PHP Developer

Best Caching Plugin for WordPress in 2011 is “Quick Cache”

codex-m — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 07:49:04 +0000

After spending almost the entire year testing the top caching plug-in for WordPress to speed up this blog; I came up with the conclusion that the best caching plug-in for WordPress in 2011 is “Quick Cache”. My criteria for this decision: 1.) Ease of installation 2.) Ease of configuration 3.) Ease of maintenance after installation [...]

PHP Syntax of Class, Objects, Methods and Getter/Setter Functions

codex-m — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 03:55:54 +0000

You should now have a better understanding regarding what are “PHP classes, objects, methods, properties” and how it relates to reality. In this tutorial, you will see what they exactly look like in the PHP script organized in a way even an idiot can understand. Let’s get started: The most basic PHP object-oriented programming needs [...]

PHP classes, objects, methods, properties guide for the Complete Idiot

codex-m — Fri, 26 Aug 2011 06:06:20 +0000

You might read our introductory tutorial on how to learn PHP Object oriented programming (OOP). Let’s start digging deeper into what are these classes, objects, methods and properties that are used in PHP OOP. Don’t be scared because this guide is written even an idiot can understand. It will be explained as easy as possible. [...]

Learn PHP OOP (Object Oriented Programming) for Beginners Tutorial

codex-m — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 08:36:49 +0000

This is a complete beginner tutorial on PHP object oriented programming. This tutorial assumes you do not have any single knowledge about PHP – a pure beginner in PHP. As a start, OOP is the best way to write programs in PHP. It is considered as one of the best practices of coding PHP. So [...]

PHP Framework vs CMS: Which one you choose for your website project?

codex-m — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 04:05:49 +0000

One of the most commonly asked questions by online entrepreneurs in starting an ambitious website project: “Which is better, starting a site using PHP framework or using CMS directly?”. The best answer to this question depends entirely on the following: a.) Your technical skills b.) Your budget c.) How your website will be used d.) [...]

Advantages & Disadvantages of Facebook Comments in WordPress Website

codex-m — Wed, 27 Jul 2011 10:26:15 +0000

As of July 2011, the number of sites that are adopting or integrating Facebook comments have been increasing. It is much easier to integrate Facebook comments in PHP and Apache based websites because most of the code in the documentation is provided in PHP. Actually Facebook comments has its own advantages or disadvantages. Let’s examine [...]

PHP Secure Authentication of User Logins

codex-m — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 06:38:10 +0000

Want to learn secure authentication of user logins? To implement this script: 1.) Download it first. 2.) Unzip the script. 3.) Create database table: First table: authentication http://www.php-developer.org/screenshot/authenticationtable.jpg Second table: ipcheck http://www.php-developer.org/screenshot/ipchecktable.jpg 4.) Configure config.php 5.) Upload securelogin folder to the root directory of your website. 6.) Test For more details, you can read my [...]

Warning: include_once(./includes/bootstrap.inc): failed to open stream

codex-m — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 05:50:37 +0000

I believe this error is now fixed with the latest Drupal releases. But if you cannot still update your Drupal site and you are needing an immediate fix for your Drupal cron jobs. Follow the steps below: 1.) Create a new PHP script with the code below: <?php $documentroot = dirname($_SERVER["SCRIPT_FILENAME"]); chdir($documentroot); include_once './cron.php'; ?> [...]

Blocking Denial of Service Attacks using PHP script, Possible?

codex-m — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 03:38:43 +0000

Denial of service attacks are a big problem especially for big websites with high level of traffic. If you still do not know how denial of service can bring down site, its goes like this: a.) An attacker with thousands or perhaps millions of “compromised” computers send a request to Server X to download a [...]

How to analyze Cpanel raw access log entries very easily?

codex-m — Thu, 26 May 2011 05:31:15 +0000

Cpanel raw access log provides a complete detail of all request made to your Apache server. This request includes: a.) Normal visitors coming from search engines or to other referring websites. b.) Search engine bots. c.) Malware bots or hacking bots. It is important to pay attention to your raw access log because it provides [...]

Best practices of coding PHP in HTML – Beginners Guide

codex-m — Mon, 23 May 2011 03:27:06 +0000

Beginner will often think PHP is completely different from HTML. Of course, it is correct. PHP is executed in the server while HTML on the client browser. But often, this differences often result to some bad coding practices in PHP. This tutorial will illustrate some of the best coding practices that a “pure” beginner in [...]

How to stop or block a hacker and spammer from abusing your WordPress website

codex-m — Sun, 22 May 2011 04:05:36 +0000

Spammers and hackers are webmasters pain in the ass. If you do not do something, then they will continue to abuse your site in a daily basis. This means: 1.) Higher server load 2.) Slowing down your server resources 3.) Filling up your MySQL database with useless and redundant information such as spammer automated comments. [...]

