In the previous article I was talking about; WordPress vs. Blogger – PROs & CONs for Choosing the Right Platform; it's a full comparison that helps you decide blogger or WordPress. But I found that new users know how to purchase domain name
but some of them don't know about adding blogger custom domain name to
Godaddy account to build own blogging URL addressing to Blogspot. I got
the question; 'How do I connect my domain to the blogger in GoDaddy?'
Let's see how to setup BlogSpot custom domain name to GoDaddy quickly.
Setting up BlogSpot Custom Domain To GoDaddy —
People used to search; how do I create a blog on Godaddy? How do I use
my domain name on Blogger? Is Blogger free? What is the custom domain?
How much does it cost to start a blog? How do I link my Godaddy domain
to BlogSpot? How do I setup BlogSpot custom domain? How to buy a url
and link to BlogSpot? How to add a custom domain to blogger? What is
blogger DNS settings? How to add blogger nameservers to Godaddy? Quick
set up blogger nameservers GoDaddy? get a free domain for blogger, how
to change blogger custom domain? how to park domain to Blogspot? Ans so
on...
You must know that the custom domain name helps in better blog branding.
When you open a blogger account and specify a blog name, it gives you
link to a free domain name that looks like 'yourname.blogspot.com'
whereas setting up a domain is nothing but 'yourname.com' shows better branding; e.g. problogbooster.com. The registering a domain name
and linking it to BlogSpot is just like a display URL for your BlogSpot
blog that allows you to create a valuable and simple to remember URL.
The custom domain setup in BlogSpot.com is applied to create your own blog URL.
The web address (URL) is your online identity by which all your
followers get connected to & it looks much more professional and
indicate that you take your blog seriously. So it is highly recommended
to get a custom domain name instead of free domain name. Even if you are blogging free on BlogSpot platform, the first step you require to purchase custom domain name and link it to your BlogSpot site to start your own blog; like shifting from 'yourname.blogspot.com' to 'yourname.com.'
Setup Custom Domain on Blogger with Godaddy
Blogger allows you to quickly integrate & connect with any domain name registrar services like GoDaddy. When you buy a domain from Godaddy.com,
they allocate an IP address for the domain you purchased in Godaddy
account. Hereafter, you require making the changes in these records to
point to your blogspot.com blog.
You just need to make your Godaddy Domain name pointing to Google servers assigned by Blogspot. This quick tutorial will help you step by step to get your own domain name
with the screenshots & guidance to make it simpler for you. This
DIY guide will assist you to change the A & CNAME records of Godaddy
account to add a BlogSpot custom domain to your blogger blog.
GoDaddy is one of the largest domain registrar company, and it’s reliable organization to purchase a domain. These custom domain names make easier for others to identify and remember your link and furthermore, you can set up your own custom email name
addresses with the domain name you assigned and purchased. But now in
this tutorial, I will be helping you step-by-step with screenshots on
how to set up a custom domain name with the custom domain purchased from
GoDaddy.
Follow the steps to setup blogger custom domain name on GoDaddy:
1. Add the purchased domain name to BlogSpot Blog.
First, you need to add the custom domain name into Blogspot account.
Login into your Blogspot account >> go to your blog >> settings >> click on "Basic" >> Look for "Publishing" section >>
Now click on 'Edit' >> and type 'www.yourdomainname.com' (don't forget to add 'www')
Once you added; you will get an error in red saying "We have not been able to verify your authority to this domain. Error 12." And following this error; you will get CNAME records from blogger for Google server to use in GoDaddy.
Note:Make a screenshot of that window and also copy all the
message into a notepad file and save it in a secure place. It may
require in future use in case you want to switch Blogger to WordPress or
want to use Cloudflare.
Now you need use these records and add them into Godaddy. Proceed to step 2.
You have CNAME records derived from blogger dashboard. You need
to add those records to Goddady domain control panel. The codes derived
by Blogger will be unique for you, so don’t type any or alter just copy & paste these codes.
