Post
They have both archive pages (sorted by author, publication date, etc.) and single pages that show a post on its own. Posts always have a publication date, and they are sorted into categories and tags to make them easier for the administrator to manage and for the visitors to locate. If the active theme has support for it, they can also be sorted into different post formats like image, video and quote. A post can be set to sticky to make it appear at the top of the first page of the blog archive, regardless of its publishing date.
A post is frequently displayed along with the name of the author, the date of publication and any categories and/or tags it is associated with. Unlike pages, they also have the WordPress comment functionality activated as default.
Plugins
There are over 50,000 free plugins in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory, and many more can be purchased from premium plugin vendors. Most websites built bespoke by agencies also make use of compatibility plugins, which add functionality, custom post types and custom forms for data input to the site. WordPress comes with two plugins packed-in: Akismet and Hello Dolly.
Plugins can be used for everything imaginable, but some of the more common use-cases are contact form plugins, SEO plugins, e-commerce plugins and security plugins. Plugins are handled in the “Plugins” page in the administration panel. In Plugins → Add New, you can also explore and install plugins directly from the WordPress.org plugin directory.
The following is a list of some of the more notable plugins in the WordPress ecosystem:
- Akismet – spam protection plugin
- bbPress – discussion boards plugin
- BuddyPress – social network plugin
- Contact Form 7 – contact form plugin
- WPML – localisation plugin
- WooCommerce – ecommerce plugin
- Space admin theme
Page Template
Page templates are included in WordPress themes, and how they are used vary from theme to theme. A common use-case for page templates is a page template for the Front Page which, when applied to a page, gives it a different layout and content settings than a regular page.
You can find a list of all page templates by editing a page in the administration panel, locating the “Page Attributes” meta box and clicking the dropdown beneath the “Template” label. Some themes also include page templates for other content types than pages, such as posts, but it isn’t as common.
Page
They are generally used for evergreen content that doesn’t change very often, like a “About Us” or “Contact Us” page. Unlike posts, they generally don’t support taxonomies(like categories and tags). Comments are deactivated as default on pages, but they can be activated by checking the “Allow comments” checkbox in the “Discussion” meta box while editing a page.
Pages can be arranged in hierarchies to create page structures. An “About Us” page could for instance have the subpages “Contact Us” and “Our Employees”. Different themes display page hierarchies differently, but they are commonly included in breadcrumbs (in the form “Home → Parent Page → Sub Page”) and menus. Pages can use Page Templates to adjust their functionality and appearance.
Multisite (MU)
If you run a company with regional offices, for instance, you might want to enable each office to have their own site, with their own pages, blogs, users and settings. WordPress Multisite enables you to do all of this, while still having a single WordPress installation at the core. It’s a lot easier to manage than having multiple individual WordPress installations.
Multisite installations have a unique user role called a super admin. Super admins can create and delete sites in the network, and they also have full access to all content and settings across all sites in the network. On multisite installations, users with the administrator role can only manage sites they’re given access to by the super admin. They also have slightly diminished capabilities compared to administrators on regular WordPress installations. They can’t install new plugins or themes or edit other user profiles, for instance.
Sites in a network installation can have two different URL structures:
- Subdomains:
site.website.com - Subdirectories:
website.com/site/
Each individual site in a network functions pretty much the same as a regular WordPress site, with their own posts, pages and users. Themes and plugins are shared across all sites in the network, although you can give site administrators the ability to activate or deactivate certain plugins.
Contect Management System (CMS)
Content management systems (CMS) comes in all shapes and sizes, with a wide variety of features. Most of them offer an interface for editing content and manage settings for one or multiple connected websites, and most of them are collaborative in nature.
The most popular CMS for managing websites is WordPress, which as of 2018 holds about 30% of the market share. Other popular CMSs include Joomla, Drupal and the e-commerce system Magento, although none of them come close to WordPress in market share.