Most Used PHP Framework-The Popular Top 7 List in year 2011

codex-m — Sun, 01 May 2011 15:39:05 +0000

There are so many PHP frameworks released open source. This provides an almost limitless options for PHP developers. However, a lot of PHP developers are mostly looking for a PHP framework with a lot of fanbase and community support. The primary reason is that a popular PHP framework will have a lot of followers which [...]

Apachebench Tutorial ab testing Tool Example in Ubuntu Lucid Lynx

codex-m — Sun, 01 May 2011 10:00:01 +0000

Is there a time when you are thinking how to do a server load testing to evaluate your PHP web application performance? This is where you will be using the Apachebench or “ab” testing tool. This is a very useful open source tool not only to PHP developers but to the entire users of the [...]

Best practices and Tips of using PHP readfile function – Developers Guide

codex-m — Sat, 02 Apr 2011 03:05:09 +0000

If you need to read a file then stream it to the browser, then you need to use PHP readfile function. Common examples and applications includes using PHP to stream MP3 files, videos or even PDF files. This is a quick PHP developer guide on readfile, and this is based on the years of experience [...]

Submitting and verifying a Blog Claim on Technorati using Feedburner

codex-m — Mon, 14 Mar 2011 06:31:23 +0000

MGQCDW3BS83U – This is my Technorati token key after submitting this blog to Technorati. If you are using Feedburner, the Technorati blog claim process is a bit of neck pain. For those of you who are using Feedburner and submitting their blog to Technorati, the following are my best advice: 1.) Make sure you write [...]

PHP website application security audit and check list

codex-m — Sun, 13 Mar 2011 14:07:42 +0000

This is a useful security audit check list that you must do to secure your website as much as possible from any forms of hacking. This is one of the most common problems I found in the reality where most webmasters often ignore and unaware of the security risk. Checklist #1: Are you validating ALL [...]

XAMPP Tips: Prevent 403 forbidden errors and edit php.ini in Ubuntu and Windows

codex-m — Tue, 01 Mar 2011 11:43:11 +0000

XAMPP is a wonderful tool for a PHP developer. Yet it may pose some problems particularly to beginning user in XAMPP. This tutorial is meant to address some of the difficult issues for a beginner user in XAMPP. If you encounter some XAMPP issues in both Windows and Ubuntu environment which is not listed here, [...]

Best practices of mysql_real_escape_string function in php

codex-m — Tue, 01 Mar 2011 07:54:14 +0000

The mysql_real_escape_string function is a very important PHP function in preventing MySQL injection attacks in PHP web applications. This short tutorial will summarizes the best practices of using MySQL real escape string. The objective is to prevent application problems and ensure security of your web applications. First: Never turn on magic_quotes_gpc function in your PHP [...]

Best practices when sanitizing POST to prevent MySQL and XSS attacks

codex-m — Mon, 28 Feb 2011 15:06:48 +0000

Before you read and criticize further, there is no such thing as perfect security. Every countermeasure has its flaws, the only way you can do it to reduce the chances of successful attacks against your website by using simple techniques such as input validation in PHP programming language. Taking maximum importance and priority on the [...]

Cpanel Crontab tutorial using PHP to execute Cron Jobs

codex-m — Fri, 28 Jan 2011 12:54:07 +0000

One of the most important tasks as a webmaster is automating periodic jobs in your server. This not only saves your time but making your job efficient too.Typically these are the following jobs you wish to automate: 1.) Execute cron jobs of popular CMS such as Drupal cron.php 2.) Doing periodic backups of your MySQL [...]

Simple PHP Proxy Detection Script and Client Real IP Address

codex-m — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 12:50:11 +0000

If you are not still aware; this server variable: $_SERVER["REMOTE_ADDR"] cannot detect real IP address of the user if it is behind a proxy server. Below is a sample PHP script that can detect if a user is using a proxy or not: <?php $remoteaddr=$_SERVER["REMOTE_ADDR"]; $xforward= $_SERVER["HTTP_X_FORWARDED_FOR"]; if (empty($xforward)) { //user is NOT using proxy [...]

How to get the absolute server path name of an executing script in PHP

codex-m — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 11:20:22 +0000

One of the most important requirement before you can use any file reading PHP functions such as fopen, file_get_contents, readfile, etc is the absolute server path name.Some of these functions won’t work if you do not use the absolute server path name to the file that needs to be read or open. An example of [...]

Best PHP Resources for Beginners Programming and Web Development

codex-m — Sun, 09 Jan 2011 04:05:39 +0000

Aside from this PHP developer website, below are the important websites where beginners and novice PHP programmers should check out if they need to learn more about PHP and its application to web development.Feel free to send me your website, in case you have a much better resource to add. www.php.net – you will be [...]

