As many know there is a WordPress Plugin for automatically upgrading WordPress. I have recently used it on one of my test blogs with no issues. But I have experienced issues using it for a client.

The problem I experienced using the plugin was with a Fantastico install on GoDaddy economy hosting. First I will say that if you intend on using GoDaddy hosting please do yourself a favor and opt for the package at least one step above the economy package. The economy package has given me fits every time I work on it because of some of limitations it has. Same goes for Yahoo small business hosting. In fact I have refused to do anymore work on Yahoo accounts!

WordPress Automatic Upgrade is a handy plugin that takes most of the guesswork out of upgrading WordPress. The only thing I will caution you on is upgrading from any version prior to 2.5. There were major changes in WordPress version 2.5 and it left some plugins in the dust. This can be the case in any upgrade but it is especially so for version 2.5 and above. So I suggest you always check all your plugins for compatibility before an upgrade.

So the issue was the Fantastico install was it was version 2.5.1 and I tried to use the WordPress Automatic Upgrade to upgrade to 2.6. When I ran the plugin all went well and the upgrade worked but I couldn’t login to the blog after the upgrade. I don’t know exactly why and perhaps someone can comment here and shed some light on it. My guess was that if you used Fantastico to install the blog then you should not use the WordPress Automatic Upgrade to upgrade. Since the hosting account uses a log of the current WordPress installation another version caused issues.

My fix for the predicament I caused and was in with the client’s blog I tried to upgrade was an easy fix in this case but I suggest you don’t try this on an existing blog. Since this was a fresh install on a new blog I just deleted all the content in the database and then when I went to the blogs URL I was presented with the WordPress installer page. There may be similar or easier ways around the problem but I got lucky in this case. Another option may be to export the old database, save it, then purge it. Run the installer and then import the database back in again once you gain access to the dashboard.

This may have been an isolated incident, but if others have had similar issues and a better fix please comment.

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

Filed In: Plugins by Jeff
2 Comments »

Related Posts

• Finally Time To Upgrade WordPress
• WordPress 2.5.1 Released Security Issues And Other Fixes
• Should You Upgrade WordPress to 2.3.2

It has not been long since the release of WordPress 2.5 which had a lot of big changes from all previous versions. WordPress version 2.6 is now available and anyone who has made the, often painful move to version 2.5 should not have any issues going to version 2.6.

I admit I haven’t upgraded any of my live blogs to even version 2.5 yet but have done so for others and have experienced some plugin compatibility issues. But I know it is only a matter of time so I will be going through the process shortly and post about the “gotchas” I experience.

Some of the changes in Version 2.6 are:

Post Revisions: Wiki-like tracking of edits:
Allowing you to view who made what changes when to any post or page through a super-easy interface, much like Wikipedia or a version control system. This is handy on any blog in case you make a mistake and want to go back to an older version of a post, and it’s super handy for multi-author blogs where you can see every change tracked by person.

Press This!: Post from wherever you are on the web:
A Press This bookmark you can add to your toolbar that provides a fast and smart popup to do posts to your WordPress blog. For example, if you click “Press This” from a Youtube page it’ll magically extract the video embed code, and if you do it from a Flickr page it’ll make it easy for you to put the image in your post.

Shift Gears: Turbo-speed your blogging:
There are a lot of things that can be done with Gears in future releases of WordPress, but this release will be using what’s called a “Local Server” to cache or keep a copy of commonly-used Javascript and CSS files on your computer, which can speed up the loading of some pages by several seconds (they just pop right up!). You can install Gears for Firefox or Internet Explorer, with support for Safari and Opera pending. WordPress works just fine without it, you just get a little extra juice when you have it installed.

Theme Previews: See it before your audience does:
This one has had a few people confused who were familiar with previous versions of WordPress. Now from the Design menu when clicking a theme it will open in a popup preview so you can see it before it is “live”. If you want to use the theme there is an Activate Theme link on the preview screen or an X to close the preview and not use the theme.

