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Web Dev + WordPress + Security
Author: Jeff Starr
956 Posts
Jeff Starr is a web developer, author, and teacher specializing in web security and building awesome things with WordPress. His favorite online projects include Plugin Planet, DigWP.com, and WP-Mix.com. Jeff writes books, runs his own business, writes about web development, and makes video tutorials at Lynda.com/LinkedIn. More »

Preparing for Business

Looking ahead at the events planned for this year, I feel the need to completely restructure, reorganize, and streamline my entire digital universe. This will take a sweet amount of time, I realize, but given the complex behemoth that my digital archive has become due to the accumulation of over seven years’ worth of projects, reformats, and acquisitions, the time is now. It all started out simply, with my first computer a mere two folders, “art” and “business,” were all […] Continue reading »

Stupid .htaccess Tricks

Welcome to Perishable Press! This article, Stupid .htaccess Tricks, covers just about every .htaccess “trick” in the book, and easily is the site’s most popular resource. I hope that you find it useful, and either way thank you for visiting :) In addition to this tutorial, you also may want to explore the growing .htaccess archive. Along with all things .htaccess, Perishable Press also focuses on HTML, CSS, PHP, JavaScript, security, and just about every other aspect of web design, […] Continue reading »

Information Theme

Information is the latest WordPress theme from my series of alphabet themes, so the name begins with the letter “I” for “Information”. Why? Because this theme is all about showcasing voluminous amounts of multimedia content, with streamlined UI/design, toggling show/hide panels for different categories, all stylish with fresh graphics and hidden features. The Information theme enjoys a fixed-width, XHTML strict layout with a sprinkle of JavaScript for toggle panels and double link pops (i.e., all the trimminz).. Information will be […] Continue reading »

Headline Theme

Headline version 2.0 now available for download! Like the Apathy Theme, Monzilla Media’s new “Headline” theme for WordPress is bandwidth friendly, XHTML strict, and employs universal fonts & colors. Also like the Apathy theme, Headline presents as a digital version of the classic printed newspaper. Indeed, whereas Apathy is a full-screen, fluid three-column layout, Headline sports a streamlined, fixed-width three-column layout that looks great even at smaller resolutions (e.g., 800×600). The latest version, Headline 2.0, also features additional graphical embellishments, […] Continue reading »

Apathy Theme

The Apathy theme displays your content via a crisp, three-column dynamic layout that is extremely lightweight and casual. The Apathy theme emulates a digital newspaper, with information presented in traditional newsprint format. Apathy validates as XHTML strict, and even better: Apathy displays with high fidelity in all modern browsers. If you are focusing on text-based content and strive toward coherent, concise presentation, the Apathy theme will serve you well.. Note: For a fixed-width version of Apathy, check out the Headline […] Continue reading »

WordPress Themes

Free WordPress themes! Here you can download my free, open-source shapeSpace starter theme, along with some older themes that once were used here at Perishable Press. For a complete list of themes designed for this site, check out the Alphabet Series Theme Library. All of downloadable themes are open-source (GPL) license and 100% FREE :) — Enjoy! Continue reading »

Website Notes

This website is the product of over three months of code, design, redesign, and eyedrops. It takes advantage of WordPress 2.0, which has been functioning flawlessly. The Monzilla website (and all subsequent sites) will also employ WP 2.0, or whichever version is the most current at the time of design. Continue reading »

More Website Notes

At last we are witnessing the completion of a WordPress theme that should endure at least the next year. If I find myself redesigning the Perishable Press website yet again sometime during 2006, then I should just walk away from it all. The Information theme has plenty of features to keep me busy and lots of nooks and crannies for some serious chillz. Continue reading »

Electric Sheep and the ASCII Matrix

Paying homage to Philip K. Dick’s novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, via collective digital screensaver morphology happening over at electricsheep.org. A virtual gallery of visually inspiring graphics generated via system of networked computers. Update: I think the original Electric Sheep site was sold to a company that sells “Electric Sheep” software or something. It still may be cool and inspiring, but maybe do some research before making any serious investment (of time or money). Continue reading »

