Categories
Blogging Mac Personal

Marco.org (With Comments)

I love Marco.org, and I also love Daring Fireball with Comments… …so I created Marco.org (with Comments)! Install the extension for Safari or Chrome and you’ll have Disqus-based comments on Marco.org! To help keep the conversation civil, rude words lead to moderated comments.  I look forward to our discussions. – Zack Katz

Categories
jQuery WordPress

Toggle WordPress Help Menu

It’s not possible (as far as I know) to currently link directly to a help tab in WordPress. Here’s the jQuery solution I cooked up: “ /** * Toggle the WP help menu tab by linking to the tab id * * The anchor must have a `rel` of `wp-help` */ $(‘a[rel=”wp-help”]’).click(function() { // Open […]

Categories
WordPress

Bradycardia & Cardiac Arrest for WordPress 3.6

Bradycardia is the resting heart rate of under 60 beats per minute…. Wikipedia A new feature in WordPress 3.6 is an upgrade to the autosave functionality that’s been around for years. It’s called “Heartbeat” and it makes sure you have valid authentication credentials, aren’t working on the same post as other people, and more. The problem […]

Categories
WordPress

Add "Preview" Link to Manage Themes

Ever since WordPress added a Live Preview option to the Manage Themes screen, it’s been frustrating to test a plugin using multiple themes. Why Live Preview sucks for developers When using Live Preview, you can’t modify the URL of the page you’re visiting or open the preview in a new window or tab. Live Preview […]

Categories
Mac

How to Email Pictures from iPhoto Using Mail.app

iPhoto Email Fail iPhoto 11 added an awful new built-in email service that replaces the previous functionality: when sending an email, it used to open the Mail application and attach the photos to a new email. Now, it uses a terribly designed built-in email functionality that ruins everything. Here’s how to get Mail.app back in […]

Categories
Tutorial Uncategorized WordPress

How to Hide or Replace the WordPress Welcome Panel

Updated: now with more in-depth code! So you want to modify the WordPress Dashboard Welcome Screen There was a thread on the WPMU website that discusses how to disable the WordPress welcome screen, but the code provided didn’t work, so I figured I’d show how to do it! The `wp_welcome_panel()` function uses the `show_welcome_panel` user […]

Categories
WordPress

Major Changes in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory

The new plugin Reviews feature suggests a shifting approach to the WordPress ecosystem. Reviews: a new tab in town On every plugin page, there is now a Reviews tab. This is in addition to the Support tab that WordPress added around August. Rating a plugin now requires a review Until now, WordPress reviews were basic: […]

Categories
Code

Prevent Refresh from Adding Another Product in WooCommerce

Prevent items from being mistakenly added to the cart multiple times. Mountain America Jerky uses the WooCommerce eCommerce plugin for WordPress, and they were having an issue: when users added a product to their cart then refreshed, the item was being added again. Also, when customers added items to their cart, then hit back, they got the dreaded […]

Categories
Gravity Forms

A Gravity Forms Add-on: Change Who Created An Entry

This simple plugin allows you to edit who created an entry in Gravity Forms. When you have an entry from Gravity Forms that you want to edit, you can edit almost anything, except for the entry assignment; who created the entry. Activate the plugin and you will see a drop-down input with each user on […]

Categories
Mac

How to Change the Width of the Reading List Sidebar in Safari

For the record, I know this is a silly hack. Add a new item to the `~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.Safari.plist` file: Key: `SidebarSplitViewDividerPosition` Type: “Number” Value: `400` For the value, use whatever width you want in the number of pixels. I think I like 400.

Categories
Google Web Development

Get URL for Searches in Safari 6

There have been many articles and conversations about the question of how to get the URL of a Google search in Safari 6. Some solutions include using the Terminal to get the URL, using AppleScript,  using bookmarklets, and using Automator. I created a Safari Extension to make this process easier. Get URL: Easily get the URL […]

Categories
Mac Web Development

Add Googlebot User Agent to Safari Develop Menu

If you’re like me, you’ve wanted to have the Googlebot user agent availalbe in the Develop menu of Safari. Go to /Applications/ Right-click on Safari.app and select Show Package Contents Navigate to Contents/Resources/ Find `UserAgents.plist` Open `UserAgents.plist` in your favorite text editor Either Replace with the contents of this file and continue to step 9: [download id=”12″] […]

Categories
Uncategorized

Time Out Free: An App to Enforce Your Stretch Breaks

It’s hard to get up and stretch on a regular basis, especially when your computer allows you to keep working! I will spend all day on my ass. That can’t be good. I have been dreaming about the perfect app that would force me to get up by blocking all access to what I was doing. […]

Categories
WordPress

Create a Custom Error Page for "Error establishing a database connection"

Here’s how to make a custom database error page for WordPress. If your site’s all set up and you see “Error establishing a database connection,” that’s an immediate “oh crap” situation. Hostgator.com, the company that hosts this website, has had some issues recently, and I’ve seen that screen a little too often. If you want […]

Categories
Web Development WordPress

Generate a Link to Activate a Plugin in WordPress

Here’s another specialized plugin development tip! If you want to create a link to activate a plugin, you need to know the path of the plugin file. Let’s use Akismet for this example. $path = ‘akismet/akismet.php’; $link = wp_nonce_url(admin_url(‘plugins.php?action=activate&plugin=’.$path), ‘activate-plugin_’.$path); The `$link` URL will be something like http://yoursite.com/wp-admin/plugins.php?action=activate&plugin=akismet%2Fakismet.php&_wpnonce=f97dabdf9

Categories
Web Development WordPress

How to Hard-Code a UA String for the Google Analytics for WordPress Plugin

If you want to define a Google Analytics “UA String” while using Yoast Google Analytics plugin for WordPress. Add the following to your theme’s `functions.php` file: add_filter( ‘option_Yoast_Google_Analytics’, ‘custom_ua_string_filter’); function custom_ua_string_filter($options = array()) { $options[‘uastring’] = ‘UA-########-#’; $options[‘manual_uastring’] = true; return $options; } For users of WordPress Multisite, this will allow you to pre-configure new blogs […]

Categories
WordPress

Enable Shortcodes for Gravity Forms Field Descriptions

To enable shortcodes inside your Gravity Forms form description, field labels and descriptions, you need to add the following code to your theme’s functions.php file:

Categories
WordPress

Merge Settings Into an Array in WordPress

I found people are coming to this site (to an unrelated article) looking for a way to merge settings into an array. You’re looking for `wp_parse_args()` The main function for WordPress to do this is `wp_parse_args()`. You likely want this function. Learn more about `wp_parse_args()` Also consider `shortcode_atts()` This is used for parsing shortcode options. […]

Categories
Design

Mitt Romney's Compressed Images

Mitt, don’t skimp on image optimization I just visited Mitt Romney’s website for the first time and noticed right away that his site looked cheap because his button images had been so compressed for load time.   For comparison, here are some similar boxes on BarackObama.com   Look for yourself I don’t think the affect of the […]

Categories
Web Development WordPress

Simple Way to Get Plugin Status in WordPress

I have previously written on how to determine if a widget is active. This is helpful for widgets, but not for plugins. WordPress has a couple of different functions that help you determine plugin status. They are both located in wp-includes/plugin.php `validate_plugin()` spits out an error if the plugin file does not  exist or has […]