WordPress 3.4 is having lot many performance improvement queries and piece of code. Apart from that, it is also having a Theme Customization Previewer which allows you to customize any theme before implementing that. For example, you need to change the site logo, tagline, menu items, background image, header image etc., you don’t need to activate the theme to see the changes.

Before this update, theme preview and customization was possible through plugins like Theme Test Drive but now you do not need a separate plugin to do the same.

With Theme Previewer, you can actually activate theme with all the basic changes. Previewer allows you to customize and see following items.

• Site Title and Tagline
• Header
• Background
• Navigation
• Static Front-Page

Here is the screenshot of Theme Previewer in WordPress 3.4,

Apart from this previewer, WordPress 3.4 is also having following changes and features,

• Better Search for Theme (Filter Search)
• Support for Touch devices like Apple iPad and Kindle, includes jQuery UI Touch extension
• Support to install child themes from WordPress Theme Directory

Let me know if you find the theme previewer in WordPress 3.4 helpful.

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define('WP_ALLOW_MULTISITE', true);

I got a message on network page saying,

Because your install is not new, the sites in your WordPress network must use sub-domains. The main site in a sub-directory install will need to use a modified permalink structure, potentially breaking existing links.

I was sure that I don’t need sub-domains for my new sites but I wanted sub-directories only. So that I can actually forward the backlinks and Google PageRank easily to my new sites. But since my site or say Installation was more than 1 month old, WordPress was not allowing to have sub-directories. The reason behind it is that when you opt for sub-directories, WordPress actually adds a term “/blog” at the start of your site’s permalink structure. And if you will enable the sub-directories structure of Network sites, you may break the old permalink structure and may lose old backlinks and Google PR juice.

But as I was not using the site to get traffic from search engine, I was sure to have sub-directories only. Finally I got the simple solution to get that.

So what is the solution?

To have sub-directories structure on old WordPress installation while activating the Network feature, you just need to add the following code in your current theme’s functions.php file.

add_filter( 'allow_subdirectory_install',
	create_function( '', 'return true;' )
	);

That’s it. Now reload the Network page from Dashboard and you will see option to choose between sub-domain and sub-directory. Once you complete the Network activation process by adding the wp-config.php and htaccess code suggested on next page on Dashboard, you may remove the code from functions.php or even can change the theme template.

I hope this simple tutorial helps you in getting sub-directory structure on WordPress Network site with old installation.

Tip credit

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Colored Vote Polls is an amazing WordPress plugin to create questionnaire for surveys and polls in no time. If you are already having the set questions and set of answers, you can create and put the survey live in less than 5 minutes. Features of this plugin is well suited for people who wants to create a simple survey to collect the feedback and to analyze the data.

Features of Colored Vote Polls

• Very easy to install and use
• All options available on WordPress Dashboard (Admin Panel)
• No need to register yourself anywhere
• Have mandatory or optional questions in one questionnaire
• Share the vote results even without voting
• Visitors may add more questions from survey page
• One can differentiate between answers by looking at their colors
• Stats in percentage to give better visual results
• Analyze the most answered or preferred question out of the questionnaire
• You can use this plugin to prioritize the tasks in an organization
• Paste shortcode inside posts or pages to embed the newly created surveys

Demo

Limitations

Colored Vote Polls is a fully capable plugin to create questionnaires and online surveys and it gives proper stat as well (including total votes). It is a nice plugin for creating and analyzing a simple survey but professional users may find few options missing here. For example, in Colored Vote Polls, one can provide the same set of answers to all questions under one survey. If you want to have different answers for different questions, then it is not possible with the current version of this plugin. In result analysis, you get stat like total vote per survey but you don’t get the location of the voter.

Verdict

I think this WordPress plugin is a handy tool to create beautiful survey / questionnaire page to get feedback on certain queries. It is also very useful for creating a set of tasks to get feedback from users to prioritize them. But still there are some ‘good to have’ features which may come in next version of the plugin to make this one a professional tool for PRO users. I would advice you to try this plugin and see if it covers your requirements.

Rating – 7/10

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WordPress 3.3

If you are having lot many WordPress plugins installed on your WordPress setup, you may have lot many options listed under “Settings” panel. And every time you need to do some customization on a plugin, you need to scroll down to find the option under “Settings” panel for that plugin. Now you don’t need to do that.

Here is the screenshot of the settings panel with flyout menu from one of my blog setup and you can see how easy it is to find the settings option for installed plugins.

