UPDATE wp_posts SET comment_status = 'closed';

Thanks Jeff Starr for the tip.

2. Now choose your customized settings there such as buttons style, tweet text, URL and language.

3. Next option is to suggest Twitter accounts for follow, this is a really useful option which lets users to folllow the recommended twitter accounts after retweeting the link.

4. In the last step just copy the code provided in the box.

5. Now open single.php or any other file of your wordpress theme (can be in found wp-content/themes/) where you want the button to be visible, paste the code and save your modified file on the webserver.

Also checkout our tutorial on How to add TweetMeme Button on Wordpress blog.

if ( current_user_can('contributor') && !current_user_can('upload_files') )
	add_action('admin_init', 'allow_contributor_uploads');

function allow_contributor_uploads() {
	$contributor = get_role('contributor');
	$contributor->add_cap('upload_files');
}

It will enable upload files feature for contributors.

This code was shared by Ryan Marganti

Open index.php file of your theme and replace the existing loop with:

<?php
if (have_posts()) :
     while (have_posts()) : the_post();
         $expirationtime = get_post_custom_values('expiration');
         if (is_array($expirationtime)) {
             $expirestring = implode($expirationtime);
         }

         $secondsbetween = strtotime($expirestring)-time();
         if ( $secondsbetween > 0 ) {
             // Enter your post display code after that.
             the_title();
             the_excerpt();
             // Post display code ends here.
         }
     endwhile;
endif;
?>

Now while creating a post to set it’s expiration date/time create a custom field with name(key) expiration and set your expiration time as value in this format mm/dd/yyyy 00:00:00.

Source: [WPRecipes]

Set Wordpress Post Expiration with Date

Open index.php file of your theme and replace the existing loop with:

<?php
if (have_posts()) :
     while (have_posts()) : the_post();
	$currentdate = date("Ymd");
	$expirationdate = get_post_custom_values('expiration');
	if (is_null($expirationdate)) {
	$expirestring = '30005050'; //MAKE UN-EXPIRING POSTS ALWAYS SHOW UP;
	} else {

	if (is_array($expirationdate)) {
	$expirestringarray = implode($expirationdate);
	}
	$expirestring = str_replace("/","",$expirestringarray);
	} //else
	if ( $expirestring > $currentdate ) {
             // Enter your post display code after that.
             the_title();
             the_excerpt();
             // Post display code ends here.
         }
     endwhile;
endif;
?>

Now while creating a post to set it’s expiration date create a custom field with name(key) expiration and set your expiration date as value in this format yyy/mm/dd.

Source: [Snipplr]

While writing a post look for Publish module usually located at extreme right on the screen, click on the Edit link next to Visibility option there check “Stick this post to the front page” option and That’s it!

Checkout this screen cast video for better understanding:

P.S. Sticky post feature was introduced in Wordpress 2.7, So you need to have Wordpress 2.7 or newer to use this feature.

function time_ago( $type = 'post' ) {
	$d = 'comment' == $type ? 'get_comment_time' : 'get_post_time';
	return human_time_diff($d('U'), current_time('timestamp')) . " " . __('ago');
}

Now place the following snippet in either single.php or comments.php (wherever you want to show it) within loop.

<?php echo time_ago(); ?>

Thanks to Chris for sharing this code.

Yeah Wordpress MU and Wordpress.org are all set to tie up with each other. Almost over a year of hard work the floks at Automattic are all set to merge their standalone blogging platform Wordpress.org with multi user platform Wordpress MU. This feature will come handy specially for large blog networks.

It is an add-on for the existing users which means it won’t hurt them if they don’t want to use it. The upgrade process will be smooth and won’t cause any difficulties to existing users. Most importantly it will be a win win situation for Wordpress MU users as they can now easily use Wordpress.org plugins out of the box needless to modify.

2. Choose Username and Password while Installing

Earlier when you do new installation Wordpress automatically choose ‘admin‘ as default username and generate a random password, however in 3.0 it allows you to choose custom username and password while installing Wordpress.

3. New Default Theme

It’s time to bid adieu to Kubrik theme which comes up default with Wordpress. Wordpress 3 has been packaged with a new theme called “Twenty Ten”. This new theme is really outstanding and minimalist at the same time. Twenty Ten has some outstanding features such as Custom Background, Custom Header, Simple and Clean Look, Multi Widget Areas Supported, Two-Columns and Drop Down Menu.

