1. Press and hold the center key (at the bottom of the phone) AND the unlock key (right) at the same time.
2. If your sound is turned on, you’ll hear a shutter sound.Your phone screen will also flash indicating that the screenshot was taken.

I have a 64GB microSD card in my phone which I use for my video/files/pictures. However, the screenshot utility saves the screenshots to the device’s built-in storage system. Specifically, it’s the Pictures/Screenshot folder if you’re browsing your phone’s content on the same phone or a computer. Here’s what it looks like when I browse my phone’s contents from my computer:

1. Suspending my laptop causes it to crash [this almost never happened with 13.04]
2. Sometimes, locking my laptop causes it to crash
3. Crashes more frequently on cpu-intensive tasks like compiling than 13.04 did

As a developer, this is pretty freaking inconvenient. I’m not sure how this release got out of the gate but I sure hope that Canonical knows that no matter how pretty they make Ubuntu, it will turn off users if we can’t use it! As always, I’m dutifully submitting crash reports and even volunteering for further bug triage if necessary. Hopefully there is someone at then end of that line listening.

In summary, stick with 13.04. I wish I did.

So, if clicking that link didn’t do anything for you, here are some ways to install software on Ubuntu:

1. Use the Ubuntu Software Center and type “blueman”. into the search box (top right). It should be the first link.
2. Go hardcore and use the CLI (command line interface): sudo apt-get install blueman
3. Attempt to fix GNOME bluetooth yourself.

And you’re done. Oddly enough, after installing Blueman, certain GNOME bluetooth functions started working e.g. sending files from PC to device. And as I write this, Blueman just choked on a 513kb PDF file which GNOME bluetooth sent just fine so don’t uninstall GNOME bluetooth just yet.

I now use Ubuntu as my main operating system and have done so for over a year. I’ve grown to love Unity and the increasing stability of this free operating system. One of my biggest annoyances about being on Ubuntu was the seeming fragility of the upgrade tool and for the longest time, an upgrade meant wiping my computer and installing a fresh copy.

I have been able to successfully upgrade my notebook from 12.04 to 12.10 and from 12.10 to 13.04 using the upgrade tool. Visually, 13.04 hasn’t changed much but a lot of changes were made under the hood. Importantly, don’t upgrade just yet if you rely on Chrome or Skype for your day job unless you understand the workarounds in the release notes.

Update: A video of the experience has been uploaded to my YouTube channel! Did you know I had one?

I started my new year with a sick husband and installing Ubuntu 11.10 on my notebook. This isn’t my first time around this OS-switching rodeo but this time, there is more than just curiosity driving my switch i.e. *cough*grades*cough*. I’ve never really gone “all the way” with the Linux distributions I’ve tried for a host of reasons but with each version of my favorite distro (Ubuntu), a lot of my reasons for not staying have evaporated. One of those things is a pain-free external monitor setup. Well, I am here to report that, with a little trial-and-error, I now have my external monitor connected to my laptop!

Here are the steps I took to get my external monitor working on my Ubuntu laptop:

First, backup your xorg.conf file by typing this command into your terminal:
sudo cp /etc/X11/xorg.conf /etc/X11/xorg.bak{add-a-date}. That way, if you accidentally screw things up, you can go back to a working xorg configuration file.

Next, connect your external monitor with the HDMI cable (I guess you can use whatever cord you have but I don’t know if these same instructions will apply). At your terminal prompt, type: sudo nvidia-settings. Ignore the bunch of messagesyou’ll get in the terminal.

Click “Detect Displays” and your new monitor should show up as “Disabled”. Then, click on the discovered monitor and select “TwinView”. Your screen should temporarily flicker and/or display garbled output. You will be prompted to save your new settings (save them). Click on “Save to X Configuration File” and back this configuration up like in step 1.

You may have noticed that before you added the external monitor, your laptop’s monitor configuration was set to “Separate X Server”. However, after adding the new monitor and saving the new configuration, my laptop’s monitor was automatically set to TwinView as well.

Open terminal again (Ctrl-Alt-T) and type sudo nvidia-settings again to get back in to the Nvidia X Server Settings application. The formerly disabled monitor should now display the max. resolution of the new monitor. Click on the new monitor and make sure TwinView is still the configuration selection for both monitors.

Click on the rectangle representing your laptop monitor and confirm that the position for your laptop monitor is now “Absolute” with the value of “+0+0”. Then, click on the newly added monitor’s rectangle and make sure that the position for that monitor is what you want it to be i.e. to the right of your laptop monitor, to the left, etc.

