Upgrades with multiple databases have always been more work and many people running multiple databases typically did not upgrade until the .1 release of whatever version of MU. When I upgraded Homeschool Journal to MU 2.7.1, it was two weeks before I had found and repaired all of the database issues (via several plugins). I decided I wasn’t going to go through that again.

With the number of blogs at WordPress.com, Automattic must be using a database plugin that supports WordPress MU better. So, over a couple of weekends, I tweaked HyperDB to use the same MD5 hash based sharding structure that we were using.

I released SharDB (Download) last week as a beta release intended for larger WordPress MU installs using an existing 1-3 character MD5 hash (by blog id) based multi-database sharding structure. (Other structures will be added in early 2010.) The alpha testing of SharDB was carried out this fall with the help of a few people who I knew were using the same multi-database that we were. SharDB has been powering live sites since early October.

SharDB has been tested with over 50 plugins including BuddyPress 1.1 through 1.1.3, domain mapping (both Donncha’s and my version) and my multi-site plugin. I have not found any issues with any of the tested plugins. It should support any plugin that accesses data via the $wpdb object. It has been used to upgrade live sites from 2.7.1 through to 2.8.6 and I’ve upgraded a test site to the WordPress MU 2.9 release candidate tagged 2009/12/21. (Note: I used the plugin in this post to create the commentmeta tables before updating MU from 2.8.6 to 2.9RC.)

One of the features that I really like about SharDB is that I don’t need to edit the database config when adding plugins (a feature inherited from HyperDB). Also, I haven’t had issues with plugins failing to create tables. As an added bonus, I added a handy column to the site admin blog screen so that you can see which database a blog’s tables are in.

• September 24, 2009 — Changing the domain (6)
• December 27, 2009 — Merge news and Buddypress awesomeness (6)
• December 16, 2009 — Bulk Import Users (2)
• December 11, 2009 — WPMU Default User Role (1)
• December 9, 2009 — Twitter Digest (4)

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Post tags: database, multiple, shard, wordpressmu, wpmu

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Now that WordPress 2.9 is out the door, the dev team (Donncha, plus the regular WordPress team) can start working on 3.0, where the merge of wpmu will be rolled in. In case you missed it, Jane has called for suggestions of anything else you would like to see, and set up a forum thread for anyone to participate in.

There are also the weekly dev chats, except the next one has a bit of holiday break. If you want to have a say, or just read along in the chat, tune in to the IRC channel on January 7th. It’s at irc.freenode.net in the #wordpress-dev channel, Thursdays @ 21:00 UTC. Likely, Jeffro at WPTavern will recap it as well – he’s pretty good at that. Since the release cycle is now being aimed at 3 times a year, it looks likely a release in March for 3.0 (tip here). And if you really want to see what’s happening code-wise, of course pay attention to both tracs. (WordPress & MU) At some not-yet-determined point, they will merge the MU one right into core.

If you have any questions or concerns about the merge itself, it would be best to follow the WordPress dev blog, the developer chats, and the twitter accounts of janeforshort and me, since we’re both interested in passing on the news to all.

The goodies kept coming out over the holidays, too. First, the wordpress.com custom css plugin, and then the Wickett Twitter Widget.

And? Andy checked in single WordPress support into the Buddypress trac. Still needs testing, so have at it.

• November 22, 2009 — Buddymatic Theme Framework (8)
• December 9, 2009 — Twitter Digest (4)
• November 30, 2009 — Free BuddyPress themes (1)
• November 26, 2009 — Facebook Dashboard Widget Update (0)
• October 19, 2009 — WordCamp New York (1)

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Post tags: buddypress, dev chat, merge, wordpress, wordpressmu, wpmu

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• December 9, 2009 — Twitter Digest (4)
• December 3, 2009 — MU 2.9 beta (5)
• November 26, 2009 — Facebook Dashboard Widget Update (0)
• November 20, 2009 — CSS Editor plugins (1)
• June 23, 2009 — WP-Devel plugin (1)

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Post tags: css, plugin, wordpress.com, wpmu

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Scroll down to the bottom of that page and there is a zip link. Do not put this on a production site yet, but please do try and test it somewhere. Maybe a development site, or a test site on a spare domain, or locally on your computer.

The more people who test it now, the less bugs we have to deal with after releases.

There are some useful changes coming through, and some are especially useful for MU sites. Like the video embed. You’ll be able to ditch the plugins to embed video for popular sites. Please read the official release post on the WordPress blog for an overview and highlights.