Login into your Godaddy account >> click on 'Domains' >> click 'All domains' >> choose your desired domain >> click on 'Manage' >>
At the bottom side of the page >> you will see the option for managing the DNS >> Click on "Manage DNS"
Then the "Records" table will be poped out on next page (Shown
below). If there is already 'www' name is available then you need to
edit it or if not, then you need to add a new record.
Click on "ADD" >> In "Type" choose "CNAME" >> in "Host" type "www" >> and in "Points to" field type "ghs.google.com" as shown below;
Similarly; you need to add another CNAME provided by blogger account;
Click on "ADD" >> In "Type" choose "CNAME" >> in "Host" type Second CNAME record >> and in "Points to" field type the
respective address. As shown below;
Now its time to update the A zone records; i.e. IP addresses provided by the BlogSpot server. The process is same as that of shown in above steps; let's do it.
Here you need to add 4 IP addresses which are common for all the blogger users at the same record table shown above.
Click on "ADD" >> In "Type" choose "A" >> in "Host" type "@" >> and in "Points to" field type "216.239.32.21" As shown below;
Again as same as above, including all add following 4 address;
This is how you can set the domain IP addresses that now pointing to
your Blogger server addresses. The final CNAME & A record table will
be like this;
Are
you looking for the highest DA blog submission sites to get some
quality links in 2019, you’re in the right place. Every blogger wants
more traffic, more links and more sales. But majority of the people
don’t put the right efforts to improve their SEO.
See,
SEO is what helps you get faster results. Not only a better SEO can
boost your traffic but more importantly your overall website’s sales.
If you are blogging for a while, you might already know the fact that, Off Page SEO
is all about quality links. The reason why authority sites rank higher
in Google even for the toughest keywords is they get a lot of links from
other sites.
And Google gives rewarding results to those sites with lots of quality links. If you are looking for proven ways to quickly build high quality links for your blogs and increase your content exposure, I’ve a good news for you.
In
this article, I’m going to discuss about few top blog submission sites
that help you build both quality links and increase your blog’s exposure
in 2019.
Blog
directories or blog submission sites allow you to submit your blog
and/or blog posts so you gain more exposure and build some backlinks to
your sites.
Although there are so many blog submission sites out
there but most of them are not active or don’t have good domain
authority. So it’s always better NOT to submit your blog on every blog
directory under the sun if you don’t want to get penalized by Google.
That’s
why I came up with this top 28 blog submission sites list with the good
domain authority of over 30. So you can safely submit your blogs on
them to build some quality links for free.
Do blog directories (or) blog submission sites still matter?
Yes,
they do. Blog submission sites are still a better way to increase your
blog’s exposure. And as I said above if you submit your blog or website
on good domain authority blog directories, it can help you boost your
link authority.
Why Should You Submit Your Blog to Blog Submission Sites?
If
you are still wondering why should you spend time on submitting your
blogs on the top blog submission sites I’m going to discuss here, let me
give you few reasons. Here are few amazing benefits of using blog
submission sites even in 2019.
Backlinks: Whether you know it or not, SEO is the key to building any profitable blog
or online business. SEO is all about building quality links. You REALLY
can’t rank higher in Google search results without building links. Blog
submission sites help you build quality links for free.
Increase exposure:
When you submit a blog on these top blog directories, it can give you
more exposure and traffic. There are thousands of bloggers who use blog
directories to find content online. So if you have an interested blog to
read, it will bring you more traffic from these blog submission sites.
Increase DA: Domain authority
is a metric given by Moz team. It is one of the crucial metric and the
more DA a blog has the better search rankings it can get. Blog
directories give you quality links and in turn you will get a good DA
with quality backlinks.
Quick note before discovering the top 28 blog submission sites: I’ve
used DA (Domain Authority) as the metric to write this article. And I
included only those blog directories which have DA of over 30 so you can
get some good links. Also make a note that, most of the blog
directories mentioned here are few and very few of the blog directories
here are paid one’s, it means they charge you a couple of bucks to
submit your blog.
Now, let’s dive into the details.
