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  • Betsy Richter 11:30 pm on January 12, 2010 Permalink | Reply  

    PDXWP Site Backed by Network Redux! 

    I used the Network Redux-hosted gathering at Beer & Blog a few months ago to secure a free lifetime account for the Portland WordPress user group so I could move it off of my own paid hosting plan. While it took me a while to get the site actually migrated, we’ve been running smoothly here for a month or so now.

    When I made the announcement here, I threw in an offhand reference to the upcoming domain registration costs for the site as well, hoping to get some kind soul(s) to kick in for renewal costs. Frankly, I figured I’d just hit up the user group attendees in January, collect a few bucks, & call it good.

    Not so — instead, I received an unsolicited email a week or so ago from Network Redux’s CEO Thomas Brenneke in response to this earlier post: “We’d like to take care of your domain registrations for the two years. Can you tell me what domains you need registered/renewed and my team will get you squared away?” And they did.

    So, to Thomas, Damien & the rest of the Network Redux team — thank you on behalf of the whole PDXWP user group!

    (I can also unequivocably recommend Network Redux, as they’re now providing the hosting for OurPDX & a few other sites I manage. Yes, I’m now a paying customer of theirs & very happy with both the service & support.)

     

  • Kathleen McDade 8:44 pm on January 5, 2010 Permalink | Reply  

    January 21: Aaron Hockley On How To Launch a Blog 

    Actually, the name of Aaron’s talk is “After Launching a Couple Dozen Blogs, I Figured Out how to Do it Right.” Aaron presented this talk at WordCamp Seattle, and has done several blog posts around this theme as well. Aaron is experienced at starting new WordPress blogs, including his highly successful SocialPhotoTalk site. Even if you’re an experienced blogger, if you’re thinking about starting another blog (and who isn’t?), Aaron Hockley has great information for you.

    We’ll also have time for networking and socializing. If you’ve got questions about WordPress 2.9 (actually, we’re already up to 2.9.1), someone might be able to help you!

    As usual, we’ll be at Webtrends, 851 SW 6th Avenue on the 16th floor. We usually get into Webtrends right around 6:00, but if you come later than that, just let the security guard know that you’re coming to the WordPress meeting and he’ll punch in the elevator code for you.

    Hope to see you there! Please let us know on Upcoming if you’ll be attending.

     

  • Betsy Richter 11:06 am on December 11, 2009 Permalink | Reply  

    Site’s Been Moved to a New Host 

    Our thanks to the people at Network Redux for providing free lifetime hosted service for the Portland WordPress User Group! (I’m especially grateful ’cause that’s one less thing for yours truly to have to cough up…)

    Speaking of – the domain names (.com, .net and .org) for the site are set to expire in mid-January. Contact me at betsy@ourpdx.com if you’re interested in helping cover that cost for the next year.

     

  • Kathleen McDade 6:26 pm on November 12, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: child-themes, ,   

    Using Child Themes – November 12, 2009 

    Sites we mentioned or looked at in our discussion of WordPress child themes.

    On ThemeShaper:

    How To Protect Your WordPress Theme Against Upgrades

    How I Used a WordPress Child Theme To Redesign My Blog

    How to Modify WordPress Themes the Smart Way

    Devin Price’s website: WordPress Theming

    Michael Fields is working child theme support into his Platypus Theme, and offered a solution to a problem he had: TEMPLATEPATH for Child Themes

    We also discussed upcoming features in WordPress 2.9: 10 Things You Need to Know About WordPress 2.9

    Aaron Jorbin offered the following 2.9 advice on Twitter post-meeting: “add_theme_support( ‘post-thumbnails’ ); is what’s needed to add post-thumbnails support in 2.9.”

     

  • Kathleen McDade 9:47 pm on November 8, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags:   

    We’re Meeting This Week! Let’s Talk Child Themes. 

    We had a more developer-focused meeting in October, and a great discussion with Aaron Jorbin, Eric Curtis, Michael Fields, Kevin Peoples and Devin Price. We discussed bugs, taxonomies, wp-ecommerce, themes, svn, git, and more. Don’t know what all of those things are? Me, either. But if you come to a meeting, maybe someone else can explain it to you.

    Our next meeting is on Thursday, November 12 at 6:00 p.m. (still at Webtrends). Yes, that is the second Thursday of the month. This month is Ignite Portland, and you know you want to be there on November 19, so we’re doing our meeting on the 12th.  This month’s topic is using child themes, so that you can customize a theme without losing all of your changes when you upgrade to a new version of that theme.  We don’t have a speaker, so I’m currently crowdsourcing. Do you use child themes? Can you be there to help us learn about them? Contact me using kmcdadepdx at gmail.  You can also RSVP on Upcoming.

