Tetrabyblos Professional Astrology Plugin Quick Manual
Tetrabyblos Requirements –
Important notice
Quick Setup Installation,
Activation and Upgrade
Using available shortcode
parameters
Custom images – upload and
use
The only requirements for installing and run
Tetrabyblos, are:
Usually, any WordPress based website has these simple features. However,
I encountered some cases where my users didn’t have the simple permission to
install one single Plugin, not even the ones from the marketplace – which is far
from being logical or fair since they are paying a considerable price for the
hosting.
If you are using WordPress.com, for example, then you cannot install plugins. We
often see on the web complaints from their users saying that they can’t see the
plugins menu in their WordPress dashboard. It is because you are using
WordPress.com, which has its limitations (earning limitations, inability of
installing plugins or upload themes, etc.). You can, however, install plugins on
WordPress.com if you upgrade to their business plan (which is expensive). On the
other hand, you can install any plugin you want on your self-hosted
WordPress.org website right out of the box. And the migration process from
the first to the second is not that hard (we are preparing an article about the
process). If you want to take control of your website, change its appearance and
give it (almost) unlimited functionalities and features, you can either choose
WordPress.org, or another hosting provider (not necessarily a specific WordPress
one).
So, before ordering Tetrabyblos, you
must be sure you can install a plugin. To do that, on your WP dashboard, click
in the Plugins menu – if you don’t have it, it’s automatically the end of the
story. If you do have it, look at its submenus and see if there’s an option
“Add new”. Again, if not, you’re done.
However, if you have that choice, make sure you have another one – after
clicking in add new – called “Upload Plugin”.
If you don’t reach this final phase, you are not able to install plugins of any
kind. In some exceptions, you might be allowed to add one from the private
WordPress marketplace, but not one you bought or downloaded freely from a
trusted repository (including the WordPress itself). You can’t install an
external plugin. Period.
Even if it’s for security reasons in some cases, the fact is that several users
are being
greatly impaired,
with the wrong idea and impression that the service that they are
paying
is at a fair price and that they are enjoying a complete package and service
with all the features of a normal WordPress installation. It’s not like this at
all. You can have, for example, a simple shared host, with all the major
features of any website (control panel, FTP, lots of space, etc.), and have a
personalized installation of WordPress with all the features it offers. So,
think wisely if you are one of these cases, not because you aren’t able to
install specifically Tetrabyblos,
but because you are being prevented to enjoy literally thousands of other useful
plugins, mostly free.
(Steps for installing or upgrading the Plugin)
Please unzip the Bundle file called
“Tetrabyblos-Bundle.zip”. You’ll get one
folder called Documentation – the
documentation in PDF along the zipped Max Heindel’s report – and a zip file
called Tetrabyblos.zip, which is the
plugin (do not unzip this last file
please). Then, you have two scenarios:
1)
If you haven’t yet installed any of the plugin versions the process is simple:
enter your admin Word Press panel, click in Plugins (on the left menu), and then
click – on the top – in “Add new “. At the
new screen, click again on the top in “Upload
Plugin “. In the next screen you can choose the file you want to upload,
which is Tetrabyblos.zip. After choosing the
file, please click on “Install now “. Wait a
few moments, and when the message that the plugin was successfully installed
press “Activate Plugin” please – otherwise
the plugin won’t show or run. You can see now the admin icon for
Tetrabyblos at the right menu.
2)
If you already have installed the old version,
you cannot do automatically step
1. You must go first to the Plugins page – as before – and right below the
Tetrabyblos label, you must
deactivate it first (or you can
check the box near to it, and in the bulk action choose
“Deactivate”). After that, still in the
Plugins page, you can then delete the plugin (the option is also bellow the name
or check it and choose “Delete” from the
Bulk operations). After this process, you can now proceed normally to step 1.
Updating manually Tetrabyblos will
make you lose all the files and configurations – except the reports if you made
an earlier backup in the Tetrabyblos
menu which can be restored.
(Using Tetrabyblos Plugin in your page)
Using
Tetrabyblos Astrology Plugin is
rather easy: just place the following code
[tetrabyblos]
with
the brackets wherever you want the interface to appear.
Tetrabyblos
allows now to generate the natal chart components, or to send the user directly
to the calendar of transits.
