Monthly Archives: August 2009

Using Flickr for your WordPress blog

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If you have a fair number of photos on your blog, you might want to store them on Flickr and use a plugin to integrate them with your blog. Why would you want to do that? Well, first of all Flickr provides free online storage for your photos (unless you go for a premium account), and also offers a pretty comprehensive way to sort, order and manage your photos.

So, how do you go about integrating them with your WordPress blog? Well, there are a number of plugins that let you do this, including Flickr Gallery to pick an example. This plugin lets you use shortcodes to embed photos and galleries from Flickr right into your blog posts.

Now that’s pretty powerful isn’t it?

WordPress v2.8.4

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Hot on the heels of the latest version of WordPress comes a new version with another security hole fixed. This wasn’t a major one, just an annoyance that lets a malicious user keep reseting a particular user’s password. It wouldn’t let them get into the blog, but it could be used to keep harassing a user (Now if someone chases you to sell low cost term life insurance and they have a WordPress blog, you know how to annoy them).

Anyway, the new release blocks the whole and helps WordPress be a little bit more secure than before, so go ahead and download it.

Meet other WordPress users

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Are you interested in meeting other WordPress users? If so, here are some opportunities, events called WordCamps, meetups by people passionate about WordPress for similar like minded individuals. I’m not saying you won’t find people you can talk to about car accessories, but the main topic of conversation will be WordPress. Here are some dates and places:

WordCamp New Zealand: Wellington, New Zealand, August 8-9, 2009

WordCamp Huntsville: Huntsville, Alabama, USA, August 15–16, 2009

WordCamp Los Angeles: Los Angeles, California, USA, September 12, 2009

WordCamp Philippines: Makati City, Philippines, September 19, 2009

WordCamp Portland: Portland, Oregon, USA, September 19-20, 2009 (Last year’s PDX WordCamp was awesome, IMO.)

WordCamp Seattle: Seattle, Washington, USA, September 26, 2009

WordCamp Birmingham: Birmingham, Alabama, USA, September 26-27, 2009

WordCamp Netherlands: Utrecht, Netherlands, October 31, 2009

WordCamp NYC: New York, New York, USA, November 14-15, 2009 (Logo contest in progress!)

WordCamp Mexico: Mexico City, Mexico, November 20, 2009

Check them out and see if you can go to any of them.

Looking to learn about WordPress?

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Are you a brand new WordPress user wanting to learn how it works? Have you been using WordPress for some time but want to spruce up what you know? If so, there’s a great collection of articles you need to check out at the WordPress Lessons page on the Codex.

There’s a massive list of different resources, ranging from “Introduction to Blogging” all the way to “Search Engine Optimisation for WordPress”. It’s an interesting place to start learning about WordPress, especially if there are a number of questions you need answered. As you can expect, it’s not questions about winning lottery number or which light fixtures to use that I’m talking about, but if it’s a WordPress one you’re after, this can definitely help.

The essential Top 10 WordPress Plugin guide

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Have you ever wondering what plugins you should be using on your blog? Well, a number of people have taken the trouble to compile Top 10 lists of what they thing are the best plugins. Here’s a collection of different articles designed to point you in the right direction. Check them out:

Interesting collection I thought and better reading than the instructions on the back of a box of the best fat burners you can find. So go forth, read the Top 10 guides and try out some new plugins today.

WordPress 2.8.3

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Hot on the heels of WordPress 2.8.2 comes WordPress 2.8.3. It has a collection of security fixes which had been missed on the initial security release. Sometimes it feels like a product is being chased by one of those Tennessee injury lawyers, they try to get out a bit too quickly, and miss some of the important points.

Anyway, as they’re security fixes, it makes sense to try and upgrade as soon as possible. The great thing is that with the inbuilt upgrade facility, it’s just a doddle to do. Read about WordPress 2.8.3 here.

What’s coming in WordPress 2.9

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An interesting point on the WordPress blog talks about what WordPress users want to see in version 2.9. The requests came in through a survey that users were invited to answer to allow the development team to prioritise what features they wanted to see in the next version of WordPress. There are some nice new features in there, with a lot of people voting for Media Albums and lots of people wanting to see the media features implemented in the WordPress core as opposed to a separate plugin.

Personally I’m a bit reluctant to see the core getting heavier with functionality that won’t be used by everyone, but gauging by the amount of people wanting these media features maybe that’s the best place to put them. I mean, a blog about free online auctions would probably use media quite intensively, but one talking about grammatical nuances of the English language probably wouldn’t. Still, happy to go with the majority on this one. Go crowd!