You’ve read it here before: there MUST be a plugin to do whatever one wants to do on a WordPress site. Wanting to incorporate the workshop signup process directly into our Websites and Coffee website, and provide an example for other WordPress users, we took our own advice. Rog and I searched for a WordPress plugin to enable folks to register for our workshops in a different way than the current one.

Well, I spent days testing plugins to handle event registration. There being only three pages of plugins to choose from should’ve been a hint that this might be quite a complicated process for a programmer to develop and perhaps for moi to make sense of… Still, I forged ahead.

Well, we’ve now got the plugin up and running in time for our October schedule of website, e-newsletter, and marketing clarity workshops. If you register for one of our workshops, you’ll get the opportunity to see it in action. We greatly welcome your comments.

Here’s what I gleaned from this exercise… First, I have even greater respect for WordPress developers and their courage, who dare to create an applet that enhances the functionality – and yet manages to not trash the site! 60,000+ downloads is impressive (and the reviews helpful). The importance of testing was underscored in this case because payments are involved. Being a process and documentation writer myself, this developer provides instructions both onsite and in a PDF file, and is reachable, offering support through a forum. The aforementioned to me indicated his commitment and longevity and were important in evaluating the plugin.

There’s always room for improvement, but hopefully, we have found a good solution for our purpose. And, hence, will gladly make a donation to support this developer’s work – his efforts are most noble.