So Regency, So Regency, My Dear

WordPress has many nice features but, for me, one of the least endearing features in the latest version, version 2.6, is the post version editing feature.  For a large blog with many contributors and editors, I can imagine this to be a very nice and useful enhancement.  However, on a small blog such as this, the intermittent (and incorrect) reminders that a more recent post exists are just a hindrance.  So I looked in to how one might turn it off, and it seems quite straightforward.  In order to disable the post revision feature, simply add the following line to your wp-config.php file:

define('WP_POST_REVISIONS', false);

And that should be the end of it.

As a relative newcomer to blogging and WordPress in particular, I’ve recently partaken of a common ritual amongst seasoned and novice WordPress users alike:  experimenting with plug-ins.  Having looked over fifty or more plug-ins, I have compiled a list of plug-ins I think all bloggers would benefit from using.  Additionally, I give three more plug-ins I found very useful. 

3 Must-Have WordPress Plug-ins

 1.  Akismet.  It is a sad fact of life that link spammers treat blogs as potential fodder for comment spamming runs.  However, Akismet is remarkably efficient at detecting comment spam and dealing with it appropriately, leaving you free to write blog content instead of deal with the wailings of the kiddies who still deal in content spam.  You’ll need to register for a free API key to use this plug-in. 

2.  All-in-one-SEO-pack.  In order to maximise the impace your site has on visiting search engine spiders, be sure to use this plug-in and tune the settings to your particular liking.  Search engine spiders pay particular attention to certain HTML, in particular <title>.  Among other useful tweaks, the all-in-one-SEO-pack ensures each page has a page <title> tag that is specific to the page’s content.

3. Google XML Sitemaps.  This very handy plug-in rebuilds your blog’s XML sitemap and notifies Google and other search engines of changes and fresh content - this can be very useful when seeking to index fresh content swiftly.  If you make subsequent changes to the structure of your blog, do not forget to manually rebuild your site’s XML sitemap.

3 Notable Mentions

1.  StatPress.  There are many stats plug-ins from WordPress including the WP-Stats API written by one of the WordPress developers.  However, I have been very impressed with StatPress.  It is light and gives real-time stats in the WP admin dashboard.

2.  AdSense Manager.  This is a must if you plan to run advertisements on your blog.  It is highly configurable and works with a myriad of advertising schemes, including AdSense, Yahoo Search Marketing, AdToll and several others.

3.  Flexi Pages Widget.  This is a very useful addition for building custom navigation menus and menu widgets that display differently on each page.  For an example of this widget is use, I found this Fishing Reels site that demonstrates it well (click the menu on the left hand side to see how).