Using multiple Wordpress sites in a Network (MultiSite) - wordpress

Is it possible to share blogroll links between different Wordpress Multi Network sites? I would like to link all sites to eachother (about 15) in a Network widget/menu on the right. All are pretty much in same niche.
I would not mind being able to manage some content as a Users database and Blogroll links centrally, I have been unable to find out how to do this.
It seems unique tables were generated per site, which makes me doubt if this is possible.
How can I get pretty statistics per subdomain? I don't want to create 15 sites in Analytics or Piwik, if this is no necessary.
Any tips for running Wordpress in an Networked environment are welcome.

There are a number of (unfortunately) premium plugins that will do as you ask:
Sitewide blogroll links
is purely a blogroll that can be centrally published. For something a bit more specific to the network, look into:
WP Social Blogroll
That one takes a little bit of doing to configure it, but it does work in Network mode.
For stats, you don't have a lot of good choices. I would tend to stick with Google Analytics, run a single master UA code and just use filters to shard off each of the network sites for reporting purposes. Depending on how your network is configured, there is (again, unfortunately) another premium plugin that specifically supports WordPress Network mode. If you are running it in sub-domains, that plugin should automatically track by sub-domain.

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Wordpress multi sites - different hosts

I have approximately 20 simple Wordpress sites, but each, on a different host company.
That's because I wanted the sites to be completely separated (with different ip and all).
My question is:
Is there a paid service (maybe on the cloud?) that give me the ability to manage multiple Wordpress sites that each of them on a different hosts?
If you wanted separate IP, that's probably for marketing and SEO purposes. In that case you should check out https://www.seosamba.com/ for the free and premium WP plugins. You can optimize any number of WordPress websites from a single interface.
https://managewp.com/ have a look I think it one of the few that can manage sites on separate servers.
Another one that I've been using is InfiniteWP (http://infinitewp.com/). They even offer a free version if you don't need all the features.
As far as I'm aware, they only offer a self-hosted solution though.

Wordpress Multisite - Is this a good idea?

I'm being tasked at my company to work out a plan to handle 50 new clients that we're about to bring in. Each client is directly related and under an "umbrella" company that owns them all. All 50 sites will be pretty similar, each is for a different company so the themes may vary across them all.
We're planning to give them 10 themes to pick from for all 50 sites. So some of them will be very similar, some won't be at all.
Is Wordpress the best path? I'm very familiar with Wordpress. I've worked with Expression Engine before but am not as savvy as I am with Wordpress and I understand Expression Engine also has a multi site functionality.
So my question, is Wordpress Multi Site the best path for this? What would you do in my situation?
Also, if we wanted to create a user that has access to 10 of the 50 sites, is that possible? We'll need to narrow permissions.
Also, each site will need its own domain name. Is that possible?
Thanks guys!
Yes, Multisite can handle this easily.
To run Mapped Domains, using the MU Domain Mapping plugin cited by #Calle, you need to set up the network as sub-domains (opposed to a directories set up). And the mapped domains must be set as Parked Domains pointing to the directory of the WordPress Multisite installation.
Multisite user management can be a little tricky.
If some site of the network has really special requirements for its user's management, maybe you'll have a hard time.
All users of the network are given Subscriber status in all sites (this can be masked). You can easily assign one user as Administrator of 10 sites, give Super Admin access to others, use a network role management, etc.
You can have a couple of parent themes with the corporate identity and create child themes to accomodate specific needs.
Useful info:
Multisite 101, introduction to MS by one of its wizards, don't forget the tip jar if it's useful to you ;)
This ebook strives to pull it all together, explain you what skills you need to get started, and move you to the next step: running your own Network. Think of it as a basic tutorial in running your own Multisite.
Multisite Rationale, real case study for implementation of a MS Network, if you can find a document like this for Expression Engine, then you can make your choice pretty fast.
Wordpress Multisite can either be path based (www.domain.com/site1, www.domain.com/site2), or domain-based (www.site1.domain.com, www.site2.domain.com). I believe each of these sites have separate users; I'm not sure about your question about setting up a user that only has access to a certain number of the sites, but you can set up a "master user" that has access to all the sites on the network. If you use a domain based network for MS, you can then go into each of your domains you have bought for your 50 sites and forward them using DNS/.htaccess to the individual Wordpress Multisites.
I hope that makes sense :)

Architecture ideas to allow customers to build their own site, based off external site's data?

