Arrow Root Media » Tutorial

WordPress on Rackspace Cloud Sites

sfrank — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 05:06:37 +0000

Installing WordPress can be either an easy or difficult process, depending on which hosting company you’re working with. For people using Bluehost, Dreamhost, and Godaddy all you need to do is go into the control panel and do what is called a “one-click installation.” When running a “one-click installation” script you are basically telling the host where on the server you’d like the WordPress files to be placed, and creating a mysql database (with username and password) to house all the information that will be pulled in through the WordPress site. That is the quick and painless way to create a WordPress site, but not all hosting companies are created equal.

Recently, my colleague and I were in the market for a new company to host our client’s sites on. We were in search of a host that has great support, technology to accommodate database driven sites, respects the privacy of its clients, and has security measures in place which will prevent client sites from being hacked. After reviewing a slew of hosting companies we discovered Rackspace. Not only do sites (referred to as Cloud Sites) hosted on Rackspace run fast, but their chat support is informative and efficient. The only downfall to Rackspace is the arduous process required for doing a WordPress installation on a cloud site. Rackspace cloud sites do not have a “one-click installation” option, so to create a WordPress site you must start from scratch, and do it manually.

This post is split into four sections:
How to Create a Client
How to Add a Site
How to Create a Database
How to Install WordPress on the Server

How to Create a Client

Below is a step-by-step guide to installing WordPress on Rackspace Cloud Sites. It may seem like a pain in the ass the first time you do it, but, like everything else, it gets easier with practice.
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First thing you need to do is log into Rackspace (assuming you already have an account with them, and have enough room to start adding clients and sites to that account), and find “Clients,” located on the left hand sidebar. Upon clicking “Clients” a dropdown menu will appear, and you’ll click on “Client List.”

Click “Add A Client” to create a new client.

This is where you enter all the client information. (*make sure you write down the username and password in case you forget it)

This ends the area for developers. Usually, it is developers that create client accounts and plug in all the information. But, if the client is already in the system, then he or she can log in to Rackspace and choose their own hosting plan.
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How to Add a Site

Adding a cloud site to a client is pretty straightforward. Similar to when you’re creating a client, you click hosting on the left hand sidebar, and then click on “Cloud Sites” after the menu drops down. After you click “Cloud Sites,” you will look for the “Add A Site” button and click on that.

After clicking the “Add A Site” button, the “Add a New Website” field will pop up like a light box image. Here is it very important that you match the domain with the right client. You will click the drop down, and find the client, fill in the domain name, and click “Add New Site.”

If it is a brand new website then you go ahead and choose “I want to ‘create a new site‘,” but some people may already have a site and just looking to redevelop or switch hosting companies. If that is the case, then you choose “I want to ‘leave the domain name alone for now‘.”

What this does is tell Rackspace that you already have a domain, but would like to create a development site. Rackspace will then create a domain address with series of random characters added on to differentiate between the live site and the new development space you’re creating.

This option is for developers offering hosting plans to their clients. If the hosting plan is included in the scope of work then you want to UNCHECK Bill Client for Site. This way, Rackspace won’t charge the client directly. Sometimes it is easier this way because the client might not want to be bothered with hosting issues. If this is not the case, and the client is responsible for all aspects of hosting, then you want to CHECK Bill Client for Site.

Here is where you decide what type of hosting plan you’d like to have for the new site you’re building. Depending on how much memory your site will require or how much traffic the site will incur indicates what type of plan your site will require. Most sites do not require more than the basic plan, which also does not add any extra costs. Some of the other plans are more expensive. After choosing the plan you want click on “Next Step.”

This next screen is very important. Keep in mind that this set of instructions is for setting up a client with a WordPress installation on a Rackspace cloud site. Your process may be different for other applications, or setups. Anything different or more sophisticated may require another set of instructions. Here, you must make sure the “Microsoft SQL Server Storage” is OFF, you choose on “1 Database,” and the default technology option is set to “Linux/Apache/PHP 5.2.0.” If you choose the wrong default technology it will create a problem later in the installation process.

This is a summary of the site you’re building, and all the settings you chose. Please review this carefully. If everything is correct, click “Finish,” and voila, you have a new site on Rackspace. But before you can install WordPress on the site, you will need to create a database.