So, for the natal chart, just place the code
[tetrabyblos action=”natal”]
And for the transits
[tetrabyblos action=”transits”]
So, you can create 2 different pages, which will have the same input, but will
give the user 2 outcomes.
In the meantime, you can decide to give access only to users registered in your
Word Press website. If that is the case, just place:
[tetrabyblos action=”natal” userlogged=”yes”]
Or in the transits case
[tetrabyblos action=”transits” userlogged=”yes”]
Important note:
place this short code in TEXT MODE,
otherwise Word Press won’t interpret the code correctly.
To use the Transit’s reports feature
in the natal report as well, you must do 2 additional things:
-
Choose the page you want the Transits to appear in the admin menu. By default,
Tetrabyblos creates a page called
Transits. You can change it to another name if you want.
-
Whatever is the page you are going to use, you must place also a short code (the
default page already has it):
[byblostransits] with the brackets and in text mode.
You’re done!
In the main options page of Tetrabyblos,
you can find basically all the possible configurations for it.
The first item in the options page,
is the “Title of the form”, which is the
sentence that will appear in the input form, at the top. You can choose whatever
you want. By default, it’s set to “Natal Chart
Calculation”.
In the second option,
“Show natal interpretation”, you choose to
show or not the written report to the users.
The third one,
“Show transits interpretations”, is where
you decide to show or not a transits option button in the generated natal chart
of the user and redirect him to the page you want where he can see the current
transits with his chart. This has nothing to do with the regular transits page,
which I’ll explain a little later. So, you decide to show or not this button in
the generated natal chart to allow the user to dig further, and in the result,
you decide to show the transits text only, or the text plus the graphic table,
with the aspects. If you won’t be using the page that
Tetrabyblos generates automatically
for you (called transits by default), you must define which page do you want,
and place inside it the shortcode:
[byblostransits]
Otherwise, the plugin won’t know where to go.
The fourth option,
“Show advanced options to user”, enables a
section in the input form which allows the advanced user to choose the house
system he wants to use, and the type of zodiac (western tropical, or several
sidereal ones).
The fifth option,
“Other Arabic Pars to show”, allows you to
define other Arabic pars to be
calculated and shown to the user. You have almost 90 additional pars besides the
usual ones. But you can activate or not the ones you want (even the usual ones).
The sixth option,
“Formula to calculate Pars Fortuna”, is a
matter of opinion. The Pars Fortuna
can be calculated differently for day or night or use the same formula. It
depends of the astrologer’s point of view. Your choice.
The seventh option,
“Select default values” defines the default
values to be used in the fourth option, when this one is not available to the
users. So again, you, as an astrologer, decide what system you wish to use.
The eighth option,
“Select essential dignities table and score system”,
gives you the chance to define which table of essential dignities and what type
of score points you want to use. In the dignities, you can use even your own
custom table (besides the traditional ones from
Ptolemy or Dorotheus), that can be
programmed a little bit lower in the options page. As for the score systems, 2
major ones are available:
System I: All the direct and mutual reception (m.r.) essential dignities and
direct debilities are considered. A peregrine body is the one which doesn't
have any direct or m.r. essential dignity and it's not considered to be
peregrine if it's in fall or detriment.
System II: All the essential dignities and debilities are considered, along
with the mutual reception (m.r.) in rulership or exaltation. A peregrine
body is the one which doesn't have any direct or m.r. essential dignity or
direct debility.
The ninth option,
“Define graphic options”, has several
aspects you can control. One is the type of chart that is draw: you can make it
with or without the current transiting planets (that will appear outside the
wheel). So, the option “Radix only” will
only draw the natal planets. You can also choose if you want your chart in
colors or in plain black and white – it’s an artistic choice.
Regarding the scale fields, they have a reason. Themes for Word Press are
different, and in some the text and graphics will appear normal, but in others
too big. You can reduce both the scale of the input/output form, and control the
solar sign size, in a way that the plugin will match your page. You can also not
show the solar sign and/or the progress bar that appears while the plugin is
making the calculations.
Finally, you can show in the written report if you want – and control the size –
pictures for the ascendant, the body with most dignities, or all the bodies.
The tenth option as for the
eleventh, are intuitive. You decide
which bodies/points/sections you want to appear or not in the generated chart.
