tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-89865422313180735732024-02-08T03:34:56.729-08:00q292uWebsite development using Wordpress and free plugins.q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.comBlogger107125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-11725960482381649432013-10-21T08:35:00.000-07:002013-10-21T08:36:22.278-07:00ESSENTIAL WORDPRESS PLUGINS (REVISITED AGAIN)<div class="post-body entry-content" id="post-body-3929090874352473371" itemprop="description articleBody" style="background-color: #141414; color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Utopia, 'Palatino Linotype', Palatino, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; position: relative; width: 536px;">
Wordpress is immensely powerful straight out of the box, but it's possible to add pretty much ANY functionality you want, and it's usually for free.<br />
<br />
This is a list of the TOP Plugins we use at q292u.com.<br />
They are in no particular order.<br />
<br />
(This is an UPDATED version of an updated version of an earlier post. There are SIGNIFICANT changes, as Wordpress is such a moving target)<br />
<br />
<b>AKISMET.</b><br />
ESSENTIAL anti-spam system. Free to non-commercial users.<br />
Filters out unwanted (spam) comments automatically, and provides stats on what it's doing. ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>WORDPRESS SEO. (YOAST)</b></div>
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We now use this in preference to All-In-One-SEO-PACK. Allows us to tailor in-post SEO far better. Also handles Sitemaps. ESSENTIAL</div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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<b>BETTER-WP-SECURITY.</b></div>
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Plugs all the holes we could find. Also handles backups. Excellent! ESSENTIAL<br />
<strong></strong><br />
<b>ADROTATE.</b><br />
Handles advertising on your site. Very comprehensive. Individual ads are created and then made into groups. You can then position the groups as widgets, in posts and on pages. Ads have start and end dates, and tracking can be switched on or off. Better than maxbannerads. ** The latest version has had features removed due to a "premium" version. Avoid this version. STRONGLY RECOMMENDED<br />
<br />
<b>WP AUTO TAGGER.</b><br />
Automatically adds relevant tags to your posts as you create them, based on post content. It'll find tags you hadn't thought of. STRONGLY RECOMMENDED.<br />
<br />
<b>AUTO POST THUMBNAIL.</b></div>
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Automatically sets the "Featured Image" attribute of the post, based on the content. STRONGLY RECOMMENDED</div>
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<br />
<b>HYPERCACHE.</b><br />
Excellent caching plugin, creates static version of all your posts and pages as they are created. Far better than SUPERCACHE. ESSENTIAL if you use a lot of plugins, or have a lot of visitors.<br />
Get the "Clear Cache" Button plugin as well.<br />
<br />
<b>EXCLUDE FROM NAVIGATION.</b><br />
Some themes automatically add all pages to navigation menus. This is how to stop it. Adds a checkbox in the editor. ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>SMART 404.</b><br />
Attempts to redirect 404 errors to relevant pages based on search query, and URL requested. Reduces bounce-rates. ESSENTIAL<br />
<br />
<b>Google Analytics. (YOAST)</b><br />
This adds Google Analytics tracking code to all your pages and posts, so you can keep tabs on everything. You need an analytics account. ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>CONTEXTUAL RELATED POSTS.</b><br />
Adds links to other relevant posts on your site. Engages visitors, and keeps them on your site longer. STRONGLY RECOMMENDED.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>STOP SPAMMERS</b></div>
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Blocks spammers from ever registering. So they can't post. Nice. STRONGLY RECOMMENDED</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>COVERT SOCIAL CONTENT</b></div>
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We use this instead of FEEDWORDPRESS, due to performance issues. NOT FREE!</div>
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Strongly Recommended</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>COVERT SOCIAL BUZZ </b></div>
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Generates Likes/Tweets/etc. Not Free. Strongly Recommended.</div>
</div>
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<b>WP SOCIAL POPUP.</b></div>
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Generates Likes/Tweets/etc. Strongly Recommended.</div>
<div class="post-body entry-content" id="post-body-3929090874352473371" itemprop="description articleBody" style="background-color: #141414; color: #cccccc; font-family: Georgia, Utopia, 'Palatino Linotype', Palatino, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; position: relative; width: 536px;">
<br /></div>
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<b>SOCIAL LOCKER (FREE Version)</b></div>