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How to Create a Database

After creating a new client and adding a site you are three quarters of the way finished installing WordPress on your Rackspace cloud site hosting plan. The next step is to create a mysql database. This will be another area where you’ll be writing login names and passwords, so please make sure you write them down in a safe place.

To create a new database go to the hosting panel on the left hand sidebar and click cloud sites. When you see the list of sites appear, click on the new one you created. Inside the site you will see five different tabs: General Settings, Domain, Security, Email Accounts, and Features. Go to the “Features” tab. Inside the “Features” tab, you will go to the database section and click “Add.”

Here is where you create the database (db) name. It will start out with a series of numbers like “634576″ Just fill in the box with a db name that has letters and characters (just to be safe). Then click “Continue”.

This area is where you will create the database username and password. Remember to keep this login information in a safe place because you don’t want anybody else messing with you database, and you might need to back up the database sometime in the future. The “634576″ will repeat before the database username, so enter a username using letters and numbers. The password will have to be entered twice, and will require letters, numbers, and at least one upper case letter. Both passwords need to match for you to finish the database.

After a few minutes the new database will appear in the “Features” tab under “Databases” You will then need to click on the database to gather important information required for the WordPress install.

The important piece of information on this screen is the “Hostname”. Without the Hostname you will not be able to link the database to your new WordPress installation.

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How to install WordPress on your server

Now that you’ve got your site and database setup, you’ll need to actually upload the WordPress files to your server. For this scenario, we’ll imagine that you’re installing WordPress inside of http://your-domain.com.

Most people who are doing manual installations of WordPress can download the most recent version of WordPress from http://wordpress.com/download.

However, there’s another quicker and simpler way to install WordPress on your Rackspace server.

1. Go to http://instantinstall.org

2. Download the installer. You’ll get a file called instantinstall.php. Once you have this file on your desktop, you can upload “instantinstall.php” to your server via FTP. Once the file is uploaded, you’ll simply visit the URL http://your-domain.com/instantinstall.php (just make sure to replace “your-domain.com” with your actual domain).

As soon as you run the installer you will see this screen. Because we are installing a WordPress site here you should click on WordPress, but just so you know, Instant Install works for all different Content Management Systems such as Drupal & Joomla.

Here is where you click “Install”. This will drop all the WordPress files inside the directory you’ve chosen.

At this point, you will need the following information: Database name/Username/Database Password/Hostname. (All of this information can be found in Rackspace)

As soon as you enter all the information in the correct places, you can press “Submit”

Then you will be taken to this screen where you enter all the information to access your new WordPress site. (Make sure you store the login information in a safe place, because you’ll need it to log into your WordPress site). If this is a development site, then you should UNCHECK the option to have the site picked up by search engines such as Google & Technorati. After clicking “Install WordPress” you will be prompted to go into the back end of the site.

After everything is installed you only have two more steps before your development site is ready to go. You must go back into FTP and find the WordPress installation. In the “root” folder you will see a file called “index.html” I call this the root directory because this is where your WordPress files are stored (technically, this would be your “public” root folder). Change the name of the file from “index.html” to “1_index.html”. If you do not do this, then the site will not appear. You will only be able to access the back-end. The front end will be all white.

As you can see in the picture above, you will need to manually add a htaccess file so your site has enough memory to upload media.

Click Here to view a text version of htaccess

After dropping the htaccess file on your server your new Rackspace cloud site WordPress site installation will be fully functional, and ready for all the cool content you plan on publishing. If you made it this far down the post, then you are either crazy, passionate about technology, have nothing better to do, or really care about the efficiency of your WordPress site. This post documents the hardest part of the equation. The rest is smooth sailing after you follow these steps. If you should run into any roadblocks then you can always use Rackspace’s solid chat support. They have helped me out in more than a few pinches. WordPress is a very powerful Content Management System, but depending on where you host it makes a huge difference how well it works.

