Sometimes you want to show your WordPress site to someone before you’re ready to properly launch it.

This plugin creates an “Allowed List” of IP addresses.  If you’re not on the list, you see a generic “Coming Soon” page.

The admin panel lets you view your list, and remove IP’s you don’t want.  You can work with Tokens, allowing you to send a link which will add the visitor to the allowed list.  This lets you show off your new site without launching it. (Or perhaps, show your client that site you’ve been working on)

The IP Allowed List plugin is designed to make life as easy as possible.  Generic tokens are set up to begin with, and a generic Coming Soon page is provided.  You can work with the defaults straight out of the box.  If you’d prefer to tweak, you can do that too.

• WordPress Plugin Page

If you have comments on the plugin, please leave them here.

I’ve been playing with the newest version of WordPress (2.8), which is due to be released in the near future.  It features a completely new way of writing Widgets, so I’ve been testing that out.

I discovered a clash with my favourite wordpress theme, the Thesis framework.  Took me a little while to figure it out, but I think I’ve solved the problem.

[AlertBox text="Update 18 June 09: Thesis 1.5.1 has been released, and makes this patch unneccessary."]

The problem

WordPress 2.8 features an excellent Widget manager in the admin area.  But with Thesis 1.5, this area is unusable.  Widgets cannot be dragged/dropped, which is essential.  It seems that the JS provided by Thesis clashes with JS provided by WordPress on a few different screens.

The fix

Open up your Thesis files, and look in /lib/admin/admin.php.   Look for function thesis_options_js()

{code type=php}
$date_modified_js = filemtime(THESIS_SCRIPTS . ‘/thesis.js’);
$date_modified_ui = filemtime(THESIS_SCRIPTS . ‘/jquery-ui.js’);
echo ‘<script type=”text/javascript” src=”‘ . THESIS_SCRIPTS_FOLDER . ‘/thesis.js?d=’ . date(‘mdy-Gms’, $date_modified_js) . ‘” /></script>’ . “\n”;
echo ‘<script type=”text/javascript” src=”‘ . THESIS_SCRIPTS_FOLDER . ‘/jquery-ui.js?d=’ . date(‘mdy-Gms’, $date_modified_ui) . ‘” /></script>’ . “\n”;
{/code}

Thesis comes with its own jQuery UI script, which clashes with the in-built wordpress scripts.  Replace that function with this one:

{code type=php}
if (!is_admin()) { return; }
$date_modified_js = filemtime(THESIS_SCRIPTS . ‘/thesis.js’);
$date_modified_ui = filemtime(THESIS_SCRIPTS . ‘/jquery-ui.js’);
wp_enqueue_script(‘jquery-ui-core’);
wp_enqueue_script(‘jquery-ui-sortable’);
wp_enqueue_script(‘jquery-ui-tabs’);
wp_enqueue_script(‘thesis-admin-js’, THESIS_SCRIPTS_FOLDER.’/thesis.js’);
{/code}

Also look for the function thesis_admin_styles_and_scripts()

It contains this:

{code type=php}
add_action(‘admin_head’, ‘thesis_options_stylesheet’);
add_action(‘admin_head’, ‘thesis_options_js’);
{/code}

Replace with this:

{code type=php}
add_action(‘admin_head’, ‘thesis_options_stylesheet’);
add_action(‘admin_head’, ‘thesis_options_js’);
add_action(‘init’, ‘thesis_options_js’);
{/code}

And problem solved!  So far I haven’t discovered any unwanted side-affects.  You may only need to enqueue jquery-ui-sortable.

[AlertBox text="Update 18 June 09: Thesis 1.5.1 has been released, and makes this patch unneccessary."]

I heard the most wonderful stream of profanity at the office today.  Funny story, really.  The long suffering Sinclair women (Brendon’s wife and daughter) have fled the country.  They’re spending a few weeks holidaying in Europe.  And no, the profanity wasn’t because Brendon and his boys are starving without Mel to cook for them.

The girls need some documents sent over, and its causing a lot more trouble than it should be.   They’re not staying in one place for very long, so timing is everything.

So Brendon mailed out the package via Australia Post, using their 2-4 day express service.  He was assured it should be there in 2 days, which would be great.  But naturally, it arrived after the girls had moved on.

When he expressed his displeasure to Australia Post, he was told that the 2-4 day express service typically takes 5 days to deliver.  Methinks they need to rename that service.

