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This tutorial shows you how to use PageSnip to build your own fully searchable knowledge base about WordPress.

With just a few clicks you can gather WordPress tutorials, tips and tricks from the Internet and file them in PageSnip.  You can do this without saving any banners, navigation menus, advertisements or meaningless blog comments.  Then you can use the PageSnip Manager to easily find, view, print or create a PDF of these snips whenever you need them.

The WordPress online documentation is a great source of information.  Unfortunately there is so much of it and it covers so many linked topics that it is easy to be overwhelmed by it. 

This example shows you how to snip a tutorial from the WordPress codex, file it in PageSnip and retrieve it in a number of different ways.

The web page used in this example is the WordPress tutorial on Writing Posts.   You can see the page below.

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Note:There are a lot of items on this web page that you do NOT need in your knowledge base.  The top banner, left side navigation and the content links are of no real tutorial value, so you are going to use PageSnip to snip the tutorial without them.  If you make a mistake, just press F5 or click the refresh button in your browser and start over.

Examining the page with the Edge Finder

A powerful feature of PageSnip is the “Edge Finder”. 

The Edge Finder adds a heavy dashed border around all of the TABLE and DIV elements on the page.  This causes the page to seem to “explode” (don’t worry - your not hurting the website - this is just in your browser!).  As a result you can see how the content on the page is grouped together.  You can also use the Edge Finder view to remove items from the page and make your snip selection.

To activate the Edge Finder, right-click on the web page and select it from the PageSnip context menu in your browser.

After the Edge Finder is activated your web page looks like the screen below.

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The DIV elements have a blue dashed border around them and TABLE elements have a red dashed border around them.

After the Edge Finder is turned on, if you use your mouse to scroll down the web page you will see that the entire body of the tutorial is contained inside a single DIV.  The title of the article is outside of the DIV, but don’t worry about capturing it.  PageSnip allows you to edit the content you snip and to add your own title when you file the snip.

Removing unwanted page elements

At the top of the DIV containing the tutorial, there is a links TABLE.  Since this is not needed, you will use PageSnip to remove it.

To remove the unwanted TABLE, first position the pointer of your mouse in the white space between the dashes of the red line as shown here.

(the mouse pointer can actually be anywhere on the width of the red border, but using the white space between the dashes makes it easy to select the border you want when there are nested elements)

After your mouse pointer is in position (and without moving it) right-click and select the “Remove Item or Selection” option.

If your mouse was in the right position, the TABLE will disappear and the content will flow in to fill the space that the TABLE occupied. Then the page will look like this.

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At the bottom of the article there is a DIV that identifies the category of the article.  You could use the same technique to remove it from the page if you wanted to. 

Snipping the article from the page as HTML

PageSnip allows you to select what you want to snip in a number of different ways, but the fastest and easiest way to select the entire tutorial on this page is to use the Edge Finder.

To snip the entire tutorial from the page, position your mouse pointer in the white space between the blue dashes of the DIV that surrounds it, as shown here.

(the mouse pointer can actually be anywhere on the width of the blue border, but using the white space between the dashes makes it easy to select the border you want when there are nested elements)

After your mouse pointer is in position (and without moving it) right-click and select the “Add Selection” option.

After PageSnip gathers the snipped content, a green border appears around whatever was snipped so you know what content has been snipped.  You can see how it looks in the screen shot below.

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Viewing your snipped content 

When the content of the snip has been downloaded, the PageSnip Assistant will open and display the snip as shown here.

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Your snip only contains the article content that you wanted.  The banner, navigation and links table are not included!

Filing the snip so you can use it later

Note: The Standard Edition of PageSnip does not have the ability to “file” snips (which is fine if you are a “snip it and use it” type of person).  That functionality is only available in the Professional Edition.

To file your snip click the “FILE” button on the PageSnip Assistant toolbar and the screen below will open.

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As you see from the screen details, PageSnip automatically provided information about where and when the snip was gathered.  A default “Title” for your filed snip is also generated.  While not very descriptive, it allows you to quickly file a snip without providing one of your own if a title is not important to you.

If you want to enter a more descriptive title, but do not want to lose the one that PageSnip generated for you, click the (down arrow) button:

PageSnip will move the generated title down to the Description line and you can type in your own Page Title in the space provided.

You can also add your own Key Words (or Tags) as needed.

Note:The information in the Page Title, Description and Key Words fields will be searched along with text extracted from the article when you search your filed snips using the ”Fuzzy Search” mode in the PageSnip Manager. 

Using SnipLists

When you file a snip, PageSnip makes it possible for you to associate that snip with one or more groups of related snips known as “SnipLists”.  This is an incredibly powerful feature because it lets you quickly find a snip by its SnipList association. 

You can create as many different SnipLists as you need.  A single snip can then be associated with any number of SnipLists selections.  The actual snip is not duplicated.

In this example the snip is associated with two different SnipLists:

1. Blog Related
2. WordPress Related

These are just the names used here - your description of the SnipList can be whatever you want it to be.

