In my article, Associate Extensionless Files with Notepad, I explain how to navigate the labyrinthine maze of Windows dialogue menus to assign Microsoft’s Notepad text editor as the opening application for files without extensions. In this post, I’ll show you how to associate any file type with any program (including Notepad) in less than five seconds. Ready? Don’t blink, you’ll miss it.. ;) Modify any file extension association in five seconds Open the Windows command prompt and enter [...] • Read more »
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3 Ways to Exclude Content from WordPress Feeds
This may surprise you, but I post quite a bit of content that never appears in the site’s main feed. It is my impression that a vast majority of subscribers are interested in web/graphic-design and development-related topics, and are really much less interested (if at all) in the miscellaneous odds and ends that wind up in the ever-expanding Perishable Press database. In the past, the process of excluding content from the main feed typically involved changing the [...] • Read more »
WordPress Core Hacks Used at Perishable Press
One of the necessary evils associated with creating a highly customized WordPress-powered site involves the inevitable necessity to hack the WordPress core. WordPress is built for mass-consumption and tends to cater to the largest audience possible, making it necessary to bend and poke around the corners to get WordPress to function in a more specific or specialized capacity. Of course, there is a major downside to tweaking core WordPress files: upgrading. The overambitious WordPress peeps are constantly [...] • Read more »
Stop WordPress from Leaking PageRank to Admin Pages
During the most recent Perishable Press redesign, I noticed that several of my WordPress admin pages had been assigned significant levels of PageRank. Not good. After some investigation, I realized that my ancient robots.txt rules were insufficient in preventing Google from indexing various WordPress admin pages. Specifically, the following pages have been indexed and subsequently assigned PageRank: WP Admin Login Page WP Lost Password Page WP Registration Page WP Admin Dashboard Needless to say, it is important [...] • Read more »
Random Fixinz for Hotmail via Outlook Express
Note: The methods described in this post apply to older versions of Internet Explorer (<6) and Outlook Express (<6), and are provided here for reference purposes only. Fix the "Unable to poll for new messages" error Here is an error message that some Outlook Express users receive when sending or receiving email, or after creating a new email account: Unable to poll for new messages on your HTTP server. Account: ‘Hotmail’ Server: ‘http://services.msn.com/svcs/hotmail/httpmail.asp’ Protocol: HTTPMail Server Response: [...] • Read more »
Rename the Recycle Bin in WinXP
To rename the Recycle Bin in Windows XP, create a new text.txt file in your favorite directory and add the following lines: REGEDIT4 [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E}\ShellFolder] “Attributes”=hex:50,01,00,20″CallForAttributes”=dword:00000000 Next, rename the file extension from ".txt" to ".reg" — the other part of the file name may be whatever you prefer (e.g., RecycleBin.reg). Then, double-click the file to have Windows import it into the Registry. Now go right-click your Recycle Bin and use the new option to Rename it. To remove [...] • Read more »
Perishable Press Unresolved Error Log
This post is hereby dedicated to the official logging of all unresolved and/or unexplained errors encountered during development or implementation of various plugins, extensions, themes, scripts, and/or anything else that results in bizarre and mysterious errors, bugs, or other anomalies. Further, we will also post any potential solutions, fixes, workarounds, or explanations for any errors logged in this post. This information is provided for reference purposes only — please share any related information you may have concerning [...] • Read more »
Delete index.dat on Windows 98SE
This brief tutorial on removing (and replacing) the "index.dat" file applies to any Windows OS running on MS-DOS. Although I haven’t researched this officially, it appears that all Windows versions released prior to Windows 2000 are running on the 16-bit MS-DOS kernel. Conversely, Win2000 and WinXP operate on a 32-bit kernel and thus do not utilize MS-DOS. Thus, this method focuses on removing the index.dat from machines running Windows 95, 98, and 98SE. As you may be [...] • Read more »
Path to Outlook Express Files on WinXP
Trying to backup your Outlook Express .dbx files on Windows XP may prove difficult if you can’t find them. Well, fret no more, my friend. Here is the generalized path to the Outlook Express folder, which contains all of the .dbx files for a particular user. Copy, paste, and shortcut: C:\Documents and Settings\[username]\Local Settings\Application Data\Identities\{12345678-1234-ABCD-EFGH-1234567890AB}\Microsoft\Outlook Express * [username] = each user will should have their set of .dbx files. * {12345678-1234-ABCD-EFGH-1234567890AB} = represents a unique alphanumeric string. • Read more »
WordPress on Crack: Tips for Faster Post Publishing
Apparently, article posting is painfully slow on 2-ish versions of WordPress. Indeed, we finally got tired of waiting several minutes every time we published, saved, or edited a post. After a bit of research, reading through countless complaints and suggested remedies, several key methods began to emerge. And, after taking the time to implement them, we have definitely enjoyed an substantial decrease in time required to publish, save, or edit posts. Please note that everyone’s site is [...] • Read more »
Theme Edits for IE7
This post is a working repository of code edits and other changes made to Perishable Press themes in order for them to function properly in Internet Explorer 7 (IE7).. Jupiter Theme *:first-child+html div.comwrap { overflow: visible; } Lithium Theme *:first-child+html div.comwrap { overflow: visible; } Casket Theme Removed html selector from first ruleset. • Read more »
Extreme Makeover for Gravatars in WordPress
Strategic Methods for Improving Gravatar Functionality in WordPress Gravatars have become a popular way of adding spice to the "comments" page of many WordPress-powered sites. So popular, in fact, that the gravatar server is often overloaded, bogged down with millions of gravatar requests every second. This immense server load effects user pages everywhere, resulting in slow loading times, unresolved server requests, and missing gravatars. Such broken presentations appear unprofessional, tarnish reputations, and may provoke confusion. This article [...] • Read more »
Delete Unwanted Context Menu Items in WinXP
Within the right-click context menu is the option to create "New" file items. While the list of available documents within the "New" submenu often contains several useful file types, such as .txt or .zip, it also contains lots of unnecessary entries. To clean up the "New" right-click context menu, open the Registry Editor, regedit.exe, and Find all instances of "ShellNew". Examine the search results. Every ShellNew branch belongs to a specific type of file. As each ShellNew [...] • Read more »
Folder Background Images in WinXP
This brief tutorial explains how to add a background image to any folder in Windows XP. First, make sure all hidden files are visible on your system. Then, open the folder for which you wish to add a background image. Within the folder, right-click and select Properties » Customize tab » Customize. There, choose any icon, click Apply and OK. That process should have created a "desktop.ini" file. Open that file with a text editor and add [...] • Read more »
Customize WordPress Quicktags
Note: This condensed tutorial assumes you are working with WordPress 2+ and are familiar with editing .php and/or .js files. WordPress quicktags1 provide shortcuts for adding certain bits of code to your posts. The default set of quicktags includes some handy shortcut buttons for tags such as <strong>, <a>, and <img>, as well as a few others. While the default set of quicktag buttons is occasionally useful, a quick bit of quicktag customization can easily transform your [...] • Read more »
Hacking Firefox Extensions
Firefox extensions enable users to customize Firefox with additional features. Generally, Firefox extensions are free, open-source, and easily downloaded as .xpi files. This article explains how to hack Firefox extensions of the .xpi variety. There are many reasons why someone would want to hack a Firefox extension — examples include: editing code, debugging errors, and learning extensions. This hack method requires a web browser, zip utility, and text editor. Step 1: Secure an extension By default, the [...] • Read more »