Posted: August 25th, 2009 | Author: Akmal
While WordPress 2.8.4 is the most secure version of WordPress up to date, it is always a good idea to implement other measures to tighten up security to the fullest. Previous versions of WordPress suffered from severe security vulnerabilities, see this for example and this, but they are all patched in the latest version.
The best way to protect your WordPress admin panel is to restrict it to be only accesible to certain IP addresses. Ideally your home and work IP address. You can do that by placing a .htaccess restriction in your wp-admin folder. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted: August 23rd, 2009 | Author: Akmal
WordPress released the latest update (2.8.4) a couple of days ago and it is one of the most important upgrades you need to do.
Earlier versions of WordPress (2.8.0 to 2.8.3) have a major security issue which allows every person with some PHP knowledge to hack your WP Admin password. Full info can be found here.
I personally update my version of WordPress whenever an upgrade is available. The best thing is that WordPress automates the whole process, so I basically backup my database and upgrade it automatically from my admin control panel.
While some users don’t bother upgrading, most of them don’t bother reading the explanation for the latest patch in the development blog as Prelovac notes. I don’t do it either, I just upgrade.
Go ahead and upgrade your WordPress to the latest version if you have not done so already.
Posted: August 19th, 2009 | Author: Akmal
Update: Wow! to be completely honest, I actually never noticed this until I hit publish and visited Retweet.com. So when I have already done it, then why not enter? I am no longer a participant.
Retweet.com which just launched today afternoon is a direct competitor to a popular digg-like site based on retweets TweetMeme. Even though it’s a total rip off (because it is just a copy of TweetMeme), I still like it better than TweetMeme and I don’t know why. So I decided to add the “Retweet” button which is exactly the same as the TweetMeme retween button to my blog posts. Update2: I have replaced the Retweet button with TweetMeme’s button.
Since I use the best WordPress theme: Thesis. I will show you how to use thesis hooks to add the retweet button to your blog posts. This method is exactly the same if you want to add a Digg or TweetMeme button.
The beauty of hooks if you are not familiar with them is that you can customize your theme without touching any back end code, so when you upgrade to a newer version of the theme, you don’t have to worry about losing any customizations you have made. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted: August 18th, 2009 | Author: Akmal
While majority of your site’s traffic might be using normal web browsers, there is quite a chunk of users who use mobile web browsers. The majority of mobile users are typically from iPhone and other smart phones with enhanced browsers such as Blackberries.
MobilePress is a free WordPress plugin that will automatically make a mobile friendly version of your site and make your mobile web browser users happy.
While there are tons of other ways you can achieve the exact same goal, but the beauty of this plugin is that it is completely automated. You basically activate plugin, fill in your site title and tagline, choose a theme and you are done.
You can see some additional functions in the screenshot above, like the ability to treat a specific mobile web browser as a normal web browser where your site would look the same way as it looks in a computer web browser.
Download MobilePress.
Posted: July 23rd, 2009 | Author: Akmal
One portion of websites that significantly affects the overall load time of a page is javascript code. Web browsers such as Firefox 3.5 and Safari 4 are paying major attention to enhance the javascript loading engines for faster user experience.
Moving all of the properly configured javascript code to the footer of a page can really enhance the page load time. Why?
When a browser loads a page, it loads the frames in a chronological order. Meaning the header (top of the page) loads first and then the rest of the page; so it is a good idea to move all the javascript code to the footer. Thats because if the code is located in the header, the browser will load it first before other page elements such as html, css and images show up.
The page will load at the same amount of time but the user will have the impression of  the page loading faster as the relevant visual elements show up first. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted: July 23rd, 2009 | Author: Akmal
You know what’s very annoying? having to go to your site’s admin panel in order to fix a tiny mistake or updating a post with a one line sentence.
I am pretty sure you have been in the situation where you had to go back to edit your posts from the admin panel after you published it. The reasons are numerous; in my case it is very usual to make spelling mistakes.
I have always wanted to have the ability of editing my site’s content specifically published posts with some sort of maybe ajax powered plugin for faster speeds, but never came across one.
Today I will be sharing with you a free WordPress plugin that does exactly what I described above.
Front-end Editor is a free ajax powered WP plugin (very fast and convenient) that lets you edit your posts, pages, comments and sidebar widgets right from your site interface without having to go to your admin panel. It saves you a huge amount of time! Read the rest of this entry »
Posted: June 28th, 2009 | Author: Akmal
Just wanted to do a quick update on a cool website I found that will help you check your text documents for any grammar or spelling mistakes. It is specially very helpful when you are doing a class project or an assignment and want to check for any errors, because in my experience the typical word processing softwares such as Microsoft Word are not always capable of pulling some mistakes. Or at least you don’t always have those softwares.
PolishMyWriting is a demonstration of AfterTheDeadline technology (technically a “better writing” software for different platforms) where you can just copy and paste your document or compose your own by typing into the text box provided and check your writing. Any spelling errors are highlighted in red, grammar suggestions in green and styling suggestion in blue.
Also, AfterTheDeadline has a free WordPress plugin that will help you improve your writing by checking for contextual spellings, grammar and advanced styling.
Pretty cool stuff! Thumbs up to the creators.