Check if your site is vulnerable to MySQL injection & ways to prevent it

codex-m — Fri, 31 Dec 2010 15:32:33 +0000

Of course no one likes to have their website hacked and defaced. It is why your main priority as a PHP developer or a webmaster should be security. You should double check and making sure you are validating user inputs especially if PHP variables are used in the MySQL queries. MySQL injection results in a [...]

WordPress Database Backup PHP Script

codex-m — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 07:58:32 +0000

If you are using WordPress and in need of an efficient backup solution of your database. You can download PHP script To implement this script: 1.) Download first to your local computer. 2.) Unzip the script. 3.) Read the instructions inside the script. It would be definitely helpful for you. 4.) Define the WordPress MySQL [...]

Excel Spreadsheet to Estimate Visitors from Google- Keyword Analysis Tool

codex-m — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 09:16:44 +0000

Below is the Excel workbook which you can use to estimate the visitors from Google for your targeted keywords. For details, please refer to the tutorial I wrote in SEO Chat entitled: Google Ranking Positions and %CTR: Estimating Search Engine Visitors SEO Chat. The details and sample computation is included in that article. Note: If [...]

Keepas tips- Copy Paste Putty Username & Password at Command Line

codex-m — Sat, 27 Nov 2010 22:41:14 +0000

Using Keepas and PuTTY you can make your login secure using a command line tool for communicating with an SSH server. If you are a webmaster, you should be using SSH for uploading and downloading files because they are more secure than using FTP method. SSH encrypts communication between your computer and the SSH server [...]

Session Destroy in PHP: Usage and Development Tips

codex-m — Sat, 27 Nov 2010 17:07:43 +0000

Session Destroy (http://php.net/manual/en/function.session-destroy.php) is a very important PHP function that will completely clear and destroy session variables. Improper use of session can lead to mysterious problems within your website. Examples of these problems are the following: a.) Sudden user log-out in some of the pages b.) If you are using a download counter, it will [...]

PHP Script to Backup MySQL database using Hosting Cron

codex-m — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 07:30:15 +0000

This is the script to automatically backup MySQL database using hosting cron feature and PHP. For details and tutorials regarding the implementation,please refer to Developer Shed/Codewalkers/Web hosting tutorial. Link here: DevShed tutorials Codewalkers tutorials Web hosting tutorials And look for the related article (e.g. Backup and Restoring MySQL Database) on this topic that I wrote [...]

Edit PHP & HTML files online quickly using Putty SSH Client

codex-m — Tue, 26 Oct 2010 09:22:19 +0000

The usual and traditional way of editing website files is to download the file first using an FTP client (Filezilla for example). Once the file has been downloaded, it edited in your local computer and then once it is done, it is re-uploaded back to the hosting server using an FTP client and this is [...]

Delete all MySQL tables in phpMyAdmin without deleting MySQL database

codex-m — Tue, 26 Oct 2010 05:36:22 +0000

There are times that for development reasons there is a need to delete the entire tables in phpMyAdmin without deleting the database itself. Of course since most webmasters are more familiar with phpMyAdmin than the MySQL command line method, so this tutorial will be using phpMyAdmin to delete the entire database tables at once. Let’s [...]

Most Popular CMS (Content Management System)

codex-m — Wed, 22 Sep 2010 00:01:23 +0000

There are lot of CMS (Content Management System) being released commercially or as open source. If you like to see the complete list, here it is: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_content_management_systems However these long lists are only dominated by the following 13 CMS (not in order of popularity) : OpenCms,dotCMS,DotNetNuke,Umbraco,Movable Type,Drupal,Joomla,Mambo,PHP-Nuke,WordPress,phpWiki,Plone,ExpressionEngine Let’s start comparing the first set of CMS [...]

Using Pages in Google Blogger -Creating Static Pages

codex-m — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 10:07:51 +0000

This is good news for Google Blogger users. It now supports the creation of static pages. This makes it possible for you to create pages which is NOT part of your normal blog posting. This is highly useful for creating a static contact page, more concise about page, resources pages, etc as long as it [...]

Tips to make your PHP website loads VERY fast

codex-m — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 08:09:41 +0000

OK, so you are looking for ways to load your PHP website very fast. The easiest way is to use Gzip compression. This will compress contents from the server to users browser, which of course makes the file size small which is quick and easy to transmit in the bandwidth limited Internet connections. To do [...]

Simple and Easiest WYSIWYG Free PHP5 Templating Engine-RainTPL Review

codex-m — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 06:33:03 +0000

To make web development in PHP as efficient as possible; there is a need to use a PHP template engine. The purpose of PHP template engine is to entirely separate the server side code (that is the PHP server side scripting language) and the HTML design. So this means that the website developers can be [...]