Ways to Backup Your WordPress Site

sfrank — Thu, 09 Jun 2011 19:42:44 +0000

Oh no! My dog ate my website! That is exactly what it feels like when you upgrade your WordPress site and your older plugins don’t exactly get along with the new software. When dealing with WordPress, it is not uncommon to run into a few bugs and hiccups. Sometimes you upgrade for security (like when a new version of WordPress is released). Or maybe the newer version of that plugin you love runs much faster or looks much sleeker than its crusty predecessor. Whatever reason you chose to modify your WordPress setup, it is imperative that you back everything up – just in case things go wrong (and they do).

So – without ado – here are a few options that will help (and most likely save) you or your client’s website.

X-CLONER

XCloner is a Backup and Restore component designed for PHP/Mysql websites, and it works as a native plugin for WordPress. It was created to create and restore the clone on any other location with the help of the automatic Restore script they provide, independent from the main package!

XCloner Backup tool uses Open Source standards like TAR and Mysql formats so you can rest assured your backups can be restored in a variety of ways, giving you more flexibility and full control.

WP Time Machine

Create archives of all your WordPress data & files and have them stored remotely. That’s right! Remote storage of…
1. Your data (from your WordPress MySQL database)
2. Your files (and Uploads) — everything in wp-content
3. Your .htaccess file
4. Instructions for a smooth recovery
5. A shell script that can help automate recovery — though this is still a “work in progress”

You provide the remote account; this plugin provides a connection to the offsite facility you choose.

You can choose to store your files on…
1. You can use Dropbox (if you don’t have a dropbox use this link): http://www.dropbox.com/
2. Also, archives can be ‘sent’ to Amazon’s AWS S3: https://s3.amazonaws.com
3. And, FTP is now supported as well (just provide an offsite host, username & password, and optionally a remote directory on that host)

Some recent improvements include:
1. A new option to exclude cache directories
2. Automatic exclusion of MySQL tables that don’t start with your table prefix

This Plugin requires PHP5 for all of its features!
With PHP4, the only offsite service capable of working at this time is FTP.
Author: Paul G Petty

WP DB Backup

WP-DB-Backup allows you easily to backup your core WordPress database tables. You may also backup other tables in the same database.

This is a really nifty plugin for a quick and easy backup of your database. Keep in mind, though, that if you need to restore your site, you will need your database AND files (typically stored in your wp-content folder).

If you need help backing up your WordPress site, let us know – we’d love to help. And we’d love to hear how you’re backing up your site. What systems, plugins, or modules do you use?

WordPress Plugins

Jaki — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 04:54:14 +0000

For the past two weeks, I’ve been leading a wordpress class at 3rdWard. During the first two classes, we covered how to setup hosting, how to use a feedburner account, and how to install plugins and themes.

During the 2nd class, I also listed out a few of my favorite themes and plugins. For a review of what we covered in our 2nd Class, download this document.

In this post, I’ve included a few favorite plugins. For a list of some my favorite themes, visit this post.

WordPress Plugins

Wordtube

This plugin manages the JW FLV MEDIA PLAYER 5.1 and makes it easy for you to put music, videos or flash movies onto your WordPress posts and pages. Various skins for the JW PLAYER are available viaÂ http://www.longtailvideo.com

wordTube supports the streaming video format (Format .flv or .swf), sound files as MP3 and JPG, GIF or PNG grafic files. With wordTube you can simply insert it into your blog with the tag [media id="media id"] or as playlist [playlist id="playlist id"].

Since Version 2.0 it supports LongTail’s AdSolution which allows you to run pre-roll, overlay mid-roll, and post-roll advertisements in your media player.Â Click here to sign up for LongTail.

You don’t need to change the WYSIWYG mode or special HTML knowledge to insert such a tag. You can show a simple media file (i.e. a flv Format) or a playlist of all your media files.

All in One SEO

Optimizes your WordPress blog for Search Engines (Search Engine Optimization).

Akismet

Akismet checks your comments against the Akismet web service to see if they look like spam or not and lets you review the spam it catches under your blog’s “Comments” admin screen.
download the plugin or read more

Contact Forms 7

Contact Form 7 can manage multiple contact forms, plus you can customize the form and the mail contents flexibly with simple markup. The form supports Ajax-powered submitting, CAPTCHA, Akismet spam filtering and so on.