Top blog submission sites to submit your blog and get more exposure in 2019
1. Alltop (DA is 70)
Guy Kawasaki
(the social media expert and one of the finest Internet marketers)
started Alltop. Alltop is one of the best blog submission sites which
can help you bring more exposure to your sites along with the quality
links.
Alltop covers every niche ranging from technology to
marketing to fitness to real estate. It doesn’t matter which niche you
are in, you can easily find a relevant topic to submit your blog for
free.
All top imports the stories and articles of the top news
websites and blogs for any given topic and display the headlines of the
five most recent stories. That’s how you can bring more traffic to your
sites. So make sure to always use attention grabbing headlines when you
write next time. How to submit your blog to Alltop? Step 1:Click here to submit your site. It will ask you to register yourself with any username and your email. Step 2: Alltop support team will review your submission and sends you a confirmation email once your site goes live. Step 3 (optional): You can add Alltop badge once your blog goes live to boast about it!
2. Blog Flux (DA is 44)
Blog
Flux is the central destination for most blogs. It’s where over 150,000
blogs are featured ranging from health to music to travel.
Here’s how to join it to submit your blog. Step 1: Click here to register an account for free. Step 2: Once you get the confirmation email, simply add your blog or website from their home page. You are done!
3. Blogarama (DA is 45)
Blogarama
is the oldest and largest blog submission sites on the web. It was
started over a decade ago and has over 100,000 registered users. Here’s how to join it to submit your blog for free. Step 1: Click here to register yourself with your email. Step 2: Add your new blog for free to their blog directory. That’s it!
4. On Top List (DA is 58)
On
Top List is another great blog directory where you can find a lot of
tech related stuff, business pages and blogging related sites from all
over the globe. Step 1:Click here to join their community. Their support team will manually review your site. Step 2: For faster reviewing process, add their site’s badge to your blog and email their customer support team about it.
5. Blog Adda (DA is 50)
This
is the latest and widely used Indian blog directory. It not only has a
great network of bloggers to connect but the editors pick best blog
posts every single day to help you get more exposure.
Here’s how to join it for free. Step 1: Click here to join their community. Step 2: Add your blog and enjoy the blog’s exposure.
6. Blog Hub (DA is 43)
This
is an online community for all kinds of bloggers to submit your blog
for free. You can also create a blog with their service! Step 1: Click here to sign up for their account for free. Step 2: Once you activate the link that you get in your email inbox, you can add your site for free.
7. Blogs Collection (DA is 41)
Blogs
Collection is a huge blog directory which collects all major blogs news
articles from all over the globe and it is another oldest blog
submission site which was started over 9 years ago. Step 1:Click here to add your blog. Step 2: Select their “Partner and Regular” listing option to submit your blog for free.
8. Blog Listing (DA is 48)
This
is another fastest growing blog submission site on the web where you
can submit your blog for free to get more exposure. It’s also a HIGH PR
(Page Rank) directory site with the domain authority of 59. Step 1: Click here to add your blog. Step 2: Once your blog goes live, start connecting with the other bloggers to increase your site exposure.
9. Blog Engage (DA is 37)
Blog
Engage is another great blog directory that has a huge blogging
community. The great thing about this site is that you will see lots of
bloggers and marketers promoting their blog posts.
Even you too can do so by joining it for free. How to submit your blog to Blog Engage? Step 1: You can register from here. Step 2:
To do manual submission of your blog posts, you should either add a
banner of their site or write a review about them. Once it’s done, you
can contact their support team to get free access to their site.
10. Indiblogger.in (DA is 50)
As
the name says, IndiBlogger is the largest Indian blogger community. If
you are an Indian and want to submit your blog for free, this is perfect
for you. You can also find thousands of Indian bloggers from various blogging topics to engage and connect. How to join Indiblogger? Step 1:Click here to sign up for their account for free. Step 2: Enter your blog title and other information to submit your blog on Indiblogger Step 3: Whenever you publish a new post, make sure to manually submit it to their forum to get more exposure.
