Amour Chaleur

WordPress love or hate?

My blog¹ has been powered by WordPress since 2005 which makes this the 5th year I have been using WordPress. As WordPress evolved into a larger and more complex blogging platform with 1001 features² and plugins, the number of problems it’s been giving me has also increased.

I’m not known to be an adventurous person hence I stick to WordPress for fear that any changes might screw up the entire blog. Tweeps following me³ would have known that I am rather famous for screwing up my blog this year⁴. During the course of my unfortunate experiences, I had written some notes to remind myself what to do/not to do on WordPress. This will help serve as a constant reminder to myself and hopefully minimise any form of disasters on Amour Chaleur in the future.

1. Do not upload an image with the same name as any of the page/posts slugs. It might screw up the URL. I lost an entire page together with 60 over comments recently.
2. Check the support forum to see if there’s any major issues with the newest upgrade before deciding whether to upgrade or not.
3. Backup WordPress database before upgrading to a newer version.
4. Deactivate all plugins before upgrading especially if the site is running many plugins. This will reduce any issues or problems with upgrading. When I upgraded from 2.8.6 to 2.9, I got a memory limit error and it was fixed when I deactivated all my plugins.
5. When there’s anything wrong with WordPress permalinks, go to the settings page and “save changes” to refresh the permalinks. This usually works for me.
6. If you have edited any of the core/plugin files, remember to note down which file/line of code you have edited before upgrading. It’s best to backup the files before upgrading just in case you cannot remember which file had been amended.
7. If it’s possible to avoid using plugins – avoid. The website loads faster when there are lesser plugins running. This is a fantastic tutorial to output Flickr RSS feed without the use of a plugin.
8. When things go wrong with a plugin and no changes were made recently⁵, leave it alone for a while, even plugins need a break sometimes. It may just works again later.
9. If there’s a page template with the same name as a page, the page will automatically use that page template. In this case, it is not possible to switch to the default template.
10. When posting “fake” comments⁶ to test the commenting system, published a new private post for it if the comments subscription plugin is running. This prevents spamming⁷ those who have subscribe to your posts with emails.

1. Confession (2005), Liberta (2005 – early 2008) and Amour Chaleur (December 2008 – present) [«]
2. I’m exaggerating this but it does have a lot of features! [«]
3. If you have not, you really should. I’m nice (kidding)! [«]
4. I have messed up my WordPress platform at least 4 times during 2010 and it’s only February now [«]
5. There are no plugins/WordPress upgrades and the settings had not been changed. [«]
6. Sometimes I do this to make sure that the commenting system is working correctly after I made changes to the comments template or activated some new comments plugins [«]
7. I am so sorry to Cherlynn and whoever received the emails with all the “tests” contents [«]

Chewy and I enjoy looking out for new places¹ to visit but due to the “supposedly” raining weather² today, we decided to head to the mall. It is not our first time at Iluma but surprisingly, we still manage to find out something new about this place. The top level has an outdoor garden which I felt was it’s a good place to chill out since it was not chocking with cigarette smoke and the green grass was lovely³.

Continue reading "Exploring Iluma II"

1. We love to treasure hunt! [«]
2. It didn’t rain in the end due to our inaccurate prediction [«]
3. It was fake plastic grass actually [«]

Most of my study breaks had been spent on surfing the Internet and browsing through websites I had never been before. I’m pretty sure most of us own a website, be it a resource site or just a personal blog. I believe everyone will have different opinions about their likes and dislikes for a website. In the short span of 2 days, I have jotted down some characteristics of websites I had visited which I’m uncomfortable with. As a disclaimer, these are my personal opinion and I’m not referring to any websites in particular.

1. Personal websites with a donation button

I find it puzzling when I saw a small notice mentioning “to cover the cost of renewing the domain …” right below the donation button when the website in question has been hosted for free. How much does a domain name cost a year? I estimate it to be about USD 9 for a .com domain. Apart from contributing to the renewal of the domain name, I cannot think of other cost which would be required to keep the website going. Is it really necessary to ask for donations for the resources¹ which are supposedly provided to your visitors for free? I do not think the kind souls² who donated would know how their money were being spend.

I understand that for some cases, the owner of the website had met with some financial problems or difficulties of their own and needed our help. I’ve no qualms about that. However, requesting for money with a donation button to fund your personal website is a bit too much. I’m pretty sure there are also other ways to get a domain name. I was reading Mimi’s blog the other day and she mentioned getting a new domain name via her rev.iew.me points. I think it’s a fantastic way as compared to asking for donations. Moreover, I often see online contests giving away free domain names for winners. Perhaps some people should start trying their luck and testing their ability at those contests.

2. A link on the navigation which leads to nothing

I need some enlightenment on this even though it’s the least annoying for me. I have seen some sites with no visitors content at all but they had a “visitors” link on the navigation. I was quite surprised to see a “No visitors content yet” when I viewed the page. In this case, the navigation link is pointless. If the content is not ready, please remove the link. Your visitor might either be disappointed or surprised which definitely makes this idea a bad choice.

3. I need a magnifying glass to be able to read anything on the site

I’m actually referring to the virtual magnifying glass – Ctrl ++ on Windows. It’s very helpful when I visit sites with extremely small font size. Having such tiny text on a website is not cool at all. Similarly, light pink text on a white background is killing my eyes. It will be nice if the designer of the layout can spare a thought for my eyes.

4. A few dozens advertisements

Seriously, does anyone really need 2 dozens advertisements on a site? The first thing I notice when I arrive at a website like this is not the content but the advertisements. The flashy graphic ads take away all the attention and I would simply click on the close button at the top of my browser without a glance at the content. It’s common to have ads on a website, be it text or graphic but try to keep it within a certain area of the layout instead of placing them everywhere. If there are many ads, a rotation might be feasible. Personally, I feel that an overdose of advertisements also spoils the entire look of the layout. No matter how good the layout is, a whole lot of ads is just repulsive for me. The mountain of ads will also slow down the website significantly. Why would I spend time waiting just to view all the ads?

1. Such as Photoshop brushes or premade templates [«]
2. They may be fans of that website [«]