Mission: Communicate

Helping People With a “Working” 404 Error Page

Tim Griffin — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 18:00:55 +0000

Regardless of whether your goals is to educate or entertain, there is bound to be a time when someone hits a “404 Error” on your website. Perhaps they typed a link in the address bar incorrectly, maybe someone linked to your best page with a space or hyphen where it didn’t belong. 404 – It happens.

You do however have a significant measure of control over WHAT happens WHEN a 404 is experienced. A moment of frustration can be turned into a laugh, a smile of appreciation or perhaps even inspiring an action/exploration that the reader had not considered. The choice of how the 404 error is handled on your domain is up to you.

A quick search and you can find dozens of great examples of how to treat your website visitors right in this scenario:

These will give a a good start on the hunt for inspirational 404 error options and links to other ideas and tutorials on what is next.

What You Need To Do:

Part of the reason for writing this up is personal. I wanted to do something about the 404 and was looking for methods that could achieve helpful results. With a WordPress powered website there are several options.

Option 1) Create or edit your 404.php template.

Update this file with your own custom message, links and imagery. A good WordPress theme comes with this template already coded – simply waiting for your custom code. What to do if your theme does not have a 404.php template? Change to a better template or, read up on the codex regarding the 404.php file and create your own. The basic 404 template can be as simple as the default theme 404.php file:



  
    Error 404 - Not Found

You can duplicate this 404.php template in your default theme and upload it to your current theme. This is a good option if the page.php template of your site has the header/content/sidebar/footer in the same order as the default theme. If not, duplicate the page.php of your current theme and use the above to guide you in the process of removing the_loop and unnecessary php from the 404 template. (theall the php code except the call for the header, footer and sidebar if theses calls exist in your present page.php template).

Joost offers a very insightful guide to 404 including the above method here.

Option 2) Install the Smart 404 WordPress Plugin.

Installation of this plugin requires editing your 404 template file “404.php” and results in a “Smart” presentation of related/helpful options for your visitors. Here is the authors’ description:

When a page cannot be found, Smart 404 will use the current URL to attempt to find a matching page, and redirect to it automatically. Smart 404 also supplies template tags which provide a list of suggestions, for use on a 404.php template page if a matching post can’t be immediately discovered.

Michaels’ plugin and instruction for setting up the Smart 404 can be found here.

Option 3) “Widgetize” Your 404 template.

Registering a new widget and updating your WordPress “404.php” template allows you to present a custom message when a person hits your 404 Error page through managing a 404 widget in your WordPress dashboard. In this way you can leave the boringly predictable default “404 Not Found” statement. You could get smart, helpful or just plain fun with a custom message on your 404 page. Justin Tadlock has written an easy to understand article to help you accomplish a widgetized 404 page.

What You Need To Know:

Serving your readers with helpful information – the kind they are looking for is the point. There are several technical aspects to doing this well and others have written some excellent rundowns for taking your 404 settings to a level that allows you analyze and track what people are finding – or TRYING to find on your site. Be sure to read Joost’s article covering some “Must Know” details about how the 404 works, what is required and how to analyze what is happening with your 404 errors pages.

Helpful 404 Page References:

Send a PDF using your WordPress website and email list

Tim Griffin — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 18:48:39 +0000

A large number of people access email using one version of outlook or another. That is great – except when a friend repeatedly sends large attachments to your address. How can you become more effective in sending documents by email?

In an earlier tip the idea of sending images without bogging down others’ email inbox was explained. The same method can be applied for handling the need to send documents – PDF, DOC, and others. The WordPress media manager can make this a breeze and give you the confidence that more people are happy receiving your email.

1. Convert your Document to a PDF

By doing this you increase the number of your recipients who will be able to quickly open and read your content. How to do this?

Mac:

In the Print dialogue, choose the “PDF/Save as PDF” option. (this is a standard option with all present day macs)
Save the file with a name that has no spaces (the name of the file will be in the url of the link – no spaces lead to less 404 not found experience)
Done

Windows:

Download and install the CutePDF tool for windows
Print your document – selecting the CUTE PDF Printer instead of your default machine
When prompted – save the document as a PDF with no spaces in the name (the name of the file will be in the url of the link – no spaces lead to less 404 not found experience)

2. Upload PDF to your WordPress media manager

Note: You can upload using the “Media/Add new” option in the main navigation of your WordPress dashboard or use the media upload dialogue above the post/page editor.

