WordPress Station

What’s the old saying, “Learn something new every day?” Working on customizing a theme for a client today, I was running into a bit of a tricky situation. The theme developer, for what ever reason, was using some php conditionals in the header to check to see if a page was the home page or not, and depending on the condition, he was inserting the CSS directly into the header and setting a background image on the container. Now why they didn’t simply use the same conditional and set a class and then use different background images in the style sheet is beyond me, but time and budget didn’t dictate that I rewrite the whole thing to do it properly. So my first stab at resolving the issue was to use the conditional tag that I knew about, is_page();. I also knew that you could specify which page by ID or slug. However, in my situation, I had created several new page templates which didn’t need the background image, as it had a repeating strip for a faux column on a third sidebar. So I took a stab at the docs again on conditional tags, and lo and behold, since WP 2.5, you can now check if it is a page template with, wait for it, if(is_page_template()). Not only that, but you can specify a template by the file name, ie, if(is_page_template('archives.php')). Wait, it gets better! You can also do an array of page templates, if(is_page_template(array('archives.php','about.php','contact.php'))). How awesome is that?

In my scenario, I simply wanted to check if it was any template besides the default template, so I was able to use if(!is_page_template('page.php')) and boom!, none of my page templates would get the faux column background.

Thinking about it, now I’m glad the theme designer took the backwards approach to the background image so that I could learn a new trick for the toolbox.

Popularity: 24% [?]

While doing a little volunteering at the WP support forums, someone came across a theme they liked but found it was broken. Seems the site is using some kind of script to generate the zip file. Unfortunately, the script is b0rked, and was appending the parent directory and a forward slash to each template and image. The user didn’t seem too familiar with WP themes, so I decided to use a little Mac utility, Name Mangler to clean up the files and figured here was as a good a place as any to allow them to download it from.

The theme’s original home requires registration to comment, otherwise I’d have added a link there.

Anyone else looking for the theme can download it here.

Popularity: 26% [?]

On the heals of the recent list over at Smashing Magazine, comes a list of “excellent, fresh, and free WordPress themes from The Design Mag. Indeed, these themes aren’t your mother’s Kubrick. The list provides a nice mix of styles. There are ones that are lean heavily on graphic elements like big, illustrated headers, the popular magazine style, as well as clean, typographic based designs. There are also themes for multi-media oriented sites (podcasts/videos) as well as some designs that would make good designs for portfolios.

Popularity: 22% [?]

Maybe not an identity exactly, but four years in, I think I’ve come up with a logo idea that doesn’t quite suck. One of my original theme’s header used a subway station of sorts, and that’s always been the general idea I wanted to convey, that WP Station was just a stop along the WordPress network. At the time, there weren’t many sites that focused on WordPress. I can only recall Weblog Tools Collection, and at the time, it wasn’t even WordPress specific. I had only been using WP for a few months when I started the site, heck, I’d only discovered the world of blogging the year before. I was beginning to collect links to themes and plugins, as well as keep up with updates and development – this was long before wordpress.org/extend – and decided it might be useful to the community to share what I was finding.

Over time, more sites started popping up doing the same, concentrating on getting subscribers, gaining in popularity, to the point I felt what I was doing was no longer useful. Eventually, the official plugins section was added to wp.org, as well as the updates directly via the admin plugins page, making my type of posts moot.

Couple all of that with the explosion of development in the WP community, and I simply could not commit the time necessary to continue blogging in the same manner as before. Life also began to get in the way, and the site slowly drifted into stagnation. The reality though was by that point the site was generating enough money via various ads that I couldn’t pull the plug. I was still using WP for work, and would occasionally post something I’d stumble across, thinking that I would start back blogging about WordPress. However, my spare time was moving towards other interests. Still, the revenue was enough to pay for those interests, so I kept the sign on.

Now that I’ve begun working with WPMU, and taking on a roll developing blog networks, I’m beginning to have a clearer vision of where I’m headed professionally, and where I’d like to take this blog. So once again, hopefully, WP Station will be a destination that WordPress travelers will find it to be a useful stop in their travels.