PHP Script to Display PHP Version and MySQL version of your website

codex-m — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 05:49:33 +0000

There are times when you need to know the PHP version as well as the MySQL version used by your website. This is particularly important when you need to update the PHP version to the latest version as well as the MySQL server version installed. Identifying PHP version seems to be pretty straightforward using phpinfo() [...]

Five Serious PHP Development Mistakes Commonly Done by Websites

codex-m — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 02:34:42 +0000

This short guide is applicable if you are: 1.) An online based business and hiring PHP developers to do the development job. 2.) An online entrepreneur hiring developers to create websites using PHP directly from scratch or highly customized templates (not using CMS like Word press for example). 3.) Already has a website and hire [...]

SEO Check list from 2010 SEO Site Review Session by Google

codex-m — Sat, 26 Jun 2010 08:32:55 +0000

Below is the Excel spreadsheet containing the checklist for SEO Site Review session. This is very useful if you are planning to implement the tips and suggestions from the session in your actual website SEO implementation: For details, I just wrote a tutorial on the summary of the SEO Site review session learnings which will [...]

How to prevent or stop receiving spam comments in Blogger?

codex-m — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 15:22:20 +0000

I just read some Blogger hosted blogs (otherwise known as “Blogspot”) and I am irritated to see a lot of spam comments and even malware links found in those comments. So if you use Blogger platform (which is owned by Google) to publish your blog posts online, how do you able to prevent spam? Unlike [...]

Mono .NET Framework using it to host ASP.NET websites

codex-m — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 04:12:38 +0000

A mono .NET framework makes it possible to run ASP.NET 2.0 applications in an Apache – Linux hosting environment. Of course, do not expect everything will be perfect and you willl most likely encountered a lot of development headaches and issues along the way. In some hosting companies, particularly using Apache and Linux platforms, they [...]

How long does it take for DNS to propagate in Godaddy Hosting?

codex-m — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 04:36:49 +0000

I worked on one website for which the domain was registered in Godaddy. The website was hosted somewhere else, not in Godaddy. It was a WordPress website with lots of content in it. One day, the owner decided to transfer his wordpress website to Godaddy web hosting under a shared account. Practically his purpose is [...]

WordPress Hosting Tips and Guide

codex-m — Sun, 06 Jun 2010 11:57:02 +0000

WordPress is the most popular blogger software. According to Andrewpaterson.com , there are around 202 million websites worldwide powered by WordPress. With this popularity also leads to the popularity of the WordPress in various hosting companies. This guide will show what you need to know or watch when you are looking for a web hosting [...]

How to use phpinfo?| phpinfo PHP Example

codex-m — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 13:23:15 +0000

Phpinfo is one of the most important troubleshooting functions in relation to PHP. The main objective of the phpinfo function is to diagnose PHP problems that are possibly related to its configuration. For example, you are using a PHP function that will open a URL but will not be able to do so. Other application [...]

Best PHP websites and their characteristics

codex-m — Wed, 26 May 2010 07:06:01 +0000

If you are a PHP developer, you might ask what the best PHP websites on the internet. It is inspiring that with the simplicity and beauty of PHP programming language used server side; it is used by some of the biggest, most popular and useful sites on the internet. You might have your own answers, [...]

PHP SQL Max Basic Code to Communicate MySQL

codex-m — Sun, 16 May 2010 17:41:13 +0000

For example, what if you need to grab the maximum numerical data from a certain MySQL column? This has several applications like: a. In WordPress, the highest post ID is the latest post. So if you need to grab the latest Post, you can query using the highest post ID. b. In other applications, the [...]

How to Transfer WordPress to New Host

codex-m — Sun, 09 May 2010 15:46:05 +0000

This very short tutorial is useful if you are planning to transfer your WordPress to a new hosting. There can be different reasons such as: 1.) For example if you are in the free hosting services and you are tired of poor hosting performance such as low uptime, low bandwidth and limited features. 2.) You [...]

PHP Web Application Design Flow and Analysis: Case Example

codex-m — Sun, 02 May 2010 16:43:26 +0000

Are you planning to design a PHP web application? If yes, you’re on the right page. You will be amazed that the first step of the PHP web development process is not really about coding. But the most important step in the design process is “brainstorming on the all possible functionality to be included” as [...]

XAMPP Linux vs. XAMPP Windows

codex-m — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 03:08:09 +0000

If you need to become a PHP developer, chances are you are either using two common operating systems which are Windows and Linux. This short guide will help you decide better whether you need to install XAMPP Linux or consider having XAMPP in Windows. The advantage and disadvantages will also be discussed. XAMPP Linux System [...]