Copy and insert a link in your email

This link – as pointed out by the green arrow above is the ticket to giving recipients the option to download and view your document. Now that you have that copied to your clipboard compose a new email and insert the link. A few quick tips on this:

avoid scaring or boring people with having to look at the “http://www. … …pdf”. Write a few meaningful words, select that text and use the insert link button in your editor. The text then becomes the active link.
Give people a clear idea of what they get when they click. Spell it out for theme i.e. “Download this 3.3MB PDF document”
A Few Tutorials for inserting links in email: Outlook, gMail, Apple Mail, Yahoo mail

Once mastered this is a very simple route for successful email and much happier recipients. Not only will more of your email make it past the spam filters more effectively, generally there will be less cringing and more clicking to get at your carefully prepared document.

Don’t have WordPress? Favor uploading documents elsewhere? Do tell what service you prefer to use when sending PDF or other documents!

Noemi Photograhy – Updated Blog Design

Tim Griffin — Tue, 26 May 2009 00:10:54 +0000

Noemi takes pictures. Lots of them!!
When you visit her blog you will quickly notice that Minnesota has a photographer who is professional, loves people and has a significant fan base regularly visiting her blog. She offers courses on photography and loves to help others begin to discover the joy of capturing life one picture at a time.

View the latest on Noemi’s Blog:

My Husband…the one I love!
Living a Life with Purpose…
The Reilly Family Portraits (Eden Prairie, MN)

Noemi needed to update her photoblog design to reflect a more “Noemi” and “photo” experience. As a photographer who specializes in making the ordinary extraordinary Noemi wanted to take her site to a new level. Priorities included:

showcasing more of her professional photography
rotate recent photos in the header of the blog
twitter updates at the top of the site
event registration/payment processing
improved blog and site navigation

What did Noemi have to say about her new design?

I am so excited to finally unveil the NEW BLOG I’ve been working on for the last few months! It’s so pretty and clean and classy and artsy and has tons of BIG PICTURES! It should be up before the end of the month. I hope you are wow-ed!
(read full quote on her blog)

A few before and after blog screenshots:

To experience the beauty of the new photography blog design “NoemiPhotography.com/blog“

Scrapper’s Guide on WordPress

Tim Griffin — Fri, 15 May 2009 03:30:28 +0000

Linda and her creative team write volumes of high quality tutorials on how to create scrapbooks with your digital pictures. As of this date Google has approximately 21,900 pages indexed on the ScrappersGuide.com website. Now that is a web SITE!! From public pages to premium content, a gallery and forum there are significant amounts of material and community involvement over at Scrappers Guide.
Here is a look at what is happening on the WordPress site presently:

Up until recently all the public pages were built as static html pages using Dreamweaver. This is not a bad thing – but a static website has limitations that a dynamic content management system such as WordPress can help you overcome.

Linda now has the ability to make site-wide changes with a single input. She also has taken advantage of the fact that multiple authors can create new content for review and then publication. The day the new WordPress powered site went live there was a buzz of comments from numerous enthusiasts who have become familiar with the quality tutorials published by the Scrapper’s Guide creative content team.

Quality content just in from Scrappers Guide:

Two Digital Advantages (Photoshop)
Two Digital Advantages
Win Adobe Photoshop Elements 8 AND Premiere Elements 8
Win ‘Learn Digital Scrapbooking’ Training PSE 8 DVD

Work Performed:

Content Architecture Consulting
WordPress Installation and Optimization
Custom Theme Development
Tailored WordPress FAQ Plugin
Coaching/Training for Creative Team to get started with managing content in WordPress

Additional Notes:
This site makes extensive use of the Widget Logic WordPress plugin – allowing for custom sidebar content that is specific to pages, categories and posts in certain categories on the website. The conversion from HTML to WordPress took place over 7 months and is ongoing as the team works through the original pages and reworks them into the new. (Redirection by John Godley is an essential resource for moving old pages to new urls). Overall the site is more user friendly as the WordPress pages are more Search engine optimized, galleries of images and product are more interactive and comments are enabled for ongoing discussion of content. The Thesis Framework for WordPress was selected as the base design to build the custom ScrappersGuide.com website layout. Page layouts include a single column, left column only, pages/posts with right side shopping cart (utilizing the robust E-junkie option for selling CD’s and downloads), standard three column posts and more. Check it out!