Popularity: 19% [?]

In case you’re not one of the quarter of a million people who subscribe to Smashing Magazine, they recently published a list of 40 high quality free WordPress themes. I don’t mean to disparage the work of the theme developers listed in the post, but defining “high quality” seems a bit subjective. And like most top (insert random number here) lists on the web these days, little effort is put into saying exactly why the author thinks the item is included. Rather, a short blurb simply describing the item is given. I’ve looked at many, many WP themes that aesthetically look nice, but one glance under the hood, and I run for the hills.

That said, as the author points out, finding free, modern, attractively designed WordPress themes these days is becoming more and more difficult with the inundation of premium themes. Which begets the ongoing, and sometimes heated debate of WordPress, GPL, and themes, which is the subject of another post for another day.

I did find a theme that potentially could be the base for a new look for this site, ZinePress. I say a base, as the color scheme isn’t what I envision for this site, nor am I enamored with the the opacity of the footer background over the body background image, but as I point out in the intro, that’s a subjective opinion, not meant to take away from the overall quality of the design. It also brings out the point that I’ve always thought that by using a “free” WordPress theme, it’s meant to be a starting point for a user to customize for their site, to their tastes, not something that you should necessarily use stock. The whole “why recreate the wheel” thing.

EDIT – heh, I looked closer at the post for ZinePress, and it was released over a year ago, so the list isn’t necessarily of recently released themes it seems. Again, not to diminish the contributions of the theme authors who’ve generously shared their work.

Popularity: 24% [?]

A little late to the party, but I’ve set up WP Station on Twitter. Not too active yet, however, but I’ll be working on following more WP devs and users, as I also work on a redesign and resurrection of WP Station.

If anyone is bored and wants to work up a logo for WP Station, I might find some way of repaying you, albeit my budget is limited. Certainly links and what not would be included.

Popularity: 20% [?]

I’ve recently begun doing more and more work with WPMU, and one of the hurdles I’ve most encountered is that of customizing the Admin menus. In the scenario I’m working in, clients are given the administrator role for their blog, however, in most scenarios, there are elements that they just don’t need to touch. D. Sader has an excellent Toggle Admin Menus plugin that will cover most of the default Admin pages, however due to some limitations in how the dashboard is tied to widgets, you can’t hide that page from users with that plugin. This is what set me off looking for such a plugin.

I discovered WPlite, which at first glance looked exactly what I wanted. However, due to different permissions issues with roles, it actually wouldn’t block anything for blog admins, which in my case I needed. It also didn’t allow to hide itself, which would have defeated the sole purpose of the plugin. So I did a quick change to hide the menu items from everyone except Site Admins, and allow the blocking of this plugins menu item as well.

As I point out in the Read Me file, this plugin does not physically prevent a user from accessing the page if they normally have permission, it simply hides it in the menu, so if you are using the at a glance widget and want to hide the widgets menu completely, you’ll need to customize this as well. For more stricter control, definitely rely on D. Sader’s plugin, but unsuspecting users not familiar with WP, they will be none the wiser, and you can hide some of the other menu items that might normally appear for blog admins, or others roles for that matter. Note, because I specifically was looking for a way to hide widgets, and didn’t see anything out of the box for Role Manager, I didn’t go that route. For my needs, the combination of this and the Toggle Admin Menu’s I’m completely satisfied with the solution.

Also, currently this plugin must be uploaded to wp-content/plugins, and activated. You can use the built in activate site wide, or use something like Plugin Commander if you are looking for even more control over plugins. Also, this currently requires a site by site configuration, as I wanted more granular control over which blog admins see what. I will eventually look into setting some defaults, possibly via an admin interface, that would be set each time the plugin is active. If anyone wants to help contribute to that effort, I’m all ears.

Any questions or feedback for the WPMU version should be directed towards this post, Muhammad clearly pointed out he doesn’t have time to address the WPMU version. I offered him the changes I had made if he wanted to release a WPMU version himself. That said, all credit for the plugin goes to him, and if you find yourself wanting to donate anything to the development of the plugin, you should seek out the original plugin and show him some love.