Here are some of the smaller features and improvements in 2.6:

• Word count! Never guess how many words are in your post anymore.
• Image captions, so you can add sweet captions like Political Ticker does under your images.
• Bulk management of plugins.
• A completely revamped image control to allow for easier inserting, floating, and resizing. It’s now fully integrated with the WYSIWYG.
• Drag-and-drop reordering of Galleries.
• Plugin update notification bubble.
• Customizable default avatars.
• You can now upload media when in full-screen mode.
• Remote publishing via XML-RPC and APP is now secure (off) by default, but you can turn it on easily through the options screen.
• Full SSL support in the core, and the ability to force SSL for security.
• You can now have many thousands of pages or categories with no interface issues.
• Ability to move your wp-config file and wp-content directories to a custom location, for “clean” SVN checkouts.
• Select a range of checkboxes with “shift-click.”
• You can toggle between the Flash uploader and the classic one.
• A number of proactive security enhancements, including cookies and database interactions.
• Stronger better faster versions of TinyMCE, jQuery, and jQuery UI.
• Version 2.6 fixes approximately 194 bugs.

Here is a video version of the changes provided by the WordPress developers:

Filed In: WordPress by Jeff
5 Comments »

Related Posts

• WordPress 2.5 Sidebar Widgets Guide
• WordPress 2.5.1 Released Security Issues And Other Fixes
• WordPress Version 2.3 Coming Soon

Lets face it most of us want to make money blogging and in my last post I explained why I want to make money blogging. Mine was to help provide for my family, yours may be for other reasons but most of us still are doing it to make some income from our blogs.

I was contacted a while back from a friend of mine Doug Gorman that wanted to interview me about blogging with WordPress. The interview was then used as part of an ebook called Home Business Gurus Secrets Revealed!

In his ebook Doug asks the questions and gets the answers that all affiliate marketers want to know about a successful Internet Business. Real One-on-one Interviews - tell-all virtually unknown (until Now!) secrets of some of the brightest minds in home business. You will learn about traffic conversion tactics, SEO/keyword, blogging, article marketing, Web 2.0, social marketing, and so much more. These interviews from top marketers like Willie Crawford, Marty Foley, Janet Wilson, and Jeff Schuman and me, Jeff Houdyschell.

I must say I was flattered and honored to be included in a group of people like that. With people like that and the magnitude of their list of followers that they will promote the ebook to I should see a nice jump in traffic once it starts getting around. The ebook is a well rounded view covering most aspects of Internet marketing including WordPress blogging and blogging in general.

Thanks to Doug for the opportunity you can get a copy here: Home Business Gurus Secrets Revealed! .

Filed In: Make Money Blogging by Jeff
1 Comment »

Related Posts

• Get Paid To Blog On Your WordPress Blog
• Learn How To Make Money With A Blog Make Money Blogging
• WordPress First Full Post Remainder As Excerpts

Why do we blog? Why do I blog? Money… yes it’s all about money but before you leave let me tell you why I blog for the money.

There are actually five reasons (or more if you count pets) here at home for me to maintain my websites and blogs. When first starting with Internet marketing it was all about trying to make a little extra cash, but then I dug a little deeper and actually thought about why I want the money it hit me like a sack of nickles across my face. My family…I have been blessed with a beautiful family, a loving wife and, for the most part, 3 terrific kids. Well hey kids can drive you nuts at times .

My oldest whom is actually an adult of 18 now is a shining example of the future of the United States, one of which I am proud of. If you watch the drive-by media you will see nothing but doom and gloom for our future. Even when it comes to our young people they want you to think that the world is going to hell but when I see my oldest I know we will be in good hands.

An honor student, an independent thinker, a great writer and creator of content and (even though I didn’t try to influence it), a young staunch conservative. I am very proud of her. She understands the difference between right and wrong, that she is responsible for her own actions and that nobody owes her anything. She is ready to jump into the world with no hands out, asking for nothing and ready take it on and to make what she wants to make of it. I will probably not need to help her, but I want to and that is why I blog.

My middle child is the party girl who wants to just have fun, but like her sister she “gets it”. She knows the difference between right and wrong, keeps everyone inline and makes sure nobody is doing anything ‘questionable’. She brings joy to all those she meets and will take that personality trait to great heights, of that I am sure, and to encourage it is why I blog.

The youngest is an ornery little guy that thinks the world is full of pirates, sailing ships, toy trains and monsters. While he may be somewhat right about the pirates and monsters, his imagination and young age offers him limitless possibilities. My little buddy is why I blog.

Then finally my wife, who works until 3am, gets up at 6am and does it day in and day out. I blog for you my dear so that some day you can sleep in.

I guess you can say I blog for money… or is it something else?