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Excellent! - Locks up content until the user tweets, likes, g+1 or whatever. STRONGLY RECOMMENDED.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
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<br /></div>
q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-39290908743524733712012-10-19T04:00:00.000-07:002012-10-19T04:00:35.142-07:00ESSENTIAL WORDPRESS PLUGINS (REVISITED)Wordpress is immensely powerful straight out of the box, but it's possible to add pretty much ANY functionality you want, and it's usually for free.<br />
<br />
This is a list of the TOP Plugins we use at q292u.com.<br />
They are in no particular order.<br />
<br />
(This is an UPDATED version of an earlier post. There are SIGNIFICANT changes, as Wordpress is such a moving target)<br />
<br />
<b>AKISMET.</b><br />
ESSENTIAL anti-spam system. Free to non-commercial users.<br />
Filters out unwanted (spam) comments automatically, and provides stats on what it's doing. ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>JETPACK</b><br />
This one is essentially a multi-plugin. It gives you a lot of the functionality of Wordpress.Com. You can do away with all the social bookmarking button plugins, contact form plugins, "Follow Me" plugins, and much more. ESSENTIAL. You need a (free) wordpress.com account.<br />
<strong></strong> <br />
<b>FEEDBURNER FEEDSMITH.</b>Redirects all RSS feeds to your Feedburner feeds. So you can control all RSS activity. From there you can do e-mail Subscriptions and much more.<br />
Including automatic TWITTER integration! Get a feedburner account. ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>ALL-IN-ONE-SEO.</b><br />
Handles ALL aspects of SEO (Search Engine Optimisation). Options to rewrite article titles, handles Keywords, meta tags, everything. There's also a "PRO version. You won't need it. ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>ADROTATE.</b><br />
Handles advertising on your site. Very comprehensive. Individual ads are created and then made into groups. You can then position the groups as widgets, in posts and on pages. Ads have start and end dates, and tracking can be switched on or off. Better than maxbannerads. STRONGLY RECOMMENDED<br />
<br />
<b>WP AUTO TAGGER.</b><br />
Automatically adds relevant tags to your posts as you create them, based on post content. It'll find tags you hadn't thought of. STRONGLY RECOMMENDED.<br />
<br />
<b>WORDBAY.</b><br />
Add relevant eBay listings to your posts and pages. This plugin is NOT free, but it's worth the money. Simply set it up, and use shortcodes to position ads. Now includes a widget as well. RECOMMENDED.<br />
<br />
<b>FEEDWORDPRESS.</b><br />
Automatically creates posts on your blog, based on predefined RSS feeds. Excellent. RECOMMENDED.<br />
<br />
<b>HYPERCACHE.</b><br />
Excellent caching plugin, creates static version of all your posts and pages as they are created. Far better than SUPERCACHE. ESSENTIAL if you use a lot of plugins, or have a lot of visitors.<br />
Get the "Clear Cache" Button plugin as well.<br />
<br />
<b>EXCLUDE FROM NAVIGATION.</b><br />
Some themes automatically add all pages to navigation menus. This is how to stop it. Adds a checkbox in the editor. ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>GOOGLE XML SITEMAPS.</b><br />
Automatically generates and submits sitemaps to Google. You can also submit these to Yahoo and Bing, yourself. Helps with SEO. ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>WORDPRESS-DB-BACKUP.</b><br />
Automatically create scheduled database backups and e-mail to yourself.<br />
Simple and effective. ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>SMART 404.</b><br />
Attempts to redirect 404 errors to relevant pages based on search query, and URL requested. Reduces bounce-rates. ESSENTIAL<br />
<br />
<b>Mail From.</b><br />
Simply changes the return e-mail address for automatically-generated e-mail messages to something like "NOREPLY@domain.com". ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>Google Analytics.</b><br />
This adds Google Analytics tracking code to all your pages and posts, so you can keep tabs on everything. You need an analytics account. ESSENTIAL. <br />
<br />
<b>CONTEXTUAL RELATED POSTS.</b><br />
Adds links to other relevant posts on your site. Engages visitors, and keeps them on your site longer. STRONGLY RECOMMENDED.<br />
<br />
q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-54412161046004558302012-10-19T03:35:00.000-07:002012-10-19T03:36:45.469-07:00Wordpress | Blank First Line in RSS feed | Broken RSS feed We've just had this happen to TWO sites:
The first line of the RSS feed comes out blank, meaning that the RSS feed is broken.
Feedburner can't cope, so the RSS subscriptions, Twitter feed, and e-mail subscriptions all disappeared down a black hole.
This happened after a couple of major site revisions, involving new plugins.
First up, we tried the "fix-rss-feed" plugin. Nope.
Then the "whitespace" fix. Nope.
Removing blank lines from wp-config. Nope.
Hmm..
The solution is the obvious, boring one:
disable ALL plugins, and re-enable one-by-one until the RSS feed breaks.
Turns out it was nothing to do with the new plugins, it was "Advanced Tag List", which I think has just been updated..
It just goes to show - you can never be too careful. With muktiple plugins by multiple authors, this IS going to happen.
Anyway - everything is again rosy in the garden.q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-19175813081992883022012-10-10T06:59:00.000-07:002012-10-19T03:40:25.738-07:00Wordpress Database Optimization | Database Bloat<b>The Problem:</b>
Wordpress is notorious for "database bloat", in particular the "wp-options" table.
This is where Wordpress (WP) stores all info for plugins and themes, etc.
There are built-in functions for storing data in this table, so a lot of developers use it to store data that really should be in a separate table.
Also, most plugins don't clean up after themselves when you delete them.
To make things worse, Wordpress stores a draft copy of EVERY post revision you make. This results in bloating of the "wp-posts" table.
<b>Some Culprits:</b>
I've come across TWO plugins that massively contribute to bloated wp-options tables:
FeedWordpress (FWP) and Artiss Social Bookmarks. Don't get me wrong, FWP is a fantastic plugin, BUT it stores "transient" records in wp-options, and then never cleans them up. Artiss does something similar.
<b>PHASE 1: Database Cleanup.</b>
<b>A Solution:</b>
There's a plugin called "Clean Options", which scans for wp-options records which are never referenced by your WP installation. It calls these "orphans", and you can tell it to remove them for you. Be careful, though: take a database backup before you delete ANYTHING. Select any options belonging to plugins you don't have installed any more. Be careful!
You should also be able to delete anything which starts with "_transient_".
<b>A fly in the ointment:</b>
If you have a wp-options table with 30000 records in it, then "Clean Options" isn't going to be able to cope. It will freeze-up. You won't be able to select records to delete.
<b>Drastic Measures:</b>
So where does that leave us? Manually deleting records from the wp-options table.
Yes. That's scary. But it's the only way.
<b>MAKE A BACKUP OF YOUR WP-OPTIONS TABLE</b>
Use phpmyadmin to directly access your database, select the wp-options table, and use the "export" option to make a backup to your local machine.
Now execute the following sql statements:
<b>select * from wp-options where wp-name like '_transient_%'</b>
This will return all the transient records with names starting with "_transient_", and give you a tally of how many there are.
Check these records to make sure there's nothing else in there before you do anything drastic.
Like this:
<b>delete from wp-options where wp-name like '_transient_%'</b>
This deletes ALL records starting with "_transient_". You did check the results of the select statement, above, didn't you? No? That's OK, you DID make a backup copy. Didn't you?
You have just deleted (possibly) thousands of wp-options records (my record is 28000). Now, at this point, one of three things will happen:
1. Nothing. That's great.
2. Your website will go offline for a while as the database server deals with the changes. No worries - it will come back on it's own..
3. Your website will go offline and stay offline. :(
If this happens, try adding "/license.txt" to the end of your site URL. If it displays the WP license agreement, your hosting is Ok, but WP is having a breakdown.
Fix this by accessing the "active plugins" record in wp-options, (usually on page 2) and copying the contents somewhere safe. Now delete the contents (NOT the record itself!)
Now try accessing your site again. You should find that you can get into the admin panel and re-activate the plugins one-by-one until everything's back up.
(or paste the copy you made earlier back in)
<b>Phase 2: Database Optimization.</b>
You should now have a nice slimline wp-options table.
Now we need to "optimize" the database.
By this, we mean delete all post revisions (you don't need them. You didn't know you HAD them, right?), spam comments, etc.
We also need to run standard database optimization routines on the core WP tables, remoce table overheads etc..
Make a COMPLETE database backup before you start messing with this. (Same routine as before, but for ALL tables together).
We use the "wp-optimize" plugin, but there are others.
WP-Optimize has checkboxes for deleting post revisions, spam, and optimization.
We always run the optimization option ON IT'S OWN.. You DO NOT want a timeout at this point!
That's it. Hopefully nothing went horribly wrong.
If it did, it's YOUR problem. We told you to make backups several times.
q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-66328285538112912352012-10-09T08:38:00.000-07:002012-10-09T08:38:01.281-07:00Wordpress - Caching Plugins RevisitedWe've been using "quickcache" for ages, after a nasty experience with wp-supercache. (it ate a website!)
Anyway, we've been doing some back-to-back testing on two similar websites running different caching plugins.
The results were:
Fastest: Hypercache, with browser caching and compression turned on.
