Van Santos

I very well may have missed the news in the last few days, but I was surprised to see that Wordpress 2.8 was released by Wordpress.org.  I knew the next version was on the way, I just didn’t know it was this soon.

So, why upgrade?

Having not yet moved through the upgrade process, wordpress 2.8 is said to:

• be faster due to scripting changes
• have theme installation process improvement
• include a widget interface redesign (good, as I felt the last version was subpar)

There are also a number (by number, I mean 180) new features included.  Ones that really seem of interest to me are:

• Separate Comments into a separate postbox, from Discussion postbox, on the Edit Post screen
• Allow the dashboard widgets to be arranged in up to four columns
• Allow editing of all plugin files (Woo hoo!)
• Autosave post/page when pressing Control/Command+S
• Give login screen proper iPhone viewport

I’m interested to do the upgrade as the potential increase in speed/usability could be very beneficial, especially if the scripting cut down on processing power.  More notes to come…

One thing bloggers and developers want to know is how traffic flows through their site and there could be for a number of reasons for wanting such information.  Is a  new design is working as intended?  Are headlines written in such a way that they illicit interest for your readers?  Why do people “bounce” away from the site?  These are all potential things a blogger would want to know about their site.

Some web stats programs have the ability to provide this information on a limited basis, but very view options are available to bloggers that show the exact path – especially for Wordpress users – so here is one for the Wordpress Community to investigate:  clickstats

clikStats is a plugin that automatically detects the current links within each post and compiles the who,what and when data (of each click) and provides an overview to the publish through his or her dashboard.

A sweet tool for anyone who wants to understand what is/isn’t working on their blog.

Time for another batch of potentially useful Wordpress plugins that are new to the community.  I am currently testing the following items, and have had no major issues thus far, but I cannot yet fully state they are 100% stable.

That out of the way, let’s get to it.

Phpinclude

If you are a PHP developer, I’m guessing you have had the urge to execute code in Wordpress at one point or another.  You can user an iFrame and call your PHP code but that can get a bit… well, it can be a pain to do so over and over.  While other plugins have attempted to execute PHP in the past, they never seemed to work properly – not that they were bad – they just never work right all of the time.  

Enter phpinclude.  

Thus far the plugin has performed flawlessly, and I may finally be able to successfully include PHP into the blog.

WP Post Styling 

This is a very interesting concept, one that I was interested in doing myself, but Joe Dolson got there before I did.  This plugin allows users to add custom styles to be applied to specific pages or posts.  Sweet idea and good execution.

Check them out, give them a try and thank the creators for their efforts.

Last week I wrote about a new service called Twitblogs – essentially a service for Microbloggers that allows posts longer than Twitters 140 character limit.

I had two issue with the service – 1) Why not simply blog, 2) The involvement a person who has what I would consider a questionable background.  

Roger, a member of the Twitblog team contacted me regarding my second point. Sam Sethi, the individual who I was concerned about, has no direct involvement in the technical aspects of the operation.  Furthemore, there is absolutely no password storage of any kind.

While I not sure I see the point of the service – if you want to write more than 140 characters, why don’t you simply blog – I do now feel better about giving TwitBlogs a try.  

I wanted to say thank you to Roger for reaching out to me to address my concerns.

Update: Blogherald wonders some of the same things I did as well…

Wikinvest, an investment website run by “everyday” investors, has created a plugin for blogs that focus on financial information – the Wikinvest Stock Quotes Plugin.  

The plugin will search your post for keywords and suggest potential stock quotes you may want to include in your posts.  For those worried that the plugin will have a mind of its own, fear not, as the plugin does not include any information without your confirmation before the post goes live.

The one thing I do not care for is how the plugin will link back to the Wikinvest site in order to be “a resource of good quality and free content for your readers”  What they are really saying is the Plugin is a way for Wikinvest to create new sources of traffic.

It should would be nice if they had an option to turn that “feature” off.

