» Wordpress 2.6.1 In Now Available for Download

The long awaited Wordpress 2.6.1 was released today. According to Wordpress Development, 2.6.1 has over 60 fixes as well as some enhancements.

I’m stoked.. As I mentioned in a previous post.. I usually wait for the first security update after a next generation release before I upgrade.

Wordpress 2.6.1 has arrived, so enough blabbering on my part.. I’ve got about 20 Wordpress CMS and Blog sites to upgrade.

Happy Blogging.

Posted in Blogging News | No Comments

» Preparing SES San Jose 2008

It’s been about 6 years since I’ve been to a Search Engine Strategies Conference. I’m really excited to have the opportunity to go this year.

There are actually several colleagues of mine that are attending also. Over the last few weeks we’ve been brushing up on what we suspect will be the hot topics… like Blogging for search, Social Networking and SEO and more.

My friend Jamie also shared this article with us on the topic… http://blog.searchenginewatch.com/blog/080708-063100

Posted in SEO Stuff | No Comments

» Adsense For Feeds Now Available to All

Found this on Search Engine Land this morning.:
AdSense For Feeds Is Now Available To All Google Publishers

Google Operating System reported he is now seeing the Google AdSense for Feeds option in his AdSense account, set up screen. I noted at the Search Engine Roundtable that many folks are buzzing about the new feature at several discussion forums. It appears to me that this beta offering, is now open to all, if not, most Google AdSense publishers.

So, Adsense publishers can now run Ads in their RSS Feeds. I checked my Adsense account and sure enough, I have to new Adsense for Feeds option… I can’t wait to try it out.

If you are currently a Feedburner user, for this feature to work you need to migrate your Feedburner Feeds over to your Google Account. You can find migration documentation here. Unfortunately the migration from Feedburner to Google is manual, so you need to contact Google Support and supply them some info. There is no turn-around time mentioned.

Posted in Announcements, Blogging News | No Comments

» Wordpress 2.6.1 Is Nearing Completion

I just popped into Wordpress Trac to check out the Roadmap on when Wordpress 2.6.1 will be available.

Unfortunately there is no estimated date set for the release of Wordpress 2.6.1, but the status is currently at 78% complete.. so I would expect a release sometime before the end of the month.

So why do I care when Wordpress 2.6.1is released? Typically I always wait to upgrade to the next generation release once they’ve reached the first round of bug / security fixes. Call me cautious but I’d rather be safe as I use Wordpress to run quite a few of my clients commercial sites & business blogs.. so if their sites don’t work 100%.. it falls on me.

Once a next generation release comes around I usually do a test install and copy over a database of some of the bigger client sites like Rafting.com, just to make sure everything is good to go.

What’s your upgrade protocol… do you automatically upgrade your Wordpress installation as soon as a new release is available, or do you wait it out like me?

Posted in Blogging News, Wordpress Tips & Tricks | 1 Comment

» What Do You Blog About?

About a month ago a colleague of mine pinged me one day.. asking if I had a few minutes to chat about some work related topics. I said sure.. I just finished blogging and was about to get started with my work day. In dismay.. he asks me “what do you blog about”?

So what do I blog about?

Blogging and Design
Well, if you follow the blog here on Search Friendly Web Design, you can tell that I blog about Wordpress, blogging and blog tuning. I also post various other web tips and resources as I stumble upon things… like my trial and error escapades with Google Analytics goal conversions. Sometimes I blog about things that I come across or address on the Wordpress Support Forum like the Fix for Google Webmaster Tools Excluded by Robots.

Green Living
My wife and I have another blog called Lite Green Living that we work on together. Here we blog about green living, natural family parenting, environmental issues and more. For the most part Lite Green Living is Carrie’s blog.. It’s cool, she is particular about the type of content that is published and how it’s presented. We work well over there because I often have more time write so I write and so goes through and editorializes my content, so essentially we tag team it.

Life
On my personal blog.. I blog about life, politics, I share my favorite joke / chain mails that friends and family forward to me and various random thoughts. It’s place to ramble on or gripe about anything I want.. check out Sammy Russo DOT Com.

Real Estate
Just after we bought our house I started to take a little bit of interest in the real estate market so I decided to start a small information real estate website which I recently converted into a blog & web resource. On Tehachapi Realtors I blog mostly about current real estate news. Between my regular job and blogging about blogging and green living, my real estate blog often takes a back seat.

So what do you blog about?

