8: Users
How to add, update and remove users who have access to the site.
Last updated
How to add, update and remove users who have access to the site.
Last updated
At some point, you will probably want to add, update or remove users. That’s super simple. Just click Users from the Dashboard. You will be taken to a list of existing users, with the option to “Add New” ones at the top:
If you need to update an existing user, just click on their name. You’ll be taken to a new screen. In my experience, the things you are most likely to edit are the user role or the password (i.e. doing a sort of administrative password reset).
WordPress users are given a role that controls what they are or aren’t able to do and access in the site’s Dashboard. Here’s what I would say: Administrator is the top role and should be given out selectively – to management-level staff, e.g. Other, less senior staff are probably safe to set as Editors – they should be able to add or update content as needed, but not mess with wider site settings. And then, if you had, for example, a student intern, you might want something even more restrictive – Author or Contributor. If you want to learn more, Google “WordPress user roles” and look for a guide, something like this:
To do a password reset, scroll down to account management, click ‘Generate Password’ and either use the secure one that’s generated or set it to something more memorable:
There’s a tonne of other fields. I doubt many of them will be relevant or useful to you, but feel free to acquaint yourself with them.
When you are done making your updates, make sure to click Update User!
From the initial list of users, you can simply hover over the user and click Delete. If this user has created content for the site, you will then be asked if you want to reassign it to another user: make sure to reassign content to another user or else it could be deleted as well!
Click “Add New” at the top, fill out at least the required fields, set a password, assign the appropriate role, and click “Add New User”. This person should get an email about this, but it often ends up in spam, so you may have to manually bring their registration to their attention.
If they need to know how to log in after this or reset their password if you automatically generated one for them, direct them to the Logging In & Dashboard page:
