While getting my site back up and functioning after the weird bug I couldn’t fix I upgraded my WordPress installation to 2.6. You probably won’t notice anything on the outside, but the new version gives me a lot more control in the admin area, and adds a whole bunch of new features.
One that I’m incredibly excited about is versioning - basically put anytime you edit a post or page, WordPress now saves a copy of the old one for you to go back to should you realize you made a mistake - it’s just one thing that brings it closer to a true, fully-functioning CMS.
I won’t re-iterate all of the changes in this new version - Matt of Automatic did a great job of that in the WordPress Development Blog 2.6 announcement post - go have a read to learn all about the fantastic new editions and upgrades to your favorite blogging platform.
The announcement post also included a great video for your viewing, and learning, pleasure:
Meanwhile I’m still tackling some issues for this site. Like a working contact form and figuring out why Twitter Tools isn’t working in 2.6, but that will come in time. Now I have paying work to get to.
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You may have noticed that this website has been acting all kinds of funky lately. I don’t know if it started when I upgraded to WordPress 2.6 or if it was happening sooner, but what I do know is the homepage failed to load and in its place was the articles page. I looked at it for a few days, had the support desk at Dreamhost look at and neither of us could figure it out. I made a note that when I had some free time I’d look at it further and figure out what was going on. Well, instead of looking into it some more, I decided to delete all the files from the server and start fresh - well sort of.
I keep backups of all my posts and pages, thanks to the WordPress Database Backup plugin and I was able to extract the tables for my pages and posts and lose everything else. After an hour or so uploading files and testing to make sure everything looked ok I’m more or less back to where I was a week or so ago. I never have been big on backing up files, partly because I hate to do it and with the WordPress Database Backup plugin I don’t have to - it runs once a week and emails the SQL file of my database tables. It couldn’t be simpler and I couldn’t be more happy.
There are a few things that need fixed (like the contact form below) but for the most part I’m back up to where I need to be and I like it like that.
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This site, like many other WordPress site, makes use of several plugins to extend the default functionality and I thought that I’d share what I use and why so that others could potentially discover new ones. Hopefully, if you’re using WordPress you’ll share with me what plugins you use.
- 404 Notifier
Can email me when someone gets a 404 error, either by coming across a bad or old link. It also creates an RSS Feed of the 404’s that I’ve subscribed to, instead of getting the emails.
- Akismet
Comes with WordPress in the default install and is vital to any site uses the blog feature of WordPress.
- cforms
A very nice AJAX contact form that I’m using in the footer. It hides my email address from spammers and creates a record of the submission in WordPress so that even if I lose the email, I can still find out who contacted me.
- Edit Comments XT
This ones is self-explanatory, it allows users to edit their comments for a limited number of minutes after posting.
- Flickr Widget
I’m using this widget to display the 4 last photos I uploaded to flickr on my homepage.
- Gravatar
Adds the globally recognized avatar functionality to my site, so that users can comment with their own avatar
- Live Comment Preview
Again, self-explanatory, lets the user see how his comment will look before he/she posts it. Check it out below.
- No Self Pings
I’ve never used this one before but WordPress 2.5 will ping itself, creating pingbacks in its own posts. This plugin disables this functionality.
- Search Pages
Allows WordPress’ default search to also search pages.
- ShareThis
This plugin adds the ShareThis functionality to all my articles.
- ThickBox 3 Plugin
Makes it insanely easy to add thickbox functionality to any post - mostly used in the portfolio section
- Twitter Tools
This plugin is what runs the last twitter update in the footer as well sends a new ‘tweet’ everytime I write a new article.
- WicketPixie Source Manager
This plugin came with the WicketPixie theme by Matt Brett and Chris Pirillo. The source manager, in combination with other code is what is responsible for the Social Me page.
- Wordpress Automatic Upgrade
This plugin is so awesome, I wrote a full article about it
- WordPress Database Backup
Backing up the WP database is important and this plugin handles it for you automatically - emailing you when it’s ran and lets you download the latest backup, should something go wrong
- wp-Table
Adds some pretty cool table creation functionality to WordPress - something which is sorely needed.
- WP Since Last Visit
I’m not using the plugin to its full potential at the moment but it lets you tell a user what’s new since they last visited.
- WPtouch iPhone Theme
This plugin will override an active WP theme if someone is using an iPhone to visit your site, giving them larger buttons and easier navigation to all of your articles.
- WYSIWYG Text Widget
This doesn’t yet work in 2.5.1, but I’m hoping the author updates it soon as I think this is something WordPress desperately needs - especially for people who need to use widgets but don’t know html
Again if you’re some that I’ve not listed, please leave a comment below, I’m constantly amazed at what the community is able to do to push WordPress to new and better heights.
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I’ve been using WordPress since 1.5 and I always hated upgrading plugins and WordPress itself because you have to go out a site, find the file, download it, upload it to your webhost, and if you’re upgrading a plugin, you have to go and reactivate it. If you’re upgrading WordPress, then it’s even a worse experience, you have to rebuild the WP database and then your site is live again. The whole process just sucked, took far too long and was too painful for my tastes.