Getting into It

Several months since it began, the Perishable Press is finally being fleshed out with posts, feeds, and images. Now that the site is (95%) built, we are experiencing the joys of blogging, tweaking, and fine-tuning details. So if the site looks good but seems a little short on content, just give us time — there is much planned for the future. I am grateful for this website, and look forward to using it to its fullest potential. Continue reading »

Garbage Theme

The Garbage theme is actually a conglomeration of several thematic elements from my first few stabs at skinning an old b2evolution blog. While converting the design into a WordPress theme template, I cannibalized the best parts of the Finished theme. So it’s got the same structural feel, but with a more playful visual aesthetic. It’s digital garbage, random offset lines and spattered digital patterns, psychedelic like mildly hallucinating around the edges while scrolling slowly down the page. Or something. Continue reading »

Finished Theme

The Finished theme is actually an old b2evolution blog skin that I really enjoyed creating. It was when I was first seriously getting into web design and WordPress development. The original b2 template markup was hideous, and the CSS was just a mess all over. But that was then and this is now. Completely rewritten with valid XHTML and CSS, the Finished theme is solid structure and clean design with cool skeleton graphics and lots of other embellished details. Continue reading »

Entropy Theme

Garden of Entropic Delightz! The Entropy theme is the disproportionate inverse of Monzilla Media’s recently released DOS_FX theme. Entropy is super lightweight and bandwidth-friendly, with minimal template code and virtually zero design embellishments (unlike my other WordPress themes). So it’s very minimalistic and casual, more of a starting point for more elaborate theme design. Honestly the funnest part of developing this theme was the little alien avatar (you can see it in the screenshot) that I found somewhere online, long, […] Continue reading »

DOS_FX Theme

It’s pure DOS, Baby! Behold, locked in a laboratory clean-room for hours with only archaic operating systems at my disposal, I found myself amazed by the sheer and utter uncompromising utility of a Windows DOS console. After a few traceroutes I found myself recreating the precise DOS aesthetic using CSS and XHTML. Basically same font, same colors, font sizes, and so forth. The rest is history. After work, I fired up the WordPress machine and hit the codes. A few […] Continue reading »

Bananaz Theme

Perishable Press serves ’em some bananas with this release of the Bananaz theme for WordPress. Bananaz is highly customizable, with a unique two-column hybrid design that merges fixed-width content with a liquid header and footer. Also, the Bananaz theme combines semantic markup with the sheer miracle of CSS, so the design validates as XHTML strict and displays consistently across all browsers. Plus, Bananaz is configured to support several popular WordPress plugins (see installation notes for further details). Continue reading »

Open Casket

Get your own Casket!! Presenting the ghastly new WordPress theme that’s fresh from the tomb. Perishable Press officially opens the casket with the free Casket WordPress theme. Casket is a meticulously designed, single-column theme that’s built with minimal code and performance in mind. This is one of my first “favorite” themes, on which I must have worked for hours, experimenting, tweaking, and fine-tuning all the details striving for that perfect layout: balanced composition, crisp icons, and some choice fonts. Continue reading »

Welcome
Perishable Press is operated by Jeff Starr, a professional web developer and book author with two decades of experience. Here you will find posts about web development, WordPress, security, and more »
.htaccess made easy: Improve site performance and security.
Thoughts
Finishing up the pro version of Head Meta Data plugin, launch planned this month.
Finally finished my ultimate block list to stop AI bots :) Blocks over 100 AI bots!
After 10 years working late at night, my schedule has changed. I am now a “morning person”, starting my day at 6am or earlier.
Nice update for Wutsearch search engine launchpad. Now with 19 engines including Luxxle AI-powered search.
New version of 8G Firewall (v1.4) now available for download :)
Wishing everyone a prosperous and bright New Year!
I disabled AI in Google search results. It was making me lazy.
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