Cicero on the virtue of Handstands

Insofar as we know, Cicero ¹ never expressed an opinion about handstands. We’re using color to signal dummy copy within this post.

Now, having adjusted the “medium” size for an uploaded image at 250 pixels, we can insert an image, select “medium” size in upload image dialog box – and if we set the image flush left, say, the text will wrap around it. We found this image using Vladimir Prelovac’s Insights Plugin. And – because this is not actually a real hypothesis (that Cicero²   wrote extensively about handstands) – we won’t mention this fact in the body of the post, but, like scholars since the invention of the footnotes and endnote – bury the data in a post ³

We’re going  to write a post about handstands – and Cicero’s opinion of them in Lorem Ipsum. Those of you who read Latin will understand this is all just dummy copy.

Three excellent plugins work together in a very efficient way.

The Image Size Control Plugin by Hiroaki Miyashita permits customization of the standard WordPress image upload sizes – e.g. “thumbnail, medium and large.” So for instance at the moment we’re using the K2 theme with one column, and one sidebar; the column is just 500 pixels wide. We’ve set large at 500 px, and medium at 250 px.

We’ve used the Insights Plugin for every outside piece of information in the post, except for the idea that Cicero cared about handstands. Any well-educated person could tell you that as a Roman aristocrat, he  would have been more interested in upper-class sports – like Grand Prix racing, or polo.

NB: the current version of  the Insights plugin is not on/in  the WordPress Plugin Repository. So it can’t be installed by using the “search for plugins” function in the plugins menu. It can be downloaded from Vladimir Prelovac ((“Creative Solutions, Search Engine Optimization, Website Performance.” )) (main site) Insights plugin page; and download link for current version of Insights plugin.

This is what you can search for via the Insights plugin:

• Search your own blog for posts, edit them or insert links to them into the current post (without having to open another tab, search for a post, think about how you really should have a simpler categories and tags, taxonomy. Or is it just me?)
• Insert Flickr Images (using the Wikipedia search will also lead you to Wikimedia Commons public domain images on the same topic)
• Insert Youtube videos
• Search and link to Wikipedia
• Search Google
• Search News
• Google Blog Search
• Insert a Google Map

All of the above, of course, can either be part of the main body of a post – or can be reference citations, without slowing the flow of reading. Because we’re on the net, we often just put a link that leads outside of the blog post (or page).Using an endnote or footnote allows readers to see the citation at the bottom of the post – and even see a quote or comment, perhaps, without navigating away from your post, or out of your blog. And each note has a hyperlink back to the position in the post where the footnote  number is located.

Which are generated, with incredible ease, Using Simon Elvery’s most excellent  WP-Footnotes plugin. (hosted on  WP Plugin directory).  For more detailed explanations – see Simon’s page on his footnotes plugin;  also, Simon is one of the core group of people who came up with a unique technology which not only protects the skin, but can also make others perceive you as having good taste in art and clothes. That’s right – WithoutPockets.⁴

A brief recapitulation:

You come up with a great idea: Cicero’s musings about handstands; you need some authority for this proposition, so you use the Insights Plugin to find images, quotes, maps;

The images are wider than the column in your theme – so you modify them with Image Size Control Plugin – making, for example, “large” 100% of the column width, and “medium,” for images 50% of the column size (others, like Mr. Fibonacci and his followers might say it should be, for instance, 5/8 of the column width).

And  having decided you want some explanation of Fibonacci on your page, but not in the main text, you create a footnote, using Simon Elvery’s WP-Footnotes plugin, which you’ve already installed, only having to use two parenthetical markers at the beginning (( and end )) of the footnote. Remember – the first pair of parenthesis marks has to be preceded by a space.

These plugins are all big time-savers. Please remember that optimal image width may vary from theme to theme – so those settings may have to be changed if you change themes.

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1. The Cicero disambiguation page on Wikipedia is very good reading. I, for one, didn’t know that there are at least four owns in the United States named Cicero [↩]
2. Wikepedia entry: Cicero. [↩]
3. The Wikipedia entry on Handstand is curiously lacking in references to Cicero’s likelong obsession with handstands. [↩]
4. But where do they keep their crayons? [↩]