DB Cache didn't seem to make any difference when combined with hypercache.
Had some issues getting rid of quickcache, as well. Had to switch off cacheing, then disable, then delete, then edit wp-config to restore the cache setting..
Google Page Speed scores have risen from around 70 to around 89.. q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-15360779770695720592012-07-03T00:50:00.000-07:002012-07-03T00:50:55.715-07:00Feedwordpress / Gzip plugin problems - can't access admin panelYesterday, after all the hoo-haa with Feedwordpress refusing to activate, I ran into another problem: I couldn't access the feedwordpress admin panel! on FOUR sites..
All I get is "page unavailable", or the dreaded error 324 in Chrome (don't start me on that one).
So I backtracked - what ELSE had I changed recently?
The answer was I had used plugin to switch on GZIP compression on the affected sites.
Deactivating the plugins "Force Gzip", or "Wordpress Gzip" allowed me back in to the feedwordpress admin panel.
I have no idea why switching on Gzip kills the feedwordpress admin panel, but it does.
You heard it here.q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-49976921457687843152012-07-02T03:54:00.001-07:002012-10-10T07:00:34.449-07:00Wordpress - Feedwordpress - Will not activate!This was a bit of a problem.
My site, which relies on FeedWordPress (fwp) for updates, had crashed.
The only way to get the site back up was to disable all active plugins via the database (see my other posts), and then re-activate the plugins one-by-one to find the culprit.
Turns out that the culprit was FeedWordPress.
FeedWordPress does this when there are a LOT of links to check. Like my site.
The only way to fix this quickly is to edit the database directly using the hosting control panel.
DO NOT edit the RSS links using the inbuilt links editor - it will chop the end off the links, destroying them. It will chop the affiliate bits off the end..
1. Get the ID of the link category that fwp is looking at.
To find out, you need to know it's name. I called mine "FWP". Yours may be "Blogroll".
Use the wordpress links editor, but DO NOT edit any links.
Now look in the WP-Terms table, and find the record with that name. Make a note of the link_category_id.
2. You are also going to need an empty link category. Use the wordpress link category editor to create one, (I called mine "FWP-DUMMY") or just select an existing link category with no links in it. Note down the link_category_id.
3. Open the wp-options table and look for the feedwordpress_category record. It probably will not be on the first page..
Edit it. The number in there should be the link_category_id for your existing category.
Change it to the number for the empty link category. <b>Save it.</b>
4. In Wordpress, activate FeedWordPress. It should work OK now.
That's because it's looking at an empty category and has nothing to check.
5. Go back to the wp-options table, and change the feedwordpress category back to the original value. <b>Save it.</b>
Feedwordpress is now up and running.
Finally, make a note of the link-category_ids for the FWP category and the Empty category, so you won't have to mess about next time.q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-73363493646440529632012-01-26T04:53:00.000-08:002012-01-26T04:53:47.806-08:00Login Blocked by misconfigured LDAP connector pluginI manage a multi-site Wordpress installation for a client.<br />
Before Christmas, they installed an LDAP connector plugin, but never got around to configuring or testing it.<br />
Unfortunately, the default settings prevented using the Wordpress login as a fallback.<br />
So everyone was locked out. So I tried the usual database>wp-settings>active-plugins workaround. There was nothing there!<br />
So I tried the old faithful "rename the plugin folder" routine. Jackpot.<br />
I was then able to get in.<br />
<br />
Sorted.q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-68311161288274612072012-01-17T05:52:00.000-08:002012-10-19T04:01:32.597-07:00STOP SOPA / SOPA BLACKOUTJanuary 18th is STOP SOPA day.<br />
All q292u sites will be participating in the SOPA blackout (18.1.2012)<br />
Sites will remain dark from 8am EST to 8pm.<br />
For information on what this is all about, visit <a href="http://sopablackout.org/" title="http://sopablackout.org"><strong>http://sopablackout.org/</strong></a>q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-53325816379410844432012-01-10T04:46:00.000-08:002012-10-19T04:01:19.275-07:00ESSENTIAL Plugins for WordpressWordpress is immensely powerful straight out of the box, but it's possible to add pretty much ANY functionality you want, and it's usually for free.<br />
<br />
This is a list of the TOP Plugins we use at q292u.com.<br />