Luckily for me, WordPres 2.5 started letting you automatically upgrade most (I’m not 100% it works on all plugins) installed plugins. Just click the link, it goes out to find the new version, installs it and reactivates it all while you sit and watch. A lot of people will argue with me, but I think it might just be the best feature in WordPress 2.5.
Now that I’ve been working in 2.5 for a few months I’ve started wonder why the developers didn’t implement that same type of experience for upgrading WordPress itself. I think having a link you can click to upgrade the WordPress install - instead of forcing me to go out to the site and grab the file - is a much better solution. Clearly they thought about it when it came to the plugins, but not the system. If only someone would create a plugin that did this very thing!
Someone has
This is the thing that I love about WordPress, the community keeps coming up with ways to push the system, add functionality and create something better than any teams of developers could on their own. The plugin, the appropriately titled “Wordpress Automatic Upgrade Plugin” was created by Techie Buzz years ago. Apparently, I just have a hard time keeping up. I just used it to upgrade from 2.5 to 2.5.1 and it was painless - it even backs up my database and installation files and lets me download them before making any changes, which is just genius.
We all have a favourite plugins, but this one just made it to the top of my list.
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Well, that didn’t work, let’s try it again
I relaunched this site earlier this year mainly to have a place to show my work of the past three years, but also in the hopes that it would trigger me to write more. Partially because the format I chose was very restricting and while it wasn’t obvious to begin with it became apparent to me the more stuff I added to it. That frustrated me and that frustration led to me not wanting to do anything with it. In the months that followed it languished and eventually I stopped posting anything there - including new work.
A Return to Form
So I’ve spent the past week or so putting together this new WordPress theme which is a return to the grid based layouts of my websites past. To keep things simple I made it a pretty basic grid with 8 columns plus a little more for padding on the sides - it’s probably not a true grid, but it’s close enough for me that I’m ok with the minute differences. This gives me room to play with the layout on different pages (see the Portfolio section vs. a Portfolio entry) and it also gives me room to grow as I add more things to the site.
Not only is this theme a return to previous design forms, but with copious amounts of help from Chris Pirillo and Matt Brett, in the form of the Social Me functionality, it’s also a return to sharing social media. I’ve been using del.icio.us, flickr, digg and last.fm for what seems like forever and with ‘new’ services like twitter, jaiku, plurk, brightkite and others I’ve got a lot of stuff to share that I just haven’t been. So this theme takes full advantage of Social Me and allows me to put any feed from any service anywhere I want so no matter what page you’re on you’ll see what I’m up to and if you want to follow/friend me, there are links to all of my services in the footer and if you don’t want to follow me then just periodically check out my Social Me page where you can see everything that I’m doing on the web, in one handy place.
With this theme, everything you see is a post within the WordPress system so if you subscribe to this site’s RSS feed you can see when I post a new article or new portfolio project which means that if you see an article or a portfolio project that you really like/hate, you can leave a comment and tell me what you think. It also means that it’s super easy to update, which is important because I know myself - if it’s not easy to update and make it work then I’ll push it off and it’ll never happen.
I also paid extra attention to the homepage - one area that I feel was lacking with the old site. You’ll also notice that it features the last portfolio project I added, plus my four most recent flickr photos, links to my last articles, tweets and delicious links so even from there it’s easy to see what’s going on and the most important social stuff is always in the footer, so no matter where you go on the site, you can see what’s going on.
Bugs and Business
There are still some bugs I still need to squash around here so if you notice anything out of place, don’t worry I’ll find them, kill them and their children. Anyway, that’s the end of this quick little tour, if you’d like to leave a comment, I love hearing from people so please, comment away!
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I have been playing with the Spore Creature Creator the past couple of days and have developed a small, weird hobby - creating creatures that look like type, see my latest creation “Y”.
The infinite options in creating a creature has led to some really interesting creations.
What you been creating?
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I had a really long discussion with Ash the other day about job hunting and finding that perfect job. She recounted a discussion she had had with a co-worker who had just left and that he told her that as soon as he met his new employer and walked into the company, he knew it was where he was meant to be, that he had finally found his “Dream Job”. He said he was so happy to know that he was walking into a place where could do what he always wanted to do. We talked some more about what her “Dream Job” would be and it over the course of dinner I realized that I am a very lucky guy. Not only do I have a great wife and partner, but I don’t have to constantly be looking for that perfect job, because I do it every day. Ironically enough I accidentally fell into graphic design, it was just not something that I ever thought about.
Let me back up a bit, when I entered college I knew - KNEW - I wanted to be a computer science major. I really liked computers had been working on them ( Commodore 64, Early Apples, etc) since Junior High writing very tiny programs and in High School designing the yearbook. So, I was convinced that CS was my path - until I failed out of my first CS class, ADA 101.
