Here we will look at how to get started with your blog. Word Press is a very powerful and modern blogging system but starting out is simple.

Step 1: Sign Up

The first step is to register your blog. There are a couple of things you need in order to do this.

1. You must have a lakeshore.wnyric.org email address. Our system will not accept outside email accounts.
2. You should use your first initial + last name for you username.

Using this link http://blogs.lakeshore.wnyric.org/wp-signup.php will bring you to the following sign up page :

After you have filled out your information, makesure that the “Gimme a blog!” radio button is selected and press Next.

You’ll then get to choose your blog Domain, Title and Privacy Options. Don’t panic, just keep reading .

Your blog Domain will be the address that you and your users use to get to the blog. In the above example the address would wind up being “http://newblog.blogs.lakeshore.wnyric.org.”

You should either use your class name, what the blog is about, or your name. For example:

• math.blogs.lakeshore.wnyric.org or
• war1812.blogs.lakeshore.wnyric.org
• jdoe.blogs.lakeshore.wnyric.org

Blog Title will be the Name of your blog. This can be changed later.

When you are ready to have visitors on your site this is a URL that you will need to give them.

For Privacy I would recommend the Yes Setting. This will post your blog in our Directory listing and allow it to be searched.

Now Click “Signup.”

You now should have an email in your inbox to confirm you are who you said you are. You’ll be assigned a temporary password that you’ll want to change immediatly.

Step 2: The Backend

The next set of instructions will concentrate on the backend of your blog. This is the area where you create posts, pages, manage your themes, commments and much much more. After you have logged in with your username and password, you will want to change your password to something you will remember. So lets do that.

When you log in for the first time you’ll be brought to your dashboard.

Lets change our password  by going to “Users -> Your Profile.”

Then Change your password at the bottom of the page.

Step 3: Start Blogging

At this point I would reccomend that you start playing around with all the back end options to see what you can do. While I could keep on writting instructions, I would just be duplicating (poorly) The great documentation over at wordpress.org on working with wordpress. You can find it at  http://codex.wordpress.org/Working_with_WordPress