I’m a bit leery of messing around too much with my Nvidia X Server settings but I’m glad I finally discovered a combination that works for my laptop + external monitor set up (even after rebooting :)). Check out my current xorg.conf file on Pastebin.

Now for the bad part, if you are like me and tried other options like Separate X server or whatnot, be prepared to restart your computer to find your computer unusable i.e. graphics gone wild. The good news is since the problems were brought about by editing xorg.conf, if you have a backup of xorg.conf that works, you can simply drop to the text console instead of graphically logging in. Then, you can overwrite the bad xorg.conf. I believe the command to drop to the text console is: Ctrl-Alt-F2.

Let me know your experiences and workarounds to getting an external monitor setup in the comments!

One thing I haven’t shared too publicly is that I worked as a part-time customer service agent for a telemarketing firm. It was a departure for any of the previous jobs I’ve held but I now hold a deeper appreciation for the work that telemarketers do. So, what has precipitated this change of subject matter?  Several weeks ago, I was contacted about a nice lady (hi Lynn! ) about advertising on my site. (Yes, I accept advertising on this site. Hit me up!) I was (a) flattered at the attention and (b) intrigued because of my former job & just how big and surprisingly effective Global Response’s call center outsourcingis.

What Does Global Response Do?

The Global Response  is a “3rd party outsourcing Catalog sales, Customer service and fulfillment.”

In plain English, that means companies like JC Penney, Puma, National Geographic, Blue Cross Blue Shield, David’s Bridal, MoMA, etc hire Global Response to handle things like customer service, sales, etc.

One of Global Response’s services is the provision of inbound call center services. An example of this could be if you’re having trouble buying an item on a website and there is a 1-800 number to call, chances are good that the party/person that picks up is a customer service agent working for a call center i.e. a center like Global Response. You know how you have to call a 1-8xx number to active your debit or credit card? Chances are you are calling into a call center much like Global Response. When you have trouble watching Netflix and that 1-866 number appears on the screen, Netflix can choose to hire people to handle those calls (in-house) or use an outfit much like Global Response (outsourcing). It is becoming increasingly popular for companies to outsource customer service to professional telemarketing organizations than handle them in-house.

In addition to providing customer service, they have fulfillment centers which means they help their clients with storing, selling and shipping goods to their clients’ customers. They also provide outbound calling services, one of the more recognizable duties of telemarketing agents. Global Response is able to be effective in their outbound calling services by providing training & quality assurance which is (to be fair) standard at call centers worth their salt.

In learning more about Global Response, I was really impressed at their client roster, case studies of their customers and their social media savvy. Let me count the ways:

• Their website stands heads & shoulders above other call centers. The site is designed to be modern, loads fast and even makes use of simple & “pretty” URLs.
• They put up case studies on their site which is something I haven’t seen on the other competitors that I’m used to. I like to read testimonials and these case studies provide prospective business some level of comfort that Global Response doesn’t trade in BS.
• The first search I did was “Global Response call center sucks” and I was relieved to find that there weren’t any major negative issues either with clients or employees. Like my (former) employer does, they pay their employees weekly and here are 2 employee reviews of Global Response which are largely positive.
• They have a blog written by several employees (David Cogan, Shane Slack, Bill Erickson, etc) which they use to put a personal touch on their company’s duties.
• Contact information is prominently displayed on all pages of their site;

Global Response isn’t perfect; I did discover a typo on their site. Overall, I’ve been pretty impressed and while I haven’t had the pleasure of speaking with a Global Response call center agent, I’m fine with drawing attention to what appears to be a well-oiled operation that Global Response runs. Visit the Global Response website at http://www.globalresponse.com/

Disclosure: I was compensated for writing about Global Response.

I updated my Motorola Atrix to Android 2.3 a.k.a. Gingerbread. You, too, can simply update your phone by going to your phone’s Settings” page, clicking on “About Phone” and tapping “System Updates”. You will get a simple notification that an update is available for your phone and offered the chance to download it. After downloading is complete, you can install it now or later. If you haven’t backed up your precious photos or phone contacts, please do so before proceeding with the update. After a restart or two, you will have the latest update from Motorola (Blur_Version.4.1.83.MB860.ATT.en.US to Blur_Version.4.5.91.MB860.ATT.en.US). Read my earlier post about the earlier updates that have been pushed out for the Motorola Atrix.