• June 23, 2009 — WP-Devel plugin (1)

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Post tags: 2.9, code, development, testing, trac

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• it now goes in the plugins folder & activates sitewide. The only users who have access to the plugin are site admins.
• it is now MU site aware and users are added to the dashboard blog if the WPMU site has one, otherwise they are added to the main blog of the site.
• there is an option to add the users to the current blog instead of the dashboard/main blog of the site.
• users are added at the default user level set in the site options.
• I tested it with WPMU Default User Role plugin and it worked like a charm.

WordPress MU Bulk Import Users (44)

• December 29, 2009 — Scaling WordPress MU with multiple databases (4)
• December 27, 2009 — Merge news and Buddypress awesomeness (6)
• December 11, 2009 — WPMU Default User Role (1)
• December 9, 2009 — Twitter Digest (4)
• December 7, 2009 — Sitewide Tags 0.4 (10)

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Post tags: bulk, user, wordpressmu, wpmu

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I gotta say, while Rafe did all the work, it sure was fun to sit down and brainstorm with him about this. Definitely not a boring guy.

Random Posts

• December 16, 2008 — Managing Autosave/Post Revisions (2)
• March 13, 2009 — Blog Categories (12)
• February 5, 2008 — Missing plugins folder and mu-plugins folder (0)
• May 26, 2009 — WPMU 2.8 dev (1)
• December 18, 2008 — WordPress Video Solution Framework for WPMU (13)

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With the default user role plugin, you can specify additional blogs to add new users to and specify a role for the user for each blog when the new user is created. I gave it a test earlier in the week and it works like a charm.

• December 29, 2009 — Scaling WordPress MU with multiple databases (4)
• December 27, 2009 — Merge news and Buddypress awesomeness (6)
• December 16, 2009 — Bulk Import Users (2)
• December 9, 2009 — Twitter Digest (4)
• December 7, 2009 — Sitewide Tags 0.4 (10)

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To get the plugin options to save, I followed the process I outlined in Writing Plugins (for WP & WPMU). The other two minor changes that I made were:

• A minor fix with post scheduling – if the digest runs after the publish time in the settings, the post status is publish. If it runs before the publish time, the status is future.
• Text field options from the settings page are sanitized before saving.

To sanitize the options I added these lines of code to the plugin:


function ws_filter_options( $setting ) {
return wp_specialchars( $setting );
}
foreach( array( 'ws_td_username', 'ws_td_title', 'ws_td_post_tags', 'ws_td_pub_time' ) as $opt ) {
add_filter( 'pre_update_option_' . $opt, 'ws_filter_options' );
}


The thing to bear in mind with the options screens is the options are automatically saved to the options table. If you want to process the option in some way before saving it to the options table, use the pre_update_option_ + option_name filter. This filter hooks the process during the update_option process prior to the option being saved in the object cache or options table.

You can download my version here: Twitter Digest for WordPress & WordPress MU (33)

• November 26, 2009 — Facebook Dashboard Widget Update (0)
• December 27, 2009 — Merge news and Buddypress awesomeness (6)
• December 3, 2009 — MU 2.9 beta (5)
• November 22, 2009 — Buddymatic Theme Framework (8)
• October 26, 2009 — Featured posts plugin and widget (13)

© ahome for WPMU Tutorials, 2009. | Permalink | 4 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: how to, plugin, wordpress, wordpressmu, wpmu

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• Added option to include pages in tags blog. (For site wide search functionality.)
• Added option to include non search engine indexed blogs if tags blog not indexed. (For site wide search functionality.)
• Added option for post meta to be copied with post. (Main use we have seen for this is including post thumbnails in the tags blog.)

Thanks to kgraeme, dsader & others for testing and feedback. I would also like to thank Donncha for the opportunity to collaborate with him on this plugin. If you’ve used SWT on your site and it’s done the trick for you, consider dropping by and giving Donncha a donation.

• December 29, 2009 — Scaling WordPress MU with multiple databases (4)
• December 27, 2009 — Merge news and Buddypress awesomeness (6)
• December 16, 2009 — Bulk Import Users (2)
• December 11, 2009 — WPMU Default User Role (1)
• December 9, 2009 — Twitter Digest (4)

© ahome for WPMU Tutorials, 2009. | Permalink | 10 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: sitewide, tags, wordpressmu, wpmu

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Triple J wrote a quick and dirty plugin for it. I revised it a bit today. Notes on usage are at the top of the file. Once the plugin has created to tables you can remove the file. JJJ add commentmeta table (40)

• December 9, 2009 — Twitter Digest (4)
• November 26, 2009 — Facebook Dashboard Widget Update (0)
• June 23, 2009 — WP-Devel plugin (1)
• December 29, 2009 — Scaling WordPress MU with multiple databases (4)
• December 27, 2009 — Merge news and Buddypress awesomeness (6)

© ahome for WPMU Tutorials, 2009. | Permalink | 5 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: beta, plugin, wordpressmu, wpmu

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