WordPress Plugin Detector Tutorial
How To Use WordPress: How To Automatically Upgrade And Delete a Plugin
From Your Dashboard. This WordPress Plugin Tutorial explains how to automatically upgrade and delete them safely from the WordPress admin dashboard without coding knowledge necessary.
In a previous article, we explain what a plugin is and how you can use them to enhance your blog’s functionality.
WordPress Plugin Detector Tutorial
In this tutorial you will learn why plugins need to be kept up-to-date, how to easily upgrade and delete a them, and discover the management tools if you plan to own or manage multiple WordPress sites or blogs.
Why Many WordPress Plugin Needs Upgrading
The WordPress software is regularly updated (about every three to four months) to fix bugs and address security issues and vulnerabilities discovered in earlier software releases, and to improve existing features.
Depending on how many plugins you have installed on your site, you can expect to see at least some new updates for WordPress plugins tutorial every.
WordPress Plugin Detector Tutorial
The reason for this, is because most WordPress plugins are created by third-party developers, so sometimes code or features in the newly-released WordPress version conflict with plugins that were developed for a previous version. When this happens, conflicts can sometimes develop.
Fortunately, most WordPress developers (and the WordPress developer community itself) are fairly proactive when it comes to making sure that a plugin get updated when a new version of WordPress is released (if required). All you have to do on your end, is keep the plugin up-to-date, which, as you will soon discover, is really easy to do.
WordPress Plugin Detector Tutorial
Keeping your WordPress plugins regularly updated and removing old plugins you no longer use is an essential aspect of good WordPress management and helps to avoid any problems or errors.
The step-by-step tutorial below explains how to automatically update and delete plugins without touching web code.
How To Automatically Upgrade And Delete a Plugin – Step-By-Step WordPress Plugin Tutorial
WordPress uses a few methods to inform users when a plugin need to be updated.
For example, you can immediately see how many plugins are out-of-date as soon as you log into your WP Dashboard simply by looking at the “Plugin” menu.
In the example below, nine plugins have older versions that need to be updated …
You can also tell how many plugins need to be updated from your WP Admin Toolbar (as shown below, a number of plugins require updating) …
The Plugins screen (Plugins > Installed Plugins) also notifies you about a plugin that need updating …
WordPress Plugins Tutorial
As well as providing information about which a plugin due for an update, the Plugins section provides links to the plugin download pages and gives you the option to update the plugins instantly …
Let’s start by showing you how to update one plugin at a time.
WordPress Plugins Tutorial
How To Update WordPress Plugins Individually
Always make a full backup of your data and files before updating your website.
In your admin menu, go to Plugins > Installed Plugins …
You will be taken to the “Plugins” area. The list of plugins can run down your screen for some length, depending on how many plugins you have installed in your site …
(Plugins Page)
Useful Information: WordPress Plugins Tutorial
If you have too many plugins and would like to reduce the number of plugins displaying on your page, then click on the Screen Options tab at the top of your Plugins screen and type in a smaller number of items per page (all plugins show on the screen by default, i.e. “999”), then click the ‘Apply’ button …
Your Plugins area will now be made more manageable with a ‘numbered pages’ feature added. You can find an installed plugin by scrolling through the pages or using the “Search” field …
You will see the plugin information in different backgrounds depending on the status of your plugins (inactive vs. active and up-to-date vs. out-of-date) …
Plugins in need of updating show the following notification message: “There is a new version of [Plugin] available” …
WordPress Plugins Tutorial
Locate the plugin that needs updating and click on the update now link …
WordPress Plugins tutorial provides smooth & simpler plugin updates, so that the process of updating your plugins happens with just “one click” without leaving your Plugins screen …
Repeat the above process for any other plugins on your site that need to be updated, or see the section below if you have many plugins that are out-of-date and would like to upgrade them all in bulk.
WordPress Plugins Tutorial
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Now that you know how to update one WordPress plugin at a time, let’s show you how to upgrade many plugins simultaneously.
WordPress Plugins Tutorial: How To Bulk-Update Plugins
To upgrade multiple plugins in a single operation directly inside your dashboard, go to the “Plugins” page and click on the Update Available link on the menu at the top of the page …
Click on the check box in the Plugin column header to select all plugins at once, or select each plugin you want to upgrade by checking its box …
In the Bulk Actions pull-down menu above the list of plugins, choose Update …
And then click Apply …
The plugins you have selected will automatically begin updating …
Once all updates have completed, you can click on the Return to Plugins page link to go back to the Plugins area, or select another option from the sidebar menu …
Once your plugins are all up-to-date, any plugin alerts will disappear (i.e. the “at-a-glance” indicators and “There is a new version of XYZ plugin available” notices no longer display) …
You have updated all plugins on your site to their latest version!
(When your site uses the latest version of all plugins, the notification icons no longer show)
Now that you know how to automatically upgrade plugins, it’s time to learn how to remove plugins from your WordPress site.