Straight from Motorola’s release notes, here are some areas you should see major changes:

1. Productivity Tools: Enhancements to business ready security features so you can get more work done on-the-go which includes robust VPN, device and SD card encryption, device management via 3rd party console and remote wipe ability. Adding Ability to install apps from unknown/3rd party sources e.g. XDA apks, the Amazon store (and its apps, etc).
2. Gallery: Enhancements to the picture Gallery allow you to aggregate all your photos, your friends’ photos and photo comments from social networking and photo sites like Facebook and Picasa in one place for easy viewing
3. Music: Enhancements so your Music player is now connected to a dashboard for music discovery. Plus, easy access to all your favorite artists, live, personalized recommendations for songs & videos and news and event updates
4. Dock Icons: Enhancement that enables easy access to favorite apps at bottom of each screen
5. Organized App Tray: Enhancement that helps you personalize and categorize favorite apps into groups so you can be more efficient
6. Location Based Recommendations: Enhancement that provides access to social content in one place so you can find out what is happening around you. You can use Yelp reviews and Facebook check-ins to find out what others are recommending
7. Task Management Tools: Enhancement that makes it easier to create, edit & delete tasks, and to assign priorities and reminders
8. Notification Tray: Enhancement that enables you to dismiss notifications one at a time
9. Faster Webtop Browsing: Enhancement to webtop application includes Firefox 4.0 so you can browse faster than with earlier versions of Firefox.
   

   You can use the Webtop feature with optional accessories (Motorola HD Multimedia Dock, the Motorola Atrix Webtop Access Kit and the Atrix Laptop Dock). I may consider checking out the Atrix HD Multimedia dock or the Webtop access kit, but NOT the “laptop” dock priced at ~ $500.

10. User Interface: Updated user interface with simpler home screen design, including shift to use of white backgrounds in menus, enabling better viewing experience
11. HD Video Playback: Enhancement that now enables HD Video Playback in 1080p for better viewing experience
12. Multiple Recipient Emails: Create groups for multiple recipient emails so you can communicate faster
13. One touch conference call access: Enhancement that makes it easier to dial-in to conference bridges while you’re on-the-go

Productivity

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I found a screen-grabbing application on XDA’s forums: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1009451. It works without needing root and the only permission required is SD card editing & storage. Boom.

This discovery reduces the likelihood of me needing to root my Atrix even more. If you have followed the instructions on installing Android SDk to your phone, all you need to do to install the app is: Open up command prompt and type: adb install path/to/the/apk/file. You should get a success message if all went well:

C:\Users\Jane\: adb install C:\Users\Jane\Documents\Coding\Android\Atrix\screengrab.apk
879 KB/s (52210 bytes in 0.058s)
        pkg: /data/local/tmp/screengrab.apk
Success

Please note: You will not be asked to okay the installation so please use this command with care. According to this Android Developer document, that adb install path/to/file only copies the file to a location on the phone, but I didn’t have to do anything else to get Screen grabber apk installed on my phone *shrug*. I can’t stress enough: don’t be rash and download random apks from the internet. If you want to verify the permissions required by an app, simply tap the “Options” button and select “Manage Apps”. Apps are now sorted alphabetically so scroll to the Screen Grabber entry and tap on it; the permissions required are at the bottom of that page and displayed below. The main difference I have found between the screenshots from the Screen Grabber app and those from the Android SDK method are: Screen Grabber’s method is easier, snaps taken by Screen Grabber have a greater bit depth (32) & thus, a larger file size than those by the SDK method.

Lastly, the Atrix now comes with the ability to encrypt personal data including data on the internal & external storage devices (good news for IT departments everywhere)! I turned on the personal data encryption on my Atrix and after rebooting, I got a message about my SIM card being removed or changed. Thanks to the encryption/security feature, you will need to enter your MOTOBLUR account/password combo every time you reboot. A little inconvenience for peace of mind is not too much to ask especially if you need it i.e. if sensitive data passes through your phone, a spy, etc. Also, please be aware that if you turn on SD card encryption, factory resetting your phone may result in total data loss.

