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Web Dev + WordPress + Security
76 posts

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

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 »

The .htaccess Rules for all WordPress Permalinks

Updated January 1st 2026: All code in this post is current with WordPress 6.9 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 »

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 »
USP Pro: Unlimited front-end forms for user-submitted posts and more.
Thoughts
Fun tool for visualizing how different internet protocols work.
Working on a complete redesign of Perishable Press :)
The Office is Cheers with more irony.
More fine-grained control of macOS screen brightness: hold down Option + Shift before pressing either of the brightness keys. You get 64 increments instead of the usual 16.
REST Pro Tools featured in David McCan’s new video on locking down WordPress.
Gonna try exercise.
Launching my new plugin, REST Pro Tools 🛠️ Granular control of the WP REST API.
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