WordPress Classic Editor | Life in the Realm of Fantasy

Tag Archives: WordPress Classic Editor

April 7, 2021 · 6:00 am

WordPress Block Editor work-around part 2: Using Images the Easy Way with the Classic Editor Toolbar #amblogging #wordpressfail

‘Life in the Realm of Fantasy’ is a WordPress blog. I originally went with WordPress for this website because it is a free, open-source blogging tool and content management system. I also have several other blogs on Blogger (Blogspot/Google), also a free, open-source blogging tool and content management system.

I prefer Blogger for ease of use, but I love the way WordPress looks when you get to the finished product stage. I do pay an annual fee to both WordPress and Blogger so that my readers aren’t subjected to random and sometimes obscene-looking advertisements.

We discussed how to find and use the classic editor tool bar in the Block Editor menu in my last post: WordPress Block Editor work-around part 1: how to find and use the classic editor toolbar. Today we’re going to source and use images to make our posts more eye-catching.

Open the Classic Editor Toolbar. Once you have your text the way you want it, it’s time to add images.

Place your cursor in the body of the blog post and click once at the spot where you will want the image. Then go to the right side of the ribbon/toolbar and click on the little camera/music notes.(When you hover your mouse over it, it will say ‘add media shift/alt/M).

When the image loads, click on it and a small toolbar will appear.

insert images classic editor toolbar

Position your photo via the small toolbar. Do this first!
To change the size of the image, click on the little white square in the upper right of the image. Hold it and drag the image to the size you want.

freerange daisies and image toolbar

If this is your first blog post, you won’t have anything in your media library yet, so click on “Upload Files.” Practice uploading images and inserting them, playing with it until you feel comfortable and know how to ensure the image will appear where you want it, and will be the size you want it to be. Then, once the image is in the body of the post, you click on the picture, and a new toolbox opens up. That is where you make your adjustments for positioning and size. You can even add captions.

But how do we find our images?

When we first begin blogging, sourcing images seems like no big deal. You google what you want, see what images pop up, right click, copy, and use them, right?

Wrong! Photographers and artists are just like writers—they are proud of their work and want to be credited for it. Protect yourself and your work by responsibly sourcing your images, giving credit to the authors and artists whose work you use.

You can get into terrible financial trouble and lose your credibility if you use images you don’t have the right to use.

A very good friend recently pointed out that even if you reblog a post where the images weren’t sourced properly, you might get into trouble, even though you reposted it in good faith.

I’ve mentioned this post before: The $7,500 Blogging Mistake That Every Blogger Needs to Avoid!

blogging meme So, now that we are clear as to our legal responsibility, what does the cash-strapped author do? I go to Wikimedia and use images that are in the public domain, and I also create my own graphics.

An excellent article on using Creative Commons Images can be found here:

What Is Creative Commons, And Should You Use It?

Wikimedia makes it easy for you to get the attributions and licensing for each image.

Another good source I have used is Allthefreestock.com, where you can find hundreds of free stock photos, music, and many other things for your blog and other projects.

Sometimes I need images I can only get by purchasing the rights to them. I’m not rich, so for those, I go to Dreamstime or Canstock, and several other reputable sources. For a few dollars, usually only two or three, I then have the right to use the image of my choice, and it’s properly licensed.

The proper legal attribution is also there on the seller’s website, clearly written out with the copyright and artist name, so all you need to do is copy and paste it into your footnotes.

credits and attributions I keep a log of where my images are sourced, who created them, and what I used them in. One thing WordPress has either removed or hidden is the ability to insert the attribution into the image details so that when a mouse hovered over the image, curious readers could go to the source. But that doesn’t seem to be an option any more.

Since we’re talking about citing our sources, what about quoting an article or other literary work? Sometimes we want to quote another blogger or use the information we have learned from them.

Plagiarism is a bad word, and you never want to be accused of it. To that end, we cite our sources—but there is a caveat here:

If we are quoting from a book and we intend to publish that passage in our book, we go to the publisher and get legal written permission to do so.
If we can’t get legal written permission to quote them in our book, we do not use that quote.

Composing the body of my post in a document rather than WordPress’s content window allows me to spell check and edit my work first, and I feel more comfortable writing in a document.

I keep a log at the bottom of my page of what website, who the author was, the date of publication, and the date I accessed it. I have found the simplest method is to list them in this order:

Author/contributors (for Wikipedia quotes, use “Wikipedia Contributors” rather than author names)
Title of article/book
Publication or website title
Link to the article
Date you accessed it.

Simple attributions/citations will look like this in the footnotes:

Wikipedia contributors, “Gallows humor,” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gallows_humor&oldid=759474185 (accessed January 30, 2017).

When you quote from Wikipedia, citation is simple. ‘Cite this page’ is listed in the left-hand menu under ‘tools.’

Clicking on this link takes you to a page offering citations for that page in CMoS, APA, or MLA style, whichever suits your need. Just copy and paste the one you prefer into your footnotes, and your due diligence has been done.

Clementines_Astoria_Dahlia_Garden2019 All this information for your images and any quotes from other sources should be listed at the BOTTOM of your current document as you find it, so everything you need for your blog post is all in one place.

When my blog article is complete and ready to post, I will insert a line to separate the body of the post from the credits and attribution notes.