Refreshed Android Photo Gallery

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With Gingerbread on the Atrix, the photo gallery shows your friends’ galleries by default. The first gallery set has the “views” which are:

1. Camera roll: Pulls photos from the DCIM folder or where photos taken from the camera are specifically stored.
2. My library: Pulls photos stored on your internal and external storage systems on the Atrix.
3. Online: This hooks into my Flickr, Facebook and Picasa Web Albums and it’s pretty nifty.
4. Friends: This pulls photos from your friend’s public Flickr, Facebook and Picasa albums.
5. DLNA servers: Pulls photos from a media server you specify.

If you’re irritated by the default setting to show pictures from your Facebook friends, turn that setting off by going to the “Settings” page. You can also setup DLNA servers via the settings. See the gallery below for the revamped options in the photo gallery app.

Refreshed Music Listening Experience

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Motorola didn’t add anything too drastic to the stock Android Gingerbread music app. One of the things I noticed was a “Music Store” app which is from AT&T. I haven’t bothered to uninstall it; besides, I already have my Amazon MP3 app installed. On the first run of the Music app on the Atrix, you will be asked if you want to get “Live Music” recommendations which is the main change to the bundled Music app. Once you have gone through the prompts on the default Music app, little has been done to differentiate the MOTOBLUR-skinned music app from Android 2.2.

The most obvious addition is that, by default, starting up the Music app (by MOTOBLUR) will display ‘live’ music recommendations to you and there is a tight integration with the (new) ATT music store. After you’ve set up the Music app, you will be presented with video, song & station recommendations. If you want a better music player, download the Google Music (beta) app which is pretty. I have used it as my main music player and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. Plus, if you install the Music beta application on your computer and upload your music library to Google’s servers, you will be able to stream your music via the Android app. Check out the gallery of the MOTOBLUR music app:

The Google Music app is another effort from Google to learn more about you and your music listening habits. Because I had Google’s Music (beta) app installed when I upgraded to the Gingerbread release, I saw 2 music apps in my App Tray. If you haven’t selected a default music player and you tap a (supported – I specify this because WMA files are apparently not supported) music file, you get to pick which player you want to play the file with. Anyway, here are some screenshots for your viewing to see just how much nicer the Google Music app is compared to the built-in app on the Atrix.

Refreshed Dock Icons

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Here’s what the earlier dock icons of the Atrix (when running Android 2.2) looked like:

I didn’t know I was missing out but now that the icons on the dock have been revamped, I’m very appreciative. My only gripe would be that I’ve mistaken the dock icons for my home screen apps and I’m not sure if I like that or not. The distinction was clearer with the old dock icons. Nevertheless, I am pleased with MOTOBLUR’s second take on the dock icons see here:

Refreshed App Tray

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Motorola added a shortcut to all apps installed to the Dock Icons. This has been incredible handy and better than the generic looking circle that was inflicted on us.

Then, when you get to the page listing all your apps, there are now options to group your apps! There is an “ATT” group by default and mine only shows 2 apps because I uninstalled much of the pre-installed ATT apps that the Atrix came with. Then, I was able to create a “Google” apps group which is pretty self-explanatory. If your apps are edging into the 100s like mine, this is pretty handy. Alas, there is a fly in this ointment: a not-so-welcome change to the All Apps screen is an extra step towards pinning apps to your home screens. When you press and hold an app now, a dialog box pops up and asks you whether you’d like to:

1. Add to Home: Adds the highlighted app to any of your Atrix’s homescreens
2. Share: shares the app to apps like Docs, Dropbox, email, etc.
3. Add to group: add the app to whatever group you’ve created earlier. If you haven’t created any special groups yet, you will be able to create one at this time.
4. Uninstall: self-explanatory. I like that uninstalling apps has become easier than ever.

Depending on the app you are attempting to pin, you may only have the options to “Add to Home” or “Add to group”. I’m sure once I’ve spent a month with this change, I’ll grow to appreciate it, but for now, it’s taking me some time to get used to. The gallery below has screenshots of the me adding apps to a newly created “App group”.

Improved Location Recommendation tools

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The main location-related change I noticed was the addition of an app called “Rich Location”.