Posted in Web Resources | No Comments

» Desktop Blogging Software Review: ScribeFire

Earlier in the Spring I posted a review of BlogJet, I can’t believe it’s taken me 5 months to finally get around to writing my review of ScribeFire.

When I decided to start writing my desktop blogging software review series, ScribeFire was the second desktop tool I tried. And I have to admit, in the beginning I was very skeptical. I used it a couple of times and it just didn’t feel comfortable. But that’s all changed now. I recently gave ScribeFire another look and have been using it more regularly and I’m really growing to like it.

Features Which Set It Apart

• Split screen view. It splits the browser in half so I have a web page in the top half of the browser window and the ScribeFire Editor on the lower half.
• ScribeFire is Add-on Extension to FireFox.
• Add categories to the blog from the editor… can’t do this with BlogDesk.
• Choose to publish as a Post, Page or Draft.
• Toggle between Visual and Code editors without going to the main menu.. it’s on the WYSIWYG interface.
• A current archive of Posts and Pages which you can edit without having to go into the WordPress Interface.
• Work on multiple posts at a time with the use of tabs for each individual post.

All-in-all I really like using ScribeFire… it’s easy to use, it’s feature rich and it’s free. For the last 5 months I’ve actually been using BlogDesk as my primary desktop blogging tool but over the last 3 weeks I’ve been using ScribeFire more and enjoying it.

Do have feedback about the ScribeFire Desktop Blogging Tool? if so, post comments and share your experience with others.

Posted in Reviews | No Comments

» A List Apart Web Design Survey for Web Professionals

I saw this come through via the Blog Herald RSS Feed… A List Apart put together an 18 page survey for web designers and web professionals. This is the second year they have conducted this survey. They took a lot from what they learned last year to make this years survey even better.

If you are a web designer or web professional, please take a few minutes to take their survey. A List Apart will release a report with the tallied results later this year.

Posted in Announcements | No Comments

» ShareThis! Social Bookmarking Widget

The buzz across the web and all the Search Engine Conferences for the last couple of years has been social media marketing or SMM. The social media platform can be a very powerful tool for your blog, feed or website.

My favorite social media plugin is ShareThis! for Wordpress. ShareThis! actually started (and still is) a widget that can be customized to your liking and placed on your website or blog. With Wordpress you still have to go to the web and register for a ShareThis! Account and the plugin makes it easy to include the button in your content.

I like ShareThis! for a few reasons…

• It allows for interaction with all the top social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Digg, Stumble Upon, Technorati etc.
• It also has an email a friend function.
• Reporting features in the ShareThis! web panel.
• Compact.. it doesn’t add 25 little buttons to your content.
• Within Worpress.. very easy to manually configure where you want your ShareThis! Button to be placed if you don’t like the auto placement.

Posted in My Favorite Plugins | No Comments

» URLs Restricted by Robots.txt in Google Webmaster Tools

The other night I popped into the Wordpress Support Forum to see if I could help solve anyone’s issues. One thread I responded to had to deal with someones site not being indexed properly by Google, plus Webmaster Tools was stating the site urls are restricted by robots.txt… but the site didn’t have a robots.txt.

Read more…

Posted in SEO Stuff, Tutorials | No Comments

» Dreamweaver Template to Wordpress Theme Variation

Last year I published a tutorial outlining how to convert a Dreamweaver Template into a Wordpress Theme. In that first method we detached the page from the Dreamweaver template and we eventually broke the templated file into the various Wordpress include files. In this alternate variation we will keep the association between the themes files & the Dreamweaver Template intact. We’ll drop the Wordpress Loop and sidebar code into the editable regions of the Dreamweaver Templated page via source code or split view. And just like in the first tutorial, we will also be merging style sheets together without bringing over too much code so theres no weird cascading effects from overlapping styles.

When converting a Dreamweaver Template to a Wordpress Theme, I personally prefer to use the initial method because creating a full on Wordpress Theme with all it’s include files makes managing your Wordpress CMS or Blog easier and more versatile in my opinion.

Suggested Requirements

• At the very minimum your Dreamweaver Template needs to have one editable region for the main body area and one editable region for the side bar area.
• Any person attempting to use this tutorial should have a moderate understanding of HTML & CSS, a pretty good understanding of how Dreamweaver Templates work, a good attention to detail and common sense.
• Most important, you should read through the original tutorial as this one is a quick bulleted todo list, where the original method goes into a little more detail. Read through both and decide which route you want to take.
• Read the primers for Theme Development and The Wordpress Loop… at least once.

Read more…

Posted in Tutorials | 1 Comment