Plugin allowing you to turn on gravatars for your site. For those which do not know about gravatars - this is icons which are linked to your identity account at the site gravatar.com, thus in your blog you and your users and guests could have their own gravatars
http://skippy.net/gravatars/

five-wordpress-cms-enabling-plugins - really good article on the plugins allowing you to consider wordpress as the real CMS for your site
http://blazenewmedia.com/articles/five-wordpress-cms-enabling-plugins/

Trackbacks
Explanation what is it and how to turn it on for your blog. Very usefull.
http://codex.wordpress.org/Template_Tags/trackback_rdf

PingBack

Pingback lets you notify the author of an article if you link to his article (article on a blog, of course). If the links you include in an article you write on a blog lead to a blog which is pingback-enabled, then the author of that blog gets a notification in the form of a pingback that you linked to his article.

Trackback

Trackback helps you to notify another author that you wrote something related to what he had written on his blog, even if you don’t have an explicit link to his article. This improves the chances of the other author sitting up and noticing that you gave him credit for something, or that you improved upon something he wrote, or something similar. With pingback and trackback, blogs are interconnected. Think of them as the equivalents of acknowledgements and references at the end of an academic paper, or a chapter in a textbook.

How to block or allow Googlebot?
http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=40364&ctx=sibling

Block or remove pages using meta tags
http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=61050&ctx=sibling

Resource devoted to the information on robots.txt file
www.robotstxt.org

How do I add my site to Google’s search results?
http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=34397&ctx=sibling

What’s an SEO? Does Google recommend working with companies that offer to make my site Google-friendly?
http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=35291&ctx=sibling

Google searches more sites more quickly, delivering the most relevant results.
http://www.google.com/technology/index.html

Search_Engine_Optimization_for_Wordpress - “native” wordpress team built article. Great. Outstanding. With lots of references to the very useful plugins. Must read!
http://codex.wordpress.org/Search_Engine_Optimization_for_Wordpress

Have not used this plugin but take a look at the list of its abilities:
1. Edit-in-place
2. Ability to backup write panels and import them
3. Date variables will be sortable via query_posts
4. A powerful query_posts function that will allow you to use FreshPost variables
5. Write panel organization (order of fields/panel)
6. Grouping fields together in the write page
7. A new admin theme for FreshPost
http://freshout.us/goodies/fresh-post-for-wordpress-wordpress-cms/

date-exclusion-wordpress-plugin - may be usefull ig you would like to exclude dates from the wordpress pages. it could be valuable for search engines optimization!
http://www.dailyblogtips.com/date-exclusion-wordpress-plugin/

Mod of wordpress having only functionality for not expirienced editors. Still - there are another plugins allowing you to controll all the abilities of the certain users. Still could be usefull to someone.
http://pixopoint.com/simplecms/

WordPress Trackback Tutorial
http://www.optiniche.com/blog/117/wordpress-trackback-tutorial/
http://faq.wordpress.com/2006/05/11/how-do-i-send-a-trackback/

Sending Pings and Trackbacks
http://www.tamba2.org.uk/wordpress/ping/

Using_Permalinks
http://codex.wordpress.org/Using_Permalinks

permalinks-migration-plugin - could be usefull if you decided to migrate to another permanent links structure, but would like to save the old-style pages accessible for the external resources. Potentionally plugin I would install for zmicer.com to migrate into permanent links style of page links constructing.
http://www.deanlee.cn/wordpress/permalinks-migration-plugin/

tutorial-automatic-sitemap-in-wordpress - three cases is considered. Must to read.
http://www.jimwestergren.com/tutorial-automatic-sitemap-in-wordpress/

seo-for-wordpress-blogs
http://www.jimwestergren.com/seo-for-wordpress-blogs/

SEO optimization
http://www.tomrafteryit.net/search-engine-optimisation-step-1-identification-of-aims/
http://www.tomrafteryit.net/search-engine-optimisation-step-2-benchmarking/
http://www.tomrafteryit.net/search-engine-optimisation-step-3-keyword-and-keyphrase-research/

using-headspace-wordpress-plugin-for-seo -SEO in action.
http://www.webhelpermagazine.com/2007/10/using-headspace-wordpress-plugin-for-seo/

WordPress SEO - The beginner’s guide
http://www.joostdevalk.nl/wordpress-seo/

Today I would provide you with some information related to the choosing of web hosting for your internet resources.

One of my wishes was to have unlimited domains to be managed through the hosting plan.

Still seems to be almost for all the web hosting proposals it is done through domain addons when you just put content of your another side into the separated folder at the main account. Still I decided to try how it is works.

My first idea was to you http://www.webhostingbuzz.com as I saw a link for them from the smashing magazine (smashingmagazine.com), as well as this link proposed anothe price, lower then their standard proposal. The link is as follows (to avoid you to search it at the smashing magazine resource) http://www.webhostingbuzz.com/website-hosting.shtml?host_smashingmagazine-special#.