Tasks Management & Notification Tray

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Notifications can now be dismissed on a per-item basis. App updates (if more than 3) are grouped into one and you can tap the new icon (a “Minus” sign) to dismiss those notifications. Otherwise, you can tap “Clear” to remove all notifications. Missed calls will be on top of any notifications (higher priority); Voicemail & Text messages are lower on the totem pole. Another new thing: when you ignore a call, you will be prompted (by default) to send a text message in return but I have since turned this feature off. Also, when you receive an incoming call notification, if your phone is locked, you get to slide-to-answer. If your phone isn’t locked, you get to tap-to-answer. The new Tasks app is underwhelming to me. I tried Astrid but it felt very “beta”. I will give GTask a try next. Feel free to read AndroidAndMe‘s brief overview of the top to-do apps for Android. The tasks app from Motorola doesn’t offer synchronization with Google Tasks or any other popular task management tool. So, if you don’t care that it’s completely local, then enjoy these screenshots:

User Interface Changes

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The visual changes to Atrix are too many to list. The best way to find out is install the update and enjoy the eye candy! The icons for pretty much everything on the Atrix look newer (i.e. new icons), new color scheme which I’m slowly coming to terms with, the camera/camcorder app got digital zoom, picture/video modes & exposure features which is pretty cool, more options for saving contacts, etc. Overall, I’m been pretty impressed with Gingerbread and the stability it brings to the Atrix. For more screenshots of new features in Gingerbread (on the Atrix), visit my Minus.com gallery which should contain the screenshots in this article and more.

My first exposure to Android was a rooted T-Mobile G1 I got off Craigslist in July, 2010. The performance on that phone was abysmal and it would be close to 7 months (& an ill-advised foray into Symbian with the Nokia N8 in October 2010) before I found a powerful phone that, for once, I didn’t need to fool around with to work. Not because I’m consciously avoiding or overlooking problems, but because this particular phone is great for my needs.

My two main reasons for not rooting are:

1. I have found nearly everything (apps) I need via the Android Market. Thanks to the apps on the Android Market, my phone nicely complements for my computer (really, things I use my computer for e.g. heavy browsing, Facebook/Twitter/News, sharing, etc). My bank has an Android app with which I can check my account balance or transfer money between my accounts or send money to another customer. For reading, I’ve got FBReader, Adobe Reader, Aldiko Premium and QuickOffice installed. Document creation is covered thanks to QuickOffice Premium & Google Docs and there are more apps for sharing (photos, text, video, etc) than I can count.
   

   Amazon has an Appstore which, before the Gingerbread update, was unavailable because Motorola removed the option to install software from unknown sources. Now, that option is available on the Atrix with the Gingerbread update.

   

2. Performance on the Atrix has been great. Apps are snappy to use and with Gingerbread, the Atrix is more stable than ever. This point is relevant because many articles proclaiming the advantages of rooting tout the fact that you can install performance management apps or task managers and whatnot. The Atrix ships with a task manager but I can count the number of times that I have used it in the 4 or so months I’ve had the Atrix. In fact, the Atrix *also* ships with a battery manager app. I think my point is: doing your research and betting on a powerful phone is a good way to make sure you won’t need to worry about task managers or performance tweaks. I was able to uninstall many of the ATT pre-installed apps on the Atrix.
   

In researching online for the top/recommended apps for rooted phones, I’ve found several reasons for rooting phones but none compelling enough to make me up & root. Well, that and I haven’t found a solid unrooting procedure yet for the Atrix.

• Full system backups of your phone e.g. using Titanium Backup. This comes in handy for backing up data from saved games, system files, etc. However, even when I had a rooted phone, I found that I didn’t really use this feature except to upgrade the custom ROM. Thankfully, the loss of this feature on my unrooted Atrix is mitigated by the fact that if you wipe your phone and you’ve elected to back up your data to Google’s servers, you can have your data (contacts, calendar, etc) restored when you reinstall. Right now, I also have Lookout Premium which also backs up photos, call history (Pssst, check your cellphone provider statements for this also) and contact details for me.
  
