Author: isaac

I like cats and compost.

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Upgrading WordPress using rsync

After the recent flurry of WordPress upgrades I started looking for an easier way to upgrade. This post at techites.com was a good start, but this comment on the post, using rsync, sounded much easier. Here’s the workflow I figured out:

  • wget http://wordpress.org/latest.zip (download the latest version)
  • unzip wordpress-XXX.zip (extract it)
  • mv wordpress [your-site's-folder-name] (rename the wordpress folder to the name of the folder your blog lives in on the server)
  • rsync -avrz [your-site's-folder-name] [username@server]:[path-to-blog-folder] (update the remote folder with the local folder)

Repeat the last two steps for each install you want to update. I’m sure it’s possible to write a script to do this for a whole bunch of installs at once if desired. You may want to test all this out on your local testing server beforehand.

Update: Jonathan’s right, Subversion is a VERY easy way to update WordPress…once you’ve got it set up. This Codex page describes the process. It’s easiest to do if you’re either just setting up your blog or if you only have a couple of plugins or themes installed. There are other benefits to using Subversion. You can easily switch from using the current release version to using the bleeding edge version, for instance to test out a release candidate. The WP Subversion repository also wasn’t affected by the recent security exploit, so there may be a security advantage.

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General

Filez 0.5

I added a few features to make it more usable and configurable. You can now specify acceptable file extensions. I should probably do the MIME checking thing like in Photopress… It’s possible to change the visual editor icon if you’ve set the proper file/folder permissions – I included a couple of options. I switched over to using WP’s capabilities instead of the obsolete levels, but there’s no drop-down menu – you’ll have to check out the WP Codex if you want to see all the options. I left the Management page admin-only because I like it that way, but I can add an option to change that if there’s interest. I added the upload error handling stuff from Photopress. I’m using it now at my family blog, so there’ll probably be more changes once a few people try it out.

Here it is: filez.zip

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Photopress 1.0

Please don’t take ‘1.0’ to mean I consider it to be perfect – I just ran out of 0.x space. This version does fix many bugs, including issues with editing categories. I know a bunch of you pointed out the problem, but when my mom noticed I had to fix it (no kidding).

The browse popup tool now has a drop-down menu for picking a page, which works much better with hundreds of images. In the process I fixed it so the filter choices are remembered, which makes a lot more sense.

Finally (I think), in the Mass Edit view the delete check boxes should be suppressed for images used in posts (if the right option is set). This makes it a lot easier to get rid of duplicates that aren’t used in posts. Oh yeah, there’s a new image for the visual editor icon. The old one is still there if you liked it better – poke around and you’ll find it.

Download: photopress.tar.gz or photopress.zip

Categories
General

Filez 0.4

This version of Filez should work with WP 2.1, using the same methods Photopress now uses. I’ll probably be making a few further improvements since I’m going to let some family members try it out – always a good way to find bugs and get ideas for improvements.

Download it: filez.zip

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General

Photopress 0.9.7 (WP 2.1+ only)

This version uses a new method to place buttons, this time stolen from the Anarchy Media Player Plugin. It’d be nice if the plugin API had an easy way to insert buttons – I guess maybe in 2.2 or 3.0…

Due to all the new files and folders, I suggest deleting your old Photopress folder (back it up first!), then installing the new files. Remember to keep your template and style files if you’ve edited them.

I’ve removed watermarking for now in order to clean up the code and interface a bit. I’m working on a plugin infrastructure so we can have features like watermarking without cluttering up the core plugin so much.

Some browser-specific notes:

Firefox 1.5-ish: The browser I use most often, so everything works properly for me there.

IE7: Seems to work fine. I have a half-broken laptop with XP for testing now so IE support should be better.

Opera: Inserting images in ‘Visual’ is broken in Opera. Inserting on the ‘Code’ side of the editor works though, so I guess that’s a workaround. Or you can use PP’s tags feature – that works on both sides.

Photopress 0.9.7 downloads: photopress-0.9.7.zip or photopress-0.9.7.tar.gz