SemiBeta Tech, Lancing, Work, and Fries

Week in Geek: The Painful WordPress Upgrade Edition

This weekend we finally upgraded the HTG backend system to WordPress 2.8 from an ancient 2.0 installation, thanks to the hard work of Shawn, our new programming wizard.

This enabled us to finally do a ton of great new things… like start the hard work of reorganizing our messy category pages. Now you’ll notice that the Office section is broken out into sub-categories… we’ve added a Windows 7 category, etc.

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The home page now has bigger thumbnails, and all of the daily articles should show up as “featured” so you know exactly what is new.

Now we’ve got a list of the authors on the home page, and each article will have a similar box showing you exactly which one of us wrote the article you are reading (if you are reading on the web site itself)? Note: We haven’t added Daniel yet, but we will shortly.

These changes really aren’t that impressive—it’s the stuff behind the scenes that makes this upgrade great, and we’ll be adding new features to the site very soon.

For those that might be curious, upgrading from 2.0 to 2.8 is actually relatively painless as long as you didn’t hack the source code. Which I did. (Seriously, it was ugly) Thankfully Shawn is a very talented guy, and he re-implemented all of my hacks as proper plugins, so from now on we should be able to upgrade WordPress without worries.

But wasn’t 2.0 insecure? Sure, you should absolutely keep WordPress updated with the latest release—but your risk is minimized if you follow some good security guidelines and lock down your wp-admin folder, make sure to create an automated backup script, sync your backups off-site, and lock your server down.

Random Links We Found This Week

Almost all of these are thanks to our great forum administrator Scott, who sends me good stuff on a daily basis.

• Dear Websites, Please Follow These 10 Rules [Google Blogoscoped]
  I really hate annoying websites too.
• Experts warn of porn Mac attacks [BBC News]
  Viruses get mean, start hitting Mac users below the belt.
• Integrate fail2ban with WordPress: Spam Log Plugin [Random Bits]
  This is ubergeeky, but being able to block spammers is loads of fun.
• Windows 7 to be shipped in Europe sans Internet Explorer [Ars Technica]
  But how will we download Firefox without IE pre-installed?
• MacBook Pro 13″ Unibody Teardown [iFixit]
  This site has sweet guides to tearing apart various gadgets—and now they took apart a Mac.
• A Note on Recent Phishing Attacks Against Outlook Users [Microsoft Office Outlook Team Blog]
  This is the official MS Outlook blog, and they are warning about some nasty phishing attacks. Should definitely read this one.
• Trillian Astra – Download
  The chat client is finally out! Now maybe Duke Nukem Forever will finally be released…
• Futurama – Calculons Windows Vista Fails [YouTube]
  Good news, everyone! We’ve got a delivery to the funny zone.
• OK ROM comes – [PreCentral Forums]
  Wait, the Konami code works on the Palm Pre? Or is it the development kit?
• Happy Negative Christmas [Scott Adams Blog]
  This is absolutely hilarious, and a really good idea too.
• The Architecture Issue – Data Center Overload [NYTimes]?
  Very interesting read about how giant datacenters are taking over.

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Reviews And Such

Yay reviews. And soon, a nicely organized reviews section. And you’ll be able to leave your own reviews! Will be good stuff.

Wise Disk Cleaner Pro The Good: Fast deep scans, easy to use interface, included file recovery tool can be a lifesaver	Read the Full Review…
WinDVD 9 The Good: A lot of great enhancements for audio and video playback and supports Blu-ray	Read the Full Review…
Ad Aware 10th Anniversary Edition Free The Good: Same great spyware protection you have learned to expect from Ad-Aware. Much faster overall. Redesigned easy to use graphical user interface.	Read the Full Review…

The Weekly Articles

Here’s the articles we wrote this week.

• MusicBee is a Fast and Powerful Music Manager
• Friday Fun: Cargo Bridge
• Firefox Themes: Best of the Darkness
• Create a Shortcut or Hotkey to Switch Power Plans
• Get Your Favourite Extensions to Work in Firefox Alpha Builds
• Fun Wallpapers: The Linux Desktop Edition
• Update Portable Firefox the Easy Way
• Input Director Controls Multiple Windows Machines with One Keyboard and Mouse
• Make Outlook Faster by Disabling Unnecessary Add-Ins
• Share Files and Printers in Windows 7 with HomeGroup
• Make Outlook Stop Using Internet Explorer’s RSS Feeds

Editor’s Weekly Random Thoughts

It’s 4am here and I’m really tired. That’s pretty much the extent of my thought process right now =)

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Week in Geek: The Painful WordPress Upgrade Edition