    UPDATE!  Devin Price is a child-theme-user, and will be at the meeting to share his knowledge. Thanks, Devin!

     

    • Devin 2:02 am on November 9, 2009 Permalink | Reply

      My site uses a child theme of Thematic. I’d be happy to share the process and learn what other folks are doing.

    • Michael Fields 3:01 am on November 9, 2009 Permalink | Reply

      Actually, I wish that I did know more about child theme’s. The articles that I have read regarding them seem to make customization a nightmare even for the most savvy CSS wizards… perhaps I have been misled? Would love to be proved wrong… Would love to learn more :)

  • Kathleen McDade 12:08 pm on October 23, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , , upgrades,   

    WordPress 2.8.5 and All In One SEO Pack 

    If you’ve logged in to your admin screen lately, you should have see a notice that “WordPress 2.8.5 is available! Please update now.”  It’s not a major update. WordPress is calling it a “hardening” release; it’s basically a security update.

    I updated plugins at the same time I updated to 2.8.5 on TechnoEarthMama, and  All in One SEO Pack was one of those with an update. Some people have gotten 502 errors recently after updating this plugin; I got one when I tried to go to the plugin’s admin screen to update options. I simply deactivated and reactivated the plugin, and everything was fine after that, but if it’s still not working for you,  Devin Price tweeted a post on the WordPress.org forums which offers another solution. It does require editing the plugin. Also, don’t forget that there’s a radio button you need to click on the All in One SEO Pack settings page to enable the plugin (in addition to activating the plugin through WordPress).

    Finally, if you’re interested, you can find out more about the changes coming in WordPress 2.9 over at ShanKrila (thanks to Kelly Guimont for the tip).

     

    • K 6:44 am on October 26, 2009 Permalink | Reply

      Kathleen,

      Thanks for the tip on the All in One SEO Pack plugin issues. Plus, a huge hi-five for a link to my WP 2.9 post. Glad you liked it!

    • Holly 10:47 pm on October 29, 2009 Permalink | Reply

      i am still looking for a good SEO plugin for Wordpress. my blog is not ranking high enought for the keywords that i wanted to rank.

    • Florida SEO 10:35 am on December 19, 2009 Permalink | Reply

      I would like to recommend the Platinum SEO Pack, it has more useful options than the all in one seo pack. There are more nofollow selections, additional post, page and home headers, you can nofollow all of the outgoing links on just the front page, you can add the noydir meta tag, the noodp meta tag, you can use the option for noindex on sub pages and my favorite option of all is all of the options that it gives you on each individual post and page of your wordpress blog.

      Those are just a few of the things that I can think of off the top of my head. The fact of the matter is that I have used both and have found that I am in greater control of my websites on-page seo than when I was using the All in One SEO Pack.

  • Kathleen McDade 8:11 pm on October 13, 2009 Permalink | Reply  

    Yes, We Are Meeting October 15! 

    It’s time for our monthly third Thursday user group meeting! We don’t have a speaker or special topic planned, so we’ll have some open discussion and Q & A time.  Feel free to share something you learned at WordCamp Portland, ask questions about something you didn’t understand, or get help with a problem on your blog.

    As usually, we’ll be at Webtrends at 6:00 p.m.

     

  • Kathleen McDade 8:56 pm on September 16, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: ,   

    August Recap, NO MEETING in September 

    Hello, WordPressers! I’m here with a recap of the August meeting, but first, a reminder that there is NO WORDPRESS USER GROUP MEETING in September, because WordCamp Portland is the same week.

    Unfortunately, if you don’t already have a ticket, WordCamp Portland is SOLD OUT!

    The August meeting was all about themes. Robin Catesby led an excellent presentation/discussion on designing themes, while Aaron Hockley and I discussed choosing and using themes on the less techie side (Kelly Guimont was unable to make it due to a death in the family. Heartfelt condolences to Kelly and her husband Scott!).

    For those who didn’t make it, or who would like another look, below is Kelly’s outline, which we used for the talk on choosing and using themes. Robin is still working on getting the slides from her presentation up on the web, and we’ll post a link as soon as they’re available.