11. Blogging Fusion (DA is 32)
Although
this is a paid blogging directory but you can still get their free
account by adding a link to their blog directory. It’s used by a wide
range of people so it’s a good place to submit your site. Step 1:Click here to submit your blog. Step 2:
Either write about them or include a link to their blog directory and
contact their support team about and you will get the free account.
That’s it!
12. Blog Ville (DA is 30)
Blogville
is a fast growing blog directory to submit your blog no matter what
your niche is. They will manually review your blog before approving it
to their blog directory.
Here’s how to add your blog to it. Step 1:Click here to register yourself for free. Step 2: You will get a confirmation email after you register, your blog will be manually review. You’ll get an email once it goes live.
13. Blog Directory (DA is 31)
It’s
another great blog directory where you can freely submit your blog for
getting links and increasing your content exposure. It periodically
shows various blogs under various topics ranging from Academics to
Computers to Real Estate.
Here’s how to submit your blog to it. Step 1: Click here to register an account. Step 2: Pick a category that’s relevant to your blog’s topic and you are done!
14. Fuel My Blog (DA is 36)
You can submit your blog or website for free on Fuel My Blog. You can also add your blog and an image, you can find a lot of interesting blogs to read as well. Here’s how to add your blog. Step 1:Click here to register for free. Step 2: Click on Add your blog (you will get a code, add it on your blog, and you are done). Step 3: You can add friends as many as you want to connect and find and read interesting blogs.
15. BlogDirectory.co (DA is 20)
Another
great source for adding your blog or website for free. This blog
directory pulls your RSS feed and shows your information whenever you
update your blog with new blog posts. Step 1:Click here to join for free. Step 2: Enjoy the exposure you get whenever you publish a new post!
16. Boing Boing (DA 88)
Boing
Boing is one of the highest domain authority blog submission sites. It
has a DA of 92. That’s too great to ignore submitting your site to it.
How to submit your blog to one of the top blog submission sites i.e Boing Boing?
Step 1: Go to Boing Boing and you will notice a thing called “Submit” at the top of the website. Just adjacent to their home page logo.
Step
2: You will be redirected to a page where you need to enter all your
details like name, email, your website’s link and description. Just make
sure to enter relevant and detailed description about your site’s
topics and click “Boing” to finish the step. That’s it! That’s how you
will be able to submit to one of the highest DA blog submission sites.
17. Entire Web (DA 52)
This
is one of the widely used blog submission sites with over 3.5 million
people worldwide have used the Entire Web service to submit their sites
for free. Once you submit your site on it, your site will start showing
on all the major search engines including Google, Yahoo and a ton of
other platforms.
So how to submit your site for free at Entire Web?
Step 1: Click on this link and you will need to enter details like your site’s URL along with your primary email address.
Step 2: Click on proceed to submit your site FREE to this blog submission sites.
18. Sonic Run (DA 36)
Sonic Run is also one of the best blog submission sites with a good domain authority to get a free link to your sites.
Here’s how to submit to this blog submission sites
Step 1: Click here to list your site for free. Enter your URL, email and name to finish the submission process.
Step 2: It will usually take upto 90 days to get your site listed on this free blog submission site.
19. So Much (DA 37)
So
Much is not just one of those random blog submission sites. Not only it
has a very good DA but it is a friendly free link directory where you
can find the best human edited links sorted by topic and category.
So how to submit on this submission site?
Step 1: Click here to submit a link
of your site for free. Just enter your site URL along with its relevant
category (along with a short description of your site). You’re done.
Step
2: The free version (submission of site) usually takes anywhere from a
few hours to a couple of weeks before your site is listed depending on
number of submissions yet to be checked. They also have a paid version
that costs around $10 where your site will get approved within a day!
20. Blog Top Sites (DA is 41)
This
is one of the highest DA blog submission sites with a whopping 82 DA
and it has been around the web for a long time since 2004.
Here’s the exact way to submit your site for free on this platform Step 1: Click here to submit and add your blog. Step 2: You’ll
just need to enter your details name, email, password and so on and you
login to your account, you can easily add your blog to their site.
