think fit, and users must learn the right way to access them. The tradition has followed through applications into operating systems and websites. Adding bookmarks, and favorites goes some way to giving users choices, but the hierarchical menu tradition is the default setting for many. The WordPress Toolbar follows this tradition, but I want to offer more choice.

I am a firm believer in a structured approach to website building. It helps visitors, and it helps search engines, to organize topics into sections. A hierarchical menu to access each section and it’s main topics is a must. However, a large website has pages that relate across sections. It has priority pages that I want to draw attention to. I want visitors to be able to access their favorite pages, those of their buddies, and also see recommendations from like-minded people. Most websites do this by creating various tables or menus above, below and at the side of their articles. I want to stick all my navigation links in a menu at the top of the screen. And I want to be able to show pages in more than one menu.

The Perils Of Sanitized Title Value

I do not like hacking around in the WordPress code, and I only look at it as a last resort to try and work out what is wrong. Several WordPress commentators build articles from snippets of WordPress code, to show how easy it is to extend or apply basic functions. They often copy and paste code that is amended from WordPress code, which is a good thing, as it goes back to the heart of open source programming. Whilst I was removing skin from my scalp trying to work out why my multiple menus seemed to be playing random tricks, I looked more closely at the snippets I had copied from a web article about building menus.

Menus are all about creating one root menu with a unique id, then adding sub-menu items in a loop for however many items you want to drop down when the mouse hovers over your root menu entry. It all starts falling apart from thereon, and I wont bore you with the details. Just to say that whatever you read about Admin bar add_menu(), or Toolbar add_node(), ignore what it says about id. The original code was confused between title, id, and defaults for id, and though later versions say id is compulsory, it isn’t, and if you do not specify it properly, your menus will fail to show properly.

The add_menu() function includes the fateful description for id:

“defaults to a sanitized title value”

The id argument, which must be unique, defaults to title if you do not specify it. Title is the wording you see for the menu item. It should be called MenuItemText to differentiate it from the HTML title property but it isn’t. I’ll call it MenuItemText, and I will accept that it should be unique in a single menu list. I might not want it to be, if I have a long list, and I want an important item to appear top and bottom, but I will accept that it has to be. I cannot accept that it has to be unique across the entire Toolbar. If you rely on default settings, even sanitized ones, then you must have unique titles. If you do not, then be sure to specify the id on all child menus. You have to set it on the root menu, so on the child menu, add the root id to the child MenuItemText (called title, remember), and make that the child id.

If you get stuck, ask in the WordPress Functions forum

A few days after my last post, a fall resulted in a broken back, a broken skull, a broken knee, and broken dreams. But 2012 is the year to set all that aside. A time to fix the health of this website, and improve the health of all my visitors.

In a new project, I am working on bringing health freedom to people, their businesses, and their networks. I will share more of that with you as that develops, but since this website is here to support everyone who is responsible for building and operating websites, let me focus on website health here today.

There is a lot of confusing information about the way to test the health of your website. Various technical experts offer different views on the importance of many aspects of page structure. Various marketeers offer different views on the importance of many aspects of search engine optimization. Various online checkers have different methods for analyzing your page health. It is very easy to lose focus. We spend more time monitoring, analyzing, and improving, but that distracts us from the important job of delivering an easy-to-navigate website to as many people as possible.

I have recently discovered the best tool to help webmasters since Google shared it’s vital Webmaster Tools. This new tool is only available to Firefox users at the moment. But then again, so am I.

Actually, that last bit is not strictly true, because I’ll work for anyone. However, I believe Firefox is the best browser for website building. Chrome is improving, and I also retain Microsoft Internet Explorer for testing. But successful webmasters are productive webmasters, so stick with whatever works for you. I use Chrome and Firefox together everyday. You are going to have to install Firefox if you want to take advantage of the tool I am about to describe. Other browsers may be covered in future releases.

Your Website Health

Before I start, I should warn that the following tool will not fix a bad site structure. If you have ignored my advice about a good website structure, then you will always be tending a sick donkey, compared to a thoroughbred race hound. I cannot blame you too much for not having a good plan, as I have not finished my articles about how to generate one on my management website. Let’s leave that one for now.

The tool you need for better website health is the aptly named SEO Doctor from the exotically named Vladimir Prelovac. Once installed as an add-on to your Firefox browser, SEO Doctor analyzes every page as it loads, giving you vital information about the health of your web pages. You get bonus points if you follow Vladimir’s advice:

SEO Doctor works really well with Search Status, in fact these may be the only two SEO extensions you will ever need in your browser.

