Tagged: wordpress plugins

Some great WordPress plugins from 2011

Using too many WordPress plugins can really slow down a WordPress website. With that in mind, here are a number of excellent WordPress plugins which I had other alternatives for and were disabled on one or more of my CMS websites. Not that these plugins aren’t great. Try them out and see if they do the job for you.

WordPress Security PLUGINS

  • AntiVirus - Security solution as a smart, effectively plugin to protect your blog against exploits and spam injections.
  • Secure WordPress – Careful using this plugin, don’t enable features without knowing the consequences. Basic security checks for securing your WordPress installation.

WordPress Post Editor PLUGINS

  • Duplicate Post – Creates a copy of a post.
  • Tiny Table – Add table controls in the TinyMCE Rich Visual Editor
  • WP-Table Reloaded – This plugin allows you to create and easily manage tables in the admin-area of WordPress.

Social Media Plugins

  • Follow Me – The Follow Me plugin is designed to allow users the ability to add links to their social media profiles in their blog.
  • FollowMe – WP FollowMe is a wordpress plugin that allow you to add a twitter Follow me badge on your wordpress blog.
  • Like-Button-Plugin-For-Wordpress – This Plugin provides the most settings for the Like-Button of Facebook.
  • Social Media Page – Generates a list of social media profiles on a given page or as a widget.
  • Social Slider – This plugin adds links to your social networking sites’ profiles in a box floating at the left side of the screen.
  • TweetMeme Follow Button – Adds a button which lets you follow Twitter users.

Font Customization Plugins

  • Font Burner – The Font Burner Plugin allows you to easily add Font Burner Fonts to your site through WordPress.

Slideshow Plugins

WordPress Admin PluginS

  • Search & Replace – -One of the most helpful plugins when you move a WP website. A simple search for find strings in your database and replace the string.
  • Sticky Note Plugin – Write your own notes at the Admin-dashboard, and help yourself remebering.
  • Vice Versa – Convert Pages to Posts and Vice Versa
  • WP Custom Menu Filter Plugin – This filters the WP Custom Menu based on whether user is logged in or not.

Mobile WordPress Plugins

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Steps to speed up WordPress

WordPress website development is usually fun except when your website gets broken into by stow-aways using brute-force. Installing way too many WordPress plugins can be really temping because of the CMS’ auto-installing feature. I weigh on the side of excessive when it comes to using plugins. Here are steps which have been recommended by one of my WordPress/PHP programmer contacts to speed up a WordPress website.

If you can access your WP admin…
(usually at  http://www.your-web-site.com/wp-admin/  )

  • Reduce the number of posts which display on your Blog home page. If you have the blog page set to load 100 posts, your website may take a long time to load.
  • Turn off Trackbacks and Pingbacks! This can improve WordPress site speed. Just go to Admin>Discussion and uncheck the “Allow link notifications…”.
  • Delete old revisions by using a plugin like Better Delete Revision. Did you know that there are tons of Revision files saved by WordPress? Here is the notification I recieved the last time I removed redundant post revisions on Fatty Matt Brewing:

Since you started using Better Delete Revision, 260 redundant post revisions have been removed!

  • Ask yourself “what plugins I can live without?”
  • Go to the Installed Plugins page at  .../wp-admin/plugins.php  
  • Deactivate all the plugins which you don’t absolutely need.
    • Plugins to leave activated might include
      • Theme support plugins like Widget Saver or Theme Companion
      • Google XML Sitemaps
      • Anti-spam plugins like SI CAPTCHA Anti-Spam and Akismet
      • Social bookmarking plugins like SexyBookmarks (by Shareaholic), Twitter Widget Pro or AddThis Social Bookmarking Widget
      • Security plugins like WordPress Database Backup, AntiVirus, Better WP Security, Semisecure Login Reimagined or Secure WordPress

In the case of Fatty Matty Brewing, I run a rather large collection of family photos using Coppermine Photo Gallery. With all this web space dedicated to personal photos (I now prefer putting family pics on Flickr or Picasa) a good step to indirectly speed up WordPress performance is to cruise the coppermine install to save then delete all these pics/movies.

With the case of WordPress, it does not hurt to go through your Media Library at /wp-admin/upload.php and remove any pictures, movies or PDFs which are not used on your website. You can verify if photos are used [or not attached] in your WordPress website by looking in the “Attached To” column in the Media Library and remove any media files which read “(Unattached)”.

Choose a web host provider which doesn’t SUCK!

  • In the case of WordPress, DO NOT use Godaddy but rather DO use Bluehost. Bluehost has been recommended to me repeatedly by my WordPress developer contacts.
  • Why does hosting matter you might as? If your WordPress website is slow, get hacked or just stops working, you will want support. Many website hosting providers like Godady or Hostgator provide support which is like getting on a hampster wheel with no real solutions.