I'm not entirely sure how to properly ask this, so please bear with me.
I have an idea for a site I would like to build, which would basically be a site for members to create some data and have it housed in my database. I would like to offer a value-add to the site which would allow people to spin off their own website via my own "website builder" tool (probably some sort of CMS). Their website would be able to communicate with my master database to display their data.
Getting down to the crux of the topic, I'm looking for architectural advice/ideas/etc. regarding what services I could use to do this. I'm not looking a 100% automated solution, but something along these lines (which may not be completely correct, I admit):
Customer puts in an order to create their own site, using my tools.
I setup a separate domain for them, roll out the CMS foundation to the site, and the customer has full editing control of the CMS to design it however they would like.
The CMS would have some customizations so that it includes functionality to call APIs located on the master site, which would return the relevant data.
In the research I have done on SO, I've seen a lot of mentions of Umbraco which honestly looks like a good start. I'm just worried that when I go to upgrade a version, I have to deal with overwriting my custom API functionality. I'm guessing this is the nature of the beast, and requires me to accept/plan for it.
Does anyone have any thoughts about this? Some high-level starting points? Thanks!
I've been thinking about this same issue for my customers.
It is not hard to automatically roll out a stock cms such as Wordpress or Joomla. This sort of thing is done all the time by "1 click installers" that DreamHost and others have.
Including custom widgets or plugins for the CMS that can connect to your main app is also not hard.
For dns, you can use Amazon Route 53 or other DNS services that include a good api at the dns management level.
I suggest that you focus on using a CMS that is very popular (eg Wordpress or Joomla) rather than something less well known such as Umbraco. Using a more popular system will drastically reduce your training costs--remember that if you supply the CMS to your customers, then they'll also expect you to supply the support for it...

Managing 2 websites from 1 admin panel

Is it possible to control 2 different Drupal website from 1 admin panel? 2 different domain, but on same host-server.
one of my client came up with the idea and I wasn't sure if it can be done.
Appreciate advices! Thanks a lot!
If you're just trying to have two domains point to the same Drupal installation (e.g. http://example.com/ and http://example2.com point to the same Example Drupal website), this is supported out of the box as long as you don't use a multisite setup.
That is, normally, you'd just stick your settings.php file in sites/default/. If you did that, any domain that's pointed to the Drupal directory will use the same Drupal site. You don't need to do anything else.
If you've stuck your site in sites/example.com, you could create a symbolic link with the name of the other domain; i.e. you'd have sites/example.com and a symbolic link to it called sites/example2.com.
If you're trying to run two disparate sites through the same admin panel, you can't do it per se: that is, you can't manage most aspects of Drupal through its default administration system because it's not designed to do that.
However, if you're trying to simulate something like Plesk or Cpanel—that is, you just want to easily manage Drupal deployments using one control panel—there is a project under heavy development called Aegir. I've used it on a few different occasions and it works pretty great, but it's a somewhat involved setup process.
With http://drupal.org/project/domain you can simulate two websites. Is not actually two different Drupal installation.
You can take a look http://drupal.org/node/346385 for more information about the different multi-site options.
No, not that I am aware. As well as the content, all the administration aspects of the site are stored in the site's database, so the admin area and the front end of the site are joined at the hip! 1 database per site, so 1 admin area per site.
There is Aegir http://www.aegirproject.org which is a multi-site manager dashboard system. It's more for creating and managing the site than for managing content, but it might be what you're looking for.

Should I add a blog to a site or use a blogging service?

I've been adding quite a few blogs to sites and I'm wondering if it's better to add blogging software on the site or use an external blogging service. The major reason I can think of adding a blog to site is if you want to customize it later on (other than look) such as more integration with the site. If I put it on the site, I'll probably use WordPress as I'm familiar with it.
Is there any major advantage to one method or the other?
I would go with putting the blog on your website itself. This will help with a number of things:
Transparency: Your users will feel as if they are on the same website, because they in fact are. Your blog will become simply an extension to your website. On the other hand, a blogging service will most likely appear as though you are going to a completely different website.
Integration: You are able to integrate everything on your website with your blog. This includes any existing user bases, or future ones. Also, the look of your blog can match your website perfectly, much more so than with a blogging service.
Customization: You get 100% control over every single feature of your blog. If you want some new crazy feature, you can program it. Blogging services are typically much more closed than this.
The downsides will be that you have to maintain it, and any features that you want you have to put in yourself.
One of the advantages of having blog on your site is that all the content will belong to your site, which is good for search engine since it will increase your site visibility through SERP. But you will have the price to pay: installation and maintenance.
It's not cut and dried:
(Assuming this is for clients) do you have an ongoing relationship with the client and time scheduled for upgrades? Most blog software needs at least some upgrading or security patching from time to time.
Are you relying on some sort of social media network effects from these blogs? If so, you may get better mileage from a hosted product as they often promote related sites within their networks (e.g. Wordpress has the "Possibly related posts" feature).
As Brian said, integration could be an issue if you have other areas of your site that rely on logins. In that case, probably better to host it yourself.

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