EN

Theme development・Setup: what to build and the tools

Stand up WordPress inside your computer with Local

After the Playground, which is fine to lose, comes your own environment that won't disappear. With the free app "Local," you can stand up a real WordPress inside your computer in a few clicks. It's building the workshop for theme development.

The Playground is a fantastic practice ground, but its weaknesses were that it disappears on reload and that it’s hard to touch the theme’s files directly. The learning ahead — “building your own theme” — needs an environment that doesn’t disappear and where you can reach the files. That’s where the free app Local comes in. It lets you stand up a real WordPress inside your computer in a few clicks.

What kind of app is Local?

To run WordPress without a server, you’d normally have to set up tools like PHP and a database yourself. Local takes care of all of that for you in one bundle. Press a button and one WordPress site launches; you can make as many as you like, and delete and rebuild them freely. It’s a standard tool used by WordPress creators around the world.

The official Local website. The heading “The #1 local WordPress development tool” and a free download button are shown
You can download it for free from the official site (Mac/Windows/Linux supported).

Official Local website

Installing and creating a site

  1. Get the installer from “DOWNLOAD FOR FREE” at localwp.com (you’ll be asked for your name and email)
  2. Open the downloaded file and install it following the guide
  3. Launch Local and press “Create a new site”
  4. Enter a site name (e.g. practice). Leave the environment settings on Preferred and you’re fine
  5. Decide and enter your own WordPress username and password — be sure to note these down. You’ll use them to log into the admin screen
  6. Wait for it to finish, and the site’s management card appears

The “WP Admin” button on the card opens the admin screen, and “Open site” opens the front side in your browser. It’s that familiar screen you walked through in the Playground.

The biggest difference from Playground: you can reach the files

A site made with Local exists entirely as folders on your own computer. Open it from “Go to site folder” on the site card, and you’ll find a structure like this.

practice/
└── app/
    └── public/          ← WordPress core
        ├── wp-admin/
        ├── wp-content/  ← themes, plugins, and images go here
        │   ├── themes/     ← the theme's address!
        │   ├── plugins/
        │   └── uploads/
        └── wp-includes/

The one to notice is wp-content/themes/. The true form of an installed theme (a bundle of files) is placed here. In the next lesson, we’ll make our own folder here — that’s the first step of theme development.

Summary of this lesson

  1. Local is the free, standard app for standing up WordPress inside your computer — it doesn’t disappear, and you can make as many as you like
  2. Creating a site is a few clicks. Note down the username and password you decide (you’ll use them to log into the admin screen)
  3. A Local site exists as real folders, and the true form of the theme is in wp-content/themes/ — the only place you touch is inside wp-content

Try it: stand up your own site with Local

Let’s stand up one WordPress on your computer that won’t disappear.

  1. Install Local from localwp.com
  2. With “Create a new site,” make a site named practice (be sure to note the username and password)
  3. Log into the admin screen from “WP Admin” and confirm the same screen as the Playground appears
  4. Open the folder with “Go to site folder,” dive down to app/public/wp-content/themes/, and take a look at the theme folders lined up there

This practice site becomes the stage for the development we’ll do until the end of the course. Even if you can’t install the app on your computer, you can still follow the course by reading, but theme development really sinks in only when you run it on your own machine, so we recommend preparing it if you can.

FAQ

Is Local free to use?
It's free. Everything we use this time (creating a site, logging into the admin screen, editing files) is covered by the free features.
Can I use it without administrator rights, such as on a company computer?
Installation often asks for administrator rights, so on a computer without those rights you may not be able to set it up. We recommend preparing it on your own computer.
Can I do the same thing with MAMP or Docker?
Yes. Both are ways to run WordPress on your computer, but they have many settings and aren't ideal for learning theme development. Because Local is done entirely with button clicks, it's well suited to your first one.