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Common WordPress Problems and Their Solutions

Ever since we have been listed on the WordPress Consultants list, I have received a number of phone calls from panicked blog/web site owners regarding WordPress errors. Since I have seen a trend in the past month, I thought I would document some of the problems and their solutions.

Error establishing a database connection

Solution: The most common solution is to look and make sure you have typed in the correct user name/password/database name in your wp-config.php file. How can you check? Log into cPanel or Plesk, or directly to mysqladmin. Make sure that the user has the correct privileges to the database and that the password is correct. If you are unsure about the password, you can always delete the user and re-add them (remember to give the newly created user the correct privileges). If you are still having an issue, and you have a high traffic blog/web site, call your web host and see if you are maxing out the server connections – you/they might need to adjust their Apache/MySQL settings or you might need to start using WP-Cache to help control the connection issues. More than likely – you just entered in your user name/password/database incorrectly. This is by far the most common issue I have seen so far.

The default theme appears instead of your chosen custom theme when making CSS changes.

Solution: This is a known issue and hopefully will be addressed soon. If this happens, log into the WordPress Admin and choose your custom theme under “Presentation”.

You are not able to edit your widgets’ content using Safari

Solution: Grab the widget content that you want and drop it below or above another widget content box in the Widgets area in the WordPress Admin. Once you move it, the edit option will appear. Edit the content, and drag it back to it’s original location.

WordPress Update: 2.2

WordPress 2.2 has officially been released. The new version includes more than 200 bugs fixed as well as offers some new UI features, and speed optimizations. For more information on WordPress version 2.2, read the official WordPress version 2.2 documentation.
Download the latest versions of WordPress:WordPress 2.2

SDAC Recommends: WordPress Plugin: Cool Player

After looking for a media player for WordPress sites and blogs, I have finally come to the conclusion that Cool Player is a great plugin to take a look at. A number of my clients need the ability to play a number of media files, and with an impressive list of supported media types, I recommend looking at Cool Player:

This version supports those types of files: rm, rmvb, ra, rv, ram, smil, smi, rtsp, rpm, asf, wm, wma, wmv, wax, wvx, ogg, ape, avi, mid, midi, wav, mms, m3u, asx, mov, qt, mqv, m4v, m4a, m4b, mpeg, mpg, m1s, m1v, m1a, m75, m15, mp2, mpm, mpv, mpa, flc, fli, cel, aiff, aif, aifc, cdda, bwf, rts, 3gp, 3gpp, 3g2, 3gp2, au, snd, ulw, smf, kar, qcp, sdv, gsm, amr, caf, amc, mp4, sdp, pdf, fdf, xfdf, xdp, xfd, gif, jpg, jpeg, bmp, png, xpm, dir, dxr, dcr, cst, cct, cxt, w3d, fgd, swa, swf, spl, mp3, flv, rtmp, rbs, xml, rss, xspf, atom.

My Page Order WordPress Plugin Modifcation

I have been working with a client recently that was using the My Page Order plugin for the WordPress CMS I set up. They had several “draft” pages they used for templates and did not want them to show up in the My Page Order Admin interface. After looking at the SQL code, I added in a piece that would only show published (live) pages.
To make the same change in your code, open up the plugin file (mypageorder.php), go to line 47 and change the following line:

$results=$wpdb->get_results("SELECT * FROM $wpdb->posts WHERE post_parent = $parentID and post_type = 'page' ORDER BY menu_order ASC");

to:

$results=$wpdb->get_results("SELECT * FROM $wpdb->posts WHERE post_parent = $parentID and post_type = 'page' and post_status='publish' ORDER BY menu_order ASC");

Now, only the pages you really want to order will appear in the menu.

SDAC Recommends: WP Plugin: Permalink Redirect Plugin

If you ever want to change your permalink structure in WordPress, but still want to have all your old URLs to work, download Permalink Redirect Plugin. This plugin will make sure that all your posts will get redirected to the new permalink structure you moved to without any hassle whatsoever. Not only will your readers be thankful, your SEO rank will not suffer with any URL reorganization.

WordPress Update: 2.0.10 and 2.1.3

WordPress 2.0.10 and 2.1.3 have officially been released. The new versions of WordPress has several security fixes for publicly known issues. Please update your WordPress installations immediately.
Download the latest versions of WordPress: WordPress 2.0.10 and WordPress 2.1.3

SDAC Recommends: WordPress Plugin: My Page Order

If you need to display pages dynamically within WordPress, and want to order them (and their sub pages), check out the My Page Order WordPress plugin. This plugins allows the WordPress administrator to manage the page order from within the WordPress admin area without hard coding anything in your template.