Link Rel Canonical Automation Excel Template for Blogger

codex-m — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 15:57:24 +0000

Below is an important Excel template to automate the generation of link rel canonical script in Blogger template which is used in migrating blogger post URLs to another domain name and different hosting. Details are discussed in the www.seochat.com article: “Move Blogspot to Another Hosting using Link Rel Canonical” VERY IMPORTANT: Be careful when entering [...]

PHP string manipulation examples: Date Formatting and Conversion

codex-m — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 12:23:11 +0000

I love string manipulation in PHP, especially if I pressured myself to complete the programming work in around 30 minutes. It really cracks my head off and a good mental exercise (better than chess or playing sudoko). Anyway in this PHP string manipulation exercises, we attempt to convert the date in the format of Apr [...]

PHP String Manipulation Functions: SUBSTR and STRPOS

codex-m — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 13:34:30 +0000

This is a tutorial on string manipulation functions which are SUBSTR and STRPOS. Here is an example: How would you write a PHP script that will accept inputs as 1-Apr-10 but will output dates as 4/1/2010??? Can you script that out in 30 minutes? Little bit tricky huh? There are a million ways to kill [...]

PHP Remove Comma from String or a Number Script

codex-m — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 09:05:59 +0000

There are some instances where you need to remove comma from a string or a number. For example, you would like PHP to convert 1,234 to 1234 and display to the browser. This where you need to remove commas… Specifically, for computational purposes, PHP won’t include in the computation for numbers including a comma so [...]

Data gathering: Average page loading time of Google Top ranking websites

codex-m — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 06:16:13 +0000

Below is the data used in the SEO Chat article “Average Page Load Time of Top ranking websites in Google”. It requires Excel program or Open Office Calc to open and read the contents. Click the download link button and save it to your computer: For more details, please read the SEO Chat article about [...]

How to select a WordPress plugin that is SAFE and SECURE

codex-m — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 11:08:32 +0000

WordPress plugin is an essential to every WordPress blog. In fact, nowadays it is almost impossible to run a WordPress blog without a plugin. Plugins are great, it makes life easier with WordPress plus it is FREE. But like any gadgets which makes life easier and productive, there are always some dark associated secrets with [...]

7 reasons why WordPress is better than Blogger

codex-m — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 08:34:56 +0000

You might have read this article: 7 reasons blogger is better than WP . It states the 7 reasons why Blogger is better than WordPress. Now since this is a democratic world, I will give my views on that post and write it here. And defend that why WordPress is better than Blogger. Here it [...]

Updating WordPress to version 2.9.2: Actual Events

codex-m — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 20:01:41 +0000

OK, here we go again, before I tried to update this blog to the latest WordPress version automatically using WordPress auto-update feature and it fails. Details of this error can be found here: http://www.php-developer.org/how-to-manually-update-wordpress-solving-technical-issues/ The root cause of the issue was the file permission of all WordPress files not set to 755. The web host [...]

Data gathering: Keyword difficulty vs Size of the domain in Google

codex-m — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 08:05:06 +0000

Below is the complete data used in the SEO Chat article on the keyword difficulty vs size of the domain in Google: Instructions: Click “Download this file” and save it to your computer Important notes: 1.) The data is considered precise but not guaranteed to be accurate as ranking fluctuates over time in Google. 2.) [...]

Blogger Robots.txt Tips

codex-m — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 14:49:05 +0000

Seriously, you cannot edit robots.txt in Blogger hosted blogs (a.k.a blogspot). What you can do is manipulate the meta robots tag using Blogger conditional tags. One of the common problems in Blogspot is content duplication, and effective use of meta robots tag can prevent this problem. But average blogger has almost no knowledge of blogger [...]

Strategy to get all URLs in the Blogger or any website

codex-m — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 17:43:05 +0000

There will be times when you like to extract all canonical URLs in your Blogger or any website (for example like in an SEO analysis or generating updated web sitemap). The easiest approach is to immediately resort to Google indexed URLs using a site command like: Site:php-developer.org However, this is limited to the number of [...]

How to make WordPress secure: Increasing WordPress security

codex-m — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 06:52:39 +0000

WordPress default installation is not OPTIMAL in terms of security. Even you have the latest updates, your current wordpress blog can run into security vulnerabilities which the attacker can exploit. We all have read a thousand security suggestions pertaining to WordPress, the following is rare list: 1. Turn off PHP functions that are known to [...]

How to manually update wordpress- Solving technical issues

codex-m — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 09:48:09 +0000

This blog has been updated from WordPress 2.6.x to the latest wordpress version WordPress 2.9.1. At first, I thought everything was ok with this server: a. Fopen in PHP was enabled (to be used for automatic updating) b. I have backup the entire mysql databases for wordpress. c. I have backup all the FTP [...]

