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How to Set Personal Preferences on WordPress.com

WordPress.com gives you the ability to set a few different preferences based on your individual tastes for publishing, proofreading, and passwords. In the WordPress.com Dashboard, click the Personal Settings link in the User menu to load the Personal Settings page. Here, you have several different options available to you:

  • Fun: Place a checkmark in this box to tell WordPress.com to set up all of the options for you. This is what they call Fun Mode, because WordPress.com will set random configurations for the Personal Settings, so you may be surprised with what you get.

  • Visual Editor: Place a check in this box to indicate that you want to use the Visual Editor when writing your posts. Leave this box blank if you prefer not to use the Visual Editor.

  • Admin Color Scheme: This option changes the colors in your WordPress Dashboard, which uses the Gray color scheme by default. The other option is Blue — the choice is yours!

  • Keyboard Shortcuts: These shortcuts are designed to save you time navigating through the different areas of the Dashboard and Dashboard. Click the More Information link to read about how you can use keyboard shortcuts in your WordPress.com Dashboard.

  • Twitter API: Enable this option to connect to WordPress.com using the Twitter program of your choice. This option also allows you to follow other blogs via Twitter as well as to post status updates to the WordPress.com blog of your choice from Twitter. More information, including recommendations for Twitter programs for your desktop and mobile phone, can be found on the WordPress.com Web site.

  • Browser Connection: You can select whether use the HTTPS connection when visiting your WordPress.com Dashboard. HTTPS refers to a secure browser connection called SSL-encrypt, which protects your Internet connection and keeps out potential hackers.

  • Interface Language: The Interface Language option refers to the language that you want to set for the Dashboard only. Don’t confuse this setting with the Language option on the General Settings page, which determines the language you publish your blog in.

  • Primary Blog: This option is the URL of your primary WordPress.com blog. Because WordPress.com allows you to have several blogs under one account, if you have more than one blog, a drop-down menu appears here, and you can use it to choose the blog you want to set as your primary blog.

  • Proofreading: WordPress.com allows you to proofread your blog posts and page content. This section gives you several different options to choose from:

    • Clichés

    • Duplicate words

    • Double negatives

    • Jargon

    • Redundant phrases

    Click the link that says Learn more about these options to read about how the proofreader can help you publish better content on your blog.

  • Additional Post Content: WordPress.com will help you find related content (images, links, related articles and tags) to use in your posts to enhance your content.

  • Account Details: Type your e-mail address in the E-mail text box and the address to your Web site in the Website URL text box (this is the URL that your name will be linked to when you leave a comment on your blog. It also appears when you comment on another WordPress.com blog.

  • New Password: When you want to change the password for your blog, type your new password in the first text box. To confirm your new password choice, type it again in the second text field.

Directly below the two New Password text boxes is a little password helper. When you create a new password, use a combination of letters, numbers, and symbols to make it hard for anyone to guess what it is (for example, aty89!#4j). When you have created a password that WordPress thinks is a good one, it says the password is Strong.

Change your password frequently. Some people on the Internet make it their business to attempt to hijack blogs for their own malicious purposes. If you change your password monthly, you lower your risk by keeping the hackers guessing.

When you finish setting all the options on the Personal Settings page, don’t forget to click the Save Changes button to save your changes.

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