Last week I installed Ubuntu Linux onto my 12 year old nephew’s laptop. He’d pestered me to do it for a while and this time when he came to visit he brought his laptop with him so I could get it working in ways that Windows never could. He wanted his laptop to work faster … Read more
I had the pleasure of installing Ubuntu onto two old computers this weekend. One laptop and one desktop. Both resistant to Doctor Lee’s orders. The Ubuntu graphical installer is poor at detecting and setting up old graphics cards and monitors. It is a strange and frustrating problem because once Ubuntu is installed it detects and … Read more
For those of us who like to use highly customizable free WordPress themes like Suffusion and Thematic, there is some good news today: Atahualpa 3.5.2 is available for download. Unfortunately (did you guess that was coming?), Atahualpa 3.5.2 has a serious bug that causes server CPU and memory usage to skyrocket. I’ve tried Atahualpa 3.5.2 … Read more
One of the most common issues to afflict most web developers who try to enable WordPress Multi Site is WordPress’s insistence that subdirectory blogs cannot be setup. The message WordPress throws up to show its dominance over afflicted web developers is: Because your install is not new, the sites in your WordPress network must use … Read more
I had a bit of a surprise yesterday, I logged into one of my sponsor filled autoblogs only to find it wasn’t there! My server and WordPress had conspired to perform an amazing disappearing multi site act! Those guys, they make me laugh…with hysterical cries of despair!
Update 25th Aug. 2011: the bug discussed here is still present. I recommend all WordPress Multi Site users install the Proper Network Activation plugin that is available here at the WordPress site.
I noticed a compatibility bug between WordPress 3 Multi Site and Greg’s High Performance SEO so reported the issue to Greg who very quickly took a look at it. It turns out that WordPress Multi Site does not like it when plugins are Network Activated. So, as a warning to all WordPress Multi Site users, do not Network Activate plugins. Not yet, anyway.
To paraphrase Greg’s explanation:
When a plugin is Network Activated, WordPress 3.0 ignores the activation hook that plugins register to run whenever they are first activated. Consequently a plugin’s default options do not get set-up on subdomains when a plugin is Network Activated. It also appears, according Greg, that WordPress does not fully remove plugins that fail to setup across subdomains when Network Activation fails – the database does not get properly cleansed.
I recommend WP 3 MS users do not Network Activate plugins until the WordPress developers fix their oversight.
In the meantime, if, like me, you need to remove a Network Activated plugin that only half installed then you must delve into your WordPress database and remove its settings manually before you re-install it. Affected plugins must then be reactivated on a per site basis. For Greg’s High Performance SEO, this means you must drop the single “ghpseo_settings” entry in “wp_n_options” (it will be repeated in your database as many times as you have sites).