Actually they might be the only ones you NEED, but if I ever share my own add-on list with you, they will not be the only ones you WANT.

Over the next few days, I will describe the tests that SEO Doctor performs, and explain why they are important to you. In the meantime, there is excellent help built-in, and that includes links to Vladimir’s website for a more thorough explanation. Or, if you are stuck, or need any other help, please ask in the website health forum.

WordPress entries are the posts and pages that make the content your website.

Your pages and posts only effective if people keep coming back to read them, and you can encourage this by sharing them at the earliest opportunity.

There are many ways to encourage this, but one of the best ways is by sharing WordPress entries by a subscription service. Of all the services I have used, FeedBurner from Google is the most effective. As this is a free service, it pays you to introduce it as soon as possible. During the early days, your content is limited, but if visitors find one of your early articles interesting, it is wise to inform them when you publish new content.

The process is particularly easy, as you are already registered with Google from the preparation for your WordPress installation. Simply go to FeedBurner.com, and add your feed (it is simply yourdomain.com/feed/).

Work through the registration wizard, selecting all options (though leave the podcasting options blank unless you will be producing podcasts). On the Optimize tab, enable SmartFeed and FeedFlare. On the Publicize tab, enable Email Subscriptions, then add the subscription form or link to as many places on your site as you can, including the sidebar, footer, and the end of your articles where relevant.

Just like this:

WordPress Pages are used for most of your website reference content.

Whilst this is largely a management process, covered at shrewdies.com, there are a few pages that, as technical manager, you need to provide, or at least ensure they are fulfilled by the management team.

As well as providing useful visitor information, these pages give your site more credibility. Though generally referred to as “admin” pages, and therefore fairly boring, I like to see them as a creative challenge to make them as interesting as possible. I’ll look at how you make a Privacy Policy or Funding Policy interesting later, but let’s consider the structure first.

Admin WordPress Pages Structure

Often grouped under the “About” heading, you could even be creative about that, but the important thing is to make them as relevant to your website topic as possible. Even basic changes can make a difference, e.g. instead of Contact Us, write a contact page that’s a little more inviting such as “Contact Shrewdies About Saving Money On Web Hosting.”

As far as your all-important site structure is concerned, these pages are also an opportunity to apply a strong topic related keyword that you do not have much content for. When I started this site, I had not included these admin pages in my website blueprint, so I just used an “about” section. For most sites now, I build these pages in a “key-topic related” section, or choose an appropriate topic synonym. For example, I could change the About section to Sidebar, Website, or similar.

Admin WordPress Pages List

This is a list of common pages to include in your Admin/About section. Please add your suggestions in the forum. The most important pages are marked with a *.

• *About This Website
• Forum Guide
• Commenting Guide
• * Privacy Policy
• Linking Policy
• * Contact Form
• * Advertising/Funding Policy
• Road Map
• * Update Service

WordPress Pages: Next Steps

You should plan to get these pages published as soon as possible after you complete your website configuration. Start with the pages marked * above, but think of creative, topic-related titles and content.

If you have any questions, problems, or theories about WordPress Pages, please raise them in the Fulfillment Forum.

WordPress configuration starts just as soon as you’ve completed your WordPress Installation

But, don’t even think about it if you do not have your site blueprint. Rushing in at this point without a clear site content plan will seriously damage your future prospects.

There are a bunch of settings that control your WordPress website. Most are common across free WordPress.com and hosted WordPress.org sites, so unless I state otherwise, assume my explanations apply to both (or I’ve made a mistake ). Most can be tweaked as your website grows, but some must be set from the start.

Enhancing wp-config.php

Hosted WordPress.org only. This can actually be done at any time – usually when you get sick of the huge list of revisions, or hit an out of memory error.
Edit wp-config.php to add:
define('WP_MEMORY_LIMIT', '64M');
define('WP_POST_REVISIONS', 3);

See wp-config.php Essentials for more.

WordPress Settings

In the Admin area, there are several pages in the Settings section. Go through these in turn:

General Settings

Site Title & Tagline

From your site blueprint.

Membership

Tick for a community site, otherwise leave blank.

Timezone

Your main market, if known, otherwise your local time.

Discussion Settings

Allow link notifications & Allow people to post comments

Tick for community websites otherwise make blank, and ignore rest of discussion settings.

Users must be registered

Not vital, but forcing registration reduces spam.

Comment Moderation

Again, not vital, but I usually change the default from 2 to 1.

Privacy Settings

Site Visibility

Should have been set during installation, but double-check to make sure you are visible to search engines.