Choose whether to show or not the Vedic
Info report, or the bodies/points
Lilith, Chiron, Moon nodes, Pars Fortuna or the stars. Show, or not, the
soft minor aspects, like Semisquare,
Quintile, Sesquisquare, Biquintile, Parallel and Cont. Parallel. Disable the
Astronomical information or the Arabic
Pars if you wish so. You have control on what is show or not.
However, here is a special attention to 2 sections:
The “Now” button is a special feature
not commonly used by astrologers, since it defines in the input form the
time or date to the current ones. For some, this is important. For most, it
won’t be. So, you can disable it by checking it.
The second, is the “Print” button, which
allows the user to print the results. This is in a beta stage, not
completely tested, which means you can use it, but must be aware that errors
– small ones – can appear.
Note:
whenever you make a change, please always
press the “Save changes button”, otherwise your choices won’t be saved properly.
The final section of the main
options page is the editor for the texts, etc. and is called
“Tetrabyblos Personal Interpretations & Dignities
Editor”. The name says it all.
By default, Tetrabyblos brings
Max Heindel’s interpretation reports.
So, if you choose to show the reports, they will appear in the chart
information.
But you can make your own texts for the natal and transit interpretations
easily. Again, two major points to not forget:
If you write any text, and don’t select the
“Active” box near it, that text is a draft, and won’t appear in the
interpretations report. This is great for making your texts quietly and with
time. Another important point is that you must always save the changes in the
blue button that says “Save Changes and delete
marked” that allows to properly save those texts and to delete all the
items you don’t want to keep; it just takes that they have the checkbox
“Mark” selected near them. It’s very simple.
So the basic operations you can do after adding or modifying a text, or to
create a new one, are:
-
Delete an entry (or several):
just check the box next to the entry (entries) you wish to delete in the column
“Mark“, and press the
“Save Changes and Delete marked“.
-
Add an entry:
write the text you want in the last blank and empty textbox for the specific
combination you choose in the first columns, and again press the
“Save Changes and Delete marked“. If the
combination was already entered, you’ll be notified of the repetion.
-
To deactivate an entry (or several):
uncheck all the entries you wish to define as drafts (or simply not to show
them) by unchecking the box near to each at the
“Active” Colum. Again, press the “Save
Changes and Delete marked”. By default, all the entries are active and
ready to be incorporated in the reports. To disable one, or several you don’t
want to show, just uncheck it (them) and press
“Save Changes and Delete marked “.
Despite this configuration, the texts will only appear if the option
“Show Interpretations” in the main
Tetrabyblos menu is set to
“Yes”.
The dignities editor – your custom
table – is intuitive. Just don’t forget to press at the end of the table in the
button that says, “Save custom settings”.
Note:
please make regular backups of these
texts and your custom tables. The plugin will advert you of that. If you install
a newer version of the plugin or loose the current one, you can always import
the work you have done without having to do everything all over again.
To backup your own text reports (along with its definitions), just press the Tetrabyblos Admin icon in your WordPress installation. There you’ll see an option for “Backup your Texts “. Make the backup by pressing the “Backup texts! “ button, and download the zip file by clicking in the indicated highlighted link “here” in the next screen. This zip will contain your work so far regarding the text reports and the dignities tables.
To restore your own text reports (along with its definitions), just press the
Tetrabyblos Admin icon in your
WordPress installation. There you’ll see an option/submenu to
“Restore your Texts “. You’ll be asked to
upload your previous backup (your zip file). Choose it and submit by pressing
“Upload texts! “. The previous reports will
be placed in the database accordingly.
In Tetrabyblos, you can use your own
images for showing up in your reports. If you choose under the Tetrabyblos admin
menu the option “Upload custom images “,
you’ll see a panel which allows that. The process is simple: you just
select/choose one image from your computer (formats accepted are
jpg, jpeg and png) and apply it to a
sign or a planet. So, for example, if you want to choose a personalized image to
be shown for the signs, you must select 12 files, and apply each one to a single
sign. The same applies to the planets.
An implementation of multilanguage support (a feature many times requested) was
made. Now, most of the major and more important texts and strings on the plugin
show to the user, can be translated manually by you, without having to resort to
the paid Google translator API. The admin panel, however, was not yet
translated.
You just must translate the strings/phrases you want, to other format or
language and they will be replaced in the user’s interface.
You can save your translation if you wish – or restore/download it at any time,
or just simply restore to the default English language. We would appreciate it
very much if you could send us the different language translations you have.