When you are satisfied with your Title, Description, Keywords and SnipLists, click the FILE button on the toolbar to complete the process. 

Congratulations!

You have successfully snipped a tutorial from the center of a web page without any banners, navigation or unwanted content.  Then you filed it in the PageSnip Manager so you can access it any time you need it.  Your personal WordPress knowledge base is off to a good start!

Using your filed snip

Now that you have filed your snip in the PageSnip Manager, you need to know how to find it when you need it.

To access the PageSnip Manager, double-click the PageSnip icon in the Windows System Tray (or press CTRL+SHIFT+P) and select that option from the main menu (if the PageSnip Assistant window is open, the main menu will appear when you close it).

There are two buttons (SNIPLIST and SEARCH) on the PageSnip Manager menu that are used to locate a filed snip.  

Finding a snip using the SnipList feature 

The SNIPLIST button allows you to display groups of related snips as you can see in the screen below.

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To display a list of all the snips associated with a single SnipList, select the name of the SnipList and click the VIEW button. 

PageSnip will then display a list of all of the snips associated with that SnipList as you see in this screen shot.

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To view the actual snip content just select any snip in the list and click the DISPLAY button.  The selected snip will be displayed as shown in this screen.

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Finding a snip using the Search feature

The SEARCH button displays a simple form where you can enter the term you want to search for and select the search method to use.  It is shown in this screen.

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PageSnip has two different search methods.  To use either one just enter the search term, select the method you want and click the VIEW button.

The Fuzzy Search method searches the text extracted from the HTML of your snip when you filed it along with the data you entered for the Page Title, Description and Keywords. 

The results are displayed in a list as shown in this screen.

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Use this method when you are searching for a snip based on the data you entered as you filed the snip.

To view the actual snip content just select any snip in the list and click the DISPLAY button.  The selected snip will be displayed as shown in this screen.

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The Web Style Search method searches only the text extracted from the HTML of your snip when you filed it (remember that this method does NOT search the data you entered when you filed the snip - only the text extracted from the HTML).

The results are displayed in a typical web search result format as shown in this screen.

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To view the actual snip content just select the snip in the list and click the DISPLAY button.  Your snip will be displayed as shown in this screen.

 (click thumbnail to view larger image)

PageSnip has two other features that  should be mentioned here, SnipNotes and SnipInfo.

Using the SnipNotes feature

The SnipNotes feature gives you the equivalent of a blank sheet of paper that is filed in the folder with your snip.  You can use this to write yourself notes or keep any other information that you want to have about the snip.

You open the SnipNote HTML editor by clicking the NOTES button on the Display Snip toolbar.

For details on using the SnipNote HTML editor refer to the help file or the online documentation (listed at the end of this tutorial).

Using the SnipInfo feature

Another powerful feature of PageSnip is that it automatically remembers the URL where you obtained your snip as well as the date and time.  It also gives you easy access to any files gathered with the snip and a quick way to return to the web page where snip originated.

To access the SnipInfo information, click the INFO button (this button is also available in the PageSnip Assistant).

The Info screen looks like this screen shot.

The info screen gives you direct access to the HTML, CSS, JS and Images gathered with your snip (Windows Explorer will open in the folder).

If you want to return to the web page where you gathered the snip, you simply click one of the browser buttons and the browser you selected will open directly to that URL.

PageSnip automatically detects and configures buttons for Internet Explorer, FireFox, Opera and Safari PC.

Conclusion

You now know how to snip tutorials or other content for your WordPress knowledge base, file it in the PageSnip Manager and find it again when you need it.  You can add SnipNotes and use the SnipInfo to access the files associated with the snip or return to the original URL again if needed.

Adding other snips to your knowledge base (or creating one for a different subject) is just a matter of following the steps outlined here on a different web page.

Note: not all web pages snip exactly like the one in this example.  That is why PageSnip has several different ways to gather a snip.  If you try this method on a page and it does not work well for you, refer to the help files or online documentation section on Selecting Content at http://www.pagesnip.com/onlinehelp/index.html?selectingdata.htm.

PageSnip makes it possible for you to do other things with your snip.  You can edit the snip content with the built-in HTML editor, print it, create a PDF of it and even send it to someone via E-mail.  These items are discussed in detail in the PageSnip documentation. 

You can view the complete PageSnip documentation online at:  http://www.pagesnip.com/onlinehelp/index.html

Try PageSnip Today Risk Free!

If you don’t already have PageSnip, visit the website and download a copy today.  You can use it absolutely free for 30 days with no nags or limitations.  Snip and file as many web pages as you like. 

Get free technical support during your trial period and get a real feel for how nice it is to make PageSnip a part of your daily web surfing routine. 

Then, when your ready, you can purchase the product risk free (PageSnip comes with a 30 day satisfaction guarantee), and never be another day without it!

Click here to visit the PageSnip website.