New Plugins for WordPress 5.5

Forgotten post! I wrote this article way back for WordPress 5.5 but forgot to publish. Rather than delete I am posting it now. I think the information remains relevant for the most part. Read with a grain of salt :) WordPress 5.5 brings some new features that may help a lot of users. The two biggies: sitemaps and lazy loading images. This rundown post explains a bit about each, and shares some free plugins to help should you need to […] Continue reading »

About the Auto-Generated WP Sitemaps and How to Disable Using Simple Code or a Free Plugin

WordPress 5.5 and beyond features built-in sitemaps that are enabled by default. For new users and sites this may be a good thing. Now users don’t have to bother with thinking about how to implement a sitemap. Like with Privacy control, WordPress just does it for you automagically. BUT for the millions of sites that already have a sitemap thanks to any of the excellent and free sitemap plugins — that’s like maybe 5–10 million websites — well congratulations you […] Continue reading »

WordPress Plugin: Disable Media Sizes

Whenever you upload an image using the Media Library, WordPress automatically creates a set of alternate-size images. The number and size of these auto-generated images continues to grow each year, as WordPress tries to keep up with increasingly hi-resolution screen sizes. For many WordPress-powered websites, the extra media sizes enable WordPress to serve images responsively and that’s a good thing. But for some WordPress sites, all the extra images simply are not necessary. In some cases downright wasteful. And that’s […] Continue reading »

WordPress Plugin: Disable Lazy Load

WordPress 5.5 brings some cool new features, including built-in support for lazy-loading images. So whether you want it or not, WordPress will add a new “loading” attribute to all of your images. That way supportive browsers will be able to load your images as the user scrolls the page, instead of trying to load everything at once. It’s a popular front-end technique that may help to boost performance a little bit. Like anything else, there are pros and cons to […] Continue reading »

WordPress Plugin: Override Comment Options

Want to keep comments open on a few old posts? This plugin is for you. It does one thing and does it well: it overrides the WordPress setting, “Automatically close comments on articles older than x days”. So you can leave comments open for any individual posts that may have passed the deadline. I actually wrote this plugin for use here at Perishable Press. Normally comments are closed after 90 days, but there are a few old posts for which […] Continue reading »

Custom Widget Names with Dashboard Widgets Suite

[ Dashboard Widgets Suite - Default Widget Names ]

Quick tutorial for my Dashboard Widgets Suite plugin. This post explains how to customize the DWS widget names on the Dashboard. Normally each DWS widget displays the widget name along with “Widgets Suite” and a little gear icon that links to the plugin settings. Several users have asked if there is a way to change the text, specifically how to remove the extra text and gear icon. So this article explains how to do it as of Dashboard Widgets Suite […] Continue reading »

Activate WordPress Plugins via the Database

Recently a reader named Chris asked, “how can we turn ON a plugin from the database?” He mentioned reading my previous article, Quickly Disable or Enable All WordPress Plugins via the Database, but for circumstantial slash technical reasons needed to do the opposite and enable a plugin directly via the WordPress database. I thought it was an interesting question that might actually be useful to discuss here at Perishable Press. Continue reading »

X Theme Leftover Code Snippets

While working on the site’s 24th redesign, I ended up with about 10 code snippets that were awesome but ultimately not needed. So rather than just delete these tasty functions, I am posting them here for future reference. Who knows, during the next site update I may decide to implement or repurpose some of these techniques. And of course sharing is caring, so feel free to use any of these code snippets in your own projects. Check out the Table […] Continue reading »

WordPress and the Blank Target Vulnerability

For those who haven’t yet noticed, WordPress now adds rel="noopener" attributes for any external links added via the link Quicktag in the Visual/RTE. So if you enable the option, “Open link in a new tab”, WordPress automatically will add the rel noopener attribute to the link. This is to protect against CORS and other exploits that take advantage of blank-target links. It’s a smart move that may escape many in the WordPress community. So in an effort to help foster […] Continue reading »

WP Cron HTTP Auth

Welcome to the official homepage for my free WordPress plugin, WP Cron HTTP Auth. This page explains what the plugin does, how it works, and where to download and get support. The plugin actually is very simple, however, so there is not a lot to explain. If you are looking for plugin documentation, visit WP Cron HTTP Auth at WordPress.org. There you will find installation steps, support forum, translation tools, and more. Continue reading »

WordPress Plugin: Disable WP REST API

Welcome to the official homepage for my free WordPress plugin, Disable WP REST API. This page explains what the plugin does, how it works, how to test the plugin, and why anyone would anyone on earth want to disable the REST API, for crying out loud, all explained on this page. If that sounds like you, you’re in the right place. If you are looking for plugin documentation, visit Disable WP REST API at WordPress.org. There you will find installation […] Continue reading »

Contact Form X

Welcome to the official homepage for my free WordPress plugin, Contact Form X (CFX). This is a more personal look at the plugin, aimed at readers who are familiar with my work. Here you’ll find some screenshots, cool features, and of course some rambling backstory (because there is one). If you are looking for official plugin documentation, visit Contact Form X at WordPress.org. There you will find docs, download, installation steps, support forum, translation tools, and more. Continue reading »

BAM: 5 New WordPress Plugins. Ahh Yeh.

I’ve been super busy this year, cranking out some useful new plugins. Nothing as awesome as Banhammer Pro, but some pretty useful new plugins nonetheless. So I’m launching a total of five new WordPress plugins. The first four basically are utility plugins designed to make WordPress life easier. The 5th and final plugin (for awhile at least), is Contact Form X, which I am now using as the contact form here at Perishable Press. Contact Form X I know what […] Continue reading »

WordPress Plugin: Disable Gutenberg

For those still in the dark, WordPress 5.0 will bring HUGE changes to the post editor. Dubbed Gutenberg, the new WP post editor replaces the entire “classic” post editing screen. So as of WordPress 5.0 and beyond, the “Edit Post” screen will be completely replaced by a giant WYSIWYG content builder called “Gutenberg”. So much more is being replaced than just the content editor. The list of things that are replaced by Gutenberg include the RTE/Visual Editor, Plain Text Editor, […] Continue reading »

WordPress Plugin: Custom Fields for Gutenberg Block Editor

Currently Gutenberg does not display the Custom Fields meta box. Before Gutenberg, in WordPress 4.9 and earlier, the “Edit” screens in the WP Admin Area optionally displayed the Custom Fields meta box. The Custom Fields meta box is employed by millions of sites, themes and plugins. Including my own collection of WordPress plugins, which use custom fields for Posts, Pages, and many Custom Post Types. Basically Custom Fields are a critical part of WordPress functionality, so I wrote a plugin […] Continue reading »

Banhammer WordPress Plugin

[ Banhammer - Protect your site from enemy hordes! ]

Banhammer makes monitoring traffic and banning visitors crazy easy and fun. Say your forum is being harassed by some dirtbag. Or your admin directory is crawling with bad bots. Or some script kiddie is trying to brute-force your login page. Don’t just sit there and watch it happen.. drop the Banhammer on those fools and block them forever. Continue reading »

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