21. Blog Roll Center (DA is 38)
Blog
Roll Center is also another excellent platform for blog submission
which has a healthy DA score of 77. Not only that, it includes blogs
ranging from arts and beauty to fitness and travel and so on so you can
submit your blog in the right categories.
How to submit your site for free on Blog Roll Center? Step 1: Click on this link add your site where you need to enter your website’s URL Step 2: In
this step, you need to create a username along with the password to
continue. It will automatically fetch your site details along with the
title and meta description so you don’t have enter it again. Choose an
appropriate category and click on submit button and you’re done.
22. Bloggernity (DA is 40)
Bloggernity
is one of the most preferred blog directories because it’s not only a
high DA submission site but also has a dedicated forum where you can
interact with other bloggers.
Here’s how you can submit your blog for free on Bloggernity. Step 1: Click on this link to visit Bloggernity login page where you’ll need to sign up using your email address which is free. Step 2: Once
you’re signed up with your email, you can use your email login details
to login and click on “Add Blog” option to add your blog to their
directory.
23. Plazoo (DA is 42)
If
you want to add your blog feed or RSS feed, you should definitely start
using Plazoo blog posting site list which has a great domain authority
of 69 and also supports multiple languages worldwide.
Here’s how you can submit your blog for free on Plazoo which has 69 DA. Step 1: Visit this link to add your website or blog’s RSS feed Step 2: Enter
your blog details to proceed and you’re done. The benefit of using
Plazoo is that it gives you access to the Plazoo Reader which is more
than a standard RSS reader where you can easily add and manage RSS
feeds. It also gives access to all kinds of other media including news,
job offerings, movies, pictures, audio files and so on.
24. Top Sites Web Directory (DA is 31)
This
directory is listed on every major web directory resource on the web
and that’s the reason why it gets so much of traffic. So if you’re not
only looking for blog submission sites in USA for just links but also to
get more traffic, this is a great fit for you.
Here’s how you can submit your blog for free on Top Sites Web Directory with DA of 56. Step 1: Visit this website link to submit your site where you’ll need to enter your website details to proceed. Step 2: If
you want to get your site listed really fast, you can try their paid
inclusion where you can get your site reviewed in only 48 hours for a
one time flat fee of 10.00 Euros or you can also give them a reciprocal
link for faster review.
25. 1Abc Directory (DA is 32)
1Abc
Directory is one of the oldest blog directories in the world which has
been available on the web for more than 12 years now with a DA of 55.
Here’s how you can add a link to your blog for free on 1Abc Directory. Step 1: Click on this link to visit their submit link page where you’ll find several submission options. Step 2: Pick the free submission option and enter your blog details including title, description, URL and so on
26. Pegasus Web Directory (DA is 33)
One
of the best reasons to use Pegasus Directory is because it’s not only a
free general web directory where you can submit your blog links for
free but it’s completely human edited which means, you rarely see spam
links or spammy websites.
Here’s how you can submit your blog for free on Pegasus directory. Step 1: Visit their home page and pick a category where your blog niche belongs to. Step 2: You’ll
find a submit page where you can submit your blog. You’ll usually find 3
options (2 premium options). Simply pick the free option to
proceed.You’ll need to add your site details such as title, meta,
keywords and so on.
27. Gain Web (DA is 29)
Gain
Web is another incredible human edited blog submission list where you
can find mostly high quality websites around the blogosphere.
Here’s how you can submit your blog for free on Gain Web. Step 1: Here’s how you can submit your website on their platform where you’ll find multiple options including premium pricing plans. Step 2: Pick the “Regular Link” which says free and enter your site details and you’re done.
28. Cipinet Web Directory (DA is 35)
Cipinet is one of the oldest blog submission sites which has been around the web since 2002, yes you heard it right.
This
is a freemium web directory submission site which means it offers you
both free and paid listings to add links to your site where you can add
top level domains, individual pages along with sub-domains are accepted
and they will review your site within 24 hours even with the basic
subscription plan (which costs you just $35 which is a one-time fee).