  
• System tweaks like overclocking, louder volume hacks, battery conservation apps, etc. This is where doing your due diligence like testing the phones in stores, reading online reviews particularly on sites like Amazon and honestly assessing your uses for a smart phone comes in really handy. Again, I strongly recommend *against* picking an Android phone simply because it’s $1 or free with your 2 year contract. <rant>I blame manufacturers for churning out turds and then, I get to read articles about how someone’s mom’s Android phone sucked so she got an iPhone.</rant> With my kick-ass phone, the Motorola Atrix, which I have no problem pimping & promoting (sans sponsorship from the folks at Motorola), I have never strongly considered rooting because despite howls of how MOTOBLUR sucks, MOTOBLUR is actually … not bad. Is it because I don’t have an alternative (which admittedly rooting could cure) or because MOTOBLUR actually works? I’d wager that it’s the latter based on my experiences but it’s just a matter of taste. A quick trip to the store should give you a feel for the UI on the Atrix. I mean, ATT’s pre-installed apps can actually be uninstalled! Yes, I’ve kvetched about the Atrix’s somewhat beta feel but I’m greatly heartened by the Gingerbread update which makes the Atrix feel like a brand new device. Battery life on the Atrix is ~ 4 hrs which kinda stinks but I’ve become conditioned to automatically plug my phone into my computer when I’m on the internet or just leave it on the wall charger.
• System tools like setCPU, root explorer, etc. If you know what these things mean and you need them, root, root, root. BUT going back to my key point about honestly assessing one’s smartphone usage, I haven’t graduated the halls of geekdom yet to even begin to appreciate these apps or why I need them.
• Tethering and Screen Capture (screenshot or video recording): These features are arguably the biggest draws of rooting. For me, I care about hassle-free screen capture but I’ve resigned myself to going the route of installing the Android SDK tools and connecting my phone to my notebook to get a screenshot of my phone. I purchased a “No root” screenshot app from the Android market, but the instructions for getting the app working did not work for my Atrix. However, feel free to check that app out. Then, for recording your Android phone’s screen, there is the Droid VNC server (beta). Regarding tethering, please note that ATT is also cracking down on unauthorized tethering. Besides, where I live, many stores offer free WiFi so unless I happen to be in a developing country with limited internet access, this might be an issue.
• Custom ROMs: For those yearning for Android’s “true” face, CyanogenMod is the gold standard in custom ROMs for Android. Most manufacturers add their own flavors to the Android User Interface. The best way to find out if you can live with a manufacturer’s spin on a phone you’ve been eyeing is to actually use the phone or watch videos of the device in action. My only experience with CyanogenMod was on the Google G1 and now, I’ve graduated to the Motorola Atrix. It would be unfair to compare the two but so far, I’m not complaining about MOTOBLUR. I do hate that my home screens are fixed in portrait orientation (pour quoi, Motorola?) but it’s not a deal breaker.
  
• Apps from non-Market Sources: Stock android has a neat feature which allows you to install apps from “Unknown sources”. which simply means if an app isn’t in the Android market, you can still install it on your phone. Depending on the manufacturer of your Android phone, you may not have this option available. This was true of the Motorola Atrix until the latest Gingerbread update. Please don’t go crazy downloading random apps from the internet.
  
  

For performance reasons, it is not a good idea to start your permalink structure with the category, tag, author, or postname fields. The reason is that these are text fields, and using them at the beginning of your permalink structure it takes more time for WordPress to distinguish your Post URLs from Page URLs (which always use the text “page slug” as the URL), and to compensate, WordPress stores a lot of extra information in its database (so much that sites with lots of Pages have experienced difficulties).

Changing my site’s URL structure was as simple as updating my permalinks options page, but with over 120 indexed posts, I needed to make sure that I:

1. Didn’t annoy my visitors: For sites with less than 100 visitors daily like mine, I was not going to lose any money or get irate messages. However, I didn’t want to chase away the few visitors I have by throwing up a bunch of 404 – URL not found” messages. Instead, I needed to make sure I had a way to let them know that there would be a temporary break in “transmission” (so to speak). To do this, I needed to perform the change at a time when I had the lowest traffic volume. Again, I don’t make much money from this site, but if I did, it would not be smart to change my site’s links during the times of heaviest traffic!
2. Had a plan for a seamless redirection: This was the biggest issue I needed to take care of before pulling the switch on my site’s structural change. I needed to make sure that the old posts were properly redirected i.e. a 301 redirect which tells Google/Search Engines that the old stuff is now at a different site. This is what Google recommends when you change a site or page’s url.

This time, I did the grunt work myself instead of going the Amazon Mechanical Turk route I used during my switch from Habari to WordPress. To make sure I didn’t leave my visitors in a lurch, I did the following:

1. Exported my site’s contents in the WordPress WXR format and backed up my site’s database for good measure. It’s just good practice to have backing up data as a first step.
   
2. Typed out an entire listing of my site’s posts by looking at my site’s Archives, grouped them by year and with a simple “search and replace” command in gedit, added the year (in which the post was written) to the URL so that janetalkstech.com/the-motorola-atrix became janetalkstech.com/2011/the-motorola-atrix.
   