Top 34 SEO and best CMS WordPress Plugins

WordPress brings simplified website publishing to new and advanced users combining flexible features, almost unlimited options and tons of add-ons and free plugins. A WordPress plugin is like a mini application which gives WordPress additional capabilities like Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and easy website content management (CMS).

WordPress really is the perfect website publishing tool for individuals or groups of all sizes and can be given extra capabilities using this best-of list of the top 34 SEO and CMS plugins.

  1. Basic Facebook Social Plugins -
    this plugin has 4 major functions but for CMS website the best use of this plugin is the  Facebook Like box widget and the “Like” buttons that it can place on all WordPress pages and posts.
  2. AddToAny -
    A featurific plugin which is used to share save posts, gives you all the goods like the “Like” button and “Tweet” button for all posts or pages etc.
  3. All in one webmaster -
    1. Sitemap Submission option to Google, Yahoo, Bing and Ask.com.
    2. Options to add Google, Bing, Yahoo, Alexa, Facebook Insights, Facebook, Blogcatalog Webmaster Meta Tag.
    3. Options to add Google, Quantcast.com, GetClicky.com, Compete.com Analytics scripts for your blogs.
  4. CBnet favicon -
    custom favicon (bookmarks/favorites/address bar icon)
  5. cbnet Ping Optimizer -
    Helps your popular website from becoming labeled as a ping spam generator and a good alternative to MaxBlogPress Ping Optimizer. This plugin works well by sending PINGs to:

    http://rpc.pingomatic.com/

    http://api.moreover.com/RPC2

    http://bblog.com/ping.php

    http://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2

    http://ping.weblogalot.com/rpc.php

    http://ping.feedburner.com

    http://ping.syndic8.com/xmlrpc.php

    http://ping.bloggers.jp/rpc/

    http://rpc.pingomatic.com/

    http://rpc.weblogs.com/RPC2

    http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping

    http://topicexchange.com/RPC2

    http://www.blogpeople.net/servlet/weblogUpdates

    http://xping.pubsub.com/ping

    http://api.my.yahoo.com/RPC2

    http://bulkfeeds.net/rpc

    http://rpc.blogrolling.com/pinger/

  6. Clker.com clip art -
    Search and add Clker.com clip art images to your posts.
  7. Easy Privacy Policy -
    If you run Google adsense ads on your website you should have a privacy page per Googles TOS. This plugin will create a privacy policy page to be goggle adsense compliant in a snap!
  8. google xml sitemap for images
    Creates a sitemap file of your images to work with Google image searches which you can also submit to the google webmaster central
  9. google xml sitemap for video
    Like the plugin above, will set you up with a sitemap file which can submit to the google webmaster central
  10. google xml sitemaps
    The ultimate plugin to connect your website with google
  11. Headspace2
    Controls almost every aspect of your site’s meta-data, including advanced tagging, Analytics, and dozens of plugins.
  12. MobilePress –    lightweight SEO enabled mobile pack
  13. Quick Adsense
    Running on this site! This free WordPress plugin is an adsense widget and also awesome on page dynamic ad placement
  14. Secure WordPress
    Did you know that by default, a new WordPress installation is literally wide open with security holes, it’s not the fault of WordPress, but rather the limitations of the PHP which WP is built on. This plugin is the solution. A Little help to secure your WordPress installation: Remove Error information on login page; adds index.html to plugin directory; removes the wp-version, except in admin area. And more!
  15. SexyBookmarks –    creates beautiful share icons on posts
  16. SI CAPTCHA Anti-Spam
    Hands down, the best damn spam stopper, make sure to active akinsmet plugin and get your akinsmet api by signing up with a wordpress.com user account, together these plugins rock and will leave your spam box empty, only real comments from now on…
  17. Simple Tags
    Dynamic page link creation of words that are on pages and in the tag list… Extended Tagging for WordPress 3.0 ! Suggested Tags, Mass edit tags, Autocompletion, Tag Cloud Widgets, Related Posts, Related Tags, etc!
  18. StatPress Reloaded –    track your website usage
  19. Subscribe to Comments Reloaded
    A robust plugin that enables commenters to sign up for e-mail notification of subsequent entries
  20. Thumbnail For Excerpts
    Thumbnail For Excerpts allow easily, without any further work, to add thumbnails wherever you show excerpts (archive page, feed…).
  21. Video Thumbnails
    Video Thumbnails simplifies the process of automatically displaying video thumbnails in your WordPress template.
  22. WP-DBManager
    Allows you to optimize database, repair database, backup database, restore database, delete backup database , drop/empty tables and run selected queries. Supports automatic scheduling of backing up and optimizing of database.
  23. Related Posts Thumbnails
    Customizable plugin, that nicely displays related posts thumbnails under the post.
  24. WP to Twitter
    Posts a Twitter status update when you update your WordPress blog or post to your blogroll, using your chosen URL shortening service.
  25. Follow me
    Provides a left or right side non-scrolling vertical follow me flash based graphic
  26. Login Configurator – gives you options to change the wordpress login screen to add your company logo etc.
  27. WordPress Database Backup –
    On-demand backup of your WordPress database. Have you backed up your WordPress database today? Do this before you upgrade to WordPress
  28. Simple Login Widget – If you are using WordPress as a CMS, this simple widget will show just the login/logout and register links instead of all the RSS and Meta Feed crap.
  29. WP Render Blogroll Links – Display your blogroll or WordPress links on a page like this!
  30. Category Posts Widget – Adds a widget that can display posts from a single category.
  31. Feedburner Email Widget -
    Allows you to add a Feedburner Email Subscription widget to one of your sidebars.
  32. Multi Column Category List
    Displays a customizable list of categories in multiple columns and not available on the WP extend directory.
  33. TinyMCE Advanced
    Enables advanced features and plugins in TinyMCE, the visual editor in WordPress. This includes the addition of tables, font color, anchors nd so much more. Bound to drive every website designer crazy!
  34. And last my favorite: CommentLuv
    Another free wordpress Plugin to show a link to the last post from the commenters blog by parsing the feed at their given URL when they leave a comment. Rewards your readers and encourage more comments.