Still then I decided to read some reviews on the different hostings. And I found lots of negative reviews on them here http://www.vistainter.com/reviews/W/webhostingbuzz.com/. So I decided to search for another web hosting company, as at their native page there were only positive reviews http://www.webhostingbuzz.com/web.shtml?whb_testimonials with very good rates what is very surprising.

What is next: I just found using google the following ratings for the hosting companies:
http://web-hosting-review.toptenreviews.com/
http://www.upperhost.com/
http://www.besthostratings.com/
http://webhostinggeeks.com/
http://www.webhostingjury.com/
http://www.webhostingjudge.com/ju.html

And I have choosen http://www.bluehost.com/. This company was in all the ratings at the top5 positions, and had lots of positive comments. Also I understand that these hosting company could play not very correctly leaving some wrong comments with too optimistic information, still I decided to try.

What I could say for now:
+ normal price. I have choosen to pay for 12 month, and got a price 7.95 instead of 9.95 per month
+ they have cpanel adjusted. E.g. when I added one domain addon - special adjusted wizzard appeared, and it even contains the check on the validity of domain I have choosen to add to the existed account. There were 4 ways to prove I am owner of this domain - JInsights.com. And I like this adjustment.
+ they have 50$ for goodle and yahoo ads programs for free
+ cpanel contains lots of additional scripts like fantastico script allowing to install wordpress and all other stuff by one click.

- it is impossible to pay just for month as it is done at the http://a2hosting.com company - another web hosting company where I have sites hosted. And this is really pitty. They have option to pay for three months, still this option includes 30$ of setup. But for what. All is done automatically. And it is worth of saying - what is fucking setup for 30 dollars, guys? for some seconds of CPU working?

Also I would take a look at the following hosting company - they have very good (unusually) comments and rates
http://www.webhostingjury.com/reviews/Blurstorm

I would spend time and in next posts would talk on the tools/resources allowing you to check the quality of the hosting.

Best regards, dealing with hosting stuff,
Zmicer Harachka

p.s. I found some articles which may be usefull for you. Please have them here:
Purchasing web hosting for your business based on price
The value of a domain name
Web Site Monitoring Service
Creating your own business plan

update: just decided to mention these sites - hosters. I have an account and site at the a2hosting and one of my friends has account at eskhosting. So if you are interested in overview of their quality - just let me know.
http://www.a2hosting.com
http://eskhosting.com
http://www.imhosted.com/

Take care!

Hi, Guys!

This post is bringing to you lots of links and insights on wordpress with the small description for each of them. I was dealing with running new resource on wordpress, updated my knowledge on it, and thus these information was taken and eaten by me. So as it is said in german Guten Appetit!

Themes

100-excellent-free-high-quality-wordpress-themes

http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/01/08/100-excellent-free-high-quality-wordpress-themes/

Great theme I was considering as a candidate for the resource I was setting today
http://test.wpthemesfree.com/?preview_theme=ygo-greenary-10

The magazine-portal style theme. I really love it and advice to be used by your blogs.
http://justintadlock.com/archives/2007/12/09/structure-wordpress-theme

Love them as well! Take an attention to the hemingway theme - really cool!
http://test.wpthemesfree.com/?preview_theme=neat-light
http://test.wpthemesfree.com/?preview_theme=hemingway-019

Plugins

This plugins allows to sett he concrete category posts from which you would see on the homepage (frontpage) of your resource
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/front-page-cats/

This information would be usefull for those which decided to understand how dynamic bars are done, and which options present for you
http://automattic.com/code/widgets/api/

Here you could download plugin for constructing nice contact forms - like it is done here http://zmicer.com/?page_id=143. This page contains lots of documentation so just download it, and go ahead. At least for me it worked from the first time
http://www.dagondesign.com/articles/secure-form-mailer-plugin-for-wordpress/

Post of how to hide pages in wordpress. Firstly I followed its advice, still then found another nice plugin allowing to set checkbox when posting the page. Second link in this section is on that!
http://realiventblog.com/2007/04/04/how-to-hide-pages-in-wordpress/
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/exclude-pages/

Really magazine

article in Russian teaching to migrate wordpress instance/installation to another hosting without troubles with db etc.
http://paradigm.ru/2008/02/26/wp-migration/

Project, integrating wordpress and phpbb. I tried it locally - it works fine. I was impressed by the possibility to migrate and map users from wordpress and the forum in one click. Still I have one question opened - if this would be done automatically when new users would be registered
http://www.wp-united.com/features
And here is an example of what could be done using this software http://www.thepufferforum.com/forum/
Please have a look at the galerie of wp-united site too.

