How to Install Wordpress Plugins

Wordpress is a free CMS engine, that empowered this blog. I’ve been using Wordpress since years ago, and what keeping me from using it? Well, the answer is typical to any open-source software benefit: support from the community. With a large support from the community, enhancements and developments are coming as time goes by. Yes, people who love Wordpress keep on adding features in terms of scripts that is known as Wordpress Plugins.

You can easily find any kind of enhancement you need for your Wordpress-powered blog (or site) by doing some searchings on Google. There are thousand of online pages that provides plugins for you to download. Some are free, and some comes along with a license. Well, that’s another story – what I’m going to tell you in here, are the steps you need to do in order to install your found plugins into your Wordpress.

After you have your plugins, stored in your local drive. Just follow these steps:

Firstly, login to your Wordpress Administration Panel
You need to login as Admin in order to carry the following steps. Go to your wp-admin section (http://yourdomain.com/wp-admin)

For Wordpress 2.7 User (or later)

If you are using Wordpress 2.7 or above, there are an easy way to add your plugins into the CMS. If you are using an earlier version, you can check the steps of Installing Wordpress Plugin for Version 2.5 or earlier, below.

1. On your left sidebar, there you can find a Plugins section (see the picture below).
   

   Plugins Section on Wordpress Blog

2. Click on the “Add New” to go for the main course. And you will find a form as shown below (click the picture for larger size). 
   

   Adding the plugins file by selecting it.

3. Click on “Choose File” to browse your local drive, and select the file.
   Usually a plug-ins package come in zipped format, you don’t have to unzipped the file, just upload the whole zipped package in this step.
4. After selecting your plugins file, click on “Install” button to start the whole plugins installation process (which is done automatically by Wordpress).
5. After the installation process is finished, you need to be aware that the plugins are not automatically activated. Yes, installing the stuff and activating it, are two different situation that you need to do. So, click the “Activate Plugins” link on the last line (see picture below). 
   

   Activating your Wordpress Plugins

6. If no error is shown, then congratulations you have succeed in installing your Wordpress plugin.

For Wordpress 2.5 User (or earlier)

This section is for those that are using an earlier version of Wordpress (than 2.7) these are the steps:

1. After logged-in, you can find “Plugins” link on the head navigation of your dashboard (see the picture below, click to enlarge). I put a circle (make it two-circles) on the Plugins link. So, click it.
   

   Wordpress 2.5 Dashboard

2. In Wordpress 2.5 (or earlier), you need to do the upload manually. Since this version doesn’t support plugins packaged upload and extraction features. So use your FTP client software (I use FileZilla) to upload the plugins package to the plugins folder (/wp-content/plugins).
3. Some plugins package provide you a detailed explanation for the installation process. Some just instructs you to extract the package and upload the whole folder to the plugins folder, while some instructs you to upload the files (and not the folder) into the plugins folder. So make sure you know the correct steps needed.
4. After you upload your plugins, you have to activate it through the Plugins page. Click on the “Activate” link to set the plugins in active state.
    
   

   Wordpress 2.5 Plugins Page

5. And that’s it. If no error shown, then you have succeed installing your Wordpress Plugins for Wordpress 2.5

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