3-21: Working with Themes Video Lecture | WordPress for Beginners - Software Development

hello and welcome back now that you're
familiar with widgets and menus it's
time to learn about themes in WordPress
the theme you're using largely
determines the look and feel of your
website including the layout colors
typography widget and menu styling and
more we are currently using the default
WordPress theme called 2014 which is
geared towards building online magazines
new sites and blogs you can access the
same sub panel by going to the dashboard
hover over appearance and then clicking
on themes
in the themes sub panel you can
customize install activate remove and
edit themes themes you have already
installed are listed here and the seams
you're currently using is indicated by
the axe of text as well as being
highlighted cooking on a seam will bring
up the same information panel allowing
you to see more details about the theme
this information panel also gives you
options to customize your theme edit
widgets menus as well as changing the
header and background of this theme
errors at the top allow you to cycle
through the information panel for themes
you have installed when you are viewing
details for another theme you can
activate or live preview the same
clicking on the live preview button will
bring up the customizer on the left and
a real-time preview of the theme on the
right live preview enables you to view
what your site will look like with that
particular theme applied when you're
live previewing a theme you're able to
interact with all elements of your
website so you can get a good idea of
how this theme renders your posts and
pages or how the same handles your site
menu and widgets you can customize these
settings or look and feel of this theme
by using the customizer on the left one
thing to remember is depending on the
theme you're using you may have
different customization options and
there may be more or less options in the
customizer panel will close the preview
window for now and learn more about
customization options for the 2014 theme
we're currently using click on customize
as you can see this theme offers more
customization options than the previous
theme and the site title and tagline you
can enable or disable it as well as
editing both
if you have a header image then hiding
the site title and tagline may be
suitable remember any changes you make
in the customizer will be reflected in
real-time within live preview
you can choose a different color for the
site title and change the background
color of your site
you have the option of displaying a
header image across the top of your
website to sit a header image click add
new image you can choose any existing
images from the media library or you can
upload another header image suggested
image dimensions as informing you that a
header image with the sides of 1260
pixels wide by 240 pixels high will
display optimally on the site if you're
uploading an image with the correct
dimensions WordPress will use that image
as is if your image dimensions are not
the recommended size WordPress will let
you crop the image to the correct size
before displaying it as a header we are
going to upload a header image
fill in the title and Oh text then hit
select and crop
position the crop box and when you're
happy click crop image the header panel
will now show the image we just uploaded
and this will be reflected in the live
preview as well
you can also upload several header
images and when you have more than one
header image you can choose the header
image you want to use by clicking on the
image or you can choose to randomize
meaning WordPress will display a random
header image every time your website is
loaded
you can also upload a background image
to your site simply click the arrow drag
and drop or select the image you want to
use then click open
after your image is uploaded you will
get a few options background repeat'
refers to whether you'd like the
background image to repeat itself if
your site is viewed on a bigger screen
we'll leave it on no-repeat background
position refers to the anchor point of
the image and you can see the image move
when I select lift center and right
we'll leave this on center lastly the
attachment options refers to the
behavior of the background image when
you scroll if the scroll option is
chosen the image will move with the
scrolling
if fixed is chosen the background image
will be static
if you prefer the scroll option you'll
notice when the image runs out the
background becomes white
there are two solutions to this the
first one is by changing background
repeat' to tile
as you can see the image now repeats
itself when you choose tile the image
will repeat itself both vertically and
horizontally obviously if you have a
background image that is not repeat
friendly meaning if it has clear edges
then repeating is probably not the best
idea the second solution to this problem
is changing the background color will
set background repeat' to no-repeat then
expand the colors pane we can now change
the background color to match the bottom
of the background image so in the
transition between image and color is
less jarring
we'll reset the background color by
clicking default for now we'll set the
background attachment to fixed under the
navigation pane you're able to assign
minis to certain locations we've covered
this in a previous video but we are
recap quickly this theme supports too
many locations the primary menu at the
top and a secondary menu on the left we
can choose which menus appear in these
