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Web Dev + WordPress + Security

Compressed JavaScript Compression

In this article, we extrapolate our favorite CSS-compression technique for JavaScript. Below, we outline the steps required to auto-compress your JavaScript documents via gzip and PHP. Two different compression methods are presented. The first method does not require htaccess, but rather involves the manual editing of JavaScript files. The second method employs htaccess to do all the work for you, thus requiring much less effort to implement. In either case, the result is the same: automatically compressed content delivered only […] Continue reading »

Fast, Effective PHP Compression

PHP compression is an excellent method of conserving bandwidth and reducing client download times. We have already discussed an excellent method for CSS compression, and in this article we share a super-easy technique for compressing all PHP content without editing a single file. Continue reading »

Invite Only: Traffic Control via Whitelist

Web developers trying to control comment-spam, bandwidth-theft, and content-scraping must choose between two fundamentally different approaches: selectively deny target offenders (the “blacklist” method) or selectively allow desirable agents (the “opt-in”, or “whitelist” method). Currently popular according to various online forums and discussion boards is the blacklist method. The blacklist method requires the webmaster to create and maintain a working list of undesirable agents, usually blocking their access via htaccess or php. The downside of blacklisting is that it requires considerable […] Continue reading »

Riding the Wave

del.icio.us

Compared to some of the big players out there on the internet, we here at Perishable Press run a relatively small website. We began this project in September of 2005 with nothing but a domain name and a pocketful of inspiration. During the first several months of development, our traffic statistics looked something like: one unique visitor and 10,000 hits (i.e., nobody but us). And then, suddenly and unexpectedly, everything changed.. Continue reading »

Disobedient Robots and Company

In our never-ending battle against spammers, leeches, scrapers, and other online undesirables, we have implemented several powerful security measures to improve the operational integrity of our perpetual virtual existence. Here is a rundown of the new behind-the-scenes security features of Perishable Press. Continue reading »

Roll your own Apache Rewrite Log

Roll your own Apache Rewrite log! Rocking your own rewrite log is super-helpful for testing .htaccess rewrite rules, WordPress Permalinks, and much more. All you need is Apache 2.2 (or previous), mod_rewrite enabled (very common on most servers), and access to your server configuration file, http.conf. Continue reading »

Block Spam by Denying Access to No-Referrer Requests

What we have here is an excellent method for preventing a great deal of blog spam. With a few strategic lines placed in your .htaccess file, you can prevent spambots from dropping spam bombs by denying access to all requests that do not originate from your domain. Continue reading »

Stop Bitacle from Stealing Content

[ Stop bitacle.org ]

If you have yet to encounter the content-scraping site, bitacle.org, consider yourself lucky. The scum-sucking worm-holes at bitacle.org are well-known for literally, blatantly, and piggishly stealing blog content and using it for financial gains through advertising. While I am not here to discuss the legal, philosophical, or technical ramifications of illegal bitacle behavior, I am here to provide a few critical tools that will help stop bitacle from stealing your content. Continue reading »

Compressed CSS Compression

In this article, we discuss two practical methods for compressing CSS documents with PHP and/or .htaccess. See also: Compress CSS and JavaScript with PHP at WP-Mix. Continue reading »

Stupid htaccess Tricks Redux

One of our most popular posts, Stupid htaccess Tricks, has been completely rewritten and now includes almost twice as many stupid htaccess tricks. Plus, we have added a library of regex character definitions, more information for many of the directives, and several handy references. But wait, there’s more — we even threw in a “quick-jump” Table of Contents and a complete set of “up” links [ ^ ] for easy navigation. Utterly amazing! Continue reading »

Website Attack Recovery

Recently, every website on our primary server was simultaneously attacked. The offending party indiscriminately replaced the contents of every index file, regardless of its extension or location, with a few vulgar lines of code, which indicated intention, identity, and influence. Apparently, the attack occurred via Germany, through a server at the University of Hamburg (uni-hamburg.de). This relatively minor attack resulted in several hours of valuable online education. In this article, it is our intention to share experience with website attack […] Continue reading »

The .htaccess Rules for all WordPress Permalinks

Updated January 15th 2023: All code in this article is current with WordPress 6 and better. The permalink rules presented below should work with all versions of WordPress. That is, the current rules are backward compatible. Jump to the Permalink Rules » I recently performed a series of tests on a fresh installation of WordPress to determine the exact .htaccess rewrite rules that WordPress writes to its .htaccess file for various permalink configurations. In the WordPress General > Permalinks settings, WordPress […] Continue reading »

Permalink Enlightenment

I recently enabled the permalinks feature for a fresh WordPress 2.0.2 upgrade. The process required several hours of research and approximately 90 minutes to fully implement. This brief article summarizes the process and applies to the following setup: 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 »

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 »
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