MrinTech » Tips & Tricks

Exclude Post/Page from WordPress Blog Homepage & RSS Feeds

Mrinmay Bhattacharjee — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 17:50:08 +0000

Case may arise, when you want to exclude specific WordPress Post from appearing in your Blog’s Front Page as well as RSS Feeds. This can be easily achieved by means of Stealth Publish WordPress Plugin.

The Plugin adds and assigns a value of 1 to custom field stealth-publish for a particular post, so that it doesn’t appear either in the FrontPage of the Blog or in the RSS Feeds. Once you have added Stealth Publish Plugin to your WordPress Installation, a small checkbox will appear in the Right Sidebar of Add New Post Page:

If it’s checked, then that particular post will never appear on the FrontPage of the Blog as well as in the RSS Feeds. In case, you have also included WordPress Pages in the RSS Feeds (using plugin like RSS Includes Pages or manually), than this plugin will override that function and that specific Page will not exist on FrontPage as well as in the RSS Feed of Blog.

Pretty Useful Feature for WordPress Bloggers who want to blog certain topics silently.

This Post: Exclude Post/Page from WordPress Blog Homepage & RSS Feeds was originally made on MrinTech

How to get Free Backlink from RSS Feeds of WordPress Blog?

Mrinmay Bhattacharjee — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 15:45:12 +0000

Do you know that, there are many websites bots which crawls and publishes posts from WordPress Blog RSS Feed on their own website? Either these website wants to earn money from your Website Content, by using their own advertising networks on pages which have your Blog Posts/Pages OR they simply want to get Ranking in Search Results by using your content.

A Webmaster can’t completely block all these crawlers, as either they are crawling and publishing your FeedBurner RSS Feeds OR the number of these Website bots are too many. Under such case, adding suitable Hyper link(s) in every post of your blog’s RSS Feed will give you Free Backlinks coming from those Websites!

By using RSS Footer WordPress Plugin, you can easily add a line of content at the top or bottom of every post which appears in the RSS Feed of your Blog. This additional line of content can be a personalized message written for your Blog Readers or Hyper link(s) to your Original Article/Homepage/any other Webpage:

On the Settings Page of RSS Footer in your WordPress Dashboard (Settings >> RSS Footer), just add any additional content line as per following format:

%%POSTLINK%% : A link to the post, with the title as anchor text
%%BLOGLINK%% : A link to your site, with your site’s name as anchor text
%%BLOGDESCLINK%% : A link to your site, with your site’s name and description as anchor text.

And the Plugin will insert those lines/links to all posts in the RSS Feed of your Blog. You can also customize the position of this Additional Message from the Plugin Settings Page. For example, following line of code in the Settings Page of RSS Footer:

This Post: %%POSTLINK%% was originally made on MrinTech

Resulted in following message in each and every post which appears in the RSS Feed of MrinTech:

Note:

If even after installing RSS Footer plugin, your FeedBurner Feed (assuming your Blog uses FeedBurner for managing/delivering RSS Feeds) doesn’t show any changes, than you may want to Ping Feedburner for immediate update or ReSync FeedBurner, so that it clears the Feed Cache and start building your Blog RSS feed again from scratch!
The Plugin Adds Hyper Link(s) which are dofollow in nature, but if crawling websites specifically uses nofollow for all outgoing links, than your blog is not going to get any backlink from those websites. Though modifying links which are present in your Blog’s/FeedBurner RSS Feeds is almost impossible, and because of this you can enjoy full benefits of this plugin.

This Post: How to get Free Backlink from RSS Feeds of WordPress Blog? was originally made on MrinTech

Lossless Compression & Optimization of WordPress Blog Images

Mrinmay Bhattacharjee — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 09:21:10 +0000

Indeed WordPress is highly optimized and free Content Management System (CMS) in the market.

But do you know the Images we upload for our WordPress Blog Posts and Pages can be further optimized using a very simple WordPress Plugin? Let’s check out in this Post, How a webmaster can optimize and compress his/her WordPress Blog Images for better load time of images?

Optimizing uploaded Images/Pictures for WordPress Blog Posts and Pages includes the following:

JPEG Compression
Removing Metadata from Images, easpecially from JPEG Images
Removing Unused Colors from Images
Suitable conversion of certain GIF Files to PNG Files

Above optimization techniques not only reduces the file size of images, but also retains the quality of original image. Above mentioned optimization techniques are completely lossless, hence your resulting images will retain its original color and visual quality.

All the above optimization techniques have been integrated into a WordPress Plugin called WP Smush.it based on the concept of Yahoo! Smush.it. Just install the plugin and all images which you are going to upload, after the plugin installation, will be optimized using the above mentioned lossless optimization techniques.