So he sends out a replacement package using UPS.  As you do.  He uses a $93 envelope GUARANTEED to be there by April 1st.  When he checks the tracking service 5 hours later, its already been rescheduled to be a day late.  Unbelievable.

Bless Ray Tomlinson, I’ll never take the reliability of email for granted again!

At work, we’re running some affiliate sites based on WordPress.  Standard practice is usually to pipe affiliate links through a /hop/ script.  We typically accomplish this by creating a .htaccess rule to redirect /hop/(.*) to hop.php, which will determine what hop was requested, and redirect based on that.

It’s a pretty tidy method, but still not ideal.  So I thought, wouldn’t it be great to manage those hops through the wordpress admin?  Much better than connecting via FTP to the server, and editing the hop.php file itself!

And so the Link Hopper is born.  You can download it here:

• WordPress Plugin Directory Page

I’ve written many custom plugins before, to satisfy client requirements on various sites.  This is the first one I’ve developed fully on my own time, and listed in the public plugin directory.

Let’s see if anyone else finds it useful!

There’s a few advantages here:

• Technical skills not required
  • It’s not that complicated to FTP to a server and edit a file, but this is still easier
• Easier to manage outdated links this way
  • Prior to using a /hop/ file, one could have an affiliate link on dozens of pages
  • When the merchant closes a product line, or changes a link, all those pages have a dead link
  • Now there’s a single setting which can be easily changed when this happens!

If you have comments on the plugin, please leave them here.

[NoticeBox text="This tutorial deals with the Thesis wordpress theme. It may not mean much if you haven't worked with Thesis before."]

The wonderful Thesis wordpress theme comes with two sidebars which are very configurable.  You can insert widgets into either sidebar, exactly as you wish.

But what if you want to put a widget somewhere else?  Let’s take a look at the Tailored Web Services website.  (That’s my employer).   Look at the footer of this site.  There are three columns down there, and each one contains a widget.

So how did that happen?

The key functions here are register_sidebar()and dynamic_sidebar().

Together, these functions allow us to set up an extra “sidebar”, which will be widget-enabled through the wp-admin area.

Let’s start with this:

{code type=php}
<?php
add_action(‘thesis_hook_footer’, ‘customFooter’);
function customFooter() {
?>
<div class=”footer1″>
<ul class=”sidebar_list”>
<?php if ( !function_exists(‘dynamic_sidebar’) || !dynamic_sidebar(‘Footer1′) ){ ?>
<li class=”widget”>Dynamic Widgets are not enabled</li>
<?php } ?>
</ul><!– sidebar_list –>
</div><!– footer1 –>
<?php
} // customFooter
?>
{/code}

The function customFooter() is designed to insert the right code for a new “sidebar”.  And yes, we’re still calling it a sidebar even though it goes in the footer.

The add_action() line defines where this new block of code should go.  The Thesis User’s Guide contains a reference list of all hooks provided by Thesis.  In this case, we want it in the footer.

The dynamic_sidebar('Footer1') call tells WordPress to output “Footer1″ there if present.

Next, we need to use that register_sidebar() function to let us put widgets in there.

{code type=php}
<?php
register_sidebar(array(‘name’=>’Footer1′, ‘before_title’=>’<h3>’, ‘after_title’=>’</h3>’));
?>
{/code}

By default, your widget titles will always be wrapped in <h3> tags.  You can change that if you want to.  The important argument to this function is the “name”.  The name should be the same as you used in the dynamic_sidebar() call.  Be descriptive:  We should call this “Footer Left”, or “Footer Right” to avoid any confusion later on.

Here’s one I prepared earlier

• Custom three-column widget-ready footer

Paste the code from this page into your custom_functions.php file.  When you add some CSS to float the columns side-by-side, you’ll get the same three-column footer we have on Tailored.

New Tailored Design

It’s always nice to receive recognition for your work.

At my workplace, we’ve taken to using the Thesis theme and WordPress together for a lot of sites.  This combination gives us powerful content-management capabilities, backed up by a highly-customisable design framework and strong search engine optimisation.  When you add some custom-built plugins to the mix, this platform can accomplish damn near anything.

The creator of Thesis, Chris Pearson, likes to tweet links to site launches and redesigns built around the Thesis theme.  So of course, when we re-launched Tailored.com.au with Thesis, we let him know.

