New WordPress plugin: Restore Admin Header
WordPress v3.3 removed the header from the admin interface, merging it with the admin bar. This meant that the link to your site’s front page was taken away and you now have to go through drop down menus to get to the link. Instead, this plugin puts that link back onto your admin interface. Download [...]
Read MoreHiding bbPress topics from logged out users
I just spent hours figuring this out so I thought I’d try and save others the bother by sharing it here. The basic aim was to hide the contents of topics in a bbPress 2.0 forum from any users not logged in. This makes for a nice private forum. I found suggestions about making forums [...]
Read MoreThe Walled Garden
Thanks to my involvement in Lichfield Live I discovered earlier this year a project based out of Woodhouse Community Farm in Fisherwick, near Whittington. The Walled Garden is a community-supported agriculture project set mostly within the listed walls that once stood part of the Fisherwick Hall Estate. Jess and I joined in July and for [...]
Read MoreThink open data is just the realm of geeks? Not in Lichfield…
This is partly the reason why I love Lichfield so much. Our council CEO recently joined Twitter and was last night tweeting (much revered) webmaster, Stuart Harrion; Where else do you get a council chief exec tweeting her webby on a Sunday evening about the Open Government License?! Fantastic!
Read MoreNorthcliffe’s Local People: It’s not working, let’s shift the risk
Good news! Northcliffe has realised that it’s Local People network model is flawed and has decided to try and shift the risk onto naive entrepreneurs instead. Maybe I’m just being optimistic given my well-known loathing of Local People but it’s as if Northcliffe have decided that receiving £7k for each new Local People site is much [...]
Read MoreWordPress Author Bio Shortcode v1.2 plugin released
I finally got round to updating this quick-release Author Bio Shortcode plugin. The main changes are background stuff and making sure it’s compatible with the latest version of WordPress (v3.2.1 as I type). One important feature is that I’ve locked in compatibility only to v3.2.1 and older. If you’re using a version of WordPress prior [...]
Read MoreWordPress Plugin: Author Bio Shortcode
I’ve just written a quick and simple plugin. It provides a shortcode which, when inserted into a post or page, will print out the bio of the author as provided in their profile. You can download from WordPress.org now. Any issues/requests, use the comments below.
Read MoreA quick rant about Local People
Yes I’m biased because I run Lichfield Live which is obviously a competing service but I’m still gonna whinge about Local People. This week Lichfield Live launched a business directory, in part because the alternative is so out of date! Today I’m annoyed because they’ve decided to be all community-hugging and have the residents of [...]
Read MoreWordPress – can it cope to power a whole council’s main website? | The Albert Memorial is still there
Thanks for writing this up, Simon! Seeing as I work with the folks at WPMU DEV (who make the Network Theme) I can answer the licensing question… It’s GPL licensed so once you’ve downloaded it you can do as you please within the confines of the GPL, just as you can with WordPress itself. For [...]
Read MoreFilming Council Meetings: For and Against
At yesterday’s LocalGovCamp I led a session which attempted to come up with a good round-up of the arguments for and against filming of council meetings. We did a good job and there’s still room for more additions. I’ve used the excellent wrangl.com to show what we came up with and allow the debate to [...]
Read More