With
the free plan, your site approval might take some time for the review
and here’s how you can submit your blog for free on Cipinet Web
Directory which has DA of 54 Step 1: Visit this link to proceed to their home page and you’ll find a ton of categories. Choose one among them where your site category belongs to. Step 2: Click on Add Site (OR) Add URL button to submit your site for free.
Are there any disadvantages of using blog submission websites?
There’s only one BIG disadvantage of using blog submission directory sites and that is “spamming”.
Spammy
blog submission directories (that accept almost all kinds of sites
along with adult content, illegal content, gambling and so on) can get
your site penalized in Google search results sooner or later. So we
highly recommend you to stay away from such sites.
All the blog posting sites list mentioned here are manually verified by us so they are safe to use.
FAQs About Top DA Free Blog Submission Sites for 2019
Here
are some of the most important questions about top DA blog submission
list you might want to know to know how they work and how you can get
benefits from them in 2019 and beyond. #1. What are the best free blog posting sites for SEO in 2019?
If
you’ve gone through the above list of blog submission sites, almost all
of them are safe to use. Although few among them are paid blog
directories where you’ll have to pay few bucks to be able to add your
site.
That said, here are few best free blog post sites that are really good for SEO in 2019 and beyond.
Alltop
Blog Engage
Boing Boing
Plazoo
Indiblogger
Blog Adda
The
above blog directories have strict rules and thousands of regular users
and they often do moderation to remove spam links from their sites so
they are considered as safe blog posting sites for SEO. #2. What is blog submission in SEO and how to do blog submission for free?
Blog
submission involves in submitting your blog links or blog post links in
order to get links, more exposure to your content and other SEO
benefits. Blog submission is definitely a good SEO practice for anyone
who wants to increase their search engine traffic to their sites.
Blog
submission is pretty simple. All you need to do is to visit the sites
(blog submission directory sites) where you want to add links, and click
on “Add URL or Submit Blog URL” buttons in order to submit your blogs
for free. Some of the sites do instant approval while others review your
site personally before adding to their directories. #3. Are blog submission site list good or bad for SEO?
This
is the most obvious and common question that most people have: are blog
submission directory sites good or bad for SEO? Honestly speaking, they
are as good as getting links from guest posting sites.
You can
get better SEO results by getting links from those blog directory sites
where they do manual review and approval of sites to keep their
platforms safe from spammy links. Fortunately now you have access to a
list of some of the high DA sites that are all safe to use for SEO.
So
yes, as long as you submit your blog links on high authority or high DA
sites, you’re safe from all Google algorithm updates. But as a
recommendation, limit your submission to 10 to 15 sites instead of
adding your blog links on almost every directory under the sun because
you never know when they’ll fade out or filled up with spammy website
links. #4. Is it okay to add my blog on the blog submission directory sites that ask for a reciprocal link?
There
are a few blog submission sites in India that ask you for reciprocal
links which means, you’ll need to add a link back to their platform
where you’re getting links from. You can either add their links in the
footer or usually as a form of widget (along with the link to their
site).
Although there’s no harm in adding reciprocal links
especially when your site is relatively new but you can avoid them as
well if you don’t want to pass any links to external sites. We recommend
you to go through all the blog directories mentioned on this page and
add links to only those sites where there’s a free submission without
having to add any link to their site. #5. What do most blog submission directories offer me apart from giving me a link?
That’s
a good question as most of the blog submission directories not only
allow you to add your blog links for free but they also allow you to add
their badge as a widget for displaying on your site. That means, you
can add your blog with your links and also vote for other blogs that you
like to read and follow.
Apart from that, you can also use blog
directories to find interesting blogs to read by going through their
catalogue, display your blog’s feed on the front page and the list goes
on. Quick note: All the above blog submission
sites have at least 40+ domain authority. DA (Domain Authority) is
usually measured by the quality and number of links that are pointing to
your site. It is calculated monthly by Moz team which is usually
considered as a great domain metric at SEO level. So this top blog
submission sites post is a great treat for anyone who wants to get high
quality links from top DA sites.