They are in no particular order.<br />
<br />
<b>AKISMET.</b><br />
ESSENTIAL anti-spam system. Free to non-commercial users.<br />
Filters out unwanted (spam) comments automatically, and provides stats on what it's doing. ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>FEEDBURNER FEEDSMITH.<br />
</b>Redirects all RSS feeds to your Feedburner feeds. So you can control all RSS activity. From there you can do e-mail Subscriptions and much more.<br />
Including automatic TWITTER integration! Get a feedburner account. ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>ALL-IN-ONE-SEO.</b><br />
Handles ALL aspects of SEO (Search Engine Optimisation). Options to rewrite article titles, handles Keywords, meta tags, everything. There's also a "PRO version. You won't need it. ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>ADROTATE.</b><br />
Handles advertising on your site. Very comprehensive. Individual ads are created and then made into groups. You can then position the groups as widgets, in posts and on pages. Ads have start and end dates, and tracking can be switched on or off. Better than maxbannerads. STRONGLY RECOMMENDED<br />
<br />
<b>WPTOUCH.</b><br />
Creates a mobile version of your site on the fly. All you need to do is access the site via a mobile device. The interface looks like Apple iOs.<br />
Very smart. ESSENTIAL There's a PRO version as well. <br />
<br />
<b>WP AUTO TAGGER.</b><br />
Automatically adds relevant tags to your posts as you create them, based on post content. It'll find tags you hadn't thought of. STRONGLY RECOMMENDED.<br />
<br />
<b>WORDBAY.</b><br />
Add relevant eBay listings to your posts and pages. This plugin is NOT free, but it's worth the money. Simply set it up, and use shortcodes to position ads. Now includes a widget as well. RECOMMENDED.<br />
<br />
<b>FEEDWORDPRESS.</b><br />
Automatically creates posts on your blog, based on predefined RSS feeds. Excellent. RECOMMENDED.<br />
<br />
<b>QUICKCACHE.</b><br />
Excellent caching plugin, creates static version of all your posts and pages as they are created. Far better than SUPERCACHE. <br />
ESSENTIAL if you use a lot of plugins, or have a lot of visitors.<br />
<br />
<b>EXCLUDE FROM NAVIGATION.</b><br />
Some themes automatically add all pages to navigation menus. This is how to stop it. Adds a checkbox in the editor. ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>GOOGLE XML SITEMAPS.</b><br />
Automatically generates and submits sitemaps to Google. You can also submit these to Yahoo and Bing, yourself. Helps with SEO. ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>WORDPRESS-DB-BACKUP.</b><br />
Automatically create scheduled database backups and e-mail to yourself.<br />
Simple and effective. ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>SMART 404.</b><br />
Attempts to redirect 404 errors to relevant pages based on search query, and URL requested. Reduces bounce-rates. ESSENTIAL<br />
<br />
<b>Mail From.</b><br />
Simply changes the return e-mail address for automatically-generated e-mail messages to something like "NOREPLY@domain.com". ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>Google Analytics.</b><br />
This adds Google Analytics tracking code to all your pages and posts, so you can keep tabs on everything. You need an analytics account. ESSENTIAL.<br />
<br />
<b>SIMPLE SOCIAL BOOKMARKS.</b><br />
Adds social bookmark icons to your posts. Allows your readers to recommend your posts on DIGG, REDDIT, SLASHDOT, etc. STRONGLY RECOMMENDED.<br />
<br />
<b>CONTEXTUAL RELATED POSTS.</b><br />
Adds links to other relevant posts on your site. Engages visitors, and keeps them on your site longer. STRONGLY RECOMMENDED.<br />
<br />
<b>GOOGLE +1 BUTTON.</b><br />
The new kid on the block. Allows visitors to mark relevant posts, adds kudos and visibility on Google.<br />
<br />
<b>FACEBOOK LIKE BUTTON.</b><br />
Allows visitors to "LIKE" your site on Facebook. Facebook is a massive audience, not to be ignored. STRONGLY RECOMMENDED.q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-70951566755725884682012-01-03T02:58:00.000-08:002012-01-03T02:58:26.942-08:00Wordpress 3.3 Error : Warning: Invalid argument supplied for foreach() in ".."/class-wp-admin-bar.php on line 342One of our sites <a target=_blank href=http://www.supercars-for-sale.com>Supercars For Sale</a> was displaying an error message:<br />
Warning: Invalid argument supplied for foreach() in ".."/class-wp-admin-bar.php on line 342<br />
<br />
This occurred after the 3.3 upgrade.<br />
<br />
The problem is caused by the theme - in this case "elements of seo" having TWO calls to wp_footer (one direct call, and a do_action).<br />
<br />
The solution was to remove the do_action call.<br />
<br />