two locations by expanding the drop down
and selecting a menu we've assigned our
menus in a previous video so we'll leave
it for now clicking on widgets will
bring up the widgets pane where you can
add edit rearrange and delete a widget
we learned about widgets in an earlier
video but we'll do a quick recap
this theme has three widget iced areas
the left and right side bars in the
footer area to add a widget choose the
area you'd like the widget to reside on
then click and a widget
I'll add a text widget into the content
sidebar
the text widget now appears on the
bottom of the sidebar
I'd like to move it to the top
to rearrange simply drag-and-drop or you
can click reorder then click the up and
down arrows
to move this widget into a different
widget sized area click the diagonal
arrow choose a new area then click move
I'll move this widget to the primary
sidebar then rearrange so that this
widget is at the top
remember to click done when you're
finished
to edit a widget simply expanded by
clicking the arrow to the right and make
any necessary changes
to delete a widget expanded then click
delete
let's go back to the customizer the
static front page option allows you to
control what content is displayed on
your home page by default this theme
displays your latest blog posts to set a
static page as the home page choose
static page then from the drop down menu
select a page you'd like to use as the
front page
you also want to select a page to
display all of your blog posts a posts
page is just a blank page with a title
and when you sit as a posts page all of
your blog posts will display on that
page as you can see the front page is
now a static page and our blog posts now
appear on the blog page
another neat feature of the 2014 theme
is the ability to have featured posts
featured posts are posts that receive
extra emphasis and appear in a grid or
slide layout at the top of your homepage
tag name refers to a tag you'd like to
use to tell WordPress a particular post
is a featured post for example if the
text specified here is awesome then any
posts tagged with the word awesome will
be featured posts I've gone ahead and
added feature tags to a fear of my
existing posts so we are going to
specify featured as our tag
as soon as I specify the tag you can see
posts appearing in the featured content
area in the layout drop-down menu you
can select a layout you prefer a grid
layout or a slider layout the checkbox
at the bottom
refers to whether you'd like the feature
tag to appear in tag clouds on the
front-end when you're happy with these
theme settings simply click Save and
publish then exit the theme customizer
to install a new theme click the large
add new theme button or you can click
add new at the top
you'll be taken to the wordpress.org
theme browser where there are thousands
of free themes to choose from from the
top you can choose to browse featured
themes popular themes and latest themes
you can also browse themes that fits the
criteria you set in the filter you can
specify colors layout features or
subject
after you've specified the criterias
apply filters by clicking the button
all seams there fits the criteria you
specified will be displayed
after you find a seam you're interested
in click on the thumbnail to open a live
preview on the left you can read more
about the same and on the right you're
able to preview how the theme might look
on your website
just like before the live preview is
interactive meaning you're able to hover
over and click elements of your website
as well as viewing posts and pages
arrow buttons at the top lets you cycle
through different themes and when you
find a cm you'd like to use click the
install button at the top of the
left-hand pane
WordPress will now download and install
the same package and then you can choose
to preview the same activate the same or
return to the same installer
live preview displays what your site
will look like with the new theme
activated and just like before you can
edit theme settings in the customizer
when you have finished making changes
click save and activate
further activate the theme without
making any changes you can do so by
clicking on activate
once you have activated the new theme
you'll be taken back to the same
subpoena and the new theme will now be
highlighted and active as indicated by
the text go ahead and preview the site
this doesn't look too shabby but we are
going to switch back to 2014 go back to
the themes sub panel
to reactivate a theme simply hover over
the thumbnail then click activate
if you have purchased a seam from other
sources chances are you'll be given a
zip archive containing the theme you can
use the upload function to install your
theme from the same sub panel click add
new
instead of choosing a theme from the
browser click upload theme navigate to
where these seams up fellows and upload
same as before you can live preview the
same activates the same or return to the
same installer
to remove a seam click on the same
thumbnail to bring up the seam details
pane then click delete at the bottom
right corner
one thing to note is you cannot delete a
theme that is currently active so make
sure to switch to another theme first
before deleting it's also worth noting
depending on the theme you're using some
customizer options may have a sub panel
under appearance I'll show you what I
mean
I go to the customizer for the same 2014
you can see the header and background
image options are also accessible under
appearance by now you should be familiar
with how things work in WordPress next
we'll be learning about working with
plugins
you