Blog submission sites: Are they really worth it?
So
far you’ve discovered some of the top DA blog submission sites. Some of
them are paid sites but most of them are free to submit. Now comes the
most important question, are blog submission sites worth your time or
money?
Yes, undoubtedly the blog submission sites are worth your time. Here are few quick reasons why I’m saying it.
Free:
Most of the top blog submission sites that you find on this page are
FREE. So there’s nothing you’re going to lose by submitting your sites.
High DA: Each and every blog submission sites that you find here have a DA of more than 30 which can be really helpful to improve your SEO.
Quick crawling:
These top blog submission sites help you crawl your websites really
fast whenever your site gets updated so they are helpful in boosting
your SEO quickly.
Final thoughts about best free & paid blog submission sites in 2019
As
I said in the article, blog submission sites with good domain authority
(DA) can help you boost your search results by giving you some good
link juice. Not only that, you can increase your blog’s exposure
whenever you publish a new content.
So there you go. Those are the
top 28 blog submission sites with 30+ DA in 2019. I hope you submit
your blogs on those blog directories to increase your SEO. I’ll be keep
updating this page in 2019 with new information so make sure to bookmark
it for future reference.
What do you think about blog submission
sites? Did I miss anything? Please let me know your thoughts in the
comments and don’t forget to share the post.
WordPress is, by far, the most popular content management system (CMS) in use today. 60% of the CMS market is owned by WordPress, and further, almost 30% of all websites are run on WordPress. This means A LOT of content in A LOT of websites that is craving to be used in new ways, on new devices. In some cases it makes perfect sense to leverage said content in a native mobile app. Enter NativeScript.
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Out of the box, WordPress includes RESTful API endpoints for WordPress data types, providing web developers (and mobile, and desktop) the ability to interact with stored content in new and exciting ways. And of course, the provided endpoints are language-agnostic. Any framework that can consume JSON will happily digest what WordPress provides. Given that NativeScript apps are built on JavaScript, consuming such an API with a simple fetch call is standard fare.
Let's Build an App
I imagine if you are here, you have an existing WordPress site with weeks, months, or even years worth of content. The potential to re-purpose said content within a native, cross-platform, mobile app is intriguing to say the least.
I think there is no better way to learn something than to do it yourself. So let's build an app!
Let's put together a simple NativeScript app to leverage WordPress content categories, posts, and post content, running on both iOS and Android, all from the same shared codebase.
While a deep dive of the WordPress API is out of the scope of this article, suffice it to say the API is well documented.
NativeScript Sidekick
Trust me when I say every good NativeScript app starts with a starter kit provided by NativeScript Sidekick.
Sidekick is a free tool for Mac, Windows, and Linux that runs on top of the NativeScript CLI to provide you with templates, plugin management, cloud builds, and app store publishing.
