Word press!you're doing it wrong

WordPress!
You’re Doing
It Wrong
WordPress! You’re doing it wrong | 1/23 | www.pantso.gr | @pantso

Yet another WordPress guy! (who am I?)
My name is Panagiotis Grigoropoulos (although I hear
to Panos and Pantso as well), I am a Front-End Designer
& Developerand I live in Athens,Greece.I studied Video
Game Programming,Application Programming,and I
also have a bachelor at Computer Science from
Roehampton University of London with amajor in Web &
Multimedia.
The tools of my trade are HTML, CSS, jQuery,Photoshop
and WordPress.I currentlyworkfor AtcomS.A and I
also maintain GreekTuts.net where I share parts of my
knowledge.
Enough about me I’m startingto blush!Let’s move on…

Things you’re doing wrong : 1. The Database Prefix
ALWAYS change the Table Prefix.
And don’t be afraid to try somethinglike
ifyoucanfindthisthenyouarefreetohackme_
Prefixes can be 1000 bytes long !!!

Things you’re doing wrong : 2. PHPinfo
Don’t allow visitors to see your phpinfo.php file.
HOW TO DO IT
Just open your .htaccess file
and write the following lines:
<Files php-info.php>
Order Deny,Allow
Deny from all
</Files>
To allow a specific IP just fill in:
Allow from 123.456.789

Things you’re doing wrong : 3. ReadMe.html
Hide the readme.html file, so the visitors won’t know what version you’re running!
Even though most hacker attacks are deployed without scanning for the WordPress
version, it can’t hurt being cautious can it?
HOW TO DO IT
Just delete the file
readme.html that comes
with the WordPress
installation and voila!

HOW TO DO IT
Open your theme’s functions.php file and add the following line:
function remove_wp_version() {
return '';
}
add_filter('the_generator', remove_wp_version ');
If your theme for some reason comes without a functions.php file, just create it!
Things you’re doing wrong : 4. WordPress version
For the same reason as the readme.html file, you should also hide the WordPress
version from the <head> of your site.

Things you’re doing wrong : 5. Kill the Admin (user)
If you already have a WordPress website, and you are not up-to-date with the latest
WordPress version, consider removing the Admin user, or simply disable it.
NOTE: For v3.x users this is not necessary since during the installation, WordPress
asks for both username and password. Just avoid using the username Admin.
HOW TO DO IT
• To disable the admin user, you will need to first of all have an Administration
account (so you won’t get locked out) and then just go to Users panel in the
Administration panel, and turn the role of the user with username Admin to
subscriber.
• To completely remove the Admin user go to the Users panel in the Administration
panel, simply select the user with username Admin and delete it, attributing all
posts and links to your account.

Things you’re doing wrong : 6. Use the Editor correctly
Many users believe that using WordPress is a walk in the park. And most of them are
kinda right! However, why not use WordPress in the way it was made to be used?

Things you’re doing wrong : 6. Use the Editor correctly
One of the most annoying things for WordPress theme developers is the post
content formatting.
PERSONAL FAVORITE: THE MORE TAG
The more tag is used to create an excerpt of the full post content. Why not use the
actual excerpt that WordPress has for us?
Try developing this layout with a post that has
an image and some text followed by a more
tag in it’s content.
You will have to catch the image and save it,
parse and save the text, and then display it the
way you want.
NO! Simply open your screen options (right
top of the Administration Panel) and enable
the post excerpt! WordPress is not Word!

Things you’re doing wrong : 7. Don’t paste from Word
WordPress (and almost every CMS on the planet) does not play well with Word
formatted text. So stop bringing all of Word’s garbage into your site!
Next time you need to
copy/paste content from a
Word file, think of using the
cute little Word icon in the
editor toolbar.
Paste, hit Insert, and you are
good to publish!

Things you’re doing wrong : 8. Not Using Featured Images
Some people say that everything happens for a reason! In the Featured Images case,
that has been going along with WordPress from version 2.9 (known as Post
Thumbnail then) and later in version 3.X named Featured Image, the saying is
correct!
They do exists, so use them!
WHY USE THEM?
 One image to rule them all
 Easy resizing/cropping
 Easy upload
 Facebook friendly (with
og:image)
 Because it’s there!

