Category Archive
The following is a list of all entries from the wordpress category. Noteworthy entries are filed topmost.
useful Wordpress links
Chiperoni has put together some useful Wordpress links. In case you need an overview on blogging have a look.
Wordpress Multiuser 1.0
Hi Folks, zungu.NET is running the new Version1.0 of WPMU. The upgrade was smooth and I hope every things is fine. Widgets are up and running. Feel free to get yourself a blog. In case you want a special theme installed check out the themeviewer and send me your request. As soon as I have time I will give it a try and let you know if it works fine.
Wordpress Multiuser Version 1 RC1
Wordpress Multiuser just released the first realease candidate of Version 1. Donncha of the Wordpress.com developers prepared the downloads [tar.gz, zip]. WPMU users are encouraged to post their feedback and create trouble-tickes in case of problems.
WPMU, the software zungu.net runs on, enables to provide multiple blogs based on a single installation. I am very excited about that and will install the release asap. If the system runs smoothly, I will update zungu.NET of course.
how to deal with spam on zungu.NET
Spam is well known to most people when it comes to email. Sadly not only mailboxes are filled with spam, also weblogs get polluted with comment spam. Some special software called “spam-crawlers” publish comments on the posts. Sometimes the comment “Wow, what a great blog” seems to be from a friendly person that found your blog, but if you have a look at the links posted you’ll find some site offering credits, mortgages, casinos, drugs and so on.
Fight Spam in your blog.
The Blogs on zungu.NET have the Askimet-Plugin installed. (Actually all wordpress blogs come with that plugin). Once activated, it filteres all comments and catches most spam comments. So you’ll just have to check the spam-comments once in a while and delete them.
Activate the Plugin
Login to your weblog (e.g. via zungu.NET) and navigate to Plugins. Hit the “Activate”-Button of the Askimet Plugin on the right side. After that you will find a tab “Akismet Configuration” next to the open Plugins Tab.
Get a API-Key
In order to activate Askimet you will need a Wordpress.com API-Key. Signup on wordpress.com. You can choose the option “Just an username, please.” if you only need that API-Key. Doublecheck your emailadress, since the API-Key will be sent there. You will receive an email to activate your new Wordpress.com Username. After you have done that, a second email will contain the Key you need to activate Askimet.
Return to your own Admin-Area of your blog and open that new tab “Plugins/Askimet Configuration” mentioned above. Paste the Api-Key from your email in there and hit the update button. Thats all, you’re done. You will find a new Tab “Askimet Spam” within the Manage-Section. All Spam will be collected there and you can delete it easily.
Sidebar Widgets Plugin released
The folks from wordpress.com have released thier Sidebar-Widgets to the public (wow, thank you!). The widgets come as a plugin and enable wordpress-users to configure their sidebar to their wishes, without touching the code. It will be easy to include or re-arrange recent comments, archives, blogroll, flickr …Â Stats
On m.zung.us I’ve been running wp-shortstat so far, since WP2.0 on a revised Version from here. 30$ for Mint, Shaun Inmans continuing development of shortstat, seemed to be quite much for private use on a single domain. Since JKE questioned me today about an alternative to shortstat, I came accross slimstat, which is based on shortstat as well. Slimstat does not come as a WP-Plugin and can therefor be used for any other Website as well. Sadly I haven’t found a suitable way to use a single installation of it to individually trac different websites. (Any hints?) Maybe I’ll have to put up AWStats on my server after all? I have a google-analytics account, but I am not that happy with it because it offers to many functions I have no interest in and seems to slow down my page sometimes.
my little Wp-tweaks
Curious as I am, I couldn’t wait to update my blog to WordPress 2.0. So end of december 2005 I put up 2.0 and started tweaking for my purpose. For my blog on mzungus I chose regulus 2 theme, originally designed by Binary Moon. I especailly liked the clear layout and the backend funktions of the theme. Since WP 2.0 it is possible to add a configuration page (functions.php) to enable easy individual themesettings, without hacking into the code or editing the stylesheet. Regulus 2 allows the user to choose whether to
- display full posts or excerpts on the homepage,
- show information about the author,
- show the calendar,
- display the meta section,
- display admin options when logged in,
- show the recent post,
- show complete archive
- display multiple categories in the blog roll.
The user can further choose from of a range of header-images and color-schemes.
I found this to be nice enhancements and extended them a little by adding the option to display recent posts beneath the content of the homepage and recent comments. I added my own header image of course and extended the color-schemes.
Recent Comments & Posts:
I decided to solely use smart-unread-comments plugin, since I think it is the easiest way to keep my readers up-to-date. It relies on cookies. Display of recent posts is also included in Regulus Theme, but it is not possible to display recents posts, excluding the first posts that are already displayed on the homepage. Customizable Post Listings Plugin allows to customize that.
Tagging:
I testet the two probably most used tagging plugins, taggerati and ultimate tag warrior UTW. It takes some time to get into, but after some reading I got the stuff going. I settled with UTW, since I peronally felt better with it. The Autor of Taggerati also still has some problems with getting things done for WP2.0.