I realized then, after miserably failing almost every assignment, that I would never be a Computer Scientist or Engineer so I searched for a new major and Information Management seemed to fit the bill. In the meantime I got a job working at the faculty computer resource center where I did created websites and flash movies, forms and quizes as well as presentations for the resource center set to thumping techo. When Information Management didn’t pan out and my ‘career counselor’ wasn’t helping I talked to my boss at the resource center, who suggested that graphic design might better suit me and it was at that moment that I set out on what would become my dream job.
When I graduated from WVU, unlike my wife, I knew what I wanted to be - what I already was - a web designer/developer and I never realized it before but I was very lucky to know that as some people struggle with that problem most of their lives. I do my dream job every day, I get to work on the internet and hopefully help to make it better, more usable, and make it look nice. Unlike most other people my dream job isn’t dependant on a company or organization as long as I’m elbow deep troubleshooting code or getting my fingers messy in Photoshop, I’m happy.
And sure, the environment I do these things in matters as well as all the ‘other stuff’, but in the end if I’m allowed to make great-looking websites with clean, validating code, then I’m happy. So yea, I’m pretty lucky and I just wanted to acknowledge and document that I get it now.
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I have a tiny little 2g iPod Shuffle, the one with the little clip, and I wear it everywhere. Sometimes while I’m at work, the music helps me focus on what I’m doing vs. what’s going on in the office but the volume is low enough I can hear co-workers who are asking questions - most of the time, at least.
I regularly change out my playlist either picking the songs I want to hear or sometimes using the Autofill function. Most of the time my iPod will, as if by magic, play songs that I was thinking of or fit what was going on around me or in my mind. I love this about my iPod, it’s one of the reasons why I wear it a lot.
However, something happened today to make me rethink my feelings about my iPod. I had just gotten up to visit the facilities and Bill Medley’s Beautiful started playing, the soft piano intro seemed to add some unneeded drama to the moment. I got to the bathroom and pressed skip - I didn’t need some guy singing about beautiful things while I was standing at the urinal - and the next song was Greensleeves by the Vince Guaraldi Trio.
How could my iPod play Bright Eyes’ When the President Talks to God while I was waiting for a Iraq War protest to pass so I could cross the street, Monkey Gone To Heaven by The Pixies as I walked past the Scientology building in Dupont, and Flashing Lights by Kayne West right when I needed a boost on the treadmill and then play these songs at the most horribly awkward moment?
I just don’t get it.
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My co-workers and I were talking about Content Management Systems today and the conversation focused mainly on the fact that they were frustrated with how difficult it is to develop for Drupal. We’ve had this discussion many times over and WordPress gets brought up most of the time comparing it to Drupal and to the other CMS we use, Adobe Contribute.
There are a few problems with WordPress when it comes to using it as a development platform for our clients:
- the lack of customization on a page level - adding different things in the sidebar for specific pages
- page management - how easy is WordPress to use when you have 150 pages in it?
- the lack of html table controls in the wysiwyg
The first two are still unknowns, but if you have any info that I can use, please leave a comment and I’ll be in touch. The last one, the lack of html table controls in the wysiwyg, has always been a problem as well but I took about 3 hours today and finally found two methods of getting html table controls into WordPress.
The first, Alex Rabe’s wp-table plugin is actually a pretty nice plugin and while it doesn’t add table controls to the wysiwyg, it gives you a separate area under “Manage” to create, import and edit tables and lets you call the table in any page or post by adding the tag “[TABLE=id]” where id is the id of the table. This would be really good for data tables and tables where no images are needed but in terms of a table control that a client could use to separate content from an image or any other need, this doesn’t really cut it.
The second method, which I found on hm2k.com is actually modifying WordPress’ default TinyCME install. TinyCME does support tables and has table controls available via a plugin - you just need to have that plugin installed and included in the tinymce configuration file. The result is table controls that are built right into WordPress’ wysiwyg and because they’re from TinyCME and pretty standard, any client - once they’re shown the new buttons - could use them to create any layout they want.
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Am I the only person that upon realizing that we’re out of syrup, finds a recipe and makes his own? Ash thought it was incredible that I had made syrup - actually I was surprised it actually turned out good. So I started thinking about why I attempt some of the more crazy things I’ve baked or cooked and I think I’ve come to some conclusion.
I have quite a bit of kitchen knowledge, I’ve been cooking and baking for years so when I read directions in a cookbook or recipe, I can at least understand what I’m supposed to do. I also utilize the power of google to help me out in case I don’t know how to do something or need a substitute for baking powder (varying amounts of baking soda, cream of tartar and cornstarch). So with my knowledge and google’s knowledge, I feel comfortable attempting something like making syrup or Orange French Toast and I know going in that sometimes it won’t work out and the food or meal will be horrible, but sometimes it’s fantastic.
In short, I’m not afraid to fail in the kitchen. It’s just one of those things it either works or it doesn’t and if it doesn’t you can analyze it and figure out why it doesn’t
This recipe btw, was very good. I didn’t have any maple flavouring so I used vanilla instead and doubled it to get a good vanilla flavour.
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