The comprehensive guide to the WordPress control panel (pictorial explanation)

WordPress is the most famous website content management system, used by more than ⅓ of website owners and designers around the world, according to statistics from the official WordPress website itself. What makes it so important; This makes us dedicate this article only to explaining its management control panel, or what is called the WordPress Dashboard. The control panel is the first thing you can see after installing WordPress on your hosting and starting to use it practically.

In order to be able to explain all the parts of the WordPress control panel, we will divide the control panel into three main parts, as you can see in the following image: The image shows the division of the WordPress control panel into three main parts, which are: The green shaded part (1) indicates the quick toolbar through which you can make some adjustments and view your site’s statistics quickly and briefly. The yellow shaded part (2) indicates the list of basic tools that you use to fully manage and control your site.

The red shaded part is number (3) and indicates

The visual interface contains some short links to create an article, for example, or manage certain parts of the site briefly as well, but you can completely dispense with that interface and use the main tools menu to do all the things related to managing and modifying the site. We will start by talking about Figure No. (1) and Figure No. (3) briefly. Then we will discuss the most important form, which is Part No. (2), which contains all the tools through which we can manage the entire site and modify it as we want. (1): The quick upper toolbar. This bar consists of some tools and links that we can summarize as follows: The first part indicated by the number “1” is a link with a welcome phrase written on it and next to it is the user name or the name of the site manager. When you place the mouse on it, you will see some links that are used to modify the site manager’s profile, such as the user name, e-mail, photo, and so on... The second part, indicated by the number “2”, is a link with the word “new” written on it. When you place the mouse on it, you will see some quick links that... During which you can create a new article to publish on your site, or create a page and a media file, and you can also create a membership for someone to be an approved contributor or writer within the site.

The third part, referred to as the number “3,” is a number that shows you the number of comments that visitors to your site have written on the articles that you publish. The fourth part, indicated by the number “4”, will show you the address of your site as you named it during the WordPress installation stage, and when you place the mouse on it, a link will appear for you to review your site so that you can see it as visitors see it.

The fifth part, which is indicated by the number “5”, which is a sign

WordPress appears in front of you, and when you place your mouse on it, you will see some links to the official WordPress website and its technical support forum. (3): The main interface of the control panel. The main interface of the site is the review panel for the status of the site and its statistics, so that you can view the most important and latest updates once you enter the control panel. We can divide the main interface into two main parts as follows: The first part, which is indicated by the number “1”: It contains some short links through which you can enter some sections of your site and modify them, and you can dispense with all of these links completely by using the tools in the main sidebar of the WordPress control panel, and we will talk about them later, and you can hide them. Completely by clicking on the “Ignore” button that appears at the top of the left part of the panel.

The second part, indicated by the number “2”: in this

The section contains some ready-made sections that, when you click on any of them, show you some statistics about your site, such as the health of your site, and whether there are programming problems, for example. It also shows the latest comments made by visitors to the site, as well as a section that shows you the latest news on the WordPress site and the new updates that are announced, etc. (Therefore, this part is only a review part and does not contain any control tools). (2): The main menu within the WordPress control panel (the most important part) is the most important part within the WordPress control panel, which contains all the tools that are used to fully manage and control the site.

The following image shows a numbered arrangement of the elements and tools contained in the main menu within the control panel as follows: Note: Please be aware that other elements and tools may appear when you install plugins on your site; It appears in the list for you to use to manage the plugin that you installed. Now let us talk in detail about the tools and items in that list with some detail and clarification: 1-Home This is the first and default item within the Control Panel menu, and it appears automatically when you enter the WordPress Control Panel, where the WordPress Dashboard appears to you, which is divided into three parts, as we explained at the beginning of the article. 2- Articles 1- When you click on the “Articles” item from the list of site controls, you will notice the “Add New” button. When you click on it, it will open a special panel for you to add a new article - we call it a new post - within your site.