Article on how to enable sending email via wordpress. Extremelly usefull. The third proposed solution really helped me.
http://ebestagent.com/wordpress-your-host-may-have-disabled-the-mail-function-error/

Post on the category templates. Contains really usefull advice on: 1) Excerpts vs. Full Posts at the homepage, 2) What categories do you show to the visitors - means excluding some certain category 3) Text Displaying Only on First Page of Archive 4) displaying category name 5) Static Text Above Posts
http://codex.wordpress.org/Category_Templates

SEO of wordpress using handy plugins. This is second part of article
http://realiventblog.com/2007/03/08/better-seo-for-your-website-using-plugins-and-tags-part-2/

Wordpress Plugins & Tutorials: Your Pick. Including articles

Separate users’ comments and admin’s comments.
Comment Styling in Wordpress and How-to style WordPress author comments. In the default of most themes, all comments look the same. There have been ways of changing the appearance before using plugins and hacks - and this is more of the same. Hopefully though it’ll give you some extra flexibility.
http://www.tamba2.org.uk/wordpress/commentstyling/
http://5thirtyone.com/archives/774

Paginate your articles.
Styling Page-Links. Did you know you could split a single post up into different web pages? Using the Next-Page Quicktag from the Write Post Panel, you can break a single post up into different web pages.
http://codex.wordpress.org/Styling_Page-Links

Use comment highlighting.
Author Comment Highlighting and Author Highlighting Through Theme Options provide information about styling author’s comments.
http://www.nyssajbrown.net/2007/06/19/wordpress-tips-tricks-author-comment-highlighting/
http://www.nyssajbrown.net/2007/06/28/wordpress-tips-tricks-author-highlighting-through-theme-options/

How to create WordPress theme from scratch: a series of 16 articles, which shows how to create WordPress themes from the very beginning to the very end. (Small Potato)
http://www.wpdesigner.com/2007/02/19/so-you-want-to-create-wordpress-themes-huh/

How-to turn visitors into returning visitors: various requisite Wordpress plugins to make visitors feel at ease.
http://blogosquare.com/2007/06/07/how-to-turn-visitors-into-returning-visitors/

The proper way to write code in your blog posts: how to write code in posts so that the blog doesn’t break when displaying them.
http://blogosquare.com/2007/04/21/the-proper-way-to-write-code-in-your-blog-posts/
All that and much more is to be found here
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2007/06/29/wordpress-plugins-tutorials-your-pick/

Not on wordpress, still usefull in this inductry

domain-tools-and-articles-about-domain-names
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2007/06/28/domain-tools-and-articles-about-domain-names/

(X)HTML template systems in PHP
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2006/10/01/html-template-systems-in-php/

Creating A Successful Online Portfolio
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/03/04/creating-a-successful-online-portfolio/

google-adsense-facts-faqs-and-tools
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2007/03/22/google-adsense-facts-faqs-and-tools/

google-pagerank-what-do-we-really-know-about-it
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2007/06/05/google-pagerank-what-do-we-really-know-about-it/

complete-list-of-best-seo-tools
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2006/09/22/complete-list-of-best-seo-tools/

developers-alarm-200-hotkeys-to-boost-your-productivity
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2007/07/20/developers-alarm-200-hotkeys-to-boost-your-productivity/

Hi, Wordpressed people!

Preface
This post would be on my expirience on upgrading WordPress #version 2.0.3 till the latest at this moment, #version 2.3, including all the details I came across during performing this operation. So the audience is word press users, especially wordpress hostings administrators interested in upgrading some old versions of this excellent CMS/blog/publishing system till the up-to-date one.

Part One : why to upgrade WordPress
I have been in the phase of running new blog related project called JBR (appropriate 2.3 version of wordpres for this project is available at http://jbr.zmicer.com). Also I had the 2.0.3 version of wordpress at the http://www.zmicer.com. When firstly taking look at the 2.3 - I was not impressed as did not notice great differences. But my mind was leaded to the right direction when I have installed the QuoteRotator widget and played with the concept of the widgets management wordpress 2.3 provides. Seeing that I decided to migrate my zmicer.com to the up-to-date wordpress software.

Part Two : migration : DB
First of all I look the nice “wordpress-native” article http://codex.wordpress.org/Upgrading_WordPress_Extended on the upgrade operation to be familar with the possible changes etc. But all appeared to be very simple. The first operation was DB backup. I choosed the variant of making backup using phpMyAdmin provided usually by all the php hosting providers. All is done with this item succesfully. The only thing I was very proud to see was the belarussian language localization of phpMyAdmin. Great job, http://extmedia.com!

Surprise! Belarussian language here!

