James Wilson /blog

I said I would post the theme for headlines when I thought it was acceptable. There are still problems, but whatever.

Anyways, this theme is based upon this tutorial theme, but changed to have multiple author support, support tags and categories, and be a double right column instead of a column on both sides. There are a few other little changes in there.

SVN: http://svn.devjavu.com/skeet/headlines-new-theme/
Trac: http://skeet.devjavu.com/browser/headlines-new-theme

Diff between both themes

I’ll try to update the theme whenever I change anything; I just have to remember to do a svn ci each time.

To run by default and not get errors, you need do need a few plugins, like wp_dtree. There’s also a classifieds plugin that I wrote just for headlines that’s needed, but I don’t plan on releasing that, since it contains db info and it’s pretty much just a MySQL query. In sidebar.php, just comment out the get_classifieds_new(10); code.

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My proposal for Google Summer of Code is a Wordpress Updater.

WordPress currently advertises how easy it is to install with its patented* 5 minute install. Upgrade is also supposedly really easy. Just delete all you old WordPress files, upload the new ones, and go to upgrade.php. In reality, this is more complicated than it seems. You have to make sure you delete only the WordPress files, don’t overwrite your other files, all the files still have the same permissions that they did before uploading, and making sure all the back up were done correctly. This proposal plans to make it a much simpler and quicker task of upgrading with easy to use and follow pages that goes through all the aspects of upgrading.

Here’s the basic concept I thought of:

1. Backup all WordPress files.
   • This is a security risk, but it can be lowered by using some obfuscated file/folder combination, or even better, using encryption. An option could also be added to back up all files in the WordPress directory
2. Backup the database
   • Also a security risk, but can be lowered using same scheme as the file backup. The user would then be prompted to download these files.
3. Check for plugin/theme incompatibilty
   • I’m unsure what this will take. It could be something that will just check to see if it has a max version listed, or it could try running them in a sandbox for the new version, like what WordPress currently does when installing plugins.
4. Download latest.(zip|tar.gz) from wordpress.org and extract it (Not overwriting any current files)
   • It could also support using nightly or beta builds, or checking out the SVN trunk
5. Confirm update with user plus other pre-update information or options
   • It could support something like replacing the site with a ‘Site Down’ page or something along those lines
6. Replace all the WordPress files with the new version’s.
   • It can be optional to replace the plugins and themes included. This can also not replace files that have not changed between versions.
7. Run update.php.
   • Most likely just using an iframe
8. Upgrade done.
   • Delete all the downloaded files, and optionally delete all the backups.

Other possible features:

• Revert back to the previous version
• Automatic upgrading

The probable evolution of it would be a drop in file, followed by a plugin, then if seen as useful, added to the WordPress core. At the first deliverable (Midterm), it will be functional, as in does the upgrading, but will probably not be a plugin and be really refined. At the final deliverable, it’ll be a feature-rich plugin with all features listed above.

First problem, it won’t work on all configurations. WordPress doesn’t either. If you’re using a MySQL user without CREATE and DROP privileges, adding plugins probably won’t work and neither will upgrade.php. It’ll give you errors while without worrying about them, changing the WordPress version, causing you to either revert to a backup or find out all the queries run and running them as a privileged user.

Also, the plugin updater would be affected by the same file permission problems that this would be susceptible to.

This is the most popular idea of from the ideas section. Though I didn’t choose this idea due to that, I just believe that the one thing WordPress really needs is a quick and painless way to upgrade.

There currently is a plugin that does this, but it seems a little large and its security practices seem a little iffy.

* Of course, it’s not patented, but it makes it sound cooler.

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I’ve added most of my widgets from Widget A Day. This is to enable update checking and updating in newer versions of Wordpress.

For some reason, you have to have the plugin uploaded to wordpress.org to be able for Wordpress to check if it’s out of date. Not sure why they couldn’t let people add an update url in their plugin informations that Wordpress would check. The only reason I can think of, without actually trying to figure out the real reason, is that all the plugins could be checked using a single request, instead of a request for each plugin. I don’t really think they should automatically just send your plugin information to themselves without asking or having a way to opt out, but whatever.

I didn’t add the Digg Widget or the Countdown Widget. The Countdown widget I just thought was lame.

A Digg Widget already exists, but it just uses the Javascript script that digg gives out, which isn’t any fun. I’ll probably still end up uploading it as ‘Digg Widget by sk33t’ or ‘Script-less Digg Script’ or something along those lines.

Also, I’ll post my GSoC proposals here in the next day or two

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They showed me about updating Wordpress.

It seems it keeps deciding to add spam to my latest post which causes it to not be shown anymore, for some reason. And it only started right after I updated it from my highly out of date version, which was working fine.

Sure, it had SQL injections, XSS vulnerabilities, and content disclosure problems, but it worked fine. Now this version not only is lacking all those cool things listed in the beginning, well for at least a day or so, but kinda forgets about the whole working part. Hooray!

Now, I’m not sure if it’s a problem with my server, but haven’t had this problem with any of my other Wordpress installations or the old version, and my other versions are only 1 version out of date. I also have no problem with any of the older posts, just the one after the 2.3.2. upgrade.

I guess I learned a lesson about updating Wordpress. Don’t. Just don’t.

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This is a plugin based on the YouTube widget. It’ll display a YouTube video, most likely in your sidebar, by calling the youtube function which you can specify the url, width, height, and if it’ll autoplay. It’s not much, at all, but meh.

Download youtube-plugin.zip (youtube-plugin.tar.gz)

This plugin is one function called youtube that will display a YouTube video. It’s pretty much the same as copying the embed code from YouTube, but will allow you to change the width and height much easier.

I’m not going to go too much into this, so here’s the whole calling it premise. You would place this in your template in php tags.

youtube(uri[,width,height[,autoplay]])

Display a video with default width and height (250×165)
youtube("http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYxu_MQSTTY")

Display a video with custom width and height (500×330)
youtube("http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYxu_MQSTTY",500,330)

Display a video with default width and height (” will cause it to default), but autoplay
youtube("http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYxu_MQSTTY","","",TRUE)

Display a video with custom width and height and autoplay
youtube("http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYxu_MQSTTY",500,330,TRUE)

Download youtube-plugin.zip (youtube-plugin.tar.gz)

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Weblog Tools now says it won’t show sponsored themes. That’s fine. I just thought, good for them, when I read it. Then ol’ Matt nuts everywhere and jumps on the bandwagon. Then ol’ shoey says fuck matt. And now I’ve had to form an opinion about this. Dammit. I didn’t feel like doing that today.

All links in my footer are now gone. That includes that nice little link to wordpress.org. Hey, I guess you’re sponsoring all the themes, and since we can’t have sponsored links, it’s gone. Link to the theme? Also gone. Link to the famfamfam icons? Also gone. But the last two don’t have to worry, I added them to the about page.

Now, they might be meaning just the themes sponsored by Joe Shmoe Auto Care that has nothing to do with the theme or wordpress. But you know what? Fuck it. All the links are benefiting someone. The theme makers gets links back to their site, which could make money by showing some advertisement. Wordpress gets exposure so more people might sign up for a wordpress.com account.

But I’m not going to discriminate against links. Either all or none are there. Even though I’ll never download and use a theme that’s advertising for Janson’s Brother’s Funeral Home, some people might. But if they’re censored like this, very few people will.

And it’s not that I condone those kind of sponsored links, I would just rather do it out of spite toward Matt. There’s just something about him that just makes me hate him.

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