That's it. Sorted.q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-41432881305966554452011-12-20T01:50:00.000-08:002011-12-20T01:50:19.870-08:00Wordpress 3.3 Upgrades CompletedOut of the final three (mission-critical) sites, two went through smoothly.<br />
One did not, and had to be upgraded via FTP, then remove the .maintenance file.<br />
Anyway, that's it. All plugins updated, and all sites running on Wordpress 3.3.<br />
<br />
Give it a week, and there'll be an urgent security fix, while everyone is off on their xm,as break..q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-59929466615772382012011-12-13T07:50:00.000-08:002011-12-13T07:50:32.383-08:00Wordpress 3.3 UpgradesWe've started rolling-out Wordpress 3.3 to our sites, starting with the less mission-critical.<br />
Site#1 went almost smoothly (timed-out), but resumed ok.<br />
Site#2 went smoothly.<br />
Site#3 timed-out in the middle of something crucial and broke the site..<br />
The solution was to delete the ".maintenance" file in the root directory, download Wordpress 3.3, and then FTP the files up, and then run the upgrade procedure manually (just access site.com/wp-admin).<br />
Site#4 was even worse - caused by SEO Ultimate plugin. Solved that by renaming the plugin folder, and ftping the files up, and running the upgrade manually.<br />
Can't wait to start with the three mission-critical sites. That'll have to wait until we complete the office move. Did I mention that?<br />
Sorted.q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-28469904883045385872011-11-23T04:28:00.000-08:002011-11-23T04:28:47.942-08:00Old eBay RSS feeds died last night!eBay appears to have (finally) pulled the plug on the old-style RSS feeds.<br />
All our RSS feeds starting with "rss.ebay.." started generating errors last night.<br />
We've now switched them all to the new "rest.ebay..." format.<br />
Doesn't seem to be any better.. but at least no errors..q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-59425743099340874772011-10-21T06:47:00.000-07:002011-10-21T06:48:25.206-07:00New Site Launched: www.motorbikes4sale.netThat's right, another q292u site was launched this week, called <a target=_blank href=www.motorbikes4sale.net>Motorbikes4Sale.net</a>. It does exactly what it says on the tin.<br />
<br />
This site raised a bit of a problem: although it's fed by RSS feeds, there is only ONE feed per manufacturer. So how to create tags for keywords that are NOT a category? Model Names, for example..<br />
<br />
After extensive searching, and at one point even considering writing a cronjob plugin to do the job, we found "WP Auto Tagger". This uses the Yahoo API to find suitable tags based on the post title and content. It works like a dream!q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-28033418414075798962011-10-10T01:06:00.000-07:002011-10-10T01:06:58.584-07:00WORDPRESS: How to disable all active plugins, without access to the dashboard..See my earlier post as to why I needed to do this..<br />
<br />
My site was down. Dead. No access to the admin functions. The problem was a plugin gone bad (when I tried to disable it).<br />
<br />
So, I needed to disable plugins, but couldn't get into the admin panel.<br />
<br />
The excellent support guys at <a href="http://www.unlimitedwebhosting.co.uk/portal/aff.php?aff=005">Unlimited Web Hosting</a> came up with this ingenious solution:<br />
<br />
Here's what you do: use CPANEL or PLESK to access the Wordpress database of your site directly. It'll be something like phpmyadmin. Details vary with web hosting firms. If in doubt, ask yours.<br />
<br />
Browse the WP_OPTIONS table. Look for a record called "active_plugins".<br />
Copy the contents of this field into notepad, and save it, just in case.<br />
Now go back to the database, and EMPTY the contents of "active plugins", and save it. (you can always restore it from the copy you made).<br />
<br />
Now access your site. It should come back up, but with no plugins running, so it'll be weird. Now go into admin as usual, and re-enable all plugins one-by-one, EXCEPT the one that caused the problem.<br />
I'd DELETE that one..<br />
<br />
<br />
** DISCLAIMER. If you try this solution, and it messes things up, that's your problem. I take no responsibility for it. It worked for me. **<br />
<br />
** If it all goes wrong, simply restore the database from your backup. You DO have a backup, right? **q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-40872723083585520732011-10-10T00:52:00.000-07:002011-10-10T01:07:50.478-07:00WP-SUPERCACHE ATE MY WEBSITE! - It's EVIL!Whatever you do, BE CAREFUL if you are using the WP-SUPERCACHE Wordpress plugin..<br />
<br />
I'll explain the problem: My site was having speed issues, so I investigated alternative cach plugins. I settled on Quick-Cache.<br />