Filed In: Rant by Jeff
8 Comments »

Related Posts

• Learn How To Make Money With A Blog Make Money Blogging
• Interviews Of Internet Marketers
• Get Paid To Blog On Your WordPress Blog

Increasing interactivity on your blog leads to more subscribers and increased traffic. This can be done with a combination of good content, plugins and the correct settings. Allowing and encouraging comments on your blog is the easiest way to grow it into a community-like atmosphere and keep people coming back to read and possibly continue the conversation. Setting up your WordPress blog to easily allow commenting on posts is the first and easiest step, writing the right type of content to entice comments is the hard part.

First to allow commenting on your WordPress blog check your settings. From the dashboard go to Settings or Options. Within the general settings look for the Membership settings. Make sure the box is not checked next to Users must be registered and logged in to comment. I don’t know about you but if I need to register on a blog just to comment I will probably not take the time. While there I suggest not checking the Anyone can register box, unless you want people to register to post on your blog.

Next click the Discussion menu and make sure the Allow people to post comments on the article is checked. I also would not check the Comment author must fill out name and e-mail as well as the Comment author must have a previously approved comment boxes. People want to see their comments immediately and waiting for them to be approved will reduce the chances of them making any more comments.

For your own good I would hold or moderate any comment with more than two links in it. Actually two or more links in a comment is a sign of a spammer, so be sure to have a good comment spam plugin. Akismet works pretty well for most but if it is letting some comment spam get through then try another like Spam Karma.

The WordPress plugins I suggest are for follow up on comments, one is Comment Relish, that sends a commenter a “Thank You” email for the comment. Another WordPress plugin is Subscribe To Comments, that will subscribe the commenter to the posts comments and send them an email when a new comment is made on a post they have commented on. There are other plugins available for polls and such but I have found that comments and the discussion on posts are what get most people coming back.

Now that you have your settings ready you have to try to encourage the actual comments and subscribers. This is the hard part for most including me. As of late I have reduced my posting here considerably due to burn out, bloggers block and other obligations. I try to encourage discussions with my WordPress Guides and people sometimes have questions about the instructions I post. How you encourage the discussion on your posts is up to you. You can flat out ask questions, or post something controversial, like a political or religious opinion. Joining and contributing to forums that are related to your blog is another way of increasing traffic. Just be sure to put a link to your blog in the forum signature.

Now that I have shared how I try to encourage interaction on my blogs how do you do it?

Filed In: WordPress Guide by Jeff
3 Comments »

Related Posts

• WordPress General Options Guide
• WordPress Categories Adding Subcategories To Your WordPress Blog
• Methods Of Successful Blogging

So you have neglected your old self-hosted WordPress blog and and now you want to dust it off and start blogging once again. But you have forgotten the username and password and the email address associated with the blog is no longer active. So when you try the ‘Lost Your Password’ link on the WordPress login page the new password is getting sent into oblivion. Well there are ways to fix this and one is to reset the password in your database and that can be cumbersome and confusing. This WordPress guide will show you how to change the email address in the database associated with your WordPress Guide.

Hopefully you can still login to your hosting account and get to the phpMyAdmin panel. Once in the phpMyAdmin panel click the drop down box to view the database associated with your WordPress blog.

Next click the Users link, note the the prefix (wp_) in front of the Users link may be different than show here.

Next click the Browse link on top of the Users info shown.

Now find the user that is the administrator of the blog. It’s usually the admin account but your blog account may differ. Click the pencil icon on the left of the account to open it.

Now simply change the email address associated with the account.

Make sure the save radio button is ticked, and then click Go to change the email address.

Now you should have successfully changed the WordPress email address and should be able to use the lost password link to receive a new password. I know you may be wondering, as you are looking at the the password in the database, why not just change that? Well if you notice it is encrypted and depending on what version of WordPress you are using depends on how to generate a new MD5 password. Some may need to use an MD5 hash generator to generate a new password in an MD5 format.

Here is a post to change newer versions of WordPress passwords in the database:
How To: Resetting Your Password in WordPress

To generate a new MD5 password you can Google md5 hash password or try this site: MD5 Password Generator

Filed In: WordPress Guide, WordPress by Jeff
3 Comments »

Related Posts

• WordPress API Key Global Dashboard Confusion
• WordPress General Options Guide
• Installing WordPress Multiple Times On The Same Site