2- Within the Add New Articles panel, you can add the article and customize it as you want, exactly as shown in the picture. Where in Part No. “2” you can write the title of the article or blog post that you want to publish under this title. 3- Also, in Part No. “3”, you begin writing the entire content of the article, and you can use the toolbar at the top of this part; To help you modify the format of the article, such as: increasing or decreasing the font size, adding main headings and sub-headings within your articles, as well as adding many different content elements such as: the numbered list item and the unnumbered list item, and adjusting the alignment of the text within the content to be right or left, in the middle as you want.

4- In Part No. “4,” you can add some formatting aspects to the article. For example, you can choose the article’s classification from the “Categories” list, which you can create from Part No. “1” by entering the categories. Choose the appropriate classification for your articles or internal pages on the site. In Part No. “4” you can choose a prominent image for the article to be displayed alongside articles while they are displayed within your site. It is noteworthy here that you can also insert images and videos within the content of articles itself by clicking on the “Add Media Files” button that appears to you above the box for adding article content, which we will also talk about in the next section on “Media” 5 - Finally, Part No. “5”, which is the part through which you can save the article as a draft (it is saved but is not published in front of visitors) or publish it by clicking on the “Publish” button so that it appears inside the site in front of your visitors, and they can view the article and comment on it if you activate the comments below. Your articles.

3- The media center is the media center of your site, through which you can upload photos, videos, and various pictorial elements that you include within new articles or pages on your site. To add a new media file, such as an image or video, to your media library, all you have to do is go to the “Media” item in the tools menu, click “Add New,” and then click “Select Files.” A panel will appear for you to choose the files you want to upload from your personal device to your site’s media library. Note: Uploading media files, such as photos and videos, can be done through the “Media” tab, or you can insert the files directly while you are working on adding a new article or page, as we talked about above in the section on adding articles.

Read also: Ways to upload images and media on WordPress 4- Pages The “Pages” tab is very similar to the “Articles” tab, through which you can also create an internal page for your site, and when you click on “Pages” you will find the “Add New” button, and when you click on it, it will open a new page addition panel like the one we talked about in the “Articles” tab, in which you can add the page title, and then the page content, and you can also add a prominent image to the page and publish it to appear in your site’s page list. Note that the pages that you create within your site can be displayed in the form of an ordered list within your site. This list appears on all pages of the site, specifically at the top of the site, and through it the visitor can choose the page whose content he wants to browse. Note: You may get confused and ask what is the difference between pages and articles?!

Yes, there is not a big difference between a page and an article on a WordPress website, but we can say that the articles that you add from within the WordPress control panel and then publish them; They appear automatically, one after another, on the “Blog” page of your site. We will explain this in the “Settings” tab and talk about ways to choose and display the blog page of your site. 5- Comments The “Comments” tab represents nothing more than a page through which you can view visitors’ comments on your articles and pages of your site, and agree to publish the comment or not. You can also add a response to someone’s comment, or delete the comment and put it in the “Trash” if it is annoying or inappropriate... through the list of options that appears to you below each comment.

6- Appearance: The “Appearance” tab is considered one of the most important parts through which you can control the look and feel of your site to visitors. The tab contains the following links in order: Templates. You can choose the template that you want to apply to your site, with some suggestions for templates that you can choose and activate, and their format and design will be applied to your site. In the “Templates” list, you will find many available templates that you can install any of on your site. You can also click on the “Add New” button if you have a template and want to upload it and apply it to your site design.

The more you change the template and install new ones, the more you will notice that the look, format and design of your site has completely changed, so use this tab to get the look you want for your site. You can install a template on a website in one of the following two ways: The first method: Search for an available template, as the picture shows you. We searched for the Twenty NineTeen template, as shown in picture number “1”. When the desired template appears; In step number “2”, you can either click on “Activate” to activate the template directly on your site, or click on “Live Preview” to open an accurate preview showing you what your site will look like after activating the template on it. If you like it, you can then activate the template.