    Two things to consider for your blog:

    • Who your audience is
    • Who you want your audience to be

    Sometimes each of these is different, whether you intend them or not. For example: If you are working on a site for the visually impaired, don’t use teeny type and lots of Flash that will keep a text-to-speech-reader from working properly. Also have some awareness of your actual audience, your regular readers aren’t always who you want them to be.

    Here is a list of validators that can help:
    http://webdesign.about.com/od/accessibilityvalidators/Accessibility_Validators.htm

    And a second list of resources for compliance:
    http://trace.wisc.edu/world/web/

    One good way to make sure you are able to meet requirements in various ways is to have a theme that is flexible and easy to customize. A prime example of this sort of theme is called Thesis:
    http://bit.ly/getthesis

    A big advantage to Thesis (even though it is a paid theme) is that it separates the content from the layout pretty clearly so it’s easy to make changes and get things how you want them without seriously breaking content elements.

    Other things you should consider when looking at themes:

    • Is there a color associated with what you’re blogging about? (Maybe your environmental blog should be in shades of green.) This isn’t something to worry about when picking your theme, usually it is easy to change a color, so don’t worry if you love a layout and don’t like the oranges in the color scheme (for example).
    • What are you posting? Are they really really long posts? I write some really long liveblog posts, and I had a theme that broke REALLY badly when I got a little lengthy. Make sure you’re keeping in mind your content when you look at themes. If you are posting a lot of large images, you might wanna avoid super skinny columns.
    • There’s more themes out there than wordpress.org. Go google (or bing or whatever the kids do these days) your desire (flexible width, blue, photoblog, custom header) with “wordpress” and “theme” at the end and you’ll get about a jillion hits. I actually googled “WordPress Themes” recently and got 81 MILLION hits (and change). I’m not kidding.
    • Monkey around with it! Swap out a header, change a color, keep in mind that like a house, you’re more looking for “good bones” than for the exact perfect thing. If you find the exact perfect thing, fabulous. But mostly you will probably be close, and if you’re close you (or someone you get to consult on your site for you) will be able to get it the rest of the way. Keep a clean copy stashed away somewhere and if you totally break everything, it’s no big deal.
     

  • Kathleen McDade 3:51 pm on August 7, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , , robin catesby,   

    August 20: All About Themes 

    Kelly Guimont and Robin Catesby will join us on Thursday, August 20 to talk about WordPress themes! We’ll be splitting up into two groups, and plan to have something for people with and without technical backgrounds.

    Kelly (@verso) describes herself on LinkedIn as a “Product Poster Girl, Powergeek, Professional Question-Asker.” She was one of the organizers of WordCampPortland’s 2008 debut, and has been teaching WordPress classes for MacForce.  Kelly’s currently a self-employed consultant, but is looking for a job, so come down, see her in action, and hire her!

    Kelly gave a presentation at WordCamp 2008 on Considerations When Choosing a Theme, and will be leading a less technical, more blogger-oriented discussion of choosing and using themes.

    Robin (@mizd) says on Twitter that she’s a “Writer, crafter, WordPress addict, NBA junkie, Cubist, and karaoke DJ.” Or, in more professional terms, “Graphic Design & Web Professional, Freelance Writer & Editor, Theatrical Craftsperson, Events Manager & Karaoke Jockey.”  She specializes in designing WordPress blogs and websites.

    Robin will be leading a discussion for the more technical folk about designing themes using a grid system and Sandbox.

    Not many people voted in the meeting time poll, and those who did still favored 6:00 p.m., so we’ll be sticking with that time.  Hope to see you Thursday, August 20, 6:00 p.m. at Webtrends, 851 SW 6th Avenue, Suite 1600.

    RSVP on Upcoming

    UPDATE: Aaron Hockley will be giving away two tickets to WordCamp Portland (which is now SOLD OUT)!

     

  • Kathleen McDade 5:17 pm on July 30, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: blogging, , monetizing   

    July Meeting Wrap-Up (Making Money Blogging) 

    In July, we were pleased to welcome Sam Churchill of dailywireless.org! 18 people attended, and the discussion was lively and informative.

    The slide show from Sam’s presentation on making money blogging is available on Slideshare.

    Also, we’re considering a change to our meeting time.  Please vote in the poll!

    Our next meeting will be August 20, and will feature both technical and non-technical discussion of WordPress themes.

     

    • Marie Mea 11:08 pm on October 10, 2009 Permalink | Reply

      i am a beginner when it comes to Money Blogging. i use Adsense to make money on my blogs and it is really good.

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