3. Manually created the redirections and a set of redirect rules with the Redirection Plugin. Instead of entering each redirect rule under the Redirection plugin’s “Redirects” tab, you can import a CSV, XML or RSS file into the plugin with the redirects you want and the plugin will do the rest of the work. Of course, the tedious part was entering the data into the CSV spreadsheet. The format for creating the CSV sheet is simple:
   • For each cell, enter the source/bad url, add a comma and then enter the target/good url.
   • Move on to the next cell below; Rinse and repeat.
   • You can verify the correct syntax for creating the redirect entries manually by exporting your current redirects from the Redirection plugin‘s “Modules” tab.
   • Double-check your work to make sure you have the correct redirections in your CSV sheet before importing!
   • I ended up with 122 cells containing redirects to the new URLs e.g.

   

4. Installed the WP Maintenance mode plugin for WordPress and turned it on. Make sure you change the “Settings” for the Maintenance Mode plugin to “True”.
   
5. Then, I changed my site’s permalinks by going to “Settings” and “Permalinks” while in the WordPress Administrative backend and entering “/%year%/%postname%“. I didn’t want trailing slashes at the end of my posts so I left out the trailing slash at the end. In my naiveté, it seems the current recommendation *is* to have a trailing slash at the end of URLs although that article is over a year old although Matt Cutts says the trailing slash doesn’t matter as much as picking the desired url style and sticking with it.
   
6. Checked my CSV file for typos before importing into the Redirection Plugins’s “import” section. Creating a bulk CSV file to import your redirects is as simply as firing up Google Docs and creating cells in a Spreadsheet with the following information:
   1. source url which is the old/bad link e.g. http://janetalkstech.com/the-motorola-atrix
   2. literal comma
   3. target url which is the new links e.g. http://janetalkstech.com/2011/the-motorola-atrix
   4. Each cell of your spreadsheet should contain 1 redirect and be in this format:

      janetalkstech.com/the-motorola-atrix,http://janetalkstech.com/2011/the-motorola-atrix

   

7. I verified that all my links were being properly redirected by clicking on old links and casually inspecting my site’s HTTP headers (using Wireshark). So, I was reasonably satisfied that my links and corresponding link juice were being passed on to the new URLs.
   

   GET /using-habari-from-a-users-perspective HTTP/1.1
   Host: janetalkstech.com
   Connection: keep-alive
   User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64) AppleWebKit/534.30 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/12.0.742.100 Safari/534.30
   Accept: text/html,application/xhtml+xml,application/xml;q=0.9,*/*;q=0.8
   Accept-Encoding: gzip,deflate,sdch
   Accept-Language: en-US,en;q=0.8
   Accept-Charset: ISO-8859-1,utf-8;q=0.7,*;q=0.3

   HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently
   Date: Wed, 15 Jun 2011 23:16:07 GMT
   Server: Apache
   X-Pingback: http://janetalkstech.com/xmlrpc.php
   Expires: Wed, 11 Jan 1984 05:00:00 GMT
   Cache-Control: no-cache, must-revalidate, max-age=0
   Pragma: no-cache
   Set-Cookie: PHPSESSID=x; path=/
   Vary: Accept-Encoding,User-Agent
   Last-Modified: Wed, 15 Jun 2011 23:16:13 GMT
   Location: http://janetalkstech.com/2009/using-habari-from-a-users-perspective
   Content-Encoding: gzip
   Content-Length: 20
   Keep-Alive: timeout=2, max=100
   Connection: Keep-Alive
   Content-Type: text/html; charset=UTF-8

   ………………..GET /2009/using-habari-from-a-users-perspective HTTP/1.1
   Host: janetalkstech.com
   Connection: keep-alive
   User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64) AppleWebKit/534.30 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/12.0.742.100 Safari/534.30
   Accept: text/html,application/xhtml+xml,application/xml;q=0.9,*/*;q=0.8
   Accept-Encoding: gzip,deflate,sdch
   Accept-Language: en-US,en;q=0.8
   Accept-Charset: ISO-8859-1,utf-8;q=0.7,*;q=0.3
   Cookie: PHPSESSID=x

8. Turned off the WP Maintenance mode plugin and closely monitored my logs for any unusual drops in traffic.

Overall, thanks to the excellent Redirection Plugin by Urban Giraffe, I’ve been able to reliably handle the worst 404 errors that Google Webmaster Tools alerted me to. If you use this plugin, don’t forget to donate! I’ve got a long way to go (see image below) but baby steps. No more switching CMSes for me, that’s for damn sure.