Unfortunately I have no way of testing the plugin at this point.  When I try to download the file from Wikinvest I obtain an error. Makes me wonder what to expect of the service moving forward…

Just when I gave up hope on finding a Wordpress template that would meet my needs, one came along that was interesting. I tried it but it sitll doesn’t work for me  (not that it’s bad, it actually looks very clean.  

Anyway, developer Arcsin, release a new theme that is worth looking at if you like basic two-column designs.

Here you go - it’s called Emplode.

Quick question for StatsPress Reloaded users - do you find the plugin slows down/chews up CPU power if your log file get’s too large?

As the site contiunes to grow it seems the StatPress Reloaded plugin slows down significantly…

Developers are always releasing new plugins for Wordpress.  As the blogging platform is “alive”, it’s always interesting to see what is hitting the community.  Here are some of the newest, most promising, plugins I’ve found in the last few days.

AutoSuggest Searches

You know how you go to Google and start typing in the search box and suggestions drop down, allowing you to pick from a list of potential results?  Bingo. That is exactly what you have here for your site.  

WordPress Video Solution Framework

Developed by Automattic, the group behind Wordpress, this is a solid release.  This plugin provides a video framework, including a transcoder and  and administration screen.  Note that a significant amount of configuration is required, so if you are not a “technical” person you may want to stay way

Google Custom Search Plugin for Wordpress

Now this is promising (and MUCH needed).  One reason I do not have a search function on the site is due to the poor performance of the built-in search feature.  Wordpress is a blog platform, not a search platform, so why would the development team spend huge amounts of time developing search functionality? Well, this plugin removes the old search and utilizes Google to provide search results to your readers!

I haven’t tested any of these extensions as of yet, so be warned, you may be getting a product that is less than perfect.  From what I’ve see and read, however, they really look to have promise.

Much like the Wordpress templates and plugins sites there a large number of Wordpress News websites available.  Frankly, most of them are spam sites simply attempting to capitalize on the brand name.  People throw up a blog, include AdSense, and link to a bunch of other sites that simply mentioned the term Wordpress in the hopes of having search engine traffic blindly clicking on their ads.

Let’s cut through the junk – here are the Top 4 Wordpress News Sources I utilize.

Planet Wordpress

This is the defacto source of news for all things Wordpress, but it’s not a blog – it’s a blog aggregator.  It collects feeds from publishers around the web and centralize all the information into one giant feed of nothing but the highest quality information.

Weblog Tools Collection

Original content, dedicated writing staff, and additional blogging information makes Weblog Tools Collection a must see on a daily basis.  They usually have some of the freshest news available.   

Wordpress Publishers Blog

Another site run by the Automattic crew – their focus is on making sure publishers get the most out of the Wordpress experience.  One cool thing they do is highlight unique sites that utilize Wordpress.  

WordCast PodCast

Let’s face it, sometimes you are just lazy.  You don’t want to read.  There is nothing wrong if it, I get you, I get the same way.  A weekly podcast informs you of the latest plugins, themes and news related to Wordpress.

Add the sites to your reader, check them daily and enjoy.

In business, if one puts out a great product I think it is safe to say the chances for success go up.  That is not to say an organization will be successful simply because they put out the best of the best, and there are a number of pure crap products that have hit the market and managed to be successful, but having a great product is a solid differentiator.

Another catalyst for success is the community that supports the product.  

I am not strictly talking about the “consumer” but the hardcore support and believer in what is being marketed.  These are the people who create communities around a product.  Think about Apple and how dedicated the core user base is - there are forums discussing the products and developers create applications that are distributed to improve performance, all of which helps create a sense of excitement for what apple is putting out.

Then there are exceptional organizations that take it one step further – direct community involvement in development and wordpress.org is one such organization.

During the Wordpress 2.7 development process a contest was held, Project Icon, that asked designers to submit custom icons for the 2.7 admin interface, and then the user community was then asked to vote for the icon set that they felt most suitable for Wordpress 2.7.  

How cool is that? 

While having a superior product is one thing, the organizations that allow the “consumers” to impact future of the product – developers, artists, testing, users feedback that is listened to – only strengthens the image and future of the brand.

Nice job Wordpress!