Modern Strategy to move Blogger to Another hosting Environment

codex-m — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 11:51:41 +0000

Before it is impossible to transfer link juices from blogger to another domain (using a different hosting other than Blogger) in case you decide move out. For example if you have a blogspot sub-domain: thisismyblogger.blogspot.com, Google won’t pass links in case you move to another hosting. This means that if people are linking to your [...]

Raw backlinks data on Page rank experiment

codex-m — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 08:23:56 +0000

I made a study on the exact relationship between Page rank and Back links published here: http://www.seochat.com/c/a/Google-Optimization-Help/Back-Links-and-Google-Page-Rank/. Basically it does not convince to be page rank freaks as it does not offer as much useful value like content , web page loading time and conversion rate. Anyway, it was fun. And this is the raw [...]

Why I decided not to use Google Blogger hosted Blogs?

codex-m — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 06:11:56 +0000

Google Blogger (www.blogger.com ) is a free blog publishing platform. They will let you use your own domain (called as “custom domain” feature) or you have a sub-domain name under Blogger domain (example: stupidblogger4life.blogspot.com) You can earn income in Blogger through Google adsense. However as I learned blogging through years, things have changed. The following [...]

Download Website Traffic Monitoring Software in Excel (SPC Chart)

codex-m — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 15:18:38 +0000

This Excel workbook automatically fetches web traffic from Google analytics using your login. Then the traffic can monitored using statistical process control techniques. The VBA macro was developed by Mikael Thuneberg. Read the official tutorial/documentation below. I developed the whole statistical process control chart integration to that Excel workbook in addition to Mike’s work. You [...]

Solution for Blogger-You are about to redirected message problem

codex-m — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 14:11:51 +0000

UPDATE (December 15, 2009): Google now allows link rel=”canonical” attribute to be applied across other domains. This is the permanent solution to the “You are about to be redirected problem”. Read this post: http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2009/12/handling-legitimate-cross-domain.html I am a big fan of Blogger (http://www.blogger.com ) on my early days of internet. Ever since I was blogging early, [...]

PHP Strip HTML Tutorial-How to remove html entities in the PHP output?

codex-m — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 16:43:57 +0000

This is an important tutorial about stripping HTML tags in PHP with sample code. Sometimes you encountered a situation when you are outputting a text into a document say RSS feeds or PDF. And the content (text) that is being outputted contains html entities for example: & nbsp ; Common practice of removing html [...]

How to delete all WordPress spam comments at once?

codex-m — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 16:01:22 +0000

Today, I experience a major problem. There were hundreds of spam comments in this blog. Most of the spam comments were of Viagra nature, some pretending to be legitimate comments but their feedback is pretty awful, you should be warned if lots of comments were like this: “Nice website. Thanks for the research you have [...]

Script about PHP encrypting code

codex-m — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 12:39:54 +0000

Not much known about PHP encryption particularly relating to obfuscating the script to add extra layer of security. Precisely some tools can be achieved to do that like one of the tools I developed: Encrypt PHP code The details will be discussed in my DevShed article. However the breakdown of the processes are as follows: [...]

How to hide WordPress Version to Improve Security

codex-m — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 08:33:24 +0000

One of the easy ways hackers can determine if your website can be easily compromised is to look at WordPress version. It is because as WordPress.org publishes a new version, it will state an update of what has been change, this includes exposing some vulnerabilities in terms of security that hackers can exploit. Although, hiding [...]

How to make user defined CSS using AJAX?

codex-m — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 15:27:00 +0000

This one is tricky, how can you make your background color and font color customizable for your visitors? Well I have made a sample in this project: User defined CSS Website: Demo using PHP and AJAX, where any user can use slider to customize the web page CSS properties particularly the background color and the [...]

MySQL Avg – Using this average built in function in PHP and Database

codex-m — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 14:55:23 +0000

This is an important beginner tutorial on MySQL avg. For those needing tips on how to properly syntax MySQL query to compute average of values stored in the database. Here it is: $result3 = mysql_query("SELECT avg(close) from `sp500` WHERE `entry`>='$lowerlimit' AND `entry`<='$upperlimit'") or die(mysql_error()); $row3 = mysql_fetch_array($result3) or die("Invalid query: " . mysql_error()); // Print [...]

Using PHP to command CSS in WordPress

codex-m — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 11:44:44 +0000

I met a problem about CSS styling in this blog. I need to make a certain style to be applicable only to WordPress front page, category and 404 pages EXCEPT to Post URLs. Now this is a bit challenging and requires a more in depth technical skill. Aside from doing complicated tweaks of the WordPress [...]

Use PHP to correct favicon.ico browser incompatibilities

codex-m — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 13:22:03 +0000

Say you have a gif type favicon.ico and it works very well with Firefox but not with IE. Of course, you are not allowed to have two favicon.ico for your website. The only solution is to use PHP to provide server side scripting commands to display: a. a GIF type favicon.ico for other browsers except [...]

