Blogging Tips - WordPress Or Blogger?

WordPress or Blogger? That is the question. Okay, it's no "to be or not to be" but it'll do for the purpose of this article. Lot of people ask me which they should use. Does it matter? Some think that one is better than the other. Well, I figured that I'd give you the straight deal on these two blogging platforms and then let you decide for yourself which is better. I'm going to try to be as objective about this as I can.
Let's start with what I feel is really the most important aspect of these two platforms...and it has nothing to do with the physical aspects of either. Truth is, with Blogger, you're restricted to using it on THEIR domain. In other words, you don't really own the blog. You're just renting space. This can be a problem in two ways.
First, as it's not your site (not really) Blogger can yank it out from under you at any time. So, if they don't like what you're promoting or think you're running a spam blog, you can lose it faster than you can say "Bob's your uncle." Personally, I don't like being at the mercy of somebody when it comes to my blogging platform.
Aside from that, you're limited to the URLs you can choose for your blog. With Blogger, you're on their domain and nothing is going to change that. With WordPress, you can get your own hosting and your own domain and place the blog on it...thus optimizing your domain keywords as much as possible. This is a big advantage of WordPress over Blogger.
But what about functionality? Well, to be honest, you CAN do a lot more with WordPress. The number of plugins are off the charts. However, for a simple blog, Blogger does a more than adequate job. So if you don't want all the hassles of installation and plugin management, Blogger will be fine.
However, the question that people most often ask is this. "Which one ranks better?" This is where you are going to be in for quite a surprise. Truth is, I've seen Blogger blogs that end up as the number one search result over at Google. If you want to be technical about this, it really doesn't matter which one you go with. How well you rank will depend more on the keywords you choose and the niche you're in than the blogging platform itself.
So there you have it...WordPress versus Blogger. Personally, I'll go with WordPress if I want a specific domain and really want to optimize the blog fully. But if I'm putting something together for quick traffic and don't want any expenses, I'll use Blogger.
In other words...it depends on what you're using the blog for.

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New WordPress Blogger

Are you a new WordPress blogger and you don't know where to start? I was in your position and I will try to help you as much as I can.
First of all, before you start blogging, I suggest you customize your blog. To do that, considering you are a new blogger, it will take you sometime. While you are customizing your blog, you don't want search engines to crawl it so I advise you first to create a file "robots.txt" and write the following code:
User-agent: *
Disallow: /
Then upload it to the folder containing WordPress (using ftp). That way you will have all the time needed to finish the customization of your blog. When you finish, you remove that file.
Now, you can choose a theme of your choice (in your admin panel, choose appearance -> add new themes). You will be provided with some search options to help you choose the one you like.
After choosing a theme, I suggest you install some plugins (in your admin panel, choose plugins -> add new). Some must have (in my opinion) plugins are:
All in one seo: This plugin has some seo options for your blog.
Google XML sitemaps: It creates a sitemap for you and it automatically notifies Google.
You can also try to search some plugins that you need and experiment. If you plan to use Google AdSense, you can try "AdSense now!". It's a very simple plugin that automatically import ads in your posts.
Now, you can delete the robots.txt file you uploaded earlier and start blogging.
Good luck with your new blog!

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How to Block Spam Comments in Your WordPress Blog

How Spammers Reap What You Sow. Is your in-box clogged with junk email messages and blog comments from people you don't know? 86% of all email addresses published on web pages received spam. Spam is something every webmaster and blogger has to deal with. Spam is the unregulated, irrelevant and unsolicited bulk messages filled indiscriminately with links to malicious sites, fake or even banned medicine advertisements.
Spam is one of the most insidious side effects of the Internet revolution and has only gotten worse over time.There are various ways to filter spam in your blog comments.Unfortunately, many of us now spend a lot of time scanning & removing spam that our biggest concern has become that we don't loose original messages we really want. A couple of simple precautions and software available online can dramatically reduce the amount of spam.
How can you stop spam

1. Use captcha plugins to counter spamming bots, that crawl the internet looking for comment boxes
2. Use Akismet plugin. Its a free to use service that keeps a database of spamming bots and their activity pattern.
3. Moderate comments
4. Disable user registration in WordPress blogs
5. Dont give away your email addresses. Stop posting your e-mail address on a public forum or website. It is estimated that 95% of all junk e-mail is caused by a person publicly disclosing his or her address in sites like Facebook, orkut etc. Stop email harvesters by obfuscating email addresses. If it is necessary to give one write it in the following manner so that the bots can't catch it. Write info@yoursite.com as info[at]yoursite[dot]com

These few basic things can certainly minimize spam in your WordPress blog.

