Minimal WP setup for commenting

  • Hi!

    I have built a Google Sites website for a friend’s party. The party is a “celebration of life” for him at the midpoint of his life (60th birthday. he’s an optimist.). I have a tab for people to submit pictures to a shared google photos album. Another tab for people to submit anonymous stories/tributes via google forms to be read at the event. And a tab for the event deets.

    I want to add an additional tab where people, especially those who can’t make the event, can share out stories about Manoj that everyone can immediately read and comment on. I realized this is basically a WP blog comment thread so I’ve decided to use that and embed it on Google Sites. If I get spam, I’ll just moderate it–the site’s low traffic and very temporary.

    I paid for a month of hosting on DreamHost.

    Any advice for how I configure WP and make the blog post/comment thread to a minimalist look and to work well with embedding?

    Other advice is also welcome!!!

Viewing 6 replies - 1 through 6 (of 6 total)

  • Hi, here’s a few ideas:

    1. Choose a “minimalist” theme to avoid most of the clutter. One example is Poema, but there are many others.
    2. Don’t create any posts. Create a page that people will leave comments on, and set it as the homepage (Settings > Reading)
    3. Use the Theme Options in the Customizer to turn off any theme features you don’t want
    4. Use Additional CSS in the Customizer to hide any elements that can’t be turned off via Theme Options
    5. Visit Settings > Discussion and configure the settings to match your needs. The defaults may mostly work, but you may want to un-check Comment author must have a previously approved comment unless you plan to monitor the site frequently.
    6. Activate and configure the Akismet plugin to avoid most spam. It’s installed by default on most hosts.
    Thread Starter eprebys

    (@eprebys)

    Great advice, thanks!!1 I’m pretty happy with where I’ve ended u but I can’t seem to change the “Leave a Reply” text to read “Share a Story”. I’d also like to change the text on the “Post Comment” button to read “Share Story”.

    For those I think you’d need to create a child theme, copy the comment template there, and modify that file. Then activate the child theme.

    Since it’s a temporary site, you could also just modify the existing theme directly. Those changes will be wiped out if you update the theme, though.

    Thread Starter eprebys

    (@eprebys)

    I was using the twentytwentythree theme so there was no functions.php file. I added a functions.php file. The entirety of the file is below:


<?php
function mycustom_comment_form_title_reply($defaults ) {
$defaults['title_reply'] = __( 'Share a Story' );
return $defaults;
}
add_filter( 'comment_form_defaults', 'mycustom_comment_form_title_reply' );

function wpb_comment_reply_text( $link ) {
$link = str_replace( 'Post Comment', 'Post Story', $link );
return $link;
}
add_filter( 'comment_reply_link', 'wpb_comment_reply_text' );

The first function works correctly and changes the "Leave a Reply" text to "Share a Story". The second funciton fails to change the "Post Comment" text. Any recommendations?

    Hi, I think the comment_reply_link filter will affect replying to an another comment. To change the button for submitting a reply to the post, you’ll want to use the same comment_form_defaults filter you used for the title:

    add_filter( 'comment_form_defaults', 'tweak_comment_defaults' );

function tweak_comment_defaults( $defaults ) {
	$defaults['label_submit'] = 'Post Story';

	return $defaults;
}

    TwentyTwentyThree is also a block theme, so you can use the Site Editor to make some changes visually if you prefer.

Viewing 6 replies - 1 through 6 (of 6 total)
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