Disappearing Widgets – A Solution in WordPress 2.7

Tim Griffin — Tue, 12 May 2009 07:28:50 +0000

Problem: Something is wrong – I added a new widget to those already in place – and when I selected to “save changes”, one or more of the widgets disappears! What happened? What did I do wrong? Can it be fixed?

For me, this problem surfaced on a WordPress 2.7 install when changing the site url from a “non-www “to a “www” url in the general settings. Apparently, this gave a signal to our WordPress install that the theme I was using was a newly selected theme. And because widgets are not transferred from one theme to the next theme automatically, (different themes are coded with widgetized areas and sidebars in unique ways for instance), the widgets were now acting in a strange and unpredictable way – as an apparent result of my changing the url of the site. Others have reported similar issue for various reasons. What a relief to find that there is a solution.

Save My Widgets!

In the scenario I was in today, we had over 20 widgets, specific logic for most of them (Widget Logic plugin), widget-specific css, html, forms, etc., and the site was live. HELP!!

So, if you feel like screaming because widgets are disappearing left and right. STOP! Don’t wait for another one to vanish into thin air. The sun will still rise tomorrow… smile at the fact that a widget got to you… well it may not be a laughing matter? Laugh anyway ;-D

After digging for answers here are the steps that worked for me:

Backup your WordPress database (never hurts!)
Download and install Justin Tadlock’s “Widget Reset” plugin. (Don’t run it yet – just install)
In Firefox open a new tab and navigate to each Widget Section in your WordPress dashboard, i.e. sidebar-1, sidebar-2, etc., etc.
In a separate tab run the reset process (see the readme in the plugin)

At this point all widget data is erased and a complete clean slate is ready for widgets to be created – without being dropped at random. Here is what saved the bacon for me with loads of data in widgets that I did no care to lose:

Visit each tab you opened earlier with the previously existing widget content still in place and choose to “save changes”

We lost three widgets before we went through the above process. And in the end, only three – which were rebuilt through the help of text files and screen shots. I am told this will not be as much an issue in 2.8. I am curious to see the change and how widgets are handled. What changes will be required for a theme to be 2.8 ready?

In the mean time I will sleep a little better having reaped the benefits of the WordPress community, Justin’s plugin, a backup of sorts and Firefox. Did I miss an easier solution? Let me know!

All Things Good | Best of WordPress

Tim Griffin — Fri, 08 May 2009 06:24:14 +0000

I’m on the hunt for all things good WordPress. If you are looking for the best plugins, the best WP tutorials, the best themes… where would you go? Here is one address I’ve added to my book for safe keeping and frequent usage:

wpazo | The best WordPress stuff.

Ian Stewart (developer of the Thematic Framework for WordPress) announced the launch this site – WPAZO, May 7, ‘09 on twitter. It was immediately added to my list of ‘must have’ resources. One things I noticed immediately was a number of tutorials for extending and making use of new features in the yet to be released 2.8 version of WordPress. Plenty of room for growth and apparently Ian is looking for people to submit links to more of the best stuff out there. Good Stuff

There are plenty of good collections out there besides the usual codex and forums over at wordpress.org. Which collections do you consider the best and find that you actually use on a frequent basis? How would you rate this latest arrival: WPAZO?

A Better Blog – Day 1 with 9100 Other Bloggers

Tim Griffin — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 12:16:42 +0000

Today marks the first day of writing a better blog. And believe me, this is as good a time as any for this blog to take on some serious “better-ment” for this blog.

The assignment for today focused on the 100-150 words that describe what it is you blog about; an elevator pitch for your blog. Once decided upon what it is then keep it in front of you. Incorporate it into your tagline, your conversations, business card, etc. Shape it, then let it shape all your communication as you move forward from there.

Why this is important to me:

My interests are so broad – containing my interests in a singular statement helps me categorize the various interests
My passion is focused – and yet easily buried by my various commitments. Perhaps the commitments need refining to more accurately reflect person strengths
You will be able to more quickly find useful reading as this site becomes more focused.
A narrower definition of content is more able to ”hit the mark“. You’ll know if you’ve landed on a site that can do what you need it to do.

