Version 0.3 of the Daily Maui Photo Widget for WordPress is now available for download. You can download the latest version from the WordPress plugin page or, if you already have it installed, update the plugin from your WordPress dashboard.

Version 0.3 Details

Version 0.3 is a minor release, correctly a security flaw that was uncovered by a third party security website. The flaw corrected in this release was actually part of the admin settings in the widget panel itself, and not directly exposed to the use of the plugin on the website. And since the code for the admin settings used by this plugin do not interact directly with any of the WordPress data or sensitive information in the database or files, the threat was considered minimal.

Regardless, the code for the admin settings have been reworked to eliminate the flaw that was discovered, and by simply upgrading to the latest version, it will be repaired without any further action.

Official blog announcement of the new Daily Maui Photo Widget for WordPress.

Now it’s easy to showcase a new photo of Maui each day right on your WordPress blog, anywhere and on any theme that has supports for Widgets. And with multiple layouts to choose from, you can select the one that fits best with your blog.

Daily Aloha for Your Readers

This WordPress plugin is just the latest extension of the Daily Maui Photo website. Thousands already enjoy these daily photos on Facebook and a strong following is growing around the @DailyMauiPhoto account on Twitter, too. So why not add your many blog visitors to that list, too?

This plugin is easy to install and use, so you’ll be up and running in no time. There are currently five different layouts to choose from, which you can view on the support page. Switching between layouts is just as easy, using the built-in Widgets panel on your WordPress dashboard. Just chose the style you want from the list and that’s it. You’ll never have to look at code or manually change files after installation. Like I said, it’s that easy.

What’s more, all the code and photos run on the Daily Maui Photo server, not yours. Why does that matter? It means you don’t have to worry about added processing time on your server or page delays while the photo is being displayed.

Not Using WordPress?

Why not?

Just kidding. Although this plugin is currently for the WordPress platform, I am working on a separate widget that can easily be copied into any website or blog template. I probably won’t post it for a few weeks, but if you’re interested in using it now as a beta user, please let me know.

This post is a short example of how I used the Posts by Tag plugin by Sudar for one of my new pages on the Maui by Photo website.

The concept of the page was simple: to build a directory of sorts for posts that were tagged with different locations on the island.

WordPress Repository Location: Posts by Tag

What Was Needed

I wanted to have a page that listed all the locations on Maui that my website featured, as well as each post associated with that location.

For the website, I’m was already using Categories for the primary navigation, such as Beaches, Activites, etc. But in order to track the location of each post, I was also tagging each post with a specific place name, such as Lahaina or Kapalua. After accumulating more than 40 posts from 11 different locations that were tagged, it was time to create a page that featured each location and list the posts assigned to it.

What Was Done

The Posts by Tag plugin actually works in two modes: a widget mode for use in a sidebar, and a shortcode mode that let you embed the list inside a post or a page. For this case, I was looking to the shortcode feature to help get the job done.

The post_by_tag shortcode functionality offered by Posts by Tag uses most of the same parameters as the get_posts template tag that WordPress offers, so right away I knew it had everything I needed.  In my case, I wasn’t as concerned with the dates of the posts (as in a traditional blog sense) as much as having a directory listing of posts. So the fact that I could order the posts by Title and in Ascending order was perfect. The only other parameter required for me then was the number of posts to return, which I set at a generous 25.

With the shortcode usage planned, it was just a matter of laying out my page just like you would any other page. While the shortcode supported multiple tags at once, I was looking to add a photo and a link for each tag. At the time, there were 11 location tags that I wanted to display posts for, so I needed 11 instances of the shortcode on the page. I added all 11 locations and photos in the order I wanted, knowing that the next time I added a post and tagged it with one of these locations, it would be automatically added in correct list and in its proper order alphabetically.

Now, if I added a tag for a new location at some point, of course I’d have to go back and manually update the page, but that is a less frequent occurrence that I was not concerned with at time.

The Result

With the shortcodes utilized and the page in place, I was all set. A screenshot of the final result is below, but if you’d prefer to see the page itself, visit the Maui by Photo Locations page.

Feedback

Please let me know if you think this short demo helped or if you’ve used this or a similar plugin on your own site, too.

- Kris

After just one year of working with the WordPress platform, it’s pretty safe to say that I’m a big fan. What’s not to love? All the functionality right out of the box already, a nice theme system with loads of designers, a rich set of plugins, and the support of a great developer community. Sure, some say it might be a resource hog or slow, but I haven’t experienced too much of that (yet). So, where do I want to fit into this process?

Plugin Development

After getting familiar with the standard installation and customization on a few different blogs, followed by theme hunting and modifications, the next logical step for me was working with plugins. It’s usually easier to find an existing plugin that fits your needs than reinvent the wheel. But just like themes, there were a few cases were something was close, but still needed to be tweaked for my own personal needs.

