May 3, 2010
If you’ve got more questions about WordPress websites or blogs, Seattle’s McBuzz Communications has answers! Just post your question in the comments below, and we will respond. The cost? FREE! Well, a link from your site to the McBuzz website with “Search Engine Optimization” in the anchor text would be nice, but it’s certainly not required.
Comments: 57
Apr 21, 2010
A reader was having trouble adding bullets to text in the Atahualpa theme for WordPress. I did a test install of Atahualpa and the bullets are working for me. Be sure to note the order of the steps. You can click on the blue text below to see a screen shot of each step.
Comments: 0
Mar 17, 2010
WordPress Websites Tutorial by Mark McLaren – How to Upload and Insert an Image
This video tutorial replaces my earlier “How to Insert an Image” tutorial for WordPress that was done using screen captures, text descriptions and WordPress version 2.1 or so, which is a bit outdated today.
Some people prefer text tutorials with screen captures. My “How to Make a Text Link” WordPress Tutorial is still a straight-forward explanation of the process, which hasn’t changed.
Comments: 0
Mar 17, 2010
Hi there! There are over 100 questions and replies on this post. If you don’t see an answer to your question here, come on over to the next installation of Questions About WordPress? / WordPress Help and post your question there. Thanks! – Mark McLaren
P.S. If you’re into WordPress, follow Mark McLaren on Twitter for free tips and howto’s.
If you’ve got questions about WordPress websites or blogs, Seattle’s McBuzz Communications has answers! Just post your question in the comments below, and we will respond. The cost? FREE! Of course, a link to the McBuzz website with “WordPress Seattle” in the anchor text would be mighty nice, but it’s certainly not required.
If your situation is urgent and you need immediate help with WordPress, you can hire McBuzz to fix the problem for you. We do this kind of work frequently. We usually respond within 24 hours. The rate is $125 an hour. You can pay with a credit card or PayPal.
Comments: 128
Nov 4, 2009
This post tells you the simplest way to improve security on your WordPress website or blog.
Recently there was a big security scare for WordPress users. A “worm” (a form of automated malicious software) was traveling around the Internet trying to break into unsuspecting WordPress users’ sites. Even high-profile bloggers like Robert Scoble were caught without adequate file and database backups in place. Scoble lost a bunch of posts, and said he felt less certain of WordPress as a result.
But the fact is, Scoble should have backed up his site. At the very least, he should have checked with his host to see if they create automatic backups. (You should do the same with your host. Why wait until after something goes wrong to find out?!) If you don’t know how to backup your MySQL database and the files in your wp-content directory, now is a good time to learn. Your web host should be able to help. If not, let me know. If your site is hosted on WordPress.com, no worries! They make backups for you. However, you might want to do a Tools > Export in the WordPress Dashboard (save the .xml file to your hard drive) just in case! Unless you have an explicit agreement with WordPress.com about backing up your data, don’t expect to hold them responsible for data loss on your site.
Here are two good posts about WordPress security inspired by the latest worm scare:
How to Keep WordPress Secure
by Matt Mullenweg – WordPress.org
Old WordPress Versions Under Attack by Lorelle VanFossen
The first thing everyone with a self-hosted (non-WordPress.com) WordPress site should do is this:
Create a new User account with a not-so-simple username. The default username that comes with WordPress is “admin”. That usually comes with a crazy-difficult password. Unfortunately, most people then change the password to something easy like “mydogname” or whatever.
Worms trying to hack into your WordPress site know to try “admin” as a username because it works probably 70% or the time or more! Then they just have to hack your simple password and they’re done.
So do yourself a favor. Login to WordPress. Go to Users (under Appearance) > Add New User. Use a difficult username, something with upper and lower case letters at the very least. Not something obvious. Then use a difficult password, something with upper and lower case letters, at least one numeral and one special character like * or ( or % etc. Don’t worry about the username displaying as your name on the site. You can enter your first and last name, and then use the dropdown menu to tell WordPress to use that instead of the username after blog posts and such. Be sure to note the email address you use for your site admin (under Settings > General). You can use a different email address for each new user account you create.
After you have created the new user account, log out and then login with the new account to make sure it works. After you have done that, you can delete the admin user account. That way, worms won’t be able to use that username to hack into your site.
Again, this is the simplest way to improve security on your WordPress website or blog.
Comments: 9
May 18, 2009
INTRODUCTION TO WEB 2.0: SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING
AND YOUR BUSINESS
Our next Social Media Marketing Event will be on May 11, 2010: “Explode the WordPress Learning Curve: An Evening with the Experts”
I’m very excited to be part of this WordPress Seminar in Seattle line-up! You’ll get lots of vital information, distilled, organized and ready to be put to use. My 20-minute segment will focus on the five most important things you can do to optimize your WordPress website or blog for search engines.
Read more and get tickets for this upcoming evening of social media learning and networking: WordPress Social Media Seminar in Seattle (click for more information). Tuesday, May 11, 6 PM to 9 PM at Bellevue College, Bellevue (Seattle) Washington.
Comments: 0