Upgrade! International Wordpress Theme Installation Guide
Hi all,
Welcome to the Installation Guide to the update of the Upgrade Theme. We’ve built this WordPress theme on a different framework and updated some of the features from the last theme.
For those of you who have expressed your interest to help test the beta version, simply follow the the instructions below:
WordPress is the blogging software we are using as the engine behind the sites. It is very user friendly and has all the features we need. It is also an open source software so we/you can extend functionality. Hurray!
What you need to make sure you have in advance:
- PHP 4.3 or greater
- MySQL 4.1.2 or greater
1. Retrieve from your host the database user name and database password.
2. Follow these instructions. Some hosts offer 1-click installation. WordPress lists hosts that are WordPress friendly. theUpgrade.net is using DreamHost service (If you choose to use DreamHost, tell them that Upgrade sent you and we’ll get some money back).
Once you have WP set up, click on the ‘Themes’ tab under ‘Appearance’ on your WP Dashboard and install the Thematic Theme Framework.
1. Download our theme by visiting this repository and clicking ‘Download Source’.
2. Save as a .zip file. Once downloaded, unzip the file and rename the folder to ‘Upgrade_Node’.
3. Move the entire ‘Upgrade_Node’ theme folder to the root level of wp-content/themes and activate this theme like any other WordPress theme.
Now let’s move on to the customization instructions. For this theme you will need to download some extra plugins.
Install the 3 required plugins
1. Install these through the ‘Plugins’ tab on your WP Dashboard.
Click ‘Add New’ then search and install the following WP plugins:
- SimplePie Core
- Geo Mashup
- WPML Multilingual CMS
- Event Calendar 3
2. Find these plugins in your plugins list and click to activate all of them.
Customizing SimplePie Core
This plugin is used for the Global Network Feed Widget. To activate, access the Widget tab in your WP dashboard and drag the U! Global Network Feed widget into the primary or secondary aside. Choose to give it a different title if you wish.
Note: This causes the site to load slow. There is a ticket for this problem. Don’t activate this widget for a normal load time.
Customizing Geo Mashup
In the Upgrade theme folder there is a subfolder titled ‘geo-mashup-custom’ This folder must be manually moved into the wp-content>plugins folder within your WP directory and then activated through the Plugin tab on the Dashboard.
Simply enter in a Google API key in the Geo Mashup settings and check the box for map in the ‘Node Settings’ tab for the map to work.
There are specific settings needed for this plugin to function as wanted. For the purpose of development the instructions are not included here but will be included in the full installation tutorial.
Customizing WPML Multilingual CMS
This is the translation plugin that we are using to replace qtranslator should you require a multilingual site. Go through the settings for WPML to set up your multilingual site. More set up instructions will be available in the full installation tutorial.
Customizing Event Calendar 3
This plugin allows you to put a calendar in the sidebars that displays events. You must activate both Event Calendar plugins first. For set up, create an Events category and go into the Event Calendar Options. Select ‘Events’ as the category to display in the calendar.
One thing we couldn’t automate is the unique colored node icon. But it’s really really easy to generate:
1. Open the file inside the theme folders: wp-content/themes/upgrade_node/styles/images/icon.psd in Photoshop
2. You will see a three layered icon.
3. Double click the lighter-blue square on the lighter color layer. Next to the # key on the bottom enter your node’s light color and press “ok”.
4. Double click the darker-blue square on the darker color layer. Next to the # key on the bottom enter your node’s dark color and press “ok”.
5. In the Photoshop menu go to File > Save for Web & Devices.
6. Under Preset choose PNG-24.
7. click “Save”
8. Upload the file to your Wordpress uploads directory (…/wp-content/plugins/geo-mashup-custom).
9. Click Replace. Done.
1. View your WP dashboard or visit your website and click edit/log-in.
2. Under Appearance select the ‘Node Settings’ Tab and fill-in the information.
This can be either an organization or your own personal credit as an organizer (if you work individually)
1. Upload the logo by clicking in Media > Add New. The logo can NOT exceed 174 px wide.
2. Copy the image url.
3. Go to Links.
4. Click Add New.
5. Name the partner organization
6. Scroll to the bottom and paste the logo URL in ‘image address.’
7. Scroll back up, enter the organization’s link
8. Create a new links category called ‘Partners’ and add the link to that category
9. In your ‘Widgets’ tab, drag the links widget to the top of the primary aside. Select ‘Partners’ and un-check ‘Show Link Name’.
10. Check the blog, the link should appear under the Upgrade International logo
11. Repeat steps 1-8 for any more organization credit you would like to add
1. Click Pages
2. Select Edit and the ‘About’ page
3. Enter your node’s statement
You can create more pages with info about your node the organizations/organizers involved and so on… You can nest pages as children of other pages by selecting “parent page” from the ‘attributes’ box on the right side of the page-editor screen.
1. Add Users to author posts and contribute.
Media
1. Go to Settings > Media
2. Change medium image size to 390 × 450
3. Save changes
Permalink Settings
1. Change from ‘default’ to ‘Month and name.’
1. In the post interface scroll down to the little Event Editor (you can also drag the box to appear slightly higher on the page next time)
2. Set the starting and ending date.
3. Your ‘events’ category will be chosen by default
1. In the post interface scroll down to the little Custom Fields (you can also drag the box to appear slightly higher on the page next time)
2. Under ‘Name’ enter: event_loc
3. Under ‘Value’ enter the location of your event