Authors should talk to the reading world about who they are and what they do. There is no better way to connect with potential readers than by talking to them. Using pictures and quoting good sources makes your website more interesting and informative.

Hopefully, this has helped you be more comfortable in finding and using the classic editor to position your images within the body of your posts.

Credits and Attributions:

All images, screenshots, and graphics in this post are the author’s own work.

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Filed under writing

Tagged as #amwriting, #writetip, responsibly sourcing your images, Using Pictures in your WordPress blog post, WordPress Block Editor work-around, WordPress Classic Editor

December 21, 2020 · 6:00 am

The Author’s Website #amwriting

UPDATE 24 March 2021: Some of what appears further down in this post is now out of date. However, you can access the Classic Dashboard by clicking on the plus in the upper left. It’s more difficult now, and not as intuitive, but we can still get it done!

One of the comments authors make most often when explaining why they don’t keep their blogs updated is that they don’t know what to write about.

Oh, the irony!

I know a great many authors who think their lives are uninteresting. They can be found chugging out tweets or Instagram posts, but a short update on their website is a wall they fear to climb.

If you want people to find your books, you must make your author name searchable. Your website is your storefront and is what comes up when fans Google you. Updating it regularly with short posts keeps it interesting.

Most authors use Facebook as a medium for connecting with readers. Any Tweet, Instagram post, or Facebook post could easily be turned into a short blog post.

If you fall into that category, a bi-monthly update on your works in progress and where you will be signing books is a good option and will keep your fans engaged. Think of it as a long tweet or Facebook post, and you’ll have three to five paragraphs written in no time.

Many of my friends use their blogs as an opportunity to quickly dash off a flash-fiction, a drabble, or a haiku. For me, writing a post keeps the creative juices flowing when I’m having a lull in other areas.

Since writing craft is my obsession, I have no trouble talking about that subject for 1000 or so words at a time.

However, I sometimes write about the challenges life hands us. I have written about how having two adult children who developed adult-onset epilepsy affects our family.

I also talk about how being vegan adds adventure to traveling. I love to talk about conferences and conventions I might have attended, and these days, virtual conferences are happening all over the internet. Sharing what I glean from writers’ conferences has generated many good discussions here.

Hilarious career advice from my grandchildren has provided fodder for some of my favorite posts.

However, I get most of my inspiration from conversations in the writing groups I visit on Facebook. Questions that arise, and how they relate to my own works-in-progress usually make good topics for a post.

I normally write for this website on Sundays, and I write the entire week’s posts that day. Sometimes, I don’t get them all written on that day, but I NEVER write and publish a post without setting it aside for a while first. This is so I can proofread my work with fresh eyes before it’s published.

If you only update once a week or twice a month, it won’t take an hour to put together a post if you write in a word document, spell check it, and paste it into the body. This allows you to make better corrections than if it’s keyed into the WordPress Editor.

We all know that proofreading our own work is dicey at best, but I do make the effort. I spell-check and self-edit my posts as well as possible using ProWriting Aid. I also have my word processor’s Read-Aloud function read the article back to me. And still, I miss a few bloopers.

Spelling is important, and some things are hard to spot, so I’m always on the lookout for words that sound the same but are spelled differently. (There, their, they’re.) (Too, to, two.) Sometimes the algorithms in the editing software miss them.

When blogging, our grammar doesn’t have to be perfect, but we don’t want to publish a mess. Our website is the face we present to the internet. People meet us here and see what kind of work we do.

Sometimes research is involved, and I need to quote other websites. If that’s the case, I make footnotes at the bottom of my composition document as I go.

Footnotes or attributions should note the original publication that you quoted from, who wrote it, their copyright, and the date you accessed it. Wikipedia makes it easy with their “cite this page” option.

Wikipedia contributors, “Gallows humor,” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gallows_humor&oldid=759474185 (accessed January 30, 2017).

To use images or quotes found on the web, only publish those you have the legal right to use. To find out more on that subject, see my article of January 8, 2020, Using Pictures and Quotes.

After my post is written in a document, I open WordPress or Blogger (if I am working on one of my other sites). This is a WordPress site. When I go to make a post, I follow these steps:

Open the My Sites menu in the upper left-hand corner
Scroll down to click on WP Admin, and
Click on Posts, and then
Click on All Posts.
When the dashboard comes up, I click on the dropdown menu beside Add New and choose Classic Editor. I despise their new block editor system, as I find it useless. I use a lot of images, and in that dashboard you can’t insert attributions in an image.

I put together a composite of screenshots detailing these steps for you:

Before I do anything else, I give my post a title and schedule the publication date. Prescheduling allows me to post a new article three times a week at 06:00 am my time (on a Monday, Wednesday, or Friday), which is 09:00 US Eastern time. It updates without my having to babysit it.

I do have to be observant when I schedule my posts. Occasionally, I accidentally hit the “publish immediately” button, which means I end up with an extra post that week, whether I meant to or not.

Don’t forget to select the categories and tags. Those labels are how people find the articles they are interested in.

Make use of the preview function and read your post. It looks different there than it does in a word doc, so you will find many things you want to change and can make any adjustments needed before the blog is actually posted.

If you’re an author, you need a place where you can show off your books, discuss what books you are reading, or just talk about life in general.

Updating your blog once or twice a month ensures that your author name is searchable. After all, your website is where people will go if they want to find your books. They are your guests, so make it interesting for them.