Wordpress

Hi guys

I've been developing a 'bare-bones' wordpress template which is basically a reset for everything filled with plenty of comments and all the gumph removed. Anyone interested in taking it for a spin?

I found Elliot Jay Stock's Starkers theme really helpful for this but I found even that was a bit to heavy so I have really stripped out most of the code thats not needed or is optional with the understanding that its a starting point not a finished theme.

Anyway, if anyone fancies it let me know here and i'll put it somewhere for download

Anyone know any good tag cloud generators? I want one that looks nice.  The UTW3 one is a bit overbearing, and the 'normal' http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/widget-category-cloud/ is a bit naff.

Any suggestions or anyone know any blogs that have got a nice looking one on?

Ta.

 

Very nice theme Pete - well done

My first theme is coming along nicely, should be ready for download next week i hope.

Theres a bit of a bug with the top menu in safari but it looks ok in i.e 7 and ff.
Haven't got round to the i.e 6 nightmare yet (not really looking forward to that)

Anyway, heres what it looks like so far:
The Theme

I know James has a huge list of these, but the main ones I use are :

anti spam stuff like akismet,

the ajax contact form - seems very good at stopping spam and email scrapers
http://www.stimuli.ca/ajaxcontact

No Ping wait, does what it says on the tin and speeds up pings when you have a big list
http://somethingunpredictable.com/wp-no-ping-wait/
(think this site is broken, I have a copy if anyone needs it)

Sociable, adds social bookmark links
http://push.cx/sociable

Post ratings - lets users rate a post
http://lesterchan.net/portfolio/programming.php

Loads more but these are the ones I use most, depends a lot on what level of tech expertise I'd expect the users to have. I'd have a lot more on my online marketing blog than on a discount codes blog for example.

Just stick in "top 10 wordpress plugins" into Google and you'll find tons of them.

I use fewer and fewer of these as time goes on, I actually find them quite distracting from the main point of the site.

Just wanted to gather some feedback.

I am currently knocking up afew wordpress themes that I'm going to distribute freely from my website.

Just wondered what plugins people find useful to include? I'm going to be adding the the a4ubacks system into the themes. Any suggestions for others?

Let me know and i'll see what i can do

Does anyone know where I can go to get decent quality Wordpress plugins coded? I've a spec for hiding aff links and tracking keywords through a site, I don't think it's a big job, but then I've no idea how to do it myself.

I've had a couple of poor experiences with Rentacoder recently so I wondered if there are any good value WP specialists out there.

Also, does anyone know how to get the community comments as an RSS feed? Think I'm missing out on a lot of good stuff.

Take it back - the Google Analytics plugin doesn't work anymore - but is being fixed.

Found a pretty damn good plugin today that I'll add to my pack.

http://tantannoodles.com/toolkit/wordpress-reports/

Google Analytics plugin providing a nice reporting interface from within wordpress (will even install all the tracking code for you and track outbound links).

Just installed it on one of my sites that gets a tiny bit of traffic to try it out.

James Little, you've been awesome this year helping me with no end of tips about blogging.

I've started using Wordpress now for some sites that I used to use Joomla for. These aren't just blogs, but a mix of static content and new offers.

Since version 2.1 I found a feature in options > reading that allows you to pick one of your pages as the homepage so I can have a 'designed' front page with my top offer, and lots of other new content going on one click away for SEO. It stops your best offer getting bumped from the homepage every time a new offer comes in.

There aren't so many functions as Joomla, like galleries, forums, e-commerce and the like, but for basic content I'm finding more and more ways to get Wordpress to look less and less like just a blog.

I ended up using wordpress for my blog after i couldn't remember my glue password.

I'd done some tweaking before in WP but I wanted to skin this in the same style as my site and I've got to say it was pretty easy, even for a PHP novice like myself.

I fully intend to make some templates and share them on my website very soon now I know my way around WP abit abit better. I'll keep you posted as to when they're done if anyone fancies using them

Today, i'm mostly loving Wordpress! However, can someone help me with a step by step guide to changing my permalinks structure? I think its best that each post has the post title at the front of the permalink - but i'll damned if i can get it to do this! I've been to the permalink part of the site - but can't fathom!
Also, i've installed WP onto an existing site - so the blog address is www . mysite . net / wordpress - how do i change the wordpress extension to be just "blog" for example? Is it just a case of changing the directory name as i normally would?
Cheers in advance for any help!

I've just started moving forward with wordpress to use it as a basic CMS for a couple of sites, as well as a bloggin platform.

there are loads of plugins available to make the sites more user and se friendly.

after downloading a wordpress package containing various plugins and themes(cheers James), I now add anything useful to the package ready for uploading to new Wordpress sites, makes things a lot quicker.

I'll echo the below - Wordpress when used with the right plugins and mod_rewrite for natural url's can be very effective as a good SEO CMS

Keep the plugins and tips n'tricks coming!

Hi,

Good tips...

James G. Evans

I'll echo Alfie's statement and say great idea for a community James :-) I've been avidly trying to learn more and more about Wordpress over the last few months.

Great stuff James! Your tips are genuinely informative and helpful! I've just started playing with the might WP, and as more of non techy, i struggle getting it installed and working, but now it is.... like a pig in sh!te springs to mind!
I use WP to compliment my sites ( well, one site so far, but am looking to add it to other sites ), and am specifically interested in the SEO properties it carries.
As i learn, i'll post here!

Welcome to the community folks. Though I should start with posting my SEO tips that I wrote at the start of the year at:

http://www.3wdl.co.uk/2007/01/22/wordpress-seo-tips/

and a post on how best to greet new visitors to your site at:

http://www.3wdl.co.uk/2007/06/10/greeting-your-first-time-visitors-and-encouraging-them-to-subscribe/

Would be good to hear how people are utilising this software and how they think it compares to other applications.