Visit the plugin site

WP-Cache

WP-Cache is an extremely efficient WordPress page caching system to make you site much faster and responsive. It works by caching Worpress pages and storing them in a static file for serving future requests directly from the file rather than loading and compiling the whole PHP code and the building the page from the database. WP-Cache allows to serve hundred of times more pages per second, and to reduce the response time from several tenths of seconds to less than a millisecond.

jQuery Lightbox For Native Galleries

jQuery Lightbox For Native Galleries makes the native WordPress galleries use a lightbox script called ColorBox to display the fullsize images.

To create the below gallery, all you have to do is upload a few photos to your post, and insert into your post’s content area. No modifications are required to get the Lightbox working.

WP-Ecommerce

This is my go to plugin for any ecommerce site built using wordpress. It has everything you need to get your store up and running.

Visit the plugin site
Download the plugin

Watch how to setup the plugin

Watch the Overview

MyFTP

If you need to access your host remotely (away from your desktop or laptop, this is the way to do it. It is a WordPress FTP like plugin that can be used to manage folders and files via the WordPress admin panel.

Google Analytics for WordPress by Yoast

This plugin easily adds your Google Analytics tracking code (the new ga.js one!) to all pages within your blog. That’s it’s main functionality, it adds a few “extra’s” though.

Visit Yoast’s site to find out what those extras are. You’ll also learn a crapload about wordpress.

Find your Google Analytics Account ID

Upcoming : WordPress Workshop @ 3rd Ward

Jaki — Sat, 12 Jun 2010 06:28:01 +0000

Here’s a freakin’Â awesome dealÂ from 3rd Ward : Sign up for theÂ WordPress WorkshopÂ (section starting 6/13),Â Illustrator IntensiveÂ (6/13), ORÂ Intro to After EffectsÂ (6/19) and get aÂ FREEÂ Apple Wireless Keyboard and Mouse.

Starting June 13th, I will be leading a 3 week workshop on WordPress. I’ve helped many organizations build their sites using WordPress and simply love the platform (in fact, this site is running on WordPress). It’s great for blogs, portfolio sites, and creative folks. You can even run ecommerce sites using WordPress.

Go on. Register for the class

A bit about the class :

You’ll learn the in’s and out’s of setting up, customizing and running your own website using WordPress, the most popular blogging platform.

WordPress is used for top blogs like CNN Money, all the New York Times blogs, and many non-profit arts websites. Simply put, WordPress makes publishing your website much easier.

We’ll start off with the basics (like setting up your own hosting) and then move to more advanced topics like customizing a theme (through the WordPress template engine), and inserting plugins for Twitter and Facebook. We will also set aside some time to review content strategy, site architecture, and look at popular plugins to help you sell your products online. This class will work well for both beginners and experts.

You can register for the class by clicking this link.

And to learn more about wordpress, visit my wordpress archives. Really. Click on that link. Or, you can take a look at some sites I’ve built using wordpress.

Ecommerce Solutions

Jaki — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 15:32:00 +0000

Note: This post was written for participants in an ecommerce seminar. Please feel free to leave questions + comments below

To sell items online, you need:
a payment gateway (like paypal) to process payments
a good shopping cart solution
an SSL seal (if you’re processing credit cards on your website)

If you’re starting from scratch, don’t have the support of a developer, or just want an online store, consider Shopify. They have beautiful templates, and can help your online store get up and running quickly. Review pricing and take a tour of what
Shopify offers. They’re great!

Below is a “short” list of payment gateways and shopping cart solutions.

PAYMENT GATEWAYS

A payment gateway processes the payment for you. Paypal is by far the most popular payment gateways. Here is a list of other payment gateways.

Paypal
The current leader in processing sales online. They have a great list of resources for shopping carts here.

Google Checkout
Take a look at their merchant center – it’s chock full of resources

ejunkie
A fantastic solution, starts at $5/month. Take a look at their pricing)

Authorize.net
If you want to process credit cards with your own bank, authorize.net is the way to go. Fees usually start at $20/month. You will need to purchase an SSL seal to use Authorize.net.

ONLINE INVOICING

Use Freshbooks. Get a free account on Freshbooks.

SHOPPING CARTS

NOTE: If you’re running your website with WordPress, use WP-ecommerce. If you’re running your website with Drupal, use Ubercart. Otherwise, there are these other solid solutions.