WordPress Plugin Tutorial: Deleting Plugin.
It’s a good idea to uninstall plugins that are no longer needed or being used on your site. This reduces resources on your server and also help to eliminate causes of problems.
In this section, we show you how to safely uninstall unused plugins from your WordPress site.
We strongly recommend creating a full back up of your WordPress site before installing, upgrading or deleting plugins, in case something goes wrong and you need to recover data or restore your site.
To remove a plugin, go to your dashboard menu and select Plugins > Installed Plugins …
In the Plugins area, find the plugin you want to remove and make sure it is deactivated.
Hint: Inactive plugins appear in a different colored background than active plugins and show an “Activate” link below the plugin name …
If the plugin is active, then click on Deactivate before proceeding …
Click Delete …
If you need to have a look at all the files that will be deleted before taking the next step, then click on the “Click to view entire list of files which will be deleted” link in the “Delete Plugin” section …
A complete list of files belonging to the plugin selected for removal will display on your screen …
If you are certain that you would like to proceed and delete these plugin files, just click on the Yes, Delete these files button …
The selected plugins and related files will be deleted …
Deleting Multiple WP Plugins Simultaneously
You can bulk-delete all inactive plugins on your site, or select a combination of active and inactive plugins to be removed.
WordPress Plugins Tutorial
Note: To delete any plugins that are currently active, you must first deactivate them.
Go to the “Plugins” section and select all of the active plugins that you want to delete by either placing a tick next to their check box, or selecting the check box next to the Plugin column header to select all plugins (warning: this will deactivate all plugins) …
Once you have done this, choose Deactivate from the Bulk Actions drop down menu …
Click the Apply button …
Your selected plugins will be deactivated …
Once you have deactivated these plugins, click on the Inactive link on the menu at the top of the page …
Select all of the plugins you want to delete by either placing a tick next to their check box, or click on the check box next to the Plugin column header to select and delete all inactive plugins …
Once you have ticked all the check boxes next to the plugins that you want deleted, choose Delete from the Bulk Actions drop-down menu …
Click Apply …
A list of all selected plugins will be displayed in the Delete Plugins area. Click on “click to view entire list of files which will be deleted” to review all the plugin files that you are about to delete, or click on the Yes, Delete these files button if you are absolutely sure that you would like to go ahead and remove all of the selected plugins …
All plugins will be deleted and their associated files will be removed from your server …
WordPress Plugins Tutorial Management – Tools
As well as the methods shown above, you can install a number of tools to manage your plugins.
For example, Plugin Central helps you manage your plugins with options that let you install plugins directly, displays the status of plugins in need of update in your Dashboard and lets you update many plugins at once in one click …
To learn more about this plugin, go here: Plugin Central – WordPress Plugin
WordPress Plugins Tutorials Managing On Multiple Sites
Whenever plugin updates are released, the best practice is to upgrade that plugin right away.
What if you have multiple sites using the same plugin? Typically, you would have to login to every site and then update the plugin manually from that site’s own WP dashboard. With multiple sites, this process can take quite a while to complete!
WordPress Power User Tip: If you own or manage multiple WordPress sites or blogs, you can install, update or uninstall plugins on multiple sites automatically and simultaneously using various WordPress management tools.
Below are just some WordPress management tools that are worth knowing about:
Jetpack Plugin By WordPress.com
The Jetpack plugin is a multifunctional plugin for WordPress that offers users a powerful range of features, allowing self-hosted WordPress site users to benefit from WordPress.com’s infrastructure and take advantage of things like robust stats, easy social sharing, and a whole lot more.
(Jetpack lets you access a range of powerful WordPress.com features)
One of these features is “Jetpack Manage”.
Jetpack Manage allows you to manage your WordPress sites and plugins from a central interface.
With Manage, you can upgrade a plugin, set a plugin to update automatically, and activate or deactivate plugin on a per-site basis or all at once, whether you’re on your laptop, tablet, or mobile phone.
To download the plugin, visit this site: Jetpack By WordPress.com
ManageWP – Manage All Your WordPress Plugins From One Dashboard
(ManageWP is a leading WordPress management tool for multiple WordPress sites)
ManageWP lets you manage all your WordPress sites from one place, including upgrades, backups, security and more. This tool features easy one-click management and instant login to your WP sites.
To learn more about the plugin, visit this site: ManageWP.com
WP Pipeline.com
(With WP Pipeline, you can update all of your WordPress sites, plugins and themes from one single dashboard)
WP Pipeline is very similar to ManageWP, but has a one-time purchase fee instead of monthly payments. It lets you control and organize your entire online WordPress presence and perform multiple updates from one central location.
Go here to download the plugin: WP Pipeline.com
Congratulations! Now you know how to update and delete plugins safely without editing web code.
WordPress is huge and can sometimes be overwhelming about where to start. As you move on to the next Page, you will have a clearer picture of where to start and progress to building a professional WordPress Site.