User defined functions: Sample Excel Workbook

codex-m — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 13:06:04 +0000

This is a supplement post material in relation to ASP free article: “User-defined Functions using Visual Basic Applications in Excel Part 1″. This helps a lot in understanding the concept of building your own user defined functions using Visual Basic programming language. Below are the summary of this tutorial: 1. User defined functions must be [...]

Date of Today PHP Code

codex-m — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 11:02:57 +0000

Whoa! This could be a useful script to anyone wanting to display date on their PHP powered website, here it is: <HTML> <HEAD> <TITLE>Date of today</TITLE> </HEAD> <BODY> <?php $dateoftoday = mktime(0, 0, 0, date("m"), date("d"), date("y")); echo "Today is ".date("m/d/y", $dateoftoday); ?> </BODY> </HTML>

Download file: Powerpoint animation example

codex-m — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 10:38:24 +0000

In this ASPfree tutorial: Developing Real Time animation with PowerPoint, one can create beautiful animations with power point. Below are the summarized tips: 1. Make sure you have prepared a sketch plan before making a drawing. 2. Use moderate colors to render graphics fast. 3. Save it as power point slide show (.pps). 4. Use [...]

Excel database sample sheets

codex-m — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 10:14:21 +0000

This is a supplement post of the ASP free tutorial: Using database functions in MS Excel As promised the attached Excel workbook for downloading is HERE: Excel database sample workbook-download only. Below are the important tips: 1. Read the full tutorial first (go to ASPFREE.com website). 2. Download the sample workbook provided. 3. Practice the [...]

Excel Macro sample workbook

codex-m — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 09:41:00 +0000

Below is the Excel macro sample workbook for downloading which you need in this Developer Shed tutorial: “Developing Macro Commands in MS Excel”. For downloading: Excel Macro Workbook. Overall Tips: 1. Make sure you have anti-virus installed in your computer. The workbook is fully scanned before it is uploaded to the server, so it is [...]

Backlinkwatch Excel Spreadsheet Analysis

codex-m — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 17:53:03 +0000

This is the supplement post of this SEO Chat tutorial: http://www.seochat.com/c/a/Link-Trading-Help/Analyzing-Inbound-Links-Using-BacklinkWatch-Data/ , that talks about the common analysis of webmasters when analyzing backlinks using the famous : www.backlinkwatch.com tool. Try this excel spreadsheet as it contains how to go with this process as well as reading the SEO chat tutorial for details. I know this [...]

PHP Server Array Variables Tutorial with Sample Test Script

codex-m — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 10:59:15 +0000

This is a very quick tutorial to give you an overview of what will be the output of the most common PHP Server Variables. Please bookmark or link to this post so that you can get a very quick reference of what PHP will give as a result if those variables are used. I upload [...]

PHP Preg Match Script to Test Conditions

codex-m — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 22:16:50 +0000

Get to know preg match in PHP. This script will test preg match conditions. It will take time for you just to write down a script. So I wrote one for you: <html> <head> <title>PHP preg_match test online</title> </head> <body> <?php echo '<h3>Instructions:</h3>'; echo '<br />'; echo '<br />'; if (!isset($_GET['submitpregmatch'])){ //form is not submitted, [...]

Using PHP to control WordPress Content Display

codex-m — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 07:07:47 +0000

There are lot of webmasters that still do not know how to customize the display of Word press pages or post. By doing this, you can prevent boilerplate repetition which can increase % similarity of the pages resulting in duplicate content. Say you have this piece of text in all pages and post sidebar (Using [...]

Check broken links after server migration using Xenu Sleuth

codex-m — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 05:37:33 +0000

Before this site was hosted in Blogger.com. But I decided to shift to WordPress to avail a lot of web features. I then download WordPress 2.8 to my desktop and install it in the WordPress XAMPP localhost. I complete all the necessary onsite work that could help the crawlability of my site. One thing I [...]

How to Filter $_POST variable against MySQL injection?

codex-m — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 09:56:16 +0000

One of the main weakness in PHP scripts particularly for amateur programmers is the lack of validation particularly when handling PHP driven forms. Below is a vulnerable script for MySQL injection: <?php if (!isset($_POST['email']) || trim($_POST['email']) == "") { die ('ERROR: Enter email'); } else { $email =$_POST['email']; ?> $_POST is not filtered for any [...]

.htaccess in WordPress XAMPP localhost

codex-m — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 09:35:23 +0000

If you have done a mod rewrite of the WordPress URLS at live site for example; rewriting unfriendly URLs like: http://www.thisisyourwordpresswebsite.com/?p=4 to keyword based URLs like: http://www.thisisyourwordpresswebsite.com/thisisyourkeyword . You need to tweak the .htaccess to function it properly when you are doing a work at XAMPP localhost (assuming you have placed all your files in [...]

