Multiple Blogs on Members Only Page

Members need to have the proper role assigned to them to edit posts. Editors and administrators can edit any posts. Authors and contributors can only edit their own posts. New contributor posts need to be approved by an editor or admin.

The capabilities for any give role can be altered. You also could create custom roles with a unique set of capabilities. There are plugins that make this relatively simple, for example “Members”. Custom code to do the same isn’t all that complicated.

Role and capability do not mean there will be a handy edit link with every post that’s displayed on the front end, that’s theme dependent. None the less, they can access their posts and edit in the backend if they have the right role and capability.

Thank you. While I understand the roles I can assign each person, it appears to author a blog they need to learn and know Elementor or the block editor. Is there an easier way for newbies to edit a blog page of their own within the site? I’ve yet to find a theme that makes it relatively simple. And if I do find such a theme, can I add a DIFFERENT them to a subpage of the WP Site?

(I will look at the Members plugin as well, although that’s more for assigning roles isn’t it?)

Thank you, again.

Lets get one thing straight. Themes only govern the appearance of the site. They should have nothing to do with functionality or editors. Functionality is the realm of plugins. It does get confusing when themes bundle page builders into their product, but they are separate items. You can use different themes with the same editor. You can use different editors with the same theme. In reality the distinction is murkier, but this is the guiding concept all the same.

Only one theme can be used at a time. However, you can create a child theme which extends the parent theme by adding other templates and CSS code. You could even have another post type for novices that uses a different editor, template, CSS, etc. Pretty much just like a secondary theme. You’ll need plugins or custom code to accomplish this.

There are a number of page builder plugins, Elementor being just one. The problem with most of these is once you create content with them, you’re locked into always using them. The block editor content is generally more portable than content from most other page builders. While there’s certainly a learning curve to overcome, IMO if one must learn how to use some editor, it may as well be the block editor. They all involve a learning curve. There’s always a trade off. Ones easier to learn tend to provide less flexibility.

Some page builders might offer the ability to switch to a different editor. However, once a page’s content is created, you may be locked into that editor for that page. And the alternative editor might be the “classic” editor, which isn’t much of a choice. I’m actually fine with the classic editor, but people tell me I’m not like everyone else ??

While there have been many attempts to make content creation easier, the fact remains that creating web content isn’t that easy. Despite WP supposedly making content creation easy, I still have several clients who’d rather pay me to create content because getting their copy to look right on their site is simply beyond their abilities.

Yes “Members” is specifically for managing roles and capabilities and nothing more. Confusingly, there are several “membership” plugins that help you manage who can see what that go beyond just roles and capabilities.

Thank you.
Per your statement above, I have used the Block Editor and that seems fairly easy to create content. The parts I am not finding with it are:

1. How to insert a picture within the text. (See https://jayjaynet.com/ff/PIC4.jpg )
2. How to end an article and begin the next so the 1st article is archived with a menu (same image above where there is a menu structure at the right of the blog so one can choose a month, recent articles or search on subject matter). I’m suspecting that may take a theme? If so, how does one search the thousands of themes to find one that provides such structure without looking at pics of them all?

Additionally, am I understanding correctly that to place a theme on one (or more) of the child pages that is different from the main theme of the site one needs to edit the CSS files?

Thank you for your help. I’m learning.

There’s a “Media & Text” block where you can insert an image and have the related text wrap around it. It’s a little weird to do it that way, one of those quirks that are part of the learning curve.

You can only have one theme active at a time for the entire site, so you cannot apply a different “theme” to different pages. That’s for the WP definition of “theme”, but I understand what you’re after. Most themes offer different page layouts. Often full width and left or right sidebars, that sort of thing. For cohesiveness, the styles applied to various pages remains pretty much the same.

Some themes may differ from that general approach and offer more variations. If there is some styling you need to accomplish that’s not offered by your chosen theme, you can apply custom CSS by adding it to the Additional CSS customizer section.

For even greater customization, a child theme could be created which has additional layouts or templates one could choose from.