Old images, which you uploaded before installing this plugin, can be optimized by clicking Smush.it Now link present just below every image in the Media Library (See Screen shot above)

By using WP Smush.it Plugin, any webmaster can highly optimize his/her blog images instantly.

[Image Credit]

Also See: Use PNG Format for Screenshots, instead of JPEG Format and Hide Data in an Image

This Post: Lossless Compression & Optimization of WordPress Blog Images was originally made on MrinTech

[Tips & Tricks] Useful WordPress Plugins and Third Party Apps

Mrinmay Bhattacharjee — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 12:49:16 +0000

WordPress is one of the best and free Content Management System in the market and with the use of some specific WordPress Plugins & Third Party Applications, you can squeeze/add more power/functionality to your Self Hosted WordPress Blog

In this post, we’ll check out some very useful, yet uncommon, WordPress Tips and Tricks which can be deployed by any WordPress User by means of certain WordPress Plugins and Third Party Applications.

1. Exclude particular Post/Page from appearing in WordPress Blog Homepage and RSS Feeds

Case may arise, when you want to exclude specific WordPress Post from appearing in your Blog’s Homepage as well as RSS Feeds. This can be easily achieved by means of Stealth Publish WordPress Plugin. The Plugin adds and assigns a value of 1 to custom field stealth-publish for a particular post, so that it doesn’t appear either in the FrontPage of the Blog as well as in the RSS Feeds. Once you have added Stealth Publish Plugin to your WordPress Installation, a small checkbox will appear in the Right Sidebar of Add New Post Page:

If it’s checked, then that particular post will never appear on the FrontPage of the Blog as well as in the RSS Feeds. In case, you have also included WordPress Pages in the RSS Feeds, using plugin like RSS Includes Pages or manual modification, than this plugin will override that function and the specific Page will not exist on FrontPage as well as in the RSS Feed of Blog

2. Add Hyper Link and get Free Backlink from RSS Feeds of your Blog

There are many websites bots which crawls and publishes posts from your Blog’s RSS Feeds on their own website. In this case, adding suitable Hyper link(s) in every post of RSS Feed will give you Free Backlinks coming from those Websites! On the Settings Page of RSS Footer in your WordPress Dashboard (Settings >> RSS Footer), just add any additional content line as per following format:

%%POSTLINK%% : A link to the post, with the title as anchor text
%%BLOGLINK%% : A link to your site, with your site’s name as anchor text
%%BLOGDESCLINK%% : A link to your site, with your site’s name and description as anchor text.

This Post: %%POSTLINK%% was originally made on MrinTech

Resulted in following message in each and every post which appears in the RSS Feed of MrinTech:

* Note: If even after installing the Stealth Publish and RSS Footer plugin, your FeedBurner Feed (assuming your Blog uses FeedBurner for managing/delivering RSS Feeds) doesn’t show any changes, than you may want to Ping Feedburner for immediate update or ReSync FeedBurner, so that it clears the Feed Cache and start building the Blog feed again from scratch!

3. Optimize Images for WordPress Posts and Pages

Optimizing Images for your WordPress Blog Posts and Pages includes the following:

JPEG Compression
Removing Meta Data from Images, easpecially from JPEG Images
Removing Unused Colors from Images
Suitable conversion of certain GIF Files to PNG Files

Above optimization techniques not only reduces the file size of images, but also retains the quality of original image. Above optimization techniques are completely lossless, hence your resulting images will retain its original color and visual quality.

All the above optimization techniques have been integrated into a WordPress Plugin called WP Smush.it based on the concept of Yahoo! Smush.it. Just install the plugin and all images which you are going to upload after the plugin installation will be optimized using the above mentioned lossless optimization techniques.

Old images, which you uploaded before installing this plugin, can be optimized by clicking Smush.it Now link present just below every image in the Media Library (See Screen shot above)

4. Install WordPress on Windows/Linux/MAC OS X/Solaris based Computers for Offline Usage/Testing

WordPress can be easily installed on your Local Machine if it’s currently running Windows, Linux, MAC OS X and Solaris. The main advantage of installing WordPress on your computer is that, you can make use of it in Offline Mode or can carry on various Testing Processes like Theme Testing/Development, Plugin Testing/Editing etc. without altering the original files on your website server.