The second method: Download a template online and then upload it. You can search online for “WordPress templates,” download them, and then upload them so that they are suitable for the look and feel of your site to visitors. You can also search the free WordPress theme store to get your favorite theme for free. As shown in the picture above, the method of raising the mold is very easy.

You go to (Appearance >> Templates >> Add New >> Upload Template), then choose the template file you want to download and upload, and click (Install Now). After downloading the template, activate it on your site with ease. Customizing this tab, when you click on it, will open for you a complete modification form on your site, through which you can see many of the tools that you use to modify many parts and elements of the site, such as changing the site’s logo and main title, as well as modifying the colors, text sizes, and arrangement of elements within your site. Widgets: In the “Widgets” tab, you can easily add some ready-made elements to your website pages.

The previous image shows adding some fixed parts by dragging and dropping with the mouse and placing them inside the “Blog Sidebar” part, such as the “Latest Comments” item, which shows visitors’ comments in this part within your site. The “Latest Articles” element shows the most recent articles published on the site, as well as the “Search” element, which displays a search box within your site so that visitors can search for the article or page they want with ease. Lists From the “Lists” tab, you can easily create a main list that appears in the top header bar of your site and contains within it the pages, articles, and categories that you want to appear within the list.

Creating a list is very simple and is done through the following steps: First, write a name for the list that you want to create, let it be “Main List.” Then click on the button: “Create List.” Now a main list is created on your site, and you can now add the pages and articles that you wish to place within it using a drag-and-drop method with ease. As shown in the following image: Header in the “Header” tab. When you click on it, the custom design that was opened in the “Customize” tab will also open for you so that you can modify the site header or the upper part of it, which includes the background image, the site title, and so on. Template Editor In this tab you can modify your site's code, and we certainly do not recommend accessing it if you do not have sufficient programming experience and know exactly what you intend to do within the site's code. Incorrectly modifying the site code may ruin your entire site, so be very careful.

7- Add-ons The “Add-ons” tab is used to manage the add-ons that you have installed on your site or intend to install later. WordPress Plugins are some files that, once installed on your site, provide you with many additional features that your site was missing. For example, there is a plugin used to place social sharing buttons at the bottom of articles within the site, so that the visitor can share the article he likes directly on his account via social media sites by clicking the share button. To install a new plugin on your site, you can click on Add-ons >> Add new.

You will see a list of many of the plugins suggested to you by WordPress, as well as a box to search for the plugins you want to install. After accessing the add-on you want, all you have to do is click on the “Install” button and then “Activate” next to the add-on and the add-on will be automatically activated and it will start working automatically within your site. Warning: Be careful and do not install add-ons that you do not know how they work and their usefulness. Sometimes installing a lot of add-ons without needing them may cause great slowness in your site and may cause harm to the site in various ways.

There is another way to install plugins on your site; You can download one of the add-ons as a compressed file over the Internet, and then click on the “Upload Add-on” button as shown in the image above, and then click on “Activate Add-on” after uploading is complete, and thus the add-on is active and working properly... and it is very simple! 8- Members: Through this tab, you can manage the members and people who are allowed to enter the site’s control panel and participate in the site in one way or another. This tab contains three main elements as follows: All members: In this part, you can see all the members registered on the site and the permissions that each member has. You can also modify the list of members in terms of modifying the permissions they have or deleting one of the members completely.

Add New: In this part, you can add a new member with you in managing the site so he can write and modify the site and specify the permissions allowed to him as follows: As you see to add a member, you add his data such as the user name (the name that the new member will use to log in to the site) - the email - and the rest of the data, including the password (which is also used to log in to the site). Read also: What do you do if you cannot log in to the WordPress control panel? In the “Rank” field, you will see many permissions that you can grant to the new member. If you choose “Contributor,” the member will be able to add articles to the site without modifying his articles or the articles of other members. He just writes the articles and sends them to the manager for review and approval. If you choose “Writer,” he will be able to write articles, review them, and approve or reject amendments.