4. Custom Background

Wordpress 3.0 now adds support for custom background for themes. To enable custom background functionality to your theme you just have to add following code in your theme’s functions.php file:

add_custom_background();

And it will enable “Background” option in Wordpress admin “Appearance” tab.

5. Custom Post Types

This is another feature which will boost up Wordpress as a CMS. This feature is due since Wordpress 2.9 it allows you create different post types such as Portfolio, Products, Reviews etc. all you have to do is to just add following code in your functions.php file:

function post_type_portfolio() {
    register_post_type( 'Portfolio',
                array( 'label' => __('Portfolio'), 'public' => true, 'show_ui' => true ) );
    register_taxonomy_for_object_type('post_tag', 'Portfolio');
}

Checkout more complex and advance use of Post Type feature here

6. Navigation Menu

This feature is inspired by WooTheme’s WooNav which allows you to create different menu items containing Categories, Pages, External or Internal Link. It also support a widget so that you can place these menus in your sidebar as widget.

7. Author Templates

Earlier we had category specific templates which we use to develop category based templates using category-slug.php now Wordpress 3 brings the same functionality for author based templates now you can create author based template files such as ‘author-chef.php‘.

Other Features Worth Mentioning

1. Welcome Guide: Now every Wordpress installation will have a Welcome Guide for which helps newbies to understand Wordpress better.
2. Core (Canonical) Plugins: Plugins will now developed by community rather than sole developer, so you can now expect updated plugins every time.
3. Deactivate plugins to Edit: In Wordpress 3 plugins can not be edited until they are active so you must first deactivate them to be able to edit.

Thanks to Jane Walls for confirming about unavailability of these features.

Useful Resources

• Wordpress Development Updates
• Wordpress 3.0 Schedule
• Download Wordpress 3.0 Nightly Build
• Download Wordpress 3.0 Beta 1

Every blogger is aware of the importance of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) through which you can get a great amount of organic traffic to your blog, which is not just good in recognition aspect but in monetary perspective aswell.

However, it could be really a pain in a head situation to get good ranking in search engines for newbie bloggers but this plugin solved this situation out. It gives you complete flexibility to optimize your blog for Search Engines.

2. Contact Form 7

It is important for every blogger to maintain a communication path with it’s readers/users, after all users make your blog success or flop so it is really important for you to get in touch with your users. It’s not just about you to get in touch with users but there must be a way for users to contact you.

Contact forms are the best way to get input from users without actually providing them email address. It is more secure and functional.

Contact Form 7 is such an out class plugin which can generate contact or query forms for your blog on the fly. It supports many advance features like File uploads and CAPTCHA. It directly sends you the submitted form to your email address.

3. Akismet

Spams are like the cancer to web industry and unfortunately it is increasing enormously day by day, it is not possible for you to protect your blog from getting into spammers attention but you can protect your blog from Spam comments and trackbacks by using Akismet plugin.

Akismet is actually developed by automatitc, which has developed Wordpress itself that’s why every new wordpress installation comes with akismet plugin. This plugin checks if submitted comments or trackbacks looks like spam, if so then it marks them as SPAM.

4. Google XML Sitemaps

Sitemaps are like a map of your site for search engines, which helps them to understand the structure of your blog/website to crawl them.

Google XML Sitemaps generate sitemap for your blog which search engines use for better crawling and indexing your blog. It also prompts famous search engines like Google, Bing, Yahoo and Ask about new blog posts whenever it is created.

5. WP Super Cache

Wordpress is developed on PHP and whenever a user visits your blog it generates lots of scripts each time before showing your blog. It can results in crashing your web server if your blog gets lots of visit at a time.

While WP Super Cache generate static html pages for your blog posts so whenever a user visit your blog a static page is served rather than a dynamic scripts which save lot of server usage and protect your blog from getting down in case of traffic spike.

if (!current_user_can('edit_users')) {
	add_action('init', create_function('$a', "remove_action('init', 'wp_version_check');"), 2);
	add_filter('pre_option_update_core', create_function('$a', "return null;"));
}

Thanks to Jeff for sharing this tip.

UPDATE wp_users SET user_pass = MD5( 'new-password' ) WHERE user_login = 'admin-username';

Change new-password with your new desired password and admin-username with your blog admin username for which you want to change password.