by Steven Snell
WordPress is the most popular blogging platform, and I know many Daily Blog Tips readers use WordPress to power their own blogs. As a WordPress user, I enjoy reading about the platform and staying up-to-date with news from the WordPress community. The great thing about WordPress is the endless possibilities that it allows, and by reading from other users and designers there is plenty of information available on just about any topic you can think of.
If you’re looking for technical documentation or support, the codex and forums are usually the first place to look. However, I would like to share some blogs and websites that provide a good amount of WP-related content that I think you will appreciate. Whether you are a theme designer/developer or a blogger who is looking to get more out of WordPress, visit some of these sites and see for yourself.
Weblog Tools Collection (added by Daniel)
Published by Mark Ghosh, Weblog Tools Collection is constantly featuring news about WordPress and its development. They also have regular columns highlighting the recent releases of WordPress plugins and themes. Finally, they just released a video section of the site, featuring all sorts of videos related to WordPress.
WP Candy
WP Candy does a nice job of keeping readers up-to-date with WordPress and what’s going on in the WP community. I’ve been subscribed for a little while and I recommend it as a source of information for any WordPress bloggers, not just theme designers. Probably the best thing available at WP Candy is the WordPress Help Sheet (also see the advanced help sheet). Four Simple Ways to Speed Up WordPress is also contains useful information.
Specky Boy
Specky Boy publishes articles on WordPress and design in general. I’m a fan of the super-clean design and layout used at Specky Boy. Just last month there was a great collection of links to 63 Essential WordPress Hacks, Tutorials, Help Files, and Cheats. Photobloggers may also want to see 30 Free Resources for Photoblogging and Image Galleries.
Pro Blog Design
Michael Martin is a blog designer and his own blog is one of the best resources for WordPress theme designers (and bloggers that want to make some customizations to there theme). Michael doesn’t post quite as often as he used too, but I recommend it to any blog designers out there. The archives are full of tutorials that are to the point, practical and easy to follow. Some must-read posts include Separating Trackbacks from Comments, 13 Tags to Delete from Your Theme, and Get RSS Subscriber Count in Plain Text.
WPDesigner
WPDesigner was the home to Small Potato, a popular theme designer, but was recently sold. I’ll be interested to see how the new owner Pawel Ciszewski maintains the site. Small Potato sold premium themes through WPDesigner and he started The $5 Themes Club, a paid membership that provided at least 12 premium themes per year for just $5. The blog at WPDesigner also has some helpful content, especially So You Want to Create WordPress Themes Huh?, which is a nice introductory article for anyone looking to learn more about WordPress themes.
Lorelle
As probably the most well-known blogger on WordPress.com, Lorelle gives plenty of helpful and practical advice for other WordPress bloggers. She provides consistent content on WordPress news, themes, and plugins.
Noupe
Noupe is another blog that has been in my feed reader for a while. Noura covers web design in general, but focuses a lot of posts on WordPress, including a four-post series Powerful Guide to Master Your WordPress. The four posts in that series are Mastering Your WordPress Theme Hacks and Techniques, 45 Must See WordPress Themes, Powerful List of WordPress Lifesavers Plugins, and 60+ Unusual WordPress Blog Designs.
Galleries
If you’ve been around the web design community for any length of time, you’re very familiar with CSS galleries, which are showcases of high-quality websites. There are a few specialty galleries that include only WordPress-based sites and blogs. These are an excellent resource for design inspiration, and to see what is possible with WordPress. The three WordPress galleries that I know of are WP Cube and We Love WP and WordPress Garden.
What Are Your Favorites?
I know this list of blogs really only scratches the surface of WordPress content. What blogs do you rely on for WordPress news or tips? Is anyone aware of any other WP design galleries aside from the 3 already mentioned?
About Mark
Mark is an digital entrepreneur from New York City who recently acquired DBT. He started his ventures buying growing then selling several businesses and content blogs on Flippa. A perfect night for him constitutes pizza, wine, slow jazz and WordPress! He's an SEO expert and a growth strategist. When he's not working on his businesses he enjoys sharing his learned lessons with the DBT community.
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