How to change DNS name server settings in Network Solutions?

codex-m — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 20:31:25 +0000

This domain : www.php-developer.org is used to be hosted by Blogger. But since I change my mind, Blogger cannot support all the features I need, this is the time to upgrade hosting. The domain is registered with Network solutions. To move the hosting from Blogger to Agility Hoster, I need to change the DNS settings [...]

Research website traffic for free using Compete

codex-m — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 20:14:28 +0000

This is amazing, http://siteanalytics.compete.com/ will let you analyze traffic for just any websites for FREE and without verification. This is very helpful when you like to measure the popularity of your competitors. To use this properly, for example if the domain you would like to check is http://www.seochat.com, just enter it as seochat.com in the [...]

How to insert Google Adsense Code in PHP script?

codex-m — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 19:37:04 +0000

I have tried this and it is confusing at first, anyway the best practice to insert the Google adsense code is to assign this to a PHP variable: Example of adsense code: <script type="text/javascript"> google_ad_client = "pub-123456789"; google_ad_slot = "123456"; google_ad_width = 180; google_ad_height = 150; //--> </script> <script type="text/javascript" src="http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/show_ads.js"> </script> So to assign [...]

How to test ROBOTS TXT file in NEW Google webmaster tools dashboard?

codex-m — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 02:41:39 +0000

Google recently change their dashboard, in such a way it confuses webmasters to test their robots.txt. The sad thing about this update is that: You can never check robots.txt unless you have verified it under your account. This appears to be true. But there is a way: If you have a existing verified account of [...]

How to have Static Front Page in Blogger (Blogspot)?

codex-m — Sat, 09 May 2009 02:17:09 +0000

At first, it may seem impossible to have a static front page in Blogger/blogspot because their control panel does not have a “Set to Front Page” option unlike in WordPress Blog publishing software. But it is possible…. If you need to make the blogger front page static, you need to tweak the existing template and [...]

Unique Meta Robots Tag for Blogger or Blogspot

codex-m — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 02:12:10 +0000

Google Blogger, popularly known as the blogspot is free but has some serious limitations. It does not have a built in corrective actions against duplicate content. For example , the content on your post can appear on the archived pages. Good to know Blogger team is helpful enough to block (by default) the /search/label in [...]

New versus Classic Blogger Templates: The SEO Advantage

codex-m — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 01:56:16 +0000

New Blogger Template ( the one that is currently the default template given by blogger if you create a new blog with www.blogger.com) is XML powered with a lots of good features such as showing labels on the sidebar, easy monetization with Google ad sense and more. The only weakness found with New Blogger template [...]

How to make blogger post title unique?

codex-m — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 01:40:14 +0000

Blogger by Google is very popular because it is free, in my tutorial published by Devshed: http://tools.devshed.com/c/a/Blog-Help/Customizing-Title-Tags-in-Blogger-Classic/ , I have clearly illustrated the process on how to make the post title of Blogger classic template unique. This offers a lot of advantages that includes: a.A user-friendly post title , user can easily find relevant information [...]

How to make WordPress Title tag SEO Friendly using PHP?

codex-m — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 16:03:49 +0000

Title tag is one of the most influential factors in Search Engine optimization. If you have a wordpress blog, you need to have a unique and descriptive title in all of your blog post and pages. If you have access to your header template, you can even customize the title tag using PHP server side [...]

Link rel=”canonical” tag PHP script for OsCommerce Websites

codex-m — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 14:16:50 +0000

Here is my script for link rel canonical tag: This will be the PHP script to solve canonical problems such as: a. http and https potential duplicate content issues b. Non-www and www versions c. Use of session ID. Place this code in the head section of the affected template.There are 4 scenarios depending on [...]

Top advice to learn PHP programming- for a pure beginner

codex-m — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 13:21:14 +0000

Here is my quick advice: 1. Download XAMPP here 2 . Install it in your PC. There , you do not need anymore a live website to run PHP scripts. 3. Download any PHP editor , you find free editor in internet just like this. 4. Learn PHP online first (you do not to enroll [...]

WordPress Sort Search Result by Title Plug-in

codex-m — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 12:10:30 +0000

I am beginning to wonder how to sort search results in word press by post titles. There is a plugin below. <?php add_action('pre_get_posts','sort_searchresult_by_title'); function sort_searchresult_by_title($k) { if(is_search()) { $k->query_vars['orderby'] = 'title'; $k->query_vars['order'] = 'DESC'; } } ?> Readme/ Instructions: 1. Download the plugin here. 2. Upload to wp-content/plugins directory in wordpress 3. Activate the plugin. [...]