This post was published 2 years 1 month 6 days ago and as such probably does not reflect my current opinions, knowledge or ability.Since Ashok just got a new WordPress blog and was asking about plugins for it, I thought it was about time to update my own.
Behind the scenes now I’m using wp-super-cache (not that I get enough traffic to actually need it), the All in One SEO plugin that everyone recommends, and an XML sitemap plugin. I’ve also set up automatic backups.
I’d really like to have a go at writing a WordPress plugin, but I can’t think of anything that I want which doesn’t already exist. Anything in particular you would like to see?
Otherwise, are there any other great plugins which you think might help my blog?
I’m using 2 home brew, 7 in total.
1. An unconfigurable post teaser maker (saves on config database queries)
2. A “if you are using these IPs go directly to login screen do not pass go do not enter until valid login”
And I built my SEO directly into my temporary theme, again to reduce queries.
However my site loads consistently around 0.4 seconds, I guess a cache would improve that but for now I’d rather have changes occur instantly as I’m tweaking it everyday.
I’ve made a few changes to some WordPress functions for this theme (for example changing the extracts) but I haven’t really had any need for anything large enough to write a separate plugin. Someone on Plurk suggested I write a blog integration plugin which I’m considering, although I probably wouldn’t use it myself…
A while back I read a blog post (sadly it’s written in Swedish), where the blogger was looking for a wordpress plugin for “self surveillance”. It would mostly involve extracting patterns in writing, what words/tags show up frequently together, as well as when in time such patterns emerge or recur.
His reasoning seem to be that with governments around the world taking a greater interest in what their citizens are doing (for better or worse) it might be a good thing to be able to visualize these patterns for oneself.
I don’t know him personally, so all I can offer is a link to the (Swedish) blog post. I am however reasonably sure that if you were to find that plugin idea interesting, and write him a comment or whatever in English, that he’d respond.
http://copyriot.se/2009/03/30/efterlyses-verktyg-for-sjalvovervakning/
Just stumbled upon your blog today, love the theme, many a great posts, have subscribed to your feed
Cheers!
Hey, this post is a little out of date now, so I don’t really have the time to work on a WordPress plugin any more. However I do think the idea is really interesting, and it’s certainly something I’d be interested in researching in future. I’d imagine it’s the sort of thing that could be useful for self-surveillance (as you suggested) as well as for marketing, keyword-densities and keeping track of changing themes in your website over time.
Too bad about your schedule, but glad that you liked the idea. And I agree, it could certainly have some interesting applications above and beyond simple surveillance to feed one’s own paranoia
Yeah, it’s a good idea and I’m sure people would use it. I’m not sure if there’s any easy way to share ideas about wordpress plugins other than posting on a forum. If it doesn’t exist already, it would be cool to have something like Ubuntu’s Brainstorm for WordPress, where people can post suggestions for features, plugins and themes and developers could choose to work on them.
Wordpress.org maintains the “Kvetch” and “Ideas” pages (http://wordpress.org/extend/kvetch/ and http://wordpress.org/extend/ideas/) so that might actually be worth looking into a little more. And to check out what Brainstorm is all about
Thank you for the link