The highest rank is “manager,” who has all the powers of the site manager, and he can also remove one of the other managers from managing the site. Your account: Here you will find your personal account data, which you can modify at any time you wish or update the data in it. 9- Tools The “Tools” tab contains many useful tools for website owners to deal with data extensively.

For example: If you own another website and want to import content from it and then insert this content into your current site, you can use the “Import” tab, and then choose the type of site you want to import data from, such as “Blogger” or “WordPress”, and start following the instructions and installing the add-ons that are suggested to you automatically in order to import content from another site to your current site: In return, you can export your current site’s data; Which includes your site content data, such as articles, pages, classifications, and other data within your site. You can choose the type of content you want to export and keep, or you can choose “All Content” to download and export the entire content in a file that you can download and keep or use later as you wish: As for the “Site Health” tab, you will find a very detailed and useful report on the health of your site in terms of the required updates and whether there are some programs that need to be updated or repaired. Following this tab will keep you constantly informed of the health status of your site so that you can quickly fix any defect that may befall it. The following image shows a report on the health of a site from within the “Site Health” tab: As for the “Export Personal Data” and “Clear Personal Data” tabs, they can be used if you want to obtain a copy of a user’s data within the site, or you want to completely delete the member’s data. To do that, you must send a confirmation invitation to the email of the member whose personal data you want to modify, and if he agrees. On the invitation, you can modify it as you wish: 10- Settings The “Settings” tab contains a lot of controls on the site settings. The image above indicates the “General” tab, from which you can specify the site name, address, and description line (this data may help your site appear on Google search pages, so be sure to choose the words that users are expected to search for your site or your site’s specialty).

There are some additional settings on that page as you can see. Next comes the “Writing” tab, through which you can also modify some largely unnecessary site settings. But more important than this is the “Reading” tab, through which you can make many important changes that may be very necessary for your site: As you can see in the image above, you can determine the appearance of the home page of your site through two options: The first is to make the home page display the recent articles that are published.

The second is to choose one of the static pages that you created and design within your site and make it appear as the home page of your site. You can also specify the number of articles that are displayed on the articles page and designate it as the home page of the site if you wish. As for the last option, which is related to “visibility to search engines,” do not misuse it, because if you put a tick next to the option “prevent search engines from archiving the site,” you are writing your site’s death certificate yourself, as your site will not appear in front of millions of people interested in your field of work or the useful articles that you provide to them.

As for the “Permanent Links” tab, through it you can customize the form of the links for your site, and you can choose the format, shape, and structure of the link that you want for your site. We advise you not to change the format and method of installing the links except after consulting an expert in site archiving or SEO, because this choice may affect your site and its appearance in Google search: Note regarding permanent links: The best way to set up a permanent link is (article title) as shown in the picture above, as the link contains the title of the article that is published and therefore has a greater chance of appearing in search engines. How do I know that my version of WordPress is up to date or how do I update? You can easily identify the templates or plugins that need to be updated within your site, and you can also see the version of WordPress that you are using and whether it needs to be updated or not, by entering the “Updates” tab under the keyword, and a report similar to the following image will appear to you showing you the status of the updates available within your site: How do I change the color, shape, and appearance of the WordPress control panel?

The WordPress control panel provides you with many options for modifying the appearance and appearance of the control panel, by entering the “Your Account” tab, which is affiliated with the “Members” tab. Within this tab, you will find many options for modifying and changing the appearance and form of the display of the site’s control panel, as you can see in the following image: In conclusion, as you can see, the WordPress control panel contains all the settings and options that help you build and customize your site exactly as you desire. You may find it somewhat difficult to use the WordPress control panel, especially if it is your first experience. It is normal for you to feel some very unfamiliar points, but I can assure you that with time and practice you will find dealing with the WordPress control panel one of the simplest and most enjoyable things you will ever encounter. Read also: The comprehensive guide to creating and managing WordPress websites