So, I disabled Supercache, which then argued, in BIG RED LETTERS at the top of the dashboard, and advised me to visit it's settings page, as caching was off. I didn't want to do that, so I hit "deactivate" again.<br />
<br />
BANG!. The site was dead. Not only that, but it was displaying the contents of the WP-CONFIG file in plain text on the frontpage!!! Including database login details, password, etc.. DISASTER!<br />
<br />
I was heading home on the train as all this was unfolding, so I got the support guys at <a href="http://www.unlimitedwebhosting.co.uk/portal/aff.php?aff=005">Unlimited Web Hosting</a> to shut down the site, which they did, instantly.<br />
<br />
We then spent most of the night, on and off, trying to get the site back up. <br />
Unlimited showed me a neat trick to disable all Wordpress plugins without access to the site.. I'll be posting about that later..<br />
<br />
Anyway, I decided that wp-supercache had corrupted something, probably wp-functions, so I reloaded Wordpress over the existing files (after configuring wp-config). <br />
<br />
Jackpot! The site came back up. I then re-enabled the plugins, one-by-one. (they were all disabled from earlier). <br />
<br />
DELETED WP-Supercache, and installed and enabled Quick-Cache.<br />
I suggest you do the same.q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-6756734923099651732011-10-06T01:05:00.000-07:002011-10-06T01:05:48.999-07:00DIGI AUTO LINKS | SERVER MELTDOWN!Last week, I started playing with the excellent <a href="http://www.digiresults.com/aff/1473/9567">DIGI AUTO LINKS (DAL)</a> wordpress plugin.<br />
It's an all-singing, all-dancing backlink-building system, which uses Wordpress Pingbacks.<br />
<br />
I had it installed on 4 sites, and I'd noticed that things were running slowly, with the occasional "Internal System Error" thrown in for good measure.<br />
<br />
So I contacted the excellent support people at <a href="http://www.unlimitedwebhosting.co.uk/portal/aff.php?aff=005">Unlimited Web Hosting</a> to see what was going on.. Unusually, they wanted to RING ME.. unheard of!<br />
I was tied up with other things for several hours, so when I finally got free, I checked my sites, and found that THREE had been suspended, (for server-hogging, I found out later..)<br />
<br />
I worked out that FEEDWORDPRESS (FWP) was creating batches of posts that DAL was trying to process instantly, resulting in server meltdown.<br />
<br />
We fixed the problem by pausing the DAL cron jobs, bringing the sites back up one at a time, and deactivating the DAL plugins. Normal servive resumed.<br />
<br />
CONCLUSION: DAL doesn't work for me.<br />
It's an excellent product, and would work fine on a normal blog, where there is a NORMAL level of posts. THAT doesn't describe my sites..<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.digiresults.com/aff/1473/9567">DIGI AUTO LINKS (DAL)</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.unlimitedwebhosting.co.uk/portal/aff.php?aff=005">UNLIMITED WEB HOSTING</a>q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-33560334417612930832011-09-28T06:36:00.000-07:002011-09-28T06:38:16.196-07:00Eliminate 404 errors! | Conserve Link JuiceEarlier today, I saw, and was impressed by a brilliant idea:<br />
Why not trap all 404 errors (wrong URL), and redirect to a page related to what was typed in?<br />
So there is no "404 error" page, and search engines don't think there's a dead link. <br />
<br />
Initially, I thought "redirect 404 errors to homepage". That'd work, but the visitor would probably not get what they were looking for. Search engines would be happy, though.<br />
<br />
So I thought: why not redirect to a page related to what the visitor typed as the URL? You could use tags and categories to help in this.<br />
<br />
There's a PAID-FOR plugin that does this. It costs $97 for a multi-site license! :(<br />
<br />
So, I had a look around, and found the "Smart 404" Wordpress plugin.. Which does exactly what I described above. It misses *some* keywords, but it's pretty damn good, and it's free.<br />
<br />
All my main sites now use it..q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-60353924376880871832011-09-28T06:15:00.000-07:002011-09-28T06:15:52.940-07:00SETTING UP CRON JOBS IN PLESKMy web hosts <a href=http://www.unlimitedwebhosting.co.uk/portal/aff.php?aff=005><b>Unlimited Web Hosting</b></a> use the PLESK system rather than CPANEL.<br />
There's no direct access to the Unix Shell, so you can't directly use Unix CRON commands.<br />
<br />
The solution is in PLESK itself. Select Domains, then the domain you want to add a job to. Now find "Scheduled Jobs", and select a "System User" - probably the FTP user. <br />
