Using Categories and Tags

Categories and Tags help to organize posts on your blog, making them easier for readers to locate and making them more searchable. They appear on posts pages and can also be displayed via a Widget in your blog sidebar.

 

What are Categories?

Categories can help to organize the Posts you have published into useful collections, making it easier for readers to locate the topics they are interested in quickly and easily. They provide a helpful way to group related posts together, and to quickly tell readers what a post is about.

Using Categories

When your readers click on a categories or tag link on a post or in your sidebar it loads a page with all posts that use that tag or category, making it easier to locate related posts.

You can add as many categories as you need to make the post easier to locate.

For example you may wish to add categories for:

• Each subject you are enrolled in – to group together assessment tasks
• Particular areas of interest – eg. Social Media, Technology, Learning Design etc
• Personal Posts – to group together general posts on personal projects or experiences.

Adding Categories via the Categories Module

Add categories to posts before you publish them using the Categories module to the right of your post editor.

All you need to do is select the check box next to a category you want to use.

When you have completed your post and selected appropriate categories, click on the Publish button to complete the process.

Creating a new category

To create a new category:

1. Click on the + Add New Category link.
2. Type your new category in the Add New Category text box
3. Click Add New Category

To remove a category from a post by unchecking the checkbox to the left of that category.

Adding Categories to previously published posts using the All Posts page

You can quickly change or add categories to existing posts by going to Posts > All Posts.

This is the area in your administration panel where you see a listing of all the saved posts, 20 posts per page, that you’ve written on your blog.

Locate the post you wish to edit and use Edit or Quick Edit to change the categories assigned to a post.

To use the ‘Edit Method’ to add categories to a post, simply click on the edit post button to go to the post editing interface and add categories as above.

You can also use the Quick Edit function to quickly add categories to posts.

To add categories using Quick Edit:

1. Hover your mouse over the title of a post to bring up four action links.
2. Click on Quick Edit to open up the post in quick editing mode.
3. Uncheck the checkbox for any categories you want to remove from the post and check the checkbox for any categories you want to add to the post.
4. Click Update.

Managing Categories

You can also create new Categories and manage existing categories using Posts > Categories.

The Categories Page includes a list of your existing categories and an option to create new categories.

You create a new category using Add New Category as follows:

1. Type your new category in the Name text box.
2. Select the parent category if you want to nest a category within a category. Otherwise leave this as none.
3. Add a description for your category (optional). The description appears as a tooltip if you use the category widget.
4. Click Add New Category.

Please note that categories won’t display in your category widget or be listed in Appearance > Menu until the category has been assigned to a post.

You use add parent categories to nest a category within a category via the Categories page.

For example, you might have your subject as a parent category and then topics being explored underneath.

To display your parent and child categories you need to select Show hierarchy when you add the category widget to your sidebar in Appearance > Widgets.

 

What are Tags?

Tags are essentially keywords for each post you create. Tags are intended to be keywords that accurately represent the subject matter you have written about and can help to increase traffic and assist readers in finding topics of interest.

Using Tags

Tags are displayed on your blog attached to posts or as a tag cloud in your sidebar. Clicking on a tag name will take your readers to all posts tagged with that term.

You can add as many tags as are relevant to your post.

Adding Tags via the Tags Module

Tags are normally added before your publish your posts by typing your desired tags in the Add New Tag text box and then clicking Add.

Creating a new Tag

You can add tags one at a time by clicking the Add button or hitting the Enter on your keyboard after typing each tag.

You can add multiple tags at a time by separating them with a comma as you type. If you forget to add a comma between your separate tags the system considers the words to be one tag.

To remove a tag from a post just click the X to the left of that tag.

You can also choose from your most commonly used tags by:

1. 1. Clicking on Choose from the most used tags to view the list of your most used tags
2. To apply, click on the tags you want to assign to the post.

Adding Tags to previously published posts using the All Posts page

You can quickly change or add tags to existing posts by going to Posts > All Posts.

Locate the post you wish to edit and use Edit or Quick Edit to change the categories assigned to a post.

To use the ‘Edit Method’ to add tags to a post, simply click on the edit post button to go to the post editing interface and add tags as above.

You can also use the Quick Edit function to quickly add tags to posts.

To add tags using Quick Edit:

1. Hover your mouse over the title of a post to bring up four action links.
2. Click on Quick Edit to open up the post in quick editing mode.
3. Remove any tags you want to remove from the post and add the tags you want to apply to the post.
4. Click Update.

Managing Tags

You can also create new tags and manage existing tags using Posts > Tags.

The Tags Page includes a list of your existing tags and an option to create new tags.

 

Displaying Categories and Tags in your Sidebar

Categories and Tags can be displayed in the sidebar of your site to make it easier for users to navigate your posts. You can do so by adding the Category and Tag Cloud Widgets via Appearance > Widgets.

For more information on adding widgets click here.