So, I picked up a book, started reading, and was ready to take on the plugin world. Like everything else, I just dove right in and started coding away, creating a few custom plugins that fit neatly into my sites. That was the first revelation for me, that these were for me and not necessary useful for a larger audience. For example, the Daily Maui Photo widget over there on the left is a plugin I created, and it’s currently deployed on a few other of my sites as well. It’s customizable with 3 different views to be adaptable to various themes and scenarios. Yet it’s still not something that may ever be available for public consumption.

There are a few other plugins that I’ve built recently, such as the recent posts display on the home page and the display view for site details on the links page. Those might be more useful to others, but that quickly led to the next few revelations: testing and support. It takes a lot of testing and dedication to release plugins that can potentially be used by hundreds or thousands of users. And while I give many kudos to all the awesome, hard-working folks doing that today with their plugin development, I just don’t have the time at the moment (or ever). The support side is huge, too. Check out the thread on this page for the Simple Facebook Connect plugins I mentioned last month. It has over 1,200 responses and growing daily. Not something I can commit to.

Plugin Contributions

So, now I’ve come to terms with not writing my own plugins for public use, I do feel comfortable and interested in helping users extend their own plugins with features that are useful for me that hopefully others might find helpful. This right here is another great feature of the WordPress platform as being open source, because if something isn’t working correctly or not meeting my needs, I can dig into the code and hack away at it. Much faster than I could do if I was building it from scratch, I might add.

On the contribution side, if I feel my modifications to the plugin are something that others might be interested in, and the original developer is accessible and approachable – most of them seem to be – I’m more than willing to engage and return the favor by handing over my code. In all honesty, this is actually in my best interest because by adding my own custom code, I put myself at risk because future updates and features added in newer versions will likely override my changes. So, if something I write for my needs ends up being included in the official release of the plugin, I’m much safter.

As a Resource

With only one year working with WordPress, I can’t by any means claim to be an expert. But as someone having multiple blogs running the software and having a strong development background to help understand how things work behind the scenes, I think I can also be a resource to help others. For example, I have collected a fairly sized list of plugins that I gravitate towards with every new install. In addition to that common list, I’ve also used various plugins for more specific reasons on a site-by-site basis.

My plans here now lead to creating a resource section here at the site that will serve as a reference for others that may just be starting out or looking for a not-so-obvious plugin to accomplish a particular goal. Acting as an extension of my web portfolio here, I’ll be adding a more detailed WordPress section of the site that will not only feature the plugins I’ve used, but also link to and reference where on my websites I’ve used them. I find helpful so readers can view by example before deciding if something will work for them or not. I mean, how many times have you seen a neat plugin that you think will work but can’t find an example of where it’s used? Not one of my favorite experiences, either.

More Soon

I seem to be ending most of my posts with “more soon” these days just because I have so much going on these days. But still, be on the lookout for this new section and some of the features that it will contain. In the meantime, I am also sharing interesting articles and posts from other blogs related to WordPress development over on my Facebook page, so that is a good place to check out in the meantime.

- Kris

One of the things my wife and I enjoy about Facebook is the interactions with all of our friends and family who are using the service. So, when I finally got around to redoing our personal site – Kris and Cindy – I wanted to find away to integrate with Facebook for comments and other features.

Enter Simple Facebook Connect

Two years ago, for something like this, I would have dove head first into the Facebook API and tried to build it myself. Nowadays, however, now that I’m very limited on time and totally drinking the WordPress kool-aid, it was just a matter of finding someone else who’s already done this.

After a few quick searches, I found the Simple Facebook Connect series of plug-ins that seemed up to the task. Sure enough, it delivered.  It was a little cumbersome at the very beginning, but only temporarily until I played around with things. That was due, in part, because the entire series consists of 15-16 separate plugins, which you don’t typically see in 3rd party plugins.

The reasoning behind it, however, is pretty clever because features are then modularized so you only end up switching on the ones you want. To start, I activated the following plugins:

• SFC – Like Button
• SFC – Comments
• SFC – Login
• SFC – Register
• Simple Facebook Connect – Base (Required)

I’ve played around with a few others, but they don’t currently fit the needs for this site at the moment. However, once I work on updates to Maui by Photo, there are certainly other aspects I will be using.

For Now…

The “For Now” portion of the post title is in reference to the announcement that Facebook Connect is going away now that the new Open Graph API is taking over. The good news is that Otto, the author of the Simple Facebook Connect, will be working towards a 1.0 release of the plugin that will support the new API. Sweet!

Check it Out

If you want to see it in action, go ahead and visit Kris and Cindy and see how it looks. If you don’t see something worth commenting on but still want to test it, try it with this post.

If you want to see more from Otto, head over to his website or visit his Facebook page, of course.

Be sure to check back again when I have updates to Maui by Photo for more samples of this awesome plugin suite.

- Kris.