WordPress can be installed on your Local Machine either by using Microsoft WebMatrix or XAMPP. While Microsoft WebMatrix runs only on Windows Operating System, XAMPP works on Windows, Linux (SuSE, RedHat, Mandrake and Debian), MAC OS X and Solaris based computers

Apart from Core WordPress Installation Files, these platforms also includes Core Components for running WordPress like MySQL Database, PHP and other Operating System dependent components like Apache, MySQL, SQLite, Microsoft SQL Server, ASP.NET, .NET Framework etc.

You have to download all the required components for WordPress within Microsoft WebMatrix/XAMPP User Interface. Once downloaded and installed, you can start using WordPress in Offline Mode on your Local Computer instantly

5. WordPress Blog Security using CloudFlare’s Globally Distributed Network

You can enhance your WordPress Blog Security by yourself using Plugins like WP Security Scan, , but still it’s not sufficient for your Blog Security! As Attackers and Bad Bots are constantly developing New Methods of attacking WordPress Blogs

Than the only option left is to opt for Free Cloud Based Security provided by CloudFlare for your WordPress Self Hosted Blog. CloudFlare make use of data from Project Honey Pot, which is a Distributed SPAM Harvester Tracking Network, to make your WordPress Blog safer from Hackers/Attackers, Malicious IP Addresses and Bad Bots.

Not only CloudFlare offers Cloud Based Security to your WordPress Blogs, but it also acts like a Free Content Delivery Network (CDN) for your WordPress Blog. CloudFlare has got many Proxy Servers located at various parts of the world and your site will be very fast to visitors, as the visitor will see a cached copy of your Website from the nearest Proxy Server of CloudFlare in his/her Browser.

Anyone can make use of CloudFlare Services either by Changing Domain Name servers provided by CloudFlare after Signing Up OR simply by using CloudFlare WordPress Plugin

Limitations of CloudFlare

Currently CloudFlare is in Beta Stage and following are the limitations in case you are going to use it for your WordPress Blog:

CloudFlare may affect internal statistics programs which are dependent on Apache Logs – The positive site here is that, your Web Server will get less load due to very few requests directed towards Apache
CloudFlare delivers static Website content to your Visitors by means of its various proxy servers located around the World. Under this if you make any changes to your WordPress Blog, then the changes may take some time to get reflected in every part of the World
If CloudFlare detects any user using Malicious IP Address or with Infected Computer, he/she have to enter a CAPTCHA, powered by reCAPTCHA, before he/she is granted access to the Website

But No Doubt, CloudFlare is currently offering Top-Notch and Free Protection, if it’s used with any Website/WordPress Blog

Hope these tips helps a lot of WordPress Users around the World. Feel Free to share your own tips/views on this article in the Comments Section below.

This Post: [Tips & Tricks] Useful WordPress Plugins and Third Party Apps was originally made on MrinTech

Download ISO File, Create DVD & Activate Windows 7 Legally

Mrinmay Bhattacharjee — Sat, 13 Nov 2010 19:28:04 +0000

If you are using various available versions of Windows 7 Operating System viz. Windows 7 Starter, Windows 7 Home Basic, Windows 7 Home Premium, Windows 7 Professional, Windows 7 Enterprise or Windows 7 Ultimate on your Desktop/Laptop/Netbook

Than, you can easily Download Windows 7 ISO Image File and create your own Windows 7 Retail Disc (DVD)! Even you can also activate it LEGALLY, if you have a Genuine Windows 7 Product Key!

Following are the 3 Very IMPORTANT steps in this guide, which you should follow in order to Download and Create ISO File of Windows 7 [All Version] & Activate Windows 7 without calling Microsoft:

1. Download Windows 7 ISO File

No matter which version of Windows 7 viz. Windows 7 Starter Edition, Windows 7 Home Basic Edition, Windows 7 Home Premium, Windows 7 Professional, Windows 7 Enterprise Edition or Windows 7 Ultimate you are using, we will be downloading a Common Windows 7 ISO Image File and will than remove the Edition Configuration File (EI.cfg) from this ISO, so that it becomes a Universal Windows 7 Installer ISO Image File!