Another application of less = more. Or stated another way, more focus = less waste of effort, time, and money. Who could have thought that could all be contained in the “elevator pitch” of your blog? Are you taking the 31 days to a better blog? Sign up here and give a shout out below. See you there!

(Note: what would you say the elevator pitch of this site is? How easy did you personally find Darren’s first assignment?)

Hidden Tool – Minimize The WordPress Admin Menu

Tim Griffin — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 16:39:55 +0000

There are frequently moments when you feel the need for space. Editing or creating content in the WordPress dashboard can often present those moments for myself. Need some more space? No worries – there is a not-so-hidden function that give you just what you are looking for.

In the upper right hand side find the small &laquo« directly under the dashboard link. Once clicked you’ve got nearly two more inches of screen space. This link eluded many people – for almost the whole existence of WordPress 2.7. So if you are one of those individuals- don’t sweat – you are not alone!

Notice the clickable button under the Dashboard link. That's the secret!

That’s the before. And now the after:

Once minimized - Enjoy the extra room now available!

Did this option escape you? How does it feel to have a bit more room?

Rob Wrote His Book

Tim Griffin — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 03:06:31 +0000

Rob Severson wrote a book. He’s been coaching himself and others in the journey of life, peace and provision for a good number of years. Now he’s gone public, persevered in the process of becoming an author and published his contribution for all to see.

Rob’s site needed additional function so he could sell his book through the website. His first question when he called to discuss this next new development was, “Have you written a book? Do you want to?” He then went on to describe what it is like to accomplish a goal like this – he jumps into the coaching, encouraging role effortlessly – even in the process of requesting specific developments on his website.

Here is what was done to go live with his book on his own site:

Latest goodness from Rob:

Greenfield Lutheran Church, Harmony, MN
FREE OFFER FOR PERSONAL FINANCE TURNAROUND
How to be Happy!

Craft a Clean Layout where the book content is described
Install and configure a shopping cart with pricing based on number of books purchased
Update each page of his site with a “Check out My New Book” link
Optimize all the above for search engine and real people interaction
Include a hidden/protected page for Rob to place special priced orders for non-profit and interested groups he’s connected with

The new layout and order pages make use of the WordPress publishing platform, xhtml and css. Google cached the new pages almost immediately and more importantly his traffic went up 56% the first month. Here’s to hoping for much more action on Rob’s site!

What do you like about this approach to selling a book online? Head over to Rob’s site and congratulate him – tell him what you like about his online contribution!

Painless Upgrade to WordPress 2.6.5

Tim Griffin — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 03:58:53 +0000

Logging into your WordPress website today will give you the familiar notice that the next update of WordPress is available and to – Please Update!.

Here is what the dev team over at WordPress.org says regarding fixes and a security update:

The security issue is an XSS exploit discovered by Jeremias Reith that fortunately only affects IP-based virtual servers running on Apache 2.x. If you are interested only in the security fix, copy wp-includes/feed.php and wp-includes/version.php from the 2.6.5 release package.

2.6.5 contains three other small fixes in addition to the XSS fix. The first prevents accidentally saving post meta information to a revision. The second prevents XML-RPC from fetching incorrect post types. The third adds some user ID sanitization during bulk delete requests. For a list of changed files, consult the full changeset between 2.6.3 and 2.6.5.

Note that we are skipping version 2.6.4 and jumping from 2.6.3 to 2.6.5 to avoid confusion with a fake 2.6.4 release that made the rounds. There is not and never will be a version 2.6.4.

The team over at Blogs About explain the security exploit: only affects IP-based virtual servers running on Apache 2.x.

Bottom line: need to upgrade WordPress.
Approach 1: Download the entire WordPress 2.6.5 version and follow the normal upgrade instructions
Approach 2: Find the changed files and only replace these files. (full changeset) This is the diff from 2.6.3 to 2.6.5. A very time efficient approach and having this list of files allows you to move quickly through a large number of installs.

Here are the files compressed and available for your downloading pleasure.WordPress 2.6.3 to 2.6.5 diff

Other files are available – just give a shout out in the response form if you’re looking for either of the following:
2.6.2 to 2.6.3 diff
2.6.1 to 2.6.2 diff

Gotta love WordPress!