hosting on WordPress vs. self-hosting
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I signed up for WordPress Premium on 8/12/13 in order to develop a website for myself. Since, I’ve discovered that I do not have access to plugins or complex CSS editing, which I thought was part of the package I signed up for. Are these options only available for self-hosted WordPress sites? If so, can I transfer my site to one of WordPress’s recommended hosts? And am I eligible for full or partial refund of the $99 I paid WordPress?
Thanks,
EvanThe blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)
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Hi there,
You are correct that even with WordPress.com Premium you do not gain access to plugin functionality. That said, you can still fully make use of CSS coding for your site. You can make changes to your site’s CSS by going to your site’s Dashboard >> Appearance >> Customizer >> CSS. Any additions made in this window will change your site’s CSS. If you are looking to modify the current CSS, you can just go here:
https://ethourihan.wordpress.com/wp-admin/themes.php?page=editcss
And change the mode from Add-On to Replace on the right hand side.
To answer your other question, all of our products except for domains are fully refundable within the first 30 days after purchase. You are currently at day 28, so if you would still like to refund your WordPress.com Premium package you can do so by logging in to your Dashboard and going to Store >> My Upgrades and cancelling there. If you run in to any troubles, just respond to this message and I can help out!
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Thanks for the reply. I’d really like to have plugin functionality, so I think I’ll have to switch to a self-hosted format.
Will making this switch cause me to lose any of the functionality I have now through WordPress Premium? Access to themes and ability to customize?
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Well we’ll be sorry to see you go!
WordPress.org is a bit of a different creature. We break down some of the differences right here:
The main things to remember is that there really isn’t any help line available (so nothing like us!), however there is a support forum with volunteers where you can go for advice:
There are a lot of themes available in WordPress.org, but you’ll want to exercise caution. Since there is no real vetting process in the .org world, some themes can really slow down or even crash your site because they are poorly written. You’ll want to make sure that whoever has written the theme you choose has a good reputation and that the theme has a lot of good reviews, etc.
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Thanks for the reply, but that doesn’t completely answer my question. What I’m asking is, if I switch, will I have to rebuild everything from the ground up or will my current theme and customizations remain intact?
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I apologize, I didn’t understand that question from your previous reply.
We have a tool which will allow you to export your content, including all posts, pages, media, and comments. You won’t need to worry about that.
As for your theme, that will not transfer. You will need to either find that one or a similar one once your new WordPress.org site is set up and you will then need to recustomize it to the point which it is now.
We do offer a Guided Transfer which does much of this for you. You can read about the Guided Transfer program right here:
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Okay, thanks for the info. I’d already read about the guided transfer. I’m honestly not keen on rebuilding with a new theme (my current theme is not supported on WordPress.org) and redoing my customization.
I have a theme-specific question: I’m currently using Elegant Grunge and would like to add a widgit linking to my Pinterest page. However, a Pinterest widgit is not currently available in my widgit list. Does that mean I’m out of luck using the particular theme I’ve chosen?
Also, if I don’t like these specific Facebook and Twitter widgits and would prefer to just have the simple F for Facebook and the little bird logo for Twitter as my links, am I similarly out of luck?
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The list of widgets actually doesn’t have much to do with which theme you’re using.
If you would like to just use icons, then you can go find the icons you’d like online and then link your various social media pages to those icons using either the Image widget:
http://en.support.wordpress.com/widgets/image-widget/
Or you can use the Text Widget and create html code to link the icons you’ve found to the social media pages. You can read how to do so right here:
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Thanks. That’s a big help. Regarding image widgets, is there any way to adjust the spacing between them? When I upload widgets for Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest, they’re spread across the footer of my page. I’d prefer they all be grouped more closely together.
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You might be able to do so by adjusting the spacing through CSS coding, however I’m not sure that would be possible. You might want to ask in the CSS Customization Forum to see if anyone has had any success with that:
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Figured it out. IF anyone else asks you about this, tell them to use text widgets:
http://en.support.wordpress.com/links/text-widget-links/
I now have another question. The footer on my blog doesn’t stretch across the entire screen on a widescreen display. It looks really sloppy and I’d like to get rid of the light gray downward indents made by my background. I’ve searched the support forums, but cannot find an answer to this. Any suggestions?
Thanks.
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It appears that you’ve already done so. When I look at your site, the dark grey footer stretches all the way across the screen.
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I don’t know if there’s a way for me to send you a screen shot (?) but the footer does not look like I want it to look. Instead of stretching across the bottom of my site in one interrupted horizontal line, it looks like this:
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____| |_____It looks fine until I view full screen on my widescreen display. I want one uninterrupted horizontal line across the top of the footer regardless of what display I’m viewing the site on.
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Sorry. That didn’t work at all. Let me try again:
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____| |____I don’t want the footer to look like that.
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Argh! Not sure I’ll be able to make this little drawing work. I’ll try one more time. Alternately, is there a way for me to send you a screen shot showing what I mean?
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____| |____The above is how the footer appears to me when viewing on a widescreen display.
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I give up. However, please take my word for it that on multiple displays (at my office and at home) when logged in or not, the top border of my dark gray footer does not form a straight, uninterrupted horizontal line across the entire display area.
As is stands now, the area where my social media and copyright links are located juts up into the main site area.
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When I view your site zoomed out I can indeed see what you mean. I’m going ahead and moving your ticket over to the CSS Customization Forum where you can get help with using CSS to make the footer do what you’re trying to do! :)
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Thanks so much. I’m thinking it’s a screen resolution issue and that maybe my theme (Elegant Grunge) simply doesn’t support higher result ion display. Hope that’s not the case!
How can I check for replies in the CSS Customization Forum? Will they automatically appear in this thread?
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Hi all. I’m trying to figure out how to get my footer to stretch all the way across the bottom of my site when viewing on a high res monitor. Here’s a link:
Right now when I maximize my browser window, the footer icons appear to jut up into the body of my site. I’d like one uninterrupted horizontal footer border regardless of screen resolution. Any ideas? Thanks.
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