...and its corresponding home-page.js file needs a little plumbing to wire up the button to send us to the next view, category-page:
var frameModule = require('ui/frame');
exports.showCategories = function() {
var navigationEntry = {
moduleName: './category/category-page',
animated: true
};
var topmost = frameModule.topmost();
topmost.navigate(navigationEntry);
};
Now it gets interesting. Open up /category/category-page.xml and replace the existing code with the following NativeScript ListView (including an item template) like so:
<Pagexmlns="http://schemas.nativescript.org/tns.xsd"class="page bg"loaded="pageLoaded"><Page.actionBar><ActionBartitle="WordPress Categories"icon=""class="action-bar"><NavigationButtontext="Back"android.systemIcon="ic_menu_back" /></ActionBar></Page.actionBar><ListViewid="listview"items="{{ items }}"class="list-group"><ListView.itemTemplate><StackLayoutclass="list-group-item"id="{{ id }}"tap="showPost"><Labeltext="{{ name }}"class="wp-category" /><Labeltext="{{ description }}"textWrap="true"class="wp-subtitle" /></StackLayout></ListView.itemTemplate></ListView></Page>
This view's accompanying JavaScript file, category-page.js, contains two functions. pageLoaded is, not surprisingly, executed when the page is loaded, and showPost will navigate us to the next view (post-page), retaining the context of the category the user tapped:
var frameModule = require('ui/frame');
var Observable = require('data/observable').Observable;
var ObservableArray = require('data/observable-array').ObservableArray;
var page;
var items = new ObservableArray([]);
var pageData = new Observable();
exports.pageLoaded = function(args) {
page = args.object;
page.bindingContext = pageData;
fetch('https://demo.wp-api.org/wp-json/wp/v2/categories')
.then(response => {
return response.json();
})
.then(function(r) {
pageData.set('items', r);
});
};
exports.showPost = function(args) {
var navigationEntry = {
moduleName: './post/post-page',
animated: true,
context: { id: args.view.id }
};
var topmost = frameModule.topmost();
topmost.navigate(navigationEntry);
};
Leaving us with a pleasing little screen containing our WordPress post categories:
The key code in category-page.js is the fetch API. fetch allows us to request data from a remote endpoint and return it in JSON, making it easily consumable in our app!
You'll also quickly notice the API endpoint we are using is leveraging the WordPress demo dataset. With a lot of lorem ipsum.
If we take a look at the returned JSON, we see a pretty legible dataset:
"id":2,
"count":3,
"description":"Neque quibusdam nihil sequi quia et inventore",
"link":"https:\/\/demo.wp-api.org\/category\/aut-architecto-nihil\/",
"name":"Aut architecto nihil",
"slug":"aut-architecto-nihil",
"taxonomy":"category",
"parent":0,
...
Ok, let's finish up and replace post/post-page.xml with another ListView:
...again, with our post-page.js code behind powering the view - and containing another two functions: pageNavigatedTo and loadWebSite which, respectively, perform a fetch request to load our posts and fire up a NativeScript WebView to show the post content's HTML output in an in-app web browser.
var frameModule = require('ui/frame');
var pageModule = require('ui/page');
var webViewModule = require('ui/web-view');
var Observable = require('data/observable').Observable;
var ObservableArray = require('data/observable-array').ObservableArray;
var page;
var items = new ObservableArray([]);
var pageData = new Observable();
exports.pageNavigatedTo = function(args) {
page = args.object;
page.bindingContext = pageData;
var id = page.navigationContext.id;
fetch('https://demo.wp-api.org/wp-json/wp/v2/posts?categories=' + id)
.then(response => {
return response.json();
})
.then(function(r) {
pageData.set('items', r);
});
};
exports.loadWebSite = function(args) {
var link = args.view.link;
var factoryFunc = function() {
var webView = new webViewModule.WebView();
webView.src = link;
var page = new pageModule.Page();
page.content = webView;
return page;
};
var topmost = frameModule.topmost();
topmost.navigate(factoryFunc);
};
While I'm glossing over some of the details to save space, a reminder that all of this code is available here on Github.
And we are done! Well, if you run the app as-is, it might not look exactly like these screenshots. That is until you grab the completed app.css, the /images/bg.png background image, and font files from /fontsfrom Github and add those to your app.
Deploy Your App
Back in NativeScript Sidekick, go to the Run menu and choose Run on Device. Choose the connected device on which you want to run your app, and build the app using our cloud servers (or build locally if you have the appropriate SDKs set up).
Sharing website content between web and mobile platforms is one thing. What about sharing the actual website code with mobile? While not related to WordPress, if you're an Angular developer and interested in the NativeScript + Angular web/mobile code sharing story, be sure to check out our code sharing webinar on YouTube.
Summary
Today we looked at how we can consume existing WordPress content with the WordPress REST API to power a truly native, cross-platform app with NativeScript. By using a little JavaScript and CSS, you can re-purpose years worth of content and provide a new, engaging, user experience for your users. Happy NativeScripting! 😁
Note: Make a screenshot of that window and also copy all the
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