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Building Static WordPress Websites Fast and Easy

First you need to find a nice template that you like. There are many free WordPress template sites. It is very easy to find Go to Google or any favorite search engine and do a search for" Free WordPress Templates" or "Free WordPress Themes".
Static WordPress site rarely need the the blog items like calendars or archives etc. A simple solution is to navigate in your WordPress administration panel to design>widgets. You can then add or subtract the widgets you want and you can make the sidebar look exactly as you like. This way you don't have to touch any code.
Now for the plugins. I recommend these basic plugins.:
Add the all in one seo plugin.
Add the privacy policy plugin. Optional, but I always have a privacy policy on my sites.
Add a sitemap plugin if you want. This is very good for search engines to find all your content.
Add a Google Sitemap and register it at Google. This is very important and will help you do well in Google.
If you want AdSense or affiliate banners add the ads manager plugin or any of the other WordPress plugins available. I like and use ads manager. It is very versatile and it can also can be used to easily add other types of banners to a page and control it by the Admin panel. With ad manager you also need the exec php plugin. This is really important this if you are going to hard code includes into the template. I use it to add banners to the sidebar via widgets and the text widget. If you don't know what this means then you can forget it.
Find the plugins at WordPress.org or do a Google search for each of the above plugins. If I am looking for some type of plugin I usually do a Google search by "keyword" and then "WordPress plugin." I always navigate to the authors site for the latest plugin and instructions on how to use the plugin.
Activate the plugins in your WordPress admin panel. They are located in the plugins link to the right if you are using WordPress 2.5. Again, I recommend that you read the instructions that are on the individual author plugin sites as to how to use each WordPress plugin.
Create a page. Label it whatever you like. Scroll down the page writing panel to the "all in one seo" area and add keywords and description to your page. This is the same as adding the keywords and descriptions to the meta content in the head portion of your template.
Scroll down some more to comments and pings and turn off "Allow Comments" so you won't see a user comment box. I want my site to look like a static site so I don't need commenting. If you want also un-check Allow Pings. It is up to you. I always un-check both.
At the bottom of the page you will see a "page order" area. If you want to have a certain order to your pages in your category menu then name the page you want on top of the menu 1 then the next page you create 2 etc. You can later change the order of your pages by using this feature. This is good so that maybe a sales page will be on top.
I also tend to use the subcategories Parent - child a lot. As an example, I will make a page called "articles" and then add different article pages as a subcategory to articles. I then add some form of introduction to the main article page and have the other articles easily accessible off the main article page. A nice touch for me is that I like to find a template that has a horizontal menu bar with drop down lists. I think it looks very classy. For me everything is then neat and orderly. But this technique is up to you.
In the WordPress admin panel go to settings>reading. On top you will see reading settings. Then "front page displays". In the front page displays check the radio button "A static page (select below)" and then from the front page drop down menu click the page you want to use for your front page. That page I usually title Welcome or I will add a keyword rich title. If you don't want any title leave blank.
With just these little changes you have the start of a static website with WordPress. The key is to use pages instead of posts, add keywords and descriptions via the "all in one seo" and your site is a really nice static website. Remember you can control the way the sidebar looks with widgets.
Do not choose templates that make use of the WordPress tagging feature initially. Some of these templates are called newspaper themes. They are a little harder to do and take a little more to understand. Once you master the basic look then you can branch out and try the tagging features of WordPress.
You can add to this basic formula to make your site even more user-friendly. Again, the above tips will give you a basic static and great looking website.

For more Wordpress tips and tricks and Wordpress tutorials visit the WordPressWebPro.com website.

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How To Secure Your Wordpress Installation

Security has always been a major issue on self-hosted Wordpress blogs. Hackers look for vulnerable web sites whose security can easily be breached to exercise their evil intentions. With every new version, the core engine of Wordpress is getting more and more secure. Still some extra steps are needed to harden its security to the maximum. There's no silver bullet that can guarantee complete protection from hackers, but we can make sure they get a tough time while attempting any intrusion.

There are three sub-systems that needs your attention to secure it from potential threats viz., blogging CMS, back end database and web server. Normally we have complete control on blogging CMS and database, while web server administration is normally maintained by hosting service provider unless you own a VPS (virtual private server) or have your own dedicated server. Remember, your Wordpress installation is only as secure as your web server. If there is any weak link in the server, all the security measures discussed below will go in vain.

Securing Wordpress Directory Tree

The basic strategy to make your installation secure is to restrict public access to sensitive files and directories. Whenever any CMS is installed, the directory tree is assigned certain access permissions that may vary according to the their importance, functionality and usage to help protect them from unauthorized access. Following is the step-by-step method to protect your Wordpress files and directories.

Assigning directory permissions - Start with assigning correct permissions to your Wordpress installation tree. Here are some of the basic rules to follow.

1. No file or directory should have a permission of 777.
2. No file should have a permission of 666, except those theme files that are edited via built-in theme editor through Wordpress dashboard.
3. Ideally, all files should have permission of 644. Similarly, all directories should have permission of 755.
4. Some servers require permission of 'wp-content/uploads' folder to be 777.

Disabling public browsing of directory tree - Add the following code to .htaccess file to prevent any kind of direct browsing activity. This ensures no one can view the contents of directory by simply typing directory paths in their browsers.

Options All -Indexes

Although the same effect can be achieved by placing blank index.html files in every directory, but it is the most inefficient and least preferred method to disable directory browsing.