FatFree Cart (run by the ejunkie folks)

FatFreeCart is a free shopping cart developed by the team behind E-junkie shopping cart. It works inside your website, your blog and will even work from your MySpace page. It is simply a copy-paste cart and does not require you to register with us or install anything.

It works with PayPal and Google Checkout. It supports product variations, shipping, handling and sales tax.

FastCommerce
This is a fully supported e-commerce solution. It’s a great way to get up and running if you have lots of products and little time. From their site: “Fastcommerce.com provides business management software to small businesses, delivered on demand as a service via the web on a free or paid monthly subscription basis. We provide small businesses with a complete fully integrated package that run their entire operations, from inventory control, sales, marketing, support, online catalog, e-commerce, backend order processing and built-in UPS and Fedex shipping tools.”

Site Ground Web Hosting has a nice list of open source shopping carts

osCommerce is a free, open source online shop software. The default installation includes a large number of features that you can easily enable and configure. You can easily install osCommerce on your website with the help of the Fantastico auto-installer.

With osCommerce shopping cart you can add multiple products on your site, organize them in categories, set discounts and special promotions. osCommerce allows you to set your prices in different currencies and accept all popular payment methods: PayPal, credit cards, cheques. osCommerce has a built-in shipping and tax functionalities.

CREloaded project is built on the source code of osCommerce but it has extra contributions installed. It offers powerful shopping cart solutions in Standard, Pro and Pro B2B editions. With CREloaded you have the ability to distribute coupon codes, the template system is better, and you have an affiliate manager.

Zen cart is being developed by a group of like-minded shop owners, programmers, designers, and consultants who have first-hand experience in e-commerce. Zen Cart is the outcome of their continuous mutual work. It is a free and user-friendly shopping cart, and is distributed as an open source software.

CS-Cart is paid shopping cart software written in PHP & MySQL (The license is a one-time fee of $265 and includes 1 month of free technical assistance at CS-Cart). The CS Shopping Cart is easy to install, has an intuitive template management system (compared to osCommerce) and user-friendly admin area. By default, CS-Cart is integrated with more than 35 popular payment systems such as PayPal, 2CheckOut, GoogleCheckOut, WorldPay, etc. It includes 5 professional templates and their 20 color schemes in all. CS-Cart is a fully multilingual software with multicurrency feature. It has also an advanced Order management tool, Affilate add-on, Product configurator, Feature comparison and Gift Registry modules.

CubeCart is an eCommerce script written in PHP & MySQL. With CubeCart you can setup a powerful online store as long as you have hosting supporting PHP and one MySQL database. CubeCart is very powerful and easy to connect to various payment gateways.

Magento is the latest open source eCommerce platform on the web. It offers professional features, flexibility and control over the look, content, and functionality of the online shop. With Magento you can establish an e-business with convenient product and catalog browser options, extended customer management, advanced analytics, reporting and marketing promotions tools, and much more. Magento has an intuitive administration interface, it is completely scalable and backed by an extensive support network.

ONLINE MARKETPLACES

If you don’t want to bother with setting up your own site, or want to extend the reach of your products, consider looking for online marketplaces. There are different marketplaces for different kinds of products. Here is a shortlist of some of the more popular ones.

Etsy.com (a place to buy and sell handmade items)

CD Baby (sell your music + CD’s online)

ebay (sell anything online)

Amazon (one of the largest ready-made marketplaces)

Craigslist (If you want to deal locally, craigslist works well)

If you’re looking to track traffic on your site and monitor how your shopping cart is doing, use google analytics. Below is short video from Google that gives you a simple overview:

Do you use any of these services and have feedback? Or Have I missed a resource? Leave a comment below and let me know… Thanks!

Tools for Running Your Business Online

Jaki — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 18:00:08 +0000

NOTE: This post was published for participants taking an online marketing seminar at 3rd Ward. I will be fleshing this post out with actual descriptions and summaries. In the meantime, I hope you find this list useful.)

“What can be measured doesn’t always count and what counts can’t always be measured.”

- Einstein

Running a business, organization, or freelance operation in the new economy requires you to be savvy online (if you want to survive). Below is a list of online tools I use and/or recommend.