He then tweeted:

pearsonified: Wow, this is a damn fine Thesis-based site… Odds are incredibly good that you will dig it: http://www.tailored.com.au/

A few others commented:

igobydoc: @pearsonified WOW is right – That is one really damn good looking #thesiswp site!

montanaflynn: @pearsonified that is a nice thesis site!

brendonsinclair: @pearsonified And apparently the bloke who owns it has an enormous… um, ego as well! Cheers.

pearsonified: @brendonsinclair Hahhaha, cheers!

TariAkpodiete: @pearsonified definitely that’s one of the nicer implementations i’ve seen of Thesis, honestly, some look boring, this is unique #thesiswp

Whoo!

Another Thesis-based site we’ve just launched is for an excellent non-profit organisation: the Spinal Injuries Assocation.  Be sure and check that out too.

A few months ago, we had Jack and Brendon’s amazing ride across Australia.  Like any trips, when you get home there’s a lot of tidying up to do.  You have to empty out the car, clean your equipment, and find somewhere to store it.

With a large family, all bike riders, Brendon has a lot of bikes in his garage.  But where to store them?

Enter the Bike Lift.  Brendon found this wonderful gizmo to suspend his bikes from the ceiling, storing the bikes out of the way.

Click for more Bike Storage solutions.

For the past few weeks, we’ve been working on re-launching the Tailored Web Services site.  For a long time its been a painful mix of Blogger and static pages.  The design was also a bit outdated.  There’s a ton of content on this site, but poor navigation and structuring makes the good stuff very hard to find.

Today I give you:  Tailored Web Services Reborn.

Based on the Thesis wordpress theme, we’ve customised it heavily.  Customisations include;

• Custom widgets
  • For twitter, Sponsors, Featured Product
  • Also to show 1 category of links at a time (Recommended Reading, Worth a Look, Top Resources, etc)
• Additional dynamic sidebars
  • The three columns in the footer are widget-enabled, for easy management
• Heavily customised Header area
  • Includes Blog Archives, Newsletter Subscription, and Contact Info
• Custom 404 page
• Youtube video in Multimedia box
  • This can be customised on a page-by-page basis with the new version of Thesis

And of course, we’ve had some birth-pains.  Shortly after launching, we discovered a bug in Internet Explorer. (Isn’t that always the way?)  Fortunately, I’ve run into that bug before, so it didn’t take long to fix.

Importing all the old posts from Blogger is a hassle, of course.  With almost 2,000 old posts going back to 2003, there’s a lot of horrible blogger-brewed code soup.  It’s going to take us a while to go through all that, and clean things up.

There’s also a lot of redirects that don’t work.  I’ve caught most of the big ones, I think, but I’ll be monitoring the server logs for a few days looking for 404 errors I’ve missed.

Brendon wrote that what we see when we look at a webpage depends on our perspective.  As web developers we look at a site and see all the aspects that make the whole, while others can look at the page and just see a picture.  Then they judge the site by whether the picture appeals to them, rather than by how effective the site will be as a tool.

We’ve long argued that you can treat your website as a business expense, or as a business investment.  If you look at it as a picture, then its an expense.  If you look at all the aspects that define how the site will perform, it becomes an investment – hopefully a profitable one!

Look at your site as an Employee!

I’ve just thought of a new angle – consider your site to be another employee for your business.  You want it to work for you and make money for you, don’t you? So…

• Find an employment agency
  • Meaning your web development company
• They’ll GROW your perfect employee
  • When you hire an employee, you have to pick one from all the applicants
  • Imagine you could grow one based on your specialised requirements!
• Put your new employee to work
  • Your vat-grown employee can take on any persona you define, to better represent your business,
  • Can work tirelessly 24 hours a day,
  • Is the perfect salesperson to attract and field initial enquiries,
  • Will follow your instructions to convert enquiries to sales!

How cool would a vat-grown employee be? One who can do all of the above?  One who you pay to have grown, who doesn’t ask for a weekly wage to keep working for you?

Well, that can be your website!

I just got off the phone with a nice Indian-sounding gentleman named Kevin, who was trying to convince me to change my electricity supplier to his company.  He was trying to point out how much my bill has increased in the last few months, and what a great deal he could give me.

But I missed every third word.  I’m not great with accents to begin with, and the amount of static in the line was not helping.  Then the line cut out for 5 seconds.  We tried to continue, and the line cut out again.  So I hung up.

Kevin called back, and I explained that I’m not going to trust my electricity needs to a company that can’t make a phone call.  I’ve since googled the company, and couldn’t find any mention of it.  Also not sure how they obtained a list of customers belonging to a competitor (my current provider), or how they got my billing history.  I’m certainly not impressed.

So, do you know how well your company being represented?