Securing wp-admin, wp-content, wp-includes and wp-config directories - Apart from disabling direct browsing of directory tree, some extra steps should be taken to restrict access to important directories.

Add the following lines to .htaccess to protect wp-config.php from unauthorized access. As the name implies, this file contains important Wordpress configuration settings needed to connect to your blog's database. It includes MySQL username and password.

<files wp-config.php>
Order deny,allow
deny from all
files>

Adding following lines to .htaccess will protect wp-admin.php from unauthorized access. This will ensure your admin dashboard is protected from intruders.

AuthUserFile /dev/null
AuthGroupFile /dev/null
AuthName "Access Control"
AuthType Basic
<LIMIT GET>
order deny,allow
deny from all
allow from xx.xx.xx.xx
allow from xx.xx.xx.xx
LIMIT>

Here xx.xx.xx.xx are the static IP addresses used by you or other administrators/contributors of the blog. In case you get a dynamic IP address each time you connect to Internet, this method will not work at all. In that case, you can use AskApache Password Protect plugin to protect wp-admin, wp-includes and wp-content without any need to edit .htaccess yourself. This excellent plugin acts as a firewall and adds an extra layer of security protecting your sensitive files from automated spam bots and hackers.

Securing Database

Hackers often target Wordpress database to insert countless spam links within the posts. Whenever you install Wordpress, by default every table gets a prefix of wp_ regardless of the table type. Intruders use this information to launch certain type of SQL injection attacks on the database. For better security, you must change this default prefix to something unpredictable. There are 3 methods to change this prefix.
Changing table prefix at the time of installation- This is one of the easiest method to provide a random table prefix to your Wordpress database tables.

At the time of installation, you get a chance to edit the table prefix. Choose a random and unpredictable table prefix that cannot be easily guessed.

Changing table prefix manually - This method can be painful for technically challenged. It requires editing of more than one .php files along with execution of multiple SQL queries. However, if you are comfortable with basic blog maintenance (technical) skills, this excellent tutorial shows you how to change table prefix in Wordpress through direct file editing.

Changing table prefix via plugin - Fortunately, Wordpress has large repository of plugins available for almost every requirement. You can also use WordPress Table Prefix Rename Plugin to achieve the same effect.

Regular database backups - Backups are lifesavers in event of any catastrophe that may bring down your entire site. You can use WP-DB-Backup plugin to backup core as well as additional (plugin & 3rd party script tables) tables of your blog's database. Make the habit of taking backups at least once a week followed by saving of more than one copy in two different locations.

Securing User ID's & Login Procedure

Almost every CMS has built-in user access control mechanism that defines a hierarchy of user-types with each type having different set of privileges. Wordpress is no different and supports pretty good user access control mechanism. Hackers target this system to gain complete control of the CMS leaving no chance to recover from the disaster. Here are some methods and safe practices that can help you in strengthening Wordpress access control mechanism.

Delete default administrator account - As soon as Wordpress installation is completed, we get a default administrator account with user id admin and random system generated password. DO NOT use this account for maintaining your blog. Create a second account with administrative privilege and delete the default admin account.

Strengthen login procedure - With the help of these 2 plugins you can make your Wordpress logins more secure and safe. Chap Secure Login encrypts your password to prevent anyone stealing it while it's in transit to the web server. Login LockDown is an excellent plugin that helps prevent brute force attack to guess your passwords. It disables the login function after specified number of failed login attempts within a given time frame blocking an IP range for specified period of time.

Fine-tuning user access privileges - For multi-author Wordpress blogs,
Role Manager plugin is a boon. If you want to exercise greater control over user access permissions, this plugin can help you assign specific rights at granular level.

Role manager can create custom roles with tailor made access privileges that can be assigned to any Wordpress user on your blog. You can even change and tweak the default roles provided by Wordpress, although it is not recommended and should be avoided.

Miscellaneous Steps To Harden The Security

Hide Wordpress version - Older versions of Wordpress have several loopholes that can be easily breached by seasoned hackers. It is always advised to hide your Wordpress version to mask any vulnerabilities (if any) that may exist in the release you are using. The best way to hide this information is placing the following code in function.php file of your theme.

php remove_action('wp_head', 'wp_generator'); ?>

This ensures removal of Wordpress version information while generating html files for client side.

Keep search engines away from Wordpress folders - You'll never want your blog's entire directory tree to be indexed by search engines. This may expose the contents of sensitive directories making it easy for hackers to analyze and find the potential loopholes. Add the following line to robots.txt file, which is located in the root directory of your blog.

Disallow: /wp-*

Adding this line will ensure none of the search engine bots are allowed to index the directory content.

General Safety Precautions

1. Create strong passwords and change them frequently.
2. Keep your plugins and Wordpress release updated.
3. Regularly backup files and database.
4. Create a disaster recovery plan and simulate it on a test blog.
5. Avoid using plugins from unknown sources (may include malicious code).
6. Use WP Security Scan plugin to find any vulnerabilities in your Wordpress installation.
7. If possible, avoid remote publishing via 3rd party publishing tools.
8. Use SSH or SFTP for secure editing of files and directories.

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