Another ways to make the backup is:
- use “backup on demand” WordPress plugin http://www.skippy.net/blog/plugins/ allowing you to make the backup of all the tables in DB through the standard WordPress admin interface (I checked it under WordPress2.0.3 only, version of plugin is 1.7, and I made the backup of all my mysql DB including phpbb run here http://forum.zmicer.com)
- use ssh client (putty http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/), login to the server and use shell
- use remote ssh commands to make what we need (e.g. excellent winscp open source software http://winscp.net/)

Part Three : migration : previous WordPress 2.0.3 installation backup
The major part of backuping is to determing what to backup and what not. The guide above mentioned provides all the information on this. Then the very important step is not to loose the changes you did at the previous installation’s php/js/css sources. I managed it the following way. Copy all the old installation to my local disk, then get the installation of appropriate version of WordPress, and using Araxis Merge, reviewed the differences. In my case it was native installation of wordpress 2.0.3 and the files I got from my server (changed a little version of 2.0.3, I have not local staging). The following paragraph says a little about what are the changes I had.

Part Four : migration : changes between clean installation of 2.0.3 and wordpress from zmicer.com
The changes I got using Araxis Merge are as follows:
* wp-content\themes\default\images\personalheader.jpg
that lovele picture with my eyes you could see at the zmicer.com header
* wp-content\themes\default\footer.php
cosmetic change - my first/last name, motto of the site placed
* wp-content\themes\default\header.php
the following changes are made:
a. #headerimg { background: url(’?>?>?>/images/personalheader.jpg’) no-repeat top;} //is put the the style to be able use custom header image
b. completely changed sources of the header to be able to contain that slogan at the top of the blog.
<div id="header">
<div id="headerimg">
<!-- some default context was removed here -->
<table width="100%" height="100%">
<tr>
<td height="30%">
<br />
<br />
<div class="description_name_small">
<a href="<?php echo get_settings('home'); ?>/">Працягвай паміраць для мінулага</a>
</div>
<div class="description_name_big">
<a href="http://zmicer.com/?p=63" mce_href="http://zmicer.com/?p=63"><?php bloginfo('name'); ?></a>
</div>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td height="35%"></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>
<div class="description_author">
<?php bloginfo('description'); ?>
</div>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</div>
* wp-content\themes\default\sidebar.php
a. added the following php instruction to show the random page from the galery (lazyest-gallery WordPress plugin http://lazyest.keytwo.net/ )

<?php
if (function_exists(lg_random_image))
lg_random_image("");
?>

b. localizations of the sidebar namings is done (belarussian language is used here)
c. not necessary linkes at the meta are excluded - just site admin to be able to have the simpliciter link to the login page
* wp-content\themes\default\style.css
my styles were introduced to be able to use them when creating posts:
tips

<div class="noteStyle"></div>
<div class="captionStyle"></div>

image with the orange caption

<div class="imageCaption"></div>
<img src="http://zmicer.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/oktober/" mce_src="http://zmicer.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/oktober/"/>


Part Five : migration : funny story on upgrade.php

Removing old not necessary context - following believe WordPress 2.3 contains friendly update functionality and backup was done perfectly!

The rest of activities is very simple. Remove what you do not need. Then ftp the latest version of WordPress. Then apply the changes you got from the previous step (in my case all of them were concerning the changing default scheme). And finally http://example.com/wp-admin/upgrade.php should be invoked. But when I go to this page - saw the message like “the update of DB is done succesfully”. I was really surprized by that and did not know what to think. And it clarified later. One man which was asked by me to take a look at zmicer.com to evaluate it, mailed to me the following: youh! I saw sql exceptions at the zmicer.com home page and decided to help you, running the upgrade php. And I suppose it was done almost at the same minutes I have finished copying new wordpress files to the server:) Imagine that!

At the end of the story some time for spend to adjust the css (in the 2.0.3 there won’t native style class “description”, and I introduced it for my purposes, but at the 2.3 they added another description, and some minutes passed before get the conclusion there is another CSS style class with the same name). So be prepared to some problems like that.

Conclusion
WordPress provides easy to perform procedure of upgrade. Guys try not to change base signatures of the framework, so almost all the plugins work properly (http://codex.wordpress.org/Plugins/Plugin_Compatibility/2.3). I really impressed by the widgets at the 2.3 version. I did not make investigations on what else was added, but know there are tags , advanced WSYWIG editor. Would make another post on that later.

Friends, hope this first post in English was useful for you. Please provide your comments here, or write to HDmitry@gmail.com, or go to zmicer.com! As I do not have expirience in blogging in English - please share your opinion on the style - would be very thankful to you!

Items to be reviewed/clarified as not cleared at this post
- how to automate this process
- have the list of files I have changed at the previous release
- have what to remove and what to leave
- auto download, unpack, replace what is necessary
- auto merge
- auto getting the upgrade page
Please share your ideas on that. Hope it is implemented already!
- is the reliable matrix of compatibility of WordPress plugins exists? I have such a belief it is so!
- make investigation on the best way to make the monthly/weekly/daily/on demand backup of DB - fully automatize this process