Permalink Settings

Custom Structure

Make sure custom is selected and change it to /%post_id%/%postname%/

Category base

From your site blueprint. Ensure this will never be the same as any planned Page Title

Tag base

From your site blueprint. Ensure this will never be the same as any planned Page Title

WordPress Categories & Tags

Setup the WordPress Categories (Admin – Posts – Categories) according to your website blueprint. Don’t forget to change uncategorized to your key market target, then add the other sections of your site. Though you can add the sections as you write the first article in that section, you will miss out on the description. I cover category descriptions in more depth in the Format section.

You should also setup the WordPress Post Tags (Admin – Posts – Post Tags) before you start publishing articles. Except for small sites, I find this a little tedious, so I tend to do it a section at a time as I work through the site blueprint. Eventually, I’ll add import features to the website development tools to do this automatically (with categories, and vital settings), but that is for the future.

WordPress Configuration: Next Steps

Your website is now just about operational, and you can edit or delete the example pages and posts that WordPress installs automatically.

Getting the first 50-60 pages published is the key task now, though if you are part of a team, you can hand this over to the Content Managers. If you are working alone, you will now constantly switch hats between Website Technical Manager (or webmaster) and Web Business Manager. See my website production introduction for the overview of managing the launch stage. For your next technical tasks, see the Function & Format sections.

In today’s page about installing WordPress, I’ve mentioned some essential tools. I’ve selected Google versions since they are free, effective, and easy to implement.

As I mentioned, these tools are so easy to use, they do not really merit step-by-step instructions, though I will do this for some of the reporting features that I use elsewhere. The tools are important, as they give you management tools (covered at Shrewdies Web Business Management), and technical development tools covered throughout this site.

Of course, you may prefer tools from other companies, and I’m always happy to discuss the comparison, or help with other tools. Just use the forum to discuss alternatives, or ask for help.

The essential tools I cover here are Google Analytics, and Google Webmaster Tools.

Analytics gives you vital information about how traffic arrives at your site, where it comes from, and what happens to your visitors once they arrive at your site. Though much of this is for management use, technicians will find some of the information crucial for making decisions about navigation. Note that Analytics cannot be used on WordPress.com sites, which do have some free site usage statistics, but none that will help you monitor navigation paths.

Webmaster Tools gives you a wide range of information about site performance and interaction with the rest of the Internet. Though some of this is vital for management use, most of it is crucial to technicians to determine and fix weaknesses, and to make the most of your strengths.

The implementation screens for both these services are very simple, so I will not spend much time explaining them. There is plenty of flexibility about the way you enable them, and I will present what I believe is the optimum sequence.

Google Analytics

It pays to start with Analytics, as Google will use that account to verify Webmaster Tools later (though there are several other options). Once your Google account is open, you need to add a new Profile in Google Analytics, and you need to choose the option for a new domain.

Your first question, after entering your website domain address, is to choose a time zone. As all information is summarized by day (and other time intervals), you need to choose something that suits you best. This is normally your local time zone, but if your market is predominately located elsewhere, then it might help to chose that location. Ideally, you would choose the same timezone as your webserver location, but this is not critical. I find that, once in use, most of your time is spent comparing current time periods with historical positions to see if you are improving, so it doesn’t particularly matter where each day starts. If you plan to use AdSense or AdWords on the same website, then it really does help to have consistent timezones, but it will not harm you if you do not.

Note that the Country selector is a little strange – common countries are listed at the top, followed by less populous countries.

After entering your timezone, the next screen gives some code to add to your website.

The simplest way to add this to your website is to copy the code, and add it to the footer.php file in your theme (Admin – Appearance – Editor – footer.php). This has drawbacks because it means you have to repeat this edit if you change your theme, and you cannot easily use advance features without adding your own PHP or JavaScript code.

The better way is to use a WordPress Plugin to add Analytics code to your site simply by setting your profile Web Property ID, and other optional choices. I’m currently testing three plugins on various websites, and will report back on them in due course. In the meantime, you can discuss your own plugin choice or experiences in the Hosting forum.

Once your plugin options have been set, and your site starts generating traffic, and this will be monitored by Google Analytics. Remember, if you have set options not to track your own visits, you will not generate any Analytics data until you, or somebody else, visits the site without being logged in. There will be a few minutes delay between your first visit, and the Analytics screen reporting you as verified. As ever, if you have problems, please use the hosting forum.