Things you’re doing wrong : 9. Ugly permalinks
In many cases users don’t mind the URL of their posts. Permanent links is one of the
best features in WordPress though! Make them readable, and user friendly!
First structure them correctly, in the Settings > Permalink Settings menu

Things you’re doing wrong : 9. Ugly permalinks
And then take good care of them in every new post you make

Things you’re doing wrong : 10. Where is your Feed?
WordPress offers the tools to spread the word of what’s going on in your website!
Why not harness that power? An RSS feed is the way and you should use it!
Make sure that one of the following URLs works
http://yourdomain.gr/?feed=rss
http:// yourdomain.gr /?feed=rss2
http:// yourdomain.gr /?feed=rdf
http:// yourdomain.gr /?feed=atom
When using custom permalinks, you should be able to find one of these:
http:// yourdomain.gr /feed/
http:// yourdomain.gr /feed/rss/
http:// yourdomain.gr /feed/rss2/
http:// yourdomain.gr /feed/rdf/
http:// yourdomain.gr /feed/atom/

The title of your pages is very important both to users and to search engines!
Give it a little facelift!
As an example, in your theme’s header.php file, try changing this:
<title><?php wp_title(''); ?></title>
to this:
<title>
<?php wp_title('»','true','right'); ?>
<?php if ( is_single() ) { ?> Blog Archive » <?php } ?>
<?php bloginfo('name'); ?>
</title>
Or you can try more combinations/information.
You can read more at http://codex.wordpress.org/Function_Reference/wp_title
Things you’re doing wrong : 11. Fix your site <title>

Things you’re doing wrong : 12. Fix your image alt tags
One of the things that people tend not to do, is bothering with image alt tags.
Apart from the fact that they are an HTML standard, so their absence instantly
means invalid code (for whoever cares), not using them means that you are not
helping crawlers “see” your images as part of your content.
Spend some seconds
into naming your
content images right
from the editor.
Just click on an image
in your content, click
the “Edit Image” icon,
and enter an
Alternative description.

Things you’re doing wrong : 13. Use the Media Gallery
Don’t ever copy paste images from other websites right into the WordPress text
editor. First of all you are hot linking and secondly you are not using one of the best
features of WordPress! The media gallery.
WHY USE MEDIA GALLERY
 All your images in one place
 Easily create galleries
 Control image attributes
 Drag & Drop upload
 Edit image information
 Easily edit images
 Global media control

One of the best things about CDNed scripts is that because many people use them in
their websites, many of your visitors may have already downloaded them from visiting
another site.
Also the speed of a CDN is most of the times faster than your server. Deal with it!
So instead of sending your users the jQuery core file all over again, just give them:
<script type="text/javascript" src="http://code.jquery.com/jquery-2.0.2.min.js"></script>
and instead of making them download your webfont, let them get:
<link href='http://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Open+Sans' rel='stylesheet' type='text/css'>
That way you gain, both speed, and you get a big load off your server!
Things you’re doing wrong : 14. Use CDNed Scripts

Things you’re doing wrong : 15. Update WordPress
We all know it and have
heard it many times!
Well don’t just stand there!
UPDATE NOW!

Why update?
 Keep up-to-date with bug fixes and security patches
 Get all the new cool WordPress features
 Keep hackers away (well at least have a good shot)
 Stay up-to-date with latest plugin functionality
 Close shut plugin security holes
 Because Google says you should!
More on codex.wordpress.org/Updating_WordPress
AND ALSO…

Each time an Admin ignores a WordPress
update notification, a kitten dies!
HOW CRUEL CAN YOU BE?

THANK YOU
FOR YOUR TIME
…and remember!
Use WordPress and use it right!

Shameless Promotion
www.greektuts.net
Also find me around the web
www.pantso.gr
fb.com/pantso
twitter.com/pantso
dribbble.com/pantso
linkedin.com/in/pantso

Word press!you're doing it wrong

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