In the following video, I do a step by step demonstration on how to do regular WordPress Website Updates that include the WordPress core, plugins and your active theme. You will find a complete transcript bellow the video as well.
If you have any questions regarding this video or any of our services please feel free to email me personally at jon@ideazone.ca. Alternatively you can call us in Victoria at 250 412 5610 or toll free at 1 844 651 9333
-Transcription-
Hello, I’m Jon Valade from IdeaZone.ca in Victoria BC.
In today’s video we are going to look at how to do regular WordPress updates from the WordPress management area.
WordPress will regularly recommend updates and it is critically important that these be completed every couple of weeks. Not only do these updates expand WordPress’ capabilities but more importantly, they keep your website safe from hackers and other online threats.
Once you are logged into your WordPress Dashboard you are going to navigate to the Updates Management screen where you will see a display of all the updates currently needed.
The orange circle with the 9 showing beside the Updates links tells us that there is a total of 9 updates needed at this time. All these updates will be spread out across the WordPress core, the plugins and possibly your theme
You can see right at the top of the page a confirmation that your WordPress core is indeed out of date and needs to be updated to version 4.9.8
Scrolling down the same page we see a complete list of the plugins that also need to be updated
Now we scroll to the bottom of the page and see a notification that the theme, in this case Enfold, also needs to be updated to the new version.
Let’s scroll back to the top of the page and start with updating the WordPress core. This literally is as simple as clicking on the Update Now link and then going to get yourself a fresh cup of coffee.
WordPress will fetch, install and configure the new version all by itself.
Once the WordPress core is updated you will be automatically directed to this page that lists all the changes and updated to WordPress since your last version.
Let’s navigate back to the Updates Management page. Notice now that the orange circle shows an 8 instead of a 9. This confirms that one of the updates, in this case the WordPress core, has been completed successfully.
So now that we are back on our Updates Management screen we are going to go ahead and deal with all the out of date plugins.
Start by clicking in the check box beside “Select All” to select all the listed plugins.
With all the outdated plugins selected, click on the “Update Plugins” button at the top of the list.
WordPress will now fetch and install each plugin, one at a time while showing you its progress. You can sit back and follow what is happening on the screen or, you can go and get yourself yet another cup of coffee.
Once all the plugins are updated you will be redirected to the Updates Management screen. Here you can see the confirmation message showing that all the plugins are properly updated.
The last step now is to update your theme. Here you need to be careful.
During the development of your website several design and layout options may have be changed within the CSS code of the theme. To make sure that design code stays separate from the theme files, a professional company will make these edits within a created child theme. Creating a child theme ensures that the parent theme can be updated without reverting the website’s design back to the original setting.
If you are unsure if your site has a child theme, then I highly recommend that you have a professional developer take a look and maybe have them make this final update for you.
If you are comfortable proceeding with this update then click in the check box beside “Select All”, Next, click on “Update Themes” button.
If you look at the font end of your website during any of these updates you will notice that the website has been put into maintenance mode. This is to make sure that visitors to your site are made aware that the site is unavailable for only a short period of time.
Once all the updates are complete, you will get a notification that maintenance mode has been deactivated and your website is accessible on the internet.
Well that is all for this video. IdeaZone does offer these updates within all our maintenance packages along with content edits and additional security measures.
If you have any questions regarding this video or any of our services please feel free to email me personally at jon@ideazone.ca. Alternatively you call us in Victoria at 250 412 5610 or toll free at 1 844 651 9333