Following are the links for Downloading ISO Image File of Windows 7 (x86) or (x64) in English Language:

Download Windows 7 x86 ISO in English:

Mirror 1: http://msft-dnl.digitalrivercontent.net/msvista/pub/X15-65732/X15-65732.iso

Mirror 2: http://msft-dnl.digitalrivercontent.net/msvista/pub/X15-65804/X15-65804.iso

Download Windows 7 x64 ISO in English:

Mirror 1: http://msft-dnl.digitalrivercontent.net/msvista/pub/X15-65733/X15-65733.iso

Mirror 2: http://msft-dnl.digitalrivercontent.net/msvista/pub/X15-65805/X15-65805.iso

Note:

digitalrivercontent is an Official Microsoft Distributor Website. All the above mentioned links are completely clean and the ISO file is safe to download
x86 stands for 32-bit version of Windows 7 Operating System, while x64 stands for 64-bit version of Windows 7 Operating System
Depending on your preferred version (x86 or x64), you have to download any one ISO File either from Mirror 1 or Mirror 2 – There’s NO need to download both of them
Make use of Third Party Software like DownThemAll! or Download Accelerator Plus (DAP) for downloading any of the above mentioned files. These files are very large (in GBs) and may not get fully downloaded using Browser’s Inbuilt Download Manager

Once you have downloaded the appropriate ISO File, proceed to the next step which helps in removing Edition Configuration File (EI.cfg) from the downloaded Windows 7 ISO File.

2. Remove Edition Configuration (EI.cfg) File from Windows 7 ISO

A simplified definition of Edition Configuration File (EI.cfg) is as follows (as taken from Official Microsoft TechNet Website):

The edition configuration file (EI.cfg) determines what edition of Windows to install and what license to use during Windows Setup

You have to remove EI.cfg file from the ISO you just downloaded. For this you have to Download EI.CFG Removal Utility (eicfg_removal_utility.zip) from here – You can also make use of THIS DIRECT LINK

Run eicfg_remover.exe and the utility will ask for the Location of Windows 7 ISO File you just downloaded using the above mentioned step:

After you properly select the ISO File, you will get a successful confirmation message from the program: ei.cfg removed:

One thing which is to be mentioned about this utility is that, it also RESTORES EI.cfg File again in the ISO, using the same steps mentioned just above – Though this is not necessary here in this guide!

Why it’s necessary to remove EI.cfg from ISO File?

When you Remove EI.cfg from the ISO File you downloaded, the ISO File will act as a Universal Windows 7 Installer for all versions. Now this Universal Windows 7 Installer ISO will Install the version of Windows 7 for which you have LEGIT PRODUCT KEY.

This means, if you have LEGAL Product Key for Windows 7 Home Premium, than this Installer will ONLY Install Windows 7 Home Premium on your Desktop/Laptop/Notebook – Though the ISO File also contains all necessary files and features meant for all other versions of Windows 7!

As soon as you have removed the EI.cfg file using the above utility, you can finally burn/write the ISO File on a DVD using softwares like Ashampoo, Nero, Roxio etc.

3. Activating Windows without calling Microsoft

Update: Many users are experiencing errors because of type of Windows 7 OEM that came pre-installed with their Computer. Refer THIS POST, if you are experiencing any errors while using ABR Software

When you install/re-install Windows 7 on your Desktop/Laptop/Netbook, everytime you have to call Microsoft in order to Activate your copy of Windows 7 even if it’s LEGIT! In this step we will Backup the Current Windows 7 Activation File using a simple utility, so that there’s NO need to Call Microsoft when you Install/Re-Install Windows 7 on your machine.

For backing up your Current Windows 7 Activation, download a utility known as ABR (Activation Backup & Restore) (currently in BETA for Windows 7, but it works without any problem) from HERE. Now run ABRbeta.exe and Extract it’s content somewhere safe on your Hard Drive >> Run activation_backup.exe which is present in the folder you just extracted >> The program will display all necessary information in Command Prompt (cmd) and will create 2 files viz. backup-key.txt and backup-cert.xrm-ms. Save these 2 files on a USB Pen Drive, DVD etc.:

Boot your Computer using your NEW Windows 7 Universal Installer DVD and Install/Re-Install it. Now run the activation-restore.exe and it will restore Windows 7 Activation and you needn’t call Microsoft at all!

Backing up Activation File of Windows 7 is very useful to those who have got OEM/Factory Installed version of Windows 7 on their Desktop/Laptop/Netbook. Under OEM/Factory Installed Version of Windows 7, most of the time, Manufacturer company don’t provide Installation Disk of Windows 7 Operating System to their customers like Dell etc.!

With the above mentioned Guide, you will Create your own Windows 7 Universal Installer DVD Disk and Activate it very easily.

Note: In case you don’t have a Genuine Product Key for Windows 7 (any version), than you can make use of this Guide for Windows 7 Trial on your Machine (Just skip the 3rd Step above). If you want to purchase Windows 7 License, make use of THIS PAGE

Feel Free to Use the Comment Area below or Contact Us, in case you have any Query/Suggestion pertaining to above Guide

[Thanks under CC]

This Post: Download ISO File, Create DVD & Activate Windows 7 Legally was originally made on MrinTech