Flyout Menu in WordPress 3.3

This new menu style is space saver as you can see all the installed options without scrolling the page (if you are not having lot many plugins with individual tab options). For example, MobilePress, Contact Form 7 etc. in the above screenshot.

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So what’s is new in WordPress 3.3 as compared to the previous version. Here is the list of new features,

New Features in WordPress 3.3

• Drag and Drop Media Uploader
• Admin bar and admin header combined as single toolbar
• Flyout Menus
• Dashboard Welcome Area for each upgrade or new installation
• New Features Pointers
• Better co-editing with co-authors as there will not be any time lag in edit operation by different authors. This will reduce or chances of invalid locking
• Thumblr Importer to import content from Thumblr
• Don’t loose the widget settings even after switching back to old themes
• jQuery 1.7.1 and jQuery UI 1.8.16
• Improved Editor API
• Improved performance for permalink structure with category as slug
• Better support for iPad and other tablets with responsive screen
• Find the complete changelog here.

Welcome Screen of WordPress 3.3

Apart from the above enhancements and new features, WordPress 3.3 is also having security fix related to the comments feed. And it is also having lot many bug fixes. That’s why it recommended to upgrade to WordPress 3.3 to have new features as well as to implement these fixes.

Note – Code name “Sonny” is given in honor of the great jazz saxophonist Sonny Stitt.

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For example, on WordPress 3.3 dashboard, you can see a feature pointer (attached below) showing details about the new “Toolbar” where admin bar and old dashboard header are combined as one.

You can remove these pointers by clicking the “dismiss” link available one the pointer box.

According to the WordPress team, the new feature pointer is,

When we add new features, move navigation, or do anything else with the dashboard that might throw you for a loop when you update your WordPress site, we’ll let you know about it with new feature pointers explaining the change.

This new pointer feature is helpful for those who are not much familiar with the ongoing development of the WordPress code. They just upgrade the WordPress setup to avoid any security issue. Now they can also see what new features has been added and how they can utilize the feature for their purpose.

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In WordPress 3.3, development team has rectified the issue and you will not have any problem in having category_slug in the permalink structure of the WordPress site. According to the team,

You have more freedom when choosing a post permalink structure. Skip the date information or add a category slug without a performance penalty

Actually the rewrite rules were generated inconsistently for the permalink structure of /%category%/%postname%. Now the problem has been solved and after editing the post.php core file, they have achieved the expected result. So from WordPress 3.3 and onwards, you can use Category in the permalink structure without worrying about the performance issue.

WordPress 3.3 Release Candidate 3 is available for testing purpose. It is expected that WordPress team will release the final version of WordPress 3.3 in first week of January. There are only 3 open tickets in WordPress 3.3 milestone on Trac as they have closed 581 till now.

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I am starting this list with a simple plugin which will add snow fall effect just like WordPress.com sites.

1. Let It Snow

Very simple and easy to customize plugin to add snow fall effect. There is no flash work involved in this plugin and even you can see the melting ice at the bottom of the page by enabling that effect.

Download

2. WordPress Falling Snow Plugin

It can help you in adding snow fall effect on specific image or banners. The problem is that once you will add the effect on certain image, that will become flash and you will have to provide the target URL in the settings panel. It can add 2D and 3D effect of snow fall as well.

Download

3. Snow, Balloons and more

Apart from the Snow fall effect, you can also get falling leaves, rain drops, balloons using this plugin. Go ahead and download the plugin from WordPress plugin directory. Install the same and customize options to start showing the snow fall or other effects.

Download

4. Snow Storm

Another WordPress plugin to add snow fall effect to celebrate the Christmas occasion with your visitors.

Download

5. iCaughtSanta

This plugin can add snow fall effect and can also add a peel effect with iCoughtSnata Affiliate Link. I am not sure whether you want that affiliate link or not, you can disable the same from settings panel of the plugin.

Download

6. Season Greetings

Another WordPress plugin to celebrate different occasions. For example, it is also having Indian Festival icons like Diwali diyas floating around the webpage. You can get snow fall effect on pages and posts of your WordPress blog.

Download

7. WP Flake

This one is a very old plugin but still works on WordPress 3.2.1. It can add snow fall or snowflakes effect on your WordPress site.

Download

Bonus – Snowstorm Script for Non-WordPress Sites

So above plugins can add snow fall effect on WordPress blog on a single click and even can provide options to change the color, number or flakes etc. In case you are running a non-Wordpress site, for example a normal static site, then you can also add a Snow Fall effect on that by placing the below mentioned script and code as per the instruction.