This is my first attempt at releasing any kind of WPMU plugin, so certainly, any feedback or suggestions are greatly welcome.

Download WPlite-MU.

Update So I stumbled upon another plugin similar to WPlite that gives even greater control over customization, which seems to work quite well with WPMU, as you can hide items from Admins and Site Admins are not affected. It still is a plugin that has to be configured on a site by site basis, but as I said, gives a far more granular control over many more elements. I will continue to work on WPlite-MU once I get the current project I’m working on finished, but wanted to share my discovery until then. You can check out the Adminimize plugin at WordPress – Extend. The author’s site is in German, but there are English instructions, and configuration is fairly straight forward for people familiar with WordPress.

Popularity: 75% [?]

2.8.5 & 2.8.5.1 were released yesterday, unfortunately a bug crept in that prevented non site admins from publishing posts. However, Donncha quickly rectified the bug, and tagged the latest release version. 2.8.5 was dubbed a “hardening” release, and upgrading is recommended. Donncha outlines the details.

I’ll also be releasing soon a WPMU version of the WPlite plugin. WPlite allows you to hide admin menu items from non-admin users, the modified version will hide menu items from blog admins, but not site admins. It doesn’t lock down the page, the URL is still accessible, but for the unsuspecting user they’ll never know a setting is available to them. For potentially destructive pages for inexperienced users you can use the Toggle Admin Menus plugin to secure blog admins from doing something they would regret (like delete their blog).

Popularity: 22% [?]

Mark Jaquith posted on the WordPress blog about a new feature on wordpress.org, plugin compatibility a couple of days ago. The idea behind it is simple, let the community give feedback on whether or not the latest version of a plugin works with the latest stable release of WordPress. Mark points out that the number one reason people don’t upgrade is because of plugin compatibility. Considered one of WordPress’s greatest assests, it also can be it’s greatest drawback. Sure, you can extend your site to do all kinds of amazing things, but what happens when that awesome plugin lingers without updates, while WordPress releases a couple times a year? Eventually, something is going to break.

Since WordPress has made the decision that security means staying up to date with the latest release, that becomes a greater issue as time goes by. Potentially, this data will give developers insight into what is breaking popular plugins, so they can either address that in the code, or (purely speculation on my part) adopt the plugin and bring it up to date.

My only concern with the data is that I think most people will tend to find plugins that are broken, and then report that, rather than think, “hey, I should go through my three hundred plugins and go report that they are working fine with the latest release.” The article does mention that eventually they’d like users to be able to report directly from the plugin page, but then that opens the whole “phone home” can of worms.

From a site developer stand point, I think the whole thing should drive home the point of trying to use the core tools as much as possible, and not relying on as many plugins to develop a site. Certainly there are ones you can’t get away from for certain projects, but often times, people will employ a plugin for convenience, which will later bite them on the behind when that plugin breaks an upgrade.

Popularity: 28% [?]

While on the subject of upgrading, one of the best tips I could offer to someone is to install WordPress via Subversion. I think most people think of using Subversion with trunk, or the “bleeding edge”. Which can be the case, however, it’s just as easy to use a tag. Previously, to check out any version of WordPress via SVN the repository URL was http://svn.automattic.com/wordpress. This always rubbed me the wrong way, as I, like a lot of people, always cringed at the blurring of the line between .org and .com WP entities. Having an automattic URL certainly blurred that line.

However, I noticed today that you can checkout from the .org URL now, specifically, http://core.svn.wordpress.org. If you have been using SVN, and want to change repos, but aren’t familiar with that command, it’s actually quite simple.

Let’s say for example you last checked out the 2.8.3 tag, and want to both switch repos and update. First you need to switch your repository

svn switch --relocate http://svn.automattic.com/wordpress/tags/2.8.3 http://core.svn.wordpress.org/tags/2.8.3, then you simply need to switch to the latest tag, svn switch http://core.svn.wordpress.org/tags/2.8.4

If anyone would like more information on how to do the initial checkout, including switching from a traditional installation to using SVN, please leave a comment and I’ll put together a post.

Popularity: 27% [?]