Favicons are used usually to create a more appealing visual interface for the visitor. The impression that they only contribute to the visual aspect of a blog is misleading, when adding a blog to favorites the Favicon is associated with the URL, so the blogs with favicons stand out.

Getting a favicon for your blog is highly advised at this point, if you don’t know how to do it but you want to find out, here’s how you can do it :

1.First off, you’ll need an image - any image that you think represents your site the most will do - keep in mind though you’re going to need one that it’s royalty-free and not copyrighted.

2. Go to Chami’s Favicon Tool Generator

3. Upload your image, by clicking the “Browse button” and afterwards “Generate Favicon”.

4. After the script will finish the favicon generation, you will be presented with a link to download the newly generated favicon. Click to download it and save it on your PC ( you can also test preview it by clicking “Test in Browser” ).

5. Unzip the folder you just downloaded ( the one that was generated on Chami’s site ), start a FTP manager and upload your files to public_html ( or www ).

6. You’ll now have to edit your header.php and add the following line of code : <link rel="shortcut icon" href="favicon.ico" />

Try to locate the code that starts with the same syntax <link />and place this one above it. Save your header.php file, go to your site’s front page and press SHIFT + F5 ( Windows Users ) to force Firefox to clear its cache. Voila, you now have a favicon on your blog. P.S : If you wish to change it, all you have to do is replace the .ico file with another.

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One of the basic things you’ll want to do after you’ve finished your Wordpress installation is to properly configure it. What does this mean ? I’m sure that by now you’ve heard many people say that Wordpress isn’t just a blogging platform it’s more of a CMS and holds great potential - it’s true. It’s easy to customize, very flexible, light and ultra fast. The only problem is that it doesn’t come pre-configured. Here are a few tips that might interest some of you.

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Developed by Fathom SEO this theme is a new theme for WordPress,  slightly different from the typical WordPress theme. It is a complete package with documentation for creating an enhanced pressroom using WordPress as the backend.

Download

If you download and use the theme let us know how you get on - add your comments below.

• Performance improvements for the Dashboard, Write Post, and Edit Comments pages.
• Better performance for those who have many categories
• Media Uploader fixes
• An upgrade to TinyMCE 3.0.7
• Widget Administration fixes
• Various usability improvements
• Layout fixes for IE

Here’s a screen shot of the theme :

As you can see this theme is designed with 2 sidebars on the right, a big AdSense box below the related links area - not a very high CTR area, a big header and lots of space for the content . The banner in the header is well placed but I don’t think that the AdSense ads in the post, at the bottom of the post  serve their purpose quite well because it’s an area with a very low CTR. Aside from that, it features a series of things that most themes lack, like :

• A cross-browser compatible navigation menu. ( I’m really a sucker for these menus )
• The possibility of choosing your layout, either 2 sidebars on the left, content in the middle and one sidebar on the left and one on the right or the layout you’ve seen in the screen shot, 2 sidebars on the right.
•  The layout works flawless in IE and FF ( latest versions).

From my point of view, it’s a really nice release but it’s nothing compared to the premium Revolution themes. As an aside to the Wordpress Revolution theme, it looks like iThemes have also release a set of 8 free Wordpress themes. Have a look : iThemes Wordpress themes