Title: Class Blogs Author: oberlincilc Published: April 4, 2012 Last modified: November 4, 2012 --- Search plugins This plugin **hasn’t been tested with the latest 3 major releases of WordPress**. It may no longer be maintained or supported and may have compatibility issues when used with more recent versions of WordPress. ![](https://s.w.org/plugins/geopattern-icon/class-blogs.svg) # Class Blogs By [oberlincilc](https://profiles.wordpress.org/oberlincilc/) [Download](https://downloads.wordpress.org/plugin/class-blogs.0.5.1.zip) * [Details](https://pcd.wordpress.org/plugins/class-blogs/#description) * [Reviews](https://pcd.wordpress.org/plugins/class-blogs/#reviews) * [Installation](https://pcd.wordpress.org/plugins/class-blogs/#installation) * [Development](https://pcd.wordpress.org/plugins/class-blogs/#developers) [Support](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/class-blogs/) ## Description The Class Blogs plugin is meant to simplify the process of blogging as a class. It accomplishes this by making it easier to find, organize and analyze the work created by your students. The functions available to you to make this happen are provided and categorized below. **Widgets** If you are running WordPress in multisite mode, these widgets are only available on the main blog. If you are unsure about what this means, you don’t need to worry about it. The available widgets allow you to display the following: * Recent student posts. * Recent student comments. * A tag cloud built from the tags used on your students’ posts. * YouTube videos embedded in your student’s posts. * An image randomly taken from your students’ posts. * Links to view posts by each of your students. **Teacher Admin Pages** The Class Blogs plugin adds pages that will be visible only to you whenever you log in to the administrative side of the blog. These pages allow you to perform the following actions: * View a table of all student posts, sorted by date. * View a table of all student comments, sorted by date. * View word counts for all student posts and comments, broken down by week. * Add links to all student blogs if running in multisite mode. * Optionally disable comments on all current and future posts. **Student Admin Pages** The Class Blogs plugin adds pages that will be visible to each student whenever they log in to create content. These pages allow students to do the following: * Create a pseudonym by changing their username and full name. * See how many words they have written for the current week. **Other** In addition to the above plugins, the Class Blogs plugin provides a few additional features that do the following: * Add a link to create a gravatar to the bottom of each user-activation email. * Set a student’s first and last name based on their email address. * Automatically approve all comments left by students on other students’ blogs. **Themes** This plugin also includes a theme that takes advantage of the above features to display information on your students’ posts in a clear, easy-to-navigate manner. Instead of showing posts sorted by date, the main page displays recent student posts grouped by student, with students having newer material appearing first. ## Screenshots * [[ * The class blogging theme * [[ * The random image and YouTube playlist widgets * [[ * The YouTube playlist page * [[ * The admin list of student comments * [[ * The admin list of student posts * [[ * The word-count options and information page ## Installation 1. Place the `class-blogs` folder in your `/wp-content/plugins/` directory. 2. Activate Class Blogs. 3. Click on the items in the ‘Class Blogs’ item in the admin menu to set options. 4. Optionally enable the ‘Class Blogging’ theme on the ‘Appearance -> Themes’ page. 5. Optionally add class-blogging widgets on the ‘Appearance -> Widgets’ page. If you are running WordPress in multisite mode, you will need to perform a network activation of the plugin. Furthermore, you will need to make the ‘Class Blogging’ theme only available on the main blog. ## FAQ Can I use this if I’m not running WordPress in multisite mode? While this plugin works best when running WordPress in multisite mode and giving each student their own blog, it will run just fine if you have a single blog and are adding students as users with limited permissions. ## Reviews There are no reviews for this plugin. ## Contributors & Developers “Class Blogs” is open source software. The following people have contributed to this plugin. Contributors * [ oberlincilc ](https://profiles.wordpress.org/oberlincilc/) [Translate “Class Blogs” into your language.](https://translate.wordpress.org/projects/wp-plugins/class-blogs) ### Interested in development? [Browse the code](https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/class-blogs/), check out the [SVN repository](https://plugins.svn.wordpress.org/class-blogs/), or subscribe to the [development log](https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/log/class-blogs/) by [RSS](https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/log/class-blogs/?limit=100&mode=stop_on_copy&format=rss). ## Changelog #### 0.5.1 * Better handling of pages when using the default permalink structure. * Fixed errors with widgets that use categories on the sitewide tags page. #### 0.5 * Better detection of the page being viewed. * Pages created by plugins are now public but excluded from nav bars. * New YouTube class playlist shortcode for showing the playlist on any page. * Student blog links widget no longer available when not running multisite. * Sitewide post-like data (pages, attachments, etc.) is no longer tracked. * Added screenshots. * More robust fetching of student information. * Student posts and comments widgets now exclude professor-created data. * Word counter dashboard widget is now properly shown to non-multisite students. #### 0.4 * Restructed to run as a standard or network-only plugin. * Can now run in either multisite or normal mode. * Activation framework added for all child plugins. * YouTube playlist no longer syncs with YouTube. * Themes are now part of the plugin. * Cleaned up unused plugins. * Added a readme. * Sitewide plugins can no longer be disabled. * Random image widget caption updates. * Admin design changes. * Simplified student pseudonym plugin to only change username. * Students can only change their username once. #### 0.3 * Cleaned up development / production media structure. * Plugins can now be selectively disabled from the admin page. * Plugins can now run arbitrary code when upgrading the main plugin. * Better dependency and loading management. * Plugins can now define options on a per-blog basis. * Word counter now properly counts words if there are comments but no posts. * Student blog links widget now handles different layouts better. * More areas of the theme are links now. * Plugins that don’t define media no longer break. * Deferred plugin initialization. * The YouTube class playlist now only maintains a local playlist. * Added an explicit license. #### 0.2 * Added plugin admin media system. * Better student name detection in blog list. * Added plugin table schema abstraction. * Better sitewide data tracking with manual resyncing capability. * Plugin table schema cleanup. * YouTube class playlist now better handles quota and request errors. * Better plugin admin notification messages. * Refactored student blog links JavaScript. * Improved documentation for all plugins. * Simplified caching logic. * Better internal widget system. * Abstracted the private plugin page functionality. * Added icons for all plugin admin pages. * Added a build system for packaging media and creating translation files. #### 0.1 * Initial release ## Meta * Version **0.5.1** * Last updated **13 years ago** * Active installations **10+** * WordPress version ** 3.1 or higher ** * Tested up to **3.3.2** * Language * [English (US)](https://wordpress.org/plugins/class-blogs/) * Tags * [academic](https://pcd.wordpress.org/plugins/tags/academic/)[blogging](https://pcd.wordpress.org/plugins/tags/blogging/) [class](https://pcd.wordpress.org/plugins/tags/class/)[students](https://pcd.wordpress.org/plugins/tags/students/) * [Advanced View](https://pcd.wordpress.org/plugins/class-blogs/advanced/) ## Ratings No reviews have been submitted yet. [Add my review](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/class-blogs/reviews/#new-post) [See all reviews](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/class-blogs/reviews/) ## Contributors * [ oberlincilc ](https://profiles.wordpress.org/oberlincilc/) ## Support Got something to say? Need help? [View support forum](https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/class-blogs/)