Click "Add Scheduled Job".<br />
In "Minutes", add the Minutes you want the job to run, eg "15,30,45,0" to run every 15 minutes.<br />
In "Hours", add the number(s) of the hours you want the job to run, eg "4,8,12,16,20", or "*" for ALL hours.<br />
Same applies for the "Day" and "Week" fields.<br />
<br />
So, for example, if you want to run a task twice an hour, every hour, every day, use the following:<br />
Put "00,30" in the Minutes field, and put "*" in all the other fields. Simple, but not immediately obvious.<br />
<br />
I now have proper CRON jobs running my feedwordpress systems, and also "<a href="http://www.digiresults.com/aff/1473/9567"><b>DIGI AUTO LINKS</b></a>". I've timed them to minimise cpu use..<br />
<br />
<br />
Minutes:q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-85875121441679256012011-09-28T06:00:00.000-07:002011-09-28T06:04:21.523-07:00Digi Auto Links PluginI've taken the plunge and actually BOUGHT a plugin.<br />
It's called <a href=http://www.digiresults.com/aff/1473/9567/><b>DIGI AUTO LINKS</b></a>, and what it does is use wordpress's pingback system to build links between my posts and related posts on other websites.<br />
It's automated, and runs by a cron job.<br />
It has the useful side-effect of adding loads of relevant tags to my posts, as well..<br />
<br />
Right Now, you can get this great plugin for 66% discount, but I'm not sure for how long.. <a href="http://www.digiresults.com/aff/1473/9567/c/wso"><b>DIGI AUTO LINKS - DISCOUNT PRICE</b></a><br />
<br />
So don't complain if you've already missed the discount..q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-69397915811774734832011-09-08T04:04:00.000-07:002011-09-08T04:04:21.970-07:00Twitter MarketingOne of my sites has a MASSIVE number of followers on Twitter.<br />
I've decided to try and leverage these followers by sending them the occasional affiliate advert. All I need to do is create a post about it, containing the appropriate link, and it will get tweeted via feedburner.<br />
That's not instantaneous though, so I've re-installed Twitter Tools* so that I can post immediately to Twitter when I create the post. The post will then get re-tweeted slightly differently when feedburner picks it up.<br />
Anyone subscribing to RSS or e-mail via feedburner will also receive the adverts.. Result.<br />
<br />
I've also added a Twitter box on the homepage, which displays the website's last few Tweets.. and users can Tweet from there as well..<br />
<br />
The first advert going out is for <a href="http://www.unlimitedwebhosting.co.uk/portal/aff.php?aff=005"><b>Unlimited Web Hosting</b></a>, who host ALL of my sites. I REALLY rate them highly, so I have no qualms about recommending them.<br />
<br />
* Not as easy as it sounds - I had to register as a Twitter developer, create a Twitter Application for the website, and go through the authentication process to make it work..q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-71157651100551597572011-09-01T08:27:00.000-07:002011-09-01T08:27:49.004-07:00Cache IssuesDue to abysmal page load times, and the "that module is evil" comment from unlimited support, I have removed wp_super_cache from supercars-for-sale.com, and replaced it with "quick_cache".<br />
<br />
No issues so far, other than a clash with the contact form plugin. So I've replaced that with the very stylish "contact_me" plugin.<br />
This includes a complete CRM system (contactme.com).. Not sure if I need that, but hey..<br />
<br />
Anyway, the page load time is now VERY fast. <br />
I've also removed a load of deactivated plugins, just in case..<br />
<br />
Gotta get this right, I'm expecting my first PAID ads for this site VERY soon..<br />
q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-27832996682958659232011-08-30T07:29:00.000-07:002011-08-30T07:29:20.994-07:00Advertising UpdateWe have ONE advertising renewal due, TWO new prospective clients via the same agency, another client or two via ANOTHER agency, and even a guest blogger!<br />
Mayhem!q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8986542231318073573.post-84917610432353530542011-08-30T07:21:00.000-07:002011-08-30T07:21:17.487-07:00All sorts of problemsCame back from holidays to find three sites down!<br />
a SWIFT E-MAIL TO UNLIMITED support, and it turns out that all three had been suspended for hogging the server last Thursday. Sites re-enabled, and tracing switched on. We'll see what's going on..<br />
RSS feeds don't seem to be getting updates properly, either. I've manually updated the feeds this morning. The two issues may be related. (eBay RSS feeds..)<br />
<br />
q292uhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15819112222747452567noreply@blogger.com0