Download the Snowstorm JavaScript from this page and add the below code in <HEAD> section of the HTML.

<!-- required snowstorm JS, default behaviour -->
<script src="snowstorm.js"></script>

<!-- now, we'll customize the snowStorm object -->
<script>
snowStorm.snowColor = '#99ccff'; // blue-ish snow!?
snowStorm.flakesMaxActive = 96;  // show more snow on screen at once
snowStorm.useTwinkleEffect = true; // let the snow flicker in and out of view
</script>

Note – You need to move the downloaded script to the hosting server and provide the exact location of the .js file in above code. More instructions and customization help are available from the script page from where you downloaded the script.That’s it, now a WordPress user can install snow flakes and show falling snow on WordPress blog using above 7 plugins and a non-WordPress user can get that by adding the above Script in the HTML code.

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How WordAds is going to be different from Google Adsense

According to the release note from Automattic, around 50,000 new blogs are created on each day and blogs are different from the normal websites on web. They are actually or should be thoughts and expressions or views about something and they should be treated differently than normal websites (corporate, shopping, applications etc.). Google Adsense serve relevant ads on blog or normal website but it doesn’t differentiate between these two. As per the release note, it seems that Federated Media and Automattic are planning to serve ads related to blogging or views about the topic of your blog. We will have to wait for the first serve of WordAds on a WordPress.com blog.

WordAds and Adsense – Both on Single Blog?

WordPress.com users can insert Google Adsense ads in their theme template using Widgets as they don’t get access to edit the theme file. And WordAds are optional service which they can choose to have on their site as well. So I don’t think Automattic company is going to restrict earning from WordAds only. That means you can use WordAds and Google Adsense both on single blog after getting approval for WordAds.

How to Get for WordAds on WordPress.com Blog?

If you are having a WordPress.com blog with custom domain and if the blog is visible to public, then you can apply for WordAds from this page. Here you need to login with your WordPress.com user-id and password and then choose the blog that you want to enroll for WordAds. Then you need to provide few details about the blog, for example the niche of the blog, current traffic etc. Then WordPress.com team will review your request and will notify you about the approval status. WordAds approval depends on the level of traffic, language of the blog, niche (topic) of the blog and user engagement.

WordAds – WordPress Plugin

Currently the announcement is only for WordPress.com users. Self hosted WordPress users will have to wait to see if the company come up with a WordAds Plugin to install on self hosted WordPress platform and to enroll the blog with the service. I am sure that the company will test WordAds on WordPress.com for few months and then will release plugin to provide the money making opportunity to self hosted WordPress users (in millions) as well.

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Anyway, if you are using Google+ and own a WordPress blog and want to increase the followers, then you should try embedding the Google+ profile widget in sidebar of the blog. This way you status updates and shared links will reach to more and more users and will help you in spreading the content of the blog to maximum people. There is no official update from Google about releasing a widget for blogs but there are few WordPress plugins and online service to add the profile widget in blog for free. Here are few of them that I tested on few test blogs.

1. GoogleCard WordPress Plugin

It add a simple box in sidebar or any other widget enabled area of the WordPress template. Once you will activate the plugin from dashboard, you can see a new widget option in widget area of the blog. Drag and drop that option named “GoogleCard” to the widget area and provide the Google+ profile ID of your account. You can find the profile ID (21 digit number) in your Google+ profile URL. For example my profile ID is 101186485812857061482 where my Google+ Profile URL is “https://plus.google.com/101186485812857061482”.

2. Scriptrr Google+ Profile Widget Plugin

This is more advanced and option rich plugin for the same purpose. Apart from “Add to Circle” option, it also shows the social networking links available on your Google+ profile. It also shows the details about you that you have entered on about page of Google+ account. You can hide the social media links from the Widget area. Here also you just need to drag and drop the widget of this plugin to widget area on WordPress dashboard.

3. Google Plus Widget

This is a web service and not a plugin. It can be used on WordPress or any other HTML/PHP Websites. You just need to go to this page and provide your Google+ Profile ID. You can also provide other details to customize the look and feel of the widget. Now click on “Get Code” to get the JavaScript code that you need to paste on theme template or Widget Text Box of your blog. Here is how it looks with minimum customization.

If you are aware of any other plugin or web service to add widget in blog or website, share that through comment section of this post.

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