5 Creative Uses of WordPress
I‘ve been working with WordPress since 2005, way back in its version 2.0 days. Back then, endlessly tinkering with CSS selectors I didn’t quite understand was about the limit of what I could do with the platform.
So it’s interesting to me to reflect on where WordPress has come from in that time. From introducing the WYSISWG editor and post previews to custom post types, taxonomies, and on-the-fly menus. It’s come from being a basic blogging platform, to being the starting point for ideas big and small.
But the WordPress core itself is a slow-moving beast. And rightfully so – it’s a mature environment now, and integrating features into the core has to be methodical and well planned. With that in mind, much of the true innovation comes in the form of the theme and plugin market.
I’ve gathered a collection of these resources over the past few months, and I’d thought I’d share them here.
Social Networking: BuddyPress
Dubbed “Social networking in a box“, BuddyPress is a plugin that sits on top of an existing WordPress installation. By default, it provides activity streams, extended profiles, friend connections, private messaging, WordPress blogging, extensible groups, and discussion forums.
Documentation and Collaboration: WordPress Wiki
If you’ve ever played with the official Wikimedia platform, you know that creating an easy-to-use Wiki is a pain in the ass. WordPress Wiki gives you the core functionality of a knowledge database with minimal trouble.
Ticket Tracking: Quality Control
Ticket tracking is hugely important for project management and customer service. And everyone in the web design/development community deals with on tickets on some level. But just like the Mediawiki platform, most ticket tracking environments are either complete overkill or get a “please gouge my eyes out” rating on the difficulty scale. Quality Control gives you an extremely lightweight ticket tracking system, and you get to keep your sanity.
Classified Ads: Yellooh!
Yellooh! is one of a few different examples of using WordPress as classified ads board. It stands out for its low cost and nice design. Users are able to add new entries from a front-end form (saving the trouble of logging into the WordPress backend), Google Maps is tightly integrated, and it even features PayPal integration if you’re looking to charges users to post ads.
Customer Support: Instant Q&A
Instant Q&A provides an easy to use Q&A forum perfect for customer support.