Online Publishing : WordPress, Posterous, Tumblr, SquareSpace, BusinessCatalyst

I use WordPress to run this site. For more wordpress resources, visit my wordpress archives.

Sample Blogs:
http://unclutterer.com/
http://www.getstoried.com/
http://www.chromasia.com/iblog/

Social Networks : Facebook, twitter, flickr, youtube
Some sample facebook pages:
http://www.facebook.com/issueprojectroom
http://www.facebook.com/brooklynmuseum

Online Communities : Ning, Meetup.com

Some sample ning communities:
Radiohead’s Ning Community
Dance-Tech.net

Email Marketing : Mailchimp, Constant Contact, Vertical Response

Tracking Online Activity : Google Analytics or Clicky

Communication : Setup Google Apps on your own domain for business email + google docs for collaboration. Setup an account here

Web Hosting: Bluehost

Organizing Yourself : BackPackIt, Basecamp

Bookkeeping + Invoicing : QuickBooks or Freshbooks (online invoicing)

CRM (customer relationship management): Salesforce, Tactile CRM, HighRise

Publicity : PR Newswire

RSS in Plain English

Jaki — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 16:09:59 +0000

finally, someone explains RSS (so i don’t have to). found on blip.tv, via some other blog written by Susan Mernit (employee at Yahoo Personals)

There are two types of Internet users, those that use RSS and those that don’t. This video is for the people who could save time using RSS, but don’t know where to start.

WordPress Resources

Jaki — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 18:57:50 +0000

This past September, I led a Blogging Workshop at the Brooklyn Food Coop. I covered lots of material and thought I would post a collection of wordpress resources.

Some of you are already blogging and are familiar, while others are just getting started.
Either way, I would encourage you to explore the resources below, and feel free to contact me with any questions.

Enjoy!

WordPress Themes

There are a whole host of wordpress theme respositories

Here are a few blogs that usually have good wordpress resources:
Smashing Magazine | http://www.smashingmagazine.com/tag/wordpress/
Noupe | http://www.noupe.com/category/wordpress
Blog Perfume | http://www.blogperfume.com/category/wordpress-theme/

Premium (paid) Themes

WooThemes | http://www.woothemes.com/themes
Elegant Themes | http://www.elegantthemes.com/
Graph Paper Press | http://graphpaperpress.com/

And my favorite and most recommended theme framwork | Thesis Theme

Portfolio Themes

If you are a designer, photographer, or want to showcase your portfolio, there are a whole host of good Portfolio themes
Here are a few good posts with nice pre-built portfolio themes

http://www.jeffhendricksondesign.com/portfolio-wordpress-themes/
http://designm.ag/freelance/wordpress-portfolio-themes/
http://www.themescloset.com/2009/03/15-best-premium-wordpress-portfolio-themes/
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2009/04/29/ultimate-guide-to-using-wordpress-for-a-portfolio/

WordPress Video Tutorials

If you’re looking for good video tutorials, take a look here:

http://wordpress.tv

I’ve also posted wordpress resources here
http://www.arrowrootmedia.com/tag/wordpress/

Finally, you can take a look at wordpress’ resources.
They have great resources, tutorials, forums, and examples
http://wordpress.com (Setup your own wordpress site for free)
http://wordpress.org (Read more about wordpress)

If you have a great wordpress resource or find a great theme, please feel free to let me know if the comments below

Managing your Email with Google Apps

Jaki — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 22:08:23 +0000

For people who are looking to manage their emails + domains hassle free, look no further than Google Apps. Google Apps will allow you to have your email available anytime, anywhere, and spam free. You can also use Google Docs, and several other Google Features without setting up a google account.

Google Apps also eases the process of adding new emails and configuring them with Outlook or other email reader.

The video below gives you a quick preview of the Google Apps Dashboard, as well as how to add a new email using your Google Apps Setup

Follow this link to view this video in full screen

How To | Writing and Publishing a Post in WordPress

Jaki — Fri, 08 May 2009 05:52:31 +0000

Writing and Editing in WordPress

Take a look at the video below to get a sense of how to publish posts + update content on wordpress

For other great wordpress tutorials, visit WordPress.tv

Inserting Media Into Your Post

view this video in a larger format