Google Webmaster Tools

On your self-hosted WordPress.org website, enabling Google Webmaster Tools is as simple as adding the site URL, and choosing the “Link to your Google Analytics account” option. (Update: for this to work, it requires Asynchronous Analytics code in your page header. Not all plugins do this, as you will see in my forthcoming review, so probably best to choose one of the other options – I prefer uploading a file. I will do a further in-depth report on Webmaster Tools soon)

If you have a free WordPress.com site you can enable WebMaster Tools by choosing the “Add a meta tag to your site’s home page” option. This will reveal a meta tag, and you need to highlight the content part of that tag – excluding the quotes. Paste this into the Tools (Admin – Tools) box labeled “Google Webmaster Tools” and save your changes.

For both these options, you click the Verify button next, and Google will report your site as verified, though you might have to wait a few minutes.

Though neither of these tools will provide much value until you publish some pages, you will soon find the data, especially from Webmaster Tools, to be indispensable. Please discuss your experiences with these tools, and any other similar services, on the hosting forum.

This covers getting a new WordPress installation ready on the Internet to start adding pages, following your site blueprint. Strictly speaking, the site blueprint is not required until the next stage, configuration. However that plan is so important to your success, that you should make sure you have it before going further.

The other thing you need is your domain name, unless you are starting with the free WordPress.com option described below. Domain names are normally registered when you open the hosting account described below, but for extra domains, I recommend GoDaddy. I explain why extra domain names are useful elsewhere, or you can ask about this in the hosting forum.

Installation Preparation

In addition to the site blueprint that I keep banging on about, there are some services that will enhance almost all web businesses, regardless of how and where they are hosted.

I tend to use Google services, as they are largely free from charge, and very effective. Alternatives do exist, and I discuss these on Shrewdies Interactive.

Two essential services are Analytics and Webmaster Tools. Setting up these services is very straightforward, so I will not bother with detailed instructions. Though you can register your domain with these services now, you can only complete the process when you have installed your website using the instructions below. For effective use of Google Analytics, you will also need to add an appropriate plugin or amend your site theme.

WordPress.com Installation

WordPress.com does not actually have an installation process – that’s the beauty of it – all the detailed technical stuff is done for you. All you need to do is register, and you can “install” as many websites as you like. Once registered, see the Next Steps notes below.

WordPress.org Installation USA

If you are planning a global web business, or a market targeting the uSA specifically, it is best to use a website server based in the USA. Experience tells me to avoid Bluehost – though recommended by WordPress, I find their server configuration very awkward, which limits some of the features I like to use, and their customer support is poor (as at 2010). I have had good technical support from Justhost, but their commercial support is terrible – as soon as you start to be successful, you break their barriers, and get suspended with no warning. Though they do offer an upgrade path, this is after you’ve lost at least one day’s business – a real budding business killer.

Since 2010, I’ve used DreamHost, and found them to be excellent. See my Web Hosting Prices page for more details.

I believe the installation process to be so simple that I haven’t (at least yet) provided a step-by-step guide. You can discuss any issues in the forum, but please note that if you order your DreamHost account through my link above, I’ll happily complete the installation process for you.

Use the DreamHost automated WordPress installation (the customized version), and WordPress will be live in around ten minutes. Alternatively, you can log into your domain via FTP, and follow the famous five minute install process. Once installed, see the Next Steps notes below.

WordPress.org Installation UK

If you are hosting a .co.uk domain, or targetting UK markets with other domain names, it pays to use a UK based server, both for speed, and audience matching reasons. I now use NativeSpace.co.uk, and have found them to be very reliable, cost effective, and user-friendly. See my Web Hosting Prices page for more details.

I believe the installation process to be so simple that I haven’t (at least yet) provided a step-by-step guide. You can discuss any issues in the forum, but please note that if you order your NativeSpace account through my link above, I’ll happily complete the installation process for you.

Use the NativeSpace automated WordPress installation under Fantastico in cPanel, and WordPress will be live in around two minutes. Alternatively, you can log into your domain via FTP, or use the cPanel File Manager, and follow the famous five minute install process. Once installed, see the Next Steps notes below.

Non-WordPress Sites & Other Countries

Please discuss non-WordPress installation issues, or hosting in other countries in the hosting forum. If common questions arise, I’ll add explanations to this page.

WordPress Installation: Next Steps

Now that you have an accessible website, you are probably eager to turn it over to the content building team (or put your content management hat on if you are a one-man-band). But there is at least one more step required first. You must apply various settings that shape how WordPress (or your alternative CMS) operates to suit your site blueprint. I deal with these in the WordPress Configuration pages.

In most cases, you will also need to add functionality using plugins, and organize your format using themes, but these can be done during the early stages of content building.

Leave the WordPress Installation page to browse the rest of WordPress Hosting Foundations.