My Blog admin
· 4 min read

Getting started

Getting started

From download to your first published post in about five minutes. No technical knowledge is needed.

What you need

You do not need a database, a command line, or any settings.

1. Upload

  1. Unzip the download on your computer. You will see a folder named tsblog.
  2. Open your host's File Manager (or FTP program) and go to your website's main folder. It is often called public_html, www or htdocs.
  3. Upload the contents of the tsblog folder there. (To put the blog in a subfolder of your site, such as example.com/blog, create a blog folder first and upload into it.)

Tip: if uploading many files is slow, upload the zip file itself and use the File Manager's Extract option.

Make sure you can see the hidden files .htaccess and .user.ini after uploading. Your file manager may have a “show hidden files” option. They are optional, but they help.

2. Open the admin

In your browser, go to your site's address followed by /admin, for example https://example.com/admin.

If you see a page that says Welcome! Let’s set up your blog., everything is working. If you see something else, open Troubleshooting.

Do this straight away. The first person to open this page chooses the password.

3. Answer three questions

| Question | Notes | | - | - | | What is your blog called? | Shown at the top of every page. You can change it later | | Your name | Optional. Shown on posts | | A password | At least 8 characters. There is no username |

Your time zone is detected from your browser, and the blog quietly checks your hosting to pick the best settings. Click Create my blog. You are signed in.

If the page shows a red box titled One thing needs fixing first, follow the plain steps in it (usually: set a folder's permissions to 755 in your file manager), then click Check again.

4. Write your first post

  1. Click New post.
  2. Type a title, press Enter, and write. Use the toolbar above the page for bold, headings, lists, quotes and links. To add a picture, paste it or drag it onto the page.
  3. Click Save draft to keep it private, or Publish to put it on your site.

Prefer to type symbols such as **bold**? Click Markdown at the top instead of Simple. Your post is the same either way.

The sliders button opens extra options: the web address, the publish date (a future date schedules the post), tags, a summary for search engines, and a cover picture. You can ignore all of it.

5. Make it yours

Click Settings at the top of the admin. Change the blog name, tagline, time zone, how many posts show per page and more. Click Save settings.

The two sample items (a welcome post and an About page) can be edited or deleted from the posts list.

6. Keep a backup

In Settings, click Download a backup now and then. It gives you a zip of all your posts, pictures and settings. To restore, upload its folders back to your site.

If something does not look right

| You see | Do this | | - | - | | A page about PHP being too old | Change the PHP version in your hosting control panel to 8.1 or higher | | A red “needs fixing” box | Follow the steps in it. It is almost always one folder permission | | Long addresses like index.php?r=about | Nothing is wrong. Your server uses plain links. See Settings if you want pretty ones | | Anything else | Troubleshooting |

Where to go next

| I want to... | Read | | - | - | | Learn the editor and Markdown | Writing | | Change settings | Settings | | Change how the site looks | Themes | | Move to another host, or tune the server | Hosting and deployment |