Enjoy!

Farming Volunteers and Twitter Plugins

Plug imageThere is a neat WordPress plugin called RF Twitter Post which will send a tweet when a new WordPress posts is published using the post’s Title and URL which are combined and kept under 140 characters on the author’s twitter status. This Twitter WordPress plugin can be turned on and off depending on the post author.

Running an event can be very time intensive. You will need a ton of HELP! Recruiting attendees is no order for evites.com. Eventful.com may be a good place to start looking for community event organizing for say a hopyard RSVP secret harvest camping weekend. hmmm…

“…Eventful is the leading events website which enables its community of users to discover, promote, share and create events. Eventful’s community of users select from nearly 4 million events taking place in local markets throughout the world, from concerts and sports to singles events and political rallies…”

Agro-Tourism

“As U-Picks’ popularity blossomed, hayrides, petting zoos and corn mazes were added. “Agri-tourism is now a growing part of Michigan’s $9 billion agriculture…”

Other Excellent links:

  • http://www.voluntourism.org/
  • http://www.wwoofusa.org/
  • http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/

Best WordPress CMS Plugins

This post about the best of the WordPress Plugins for a CMS website was originally published on the Fatty Matty Brewing brewlog on June 19, 2009.

After using WordPress for so long on this Fatty Matty Brewing blog, I decided to use WordPress as a CMS (content management) with a few new clients’ websites including Greenspirit Farm and Free Congregation of Sauk County. Each of these unique clients has different business communication needs from WordPress and with the huge amount of WordPress plugins available, I knew I could pretty much accomplish any requests for website customization.

This list of WordPress plugins gives your website flexability to perform tons of fat website functions.

My Favorite WordPress Plugins

(tested on WordPress 2.7.1)

Plugins Used on the Fatty Matty Brewing Brewlog

  • Akismet – A must have spam catcher for ALL WordPress websites!
  • BrewPoll – For all you beer bloggers… Adds a BrewPoll icon to each post on your blog.
  • WordPress Database Backup – On-demand backup of your WordPress database. Have you backed up your WordPress database today? Do this before you upgrade to WordPress 2.8!

WordPress Plugins Used on the Greenspirit Farm website

  • All in One SEO Pack – Improve your website’s popularity on Google with super SEO.
  • Force User Field Registration – Forces new users to register additional fields. As a WordPress admin, it is nice to know that your website’s members are human.
  • Google XML Sitemaps – This plugin will generate a sitemaps.org compatible sitemap of your WordPress blog which is supported by Ask.com, Google, MSN Search and YAHOO!.
  • Login Configurator – Sick of looking at the WordPress logo on your website? Get your company logo on the WordPress registration / login page.
  • Multi Column Category List – Want to create a WordPress Page with a list of categories? See the Recipes Category list at the bottom of this page. Requires the use of WordPress Page Templates and some custom coding.
  • Page Links To – This plugin allows you to point a post or page to any URL you want. Very useful if you want a WordPress Page to link an external URL.
  • Simple Login Widget – If you are using WordPress as a CMS, this simple widget will show just the login/logout and register links instead of all the RSS and Meta Feed crap.
  • WP Render Blogroll Links – Display your blogroll or WordPress links on a page like this!

Plugins Used on the Free Congregation website

  • Drop-down menu – Add a cool drop down style page menu to your WordPress theme.
  • Event Calendar – After a ton of searching for the perfect Event Calendar plugin – this one is the BEST!
  • Inline Posts – Allows you to include dynamic WordPress posts in your static WordPress pages (and in other posts). See an example here.
  • Simple:Press Forum – as far as I can tell (and there are not many to choose from) the best WordPress Forum Plugin. See a brand new installation of this WordPress Forum plugin here.
Check out some of our other favorite Free WordPress Plugins.