This video we’ll look at the “Settings” menu in the “Dashboard”.  For adjusting the settings to things like posts or your site’s appearance refer to the corresponding videos.

In the “General” tab you’ll find options to define your site as a whole, like your “Title” and “Tagline”, the URL you want your site to point to, Time and Date format options, as well as install new language packs to use as your site’s default language.

The “Writing Settings” lets you control how post content is displayed on your site, control the formatting of emoticons, and whether or not you want WordPress to correct any invalid XHTML code.  Set your default post category and format, and setup the optional post-via-email which allows users to make posts without signing in.

In the “Reading Settings” you can choose whether the front page shows your latest posts, which can also be controlled by your theme, or if you want to set a static homepage that doesn’t change.  Choose how many posts you want your pages and feed to display; and check whether or not you want your site discoverable by search engines like Google or Yahoo.

The “Discussion Settings” control how your blog handles comments, allow pingback and trackback notifications, and notify other blogs when you link to them.  Set basic comment settings like requiring user information and how long comment threads stay open, choose how you want to be notified about new comments, create a blacklist of words you don’t want used on your blog, and allow users to have avatars with image ratings.

“Media Settings” determine the maximum dimensions used when uploading images and how they are organized.

Lastly the “Permalink Settings” control how your URL structure is defined.  By default WordPress uses question marks and numbers, but by using your own custom structure you can improve the usability, aesthetics, and forward compatibility of your site.