Daniel Felice

WordPress MU 2.8.1 & BuddyPress 1.0.2

// July 11th, 2009 // 3 Comments » // Buddypress, Wordpress

WordPress MU 2.8.1 was released the other day, however if you are running the latest version of BuddyPress you should hold off upgrading until we are given the green light from the guys at BuddyPress.

There does not seem to be any major issues currently known and the testing I have done with the two current versions doesn’t seem to break anything, but there are a few little things that will need to be looked at before BP 1.0.2 is WPMU 2.8.1 ready.

If you are running bbPress with deep intergration you will also need to change a few things in the config files in order to ensure it still works. Check out the forums for all the latest updates.

When Does a Project End?

// April 21st, 2009 // No Comments » // Projects

I am currently running 3 websites, all are WordPress based and all of them require effort and a few hours a week of work. I just finished v2 of Explore With Me and am very happy with it, but now it is time to give Free BuddyPress Themes a makeover.

I was already thinking about Free BuddyPress Themes while I was working on Explore With Me, and now I am already looking towards Explore With Me v3. Once Free BuddyPress Themes v2 is ready and rolled out, I also want to find some time to give this blog a makeover. I have been using this same theme for about 9 months now and need something fresh.

Once I finshed all these updates, I will probably go through the process again and again. I am never happy with my sites, there is always something I know needs doing, and with technology changing so fast, especially with WordPress MU and BuddyPress, I need to stay on top of things.

Once I get the idea in my head that I am going to make an upgrade, I need to do it sooner rather than later. I just cannot let things go – once I tell myself it is going to be done then I have to do it or the exisiting site will just drive me crazy.

But with 3 projects at the moment and possible another coming on soon – when does it end? Long gone are the days of having a website setup and letting it sit for 3 years before you upgrade it.

Free BuddyPress Themes

// January 8th, 2009 // No Comments » // Buddypress

I started a new project last night – Free BuddyPress Themes. I came up with the idea on Tuesday so I registered a domain name, got some web hosting sorted out and then built the WordPress based site last night. The site is now up and running, however I do need to do a bit more work on it before it is complete.

The idea of the site is to share BuddyPress Themes with other BuddyPress users. The site will depend on users submitting their designs via an online form. Once I receieve the theme I will approve it and then upload it to the blog for users to download.

As far as I am aware there are no other BuddyPress Theme websites around – although it is only early days for BuddyPress and I expect there will be a lot of BP theme sites popping up over the coming months.

It is fairly bare at the moment as not many people have designed their own theme yet. Hopefully once the plugin gets more exposure, users will start to develop their own themes and then submit them to FreeBuddyPressThemes.com!

BuddyPress Beta Released

// December 16th, 2008 // No Comments » // Projects, Wordpress

I mentioned a few months ago a WordPress MUplugin called BuddyPress. BuddyPress is a WordPress MU plugin that turns a standard WordPress MU installation in a social community.

I have been using very early versions of the plugin at Explore With Me for the past two months or so, and today it was nice to see that the first official beta version was released.

I was almost updating BuddyPress everyday as bugs were fixed and new features added, so I can now finally work on enhancing the members theme so it fits in with the rest of the site layout and it will also be nice for the users in the way that there are no more broken links and pages that don’t work properly!

Here are a few BuddyPress features:

• Private Messaging
• Add Friends
• Create Groups
• Activity Stream
• Post to users “wire”
• Incorporate a users blog, comments and posts into profile
• Group Forums
• and more!

Now that the first beta is released there is a feature freeze on the development of BuddyPress so that any bugs can be fixed. The first official version should be released shortly.

I’d like to thank Andy Peatling who developed BuddyPress! A huge amount of work went into it and it was just what we were looking to incorporate into Explore With Me!

Now that we have a stable version of BuddyPress my focus will shift to the rest of the site and get it officially up and running in January. It has been 3 months or so of work, so we need to start seeing it grow, and grow, and grow…until when one day someone offers us a nice multi-million dollar sum for it…

I’m Back!

// December 10th, 2008 // 2 Comments » // Project Blogger

After a few weeks soaking up the sun in Australia I have returned to Dublin and am starting to get back into reality! Once I get over this jet-lag, things will start to return to normal and I can once again start to spend time on both danielfelice.com and explorewithme.com.

Considering I have not blogged that much things aren’t too bad. I seem to have enough content on this blog to keep the traffic coming in. Traffic has suffered a little bit, however the PageRank has remained the same and I am getting some good traffic coming from the search engines – especially users who are searching for information regarding WordPress MU and BuddyPress.

I am thinking of changing the focus of this blog. It started out as a money making blog experiment, however looking at the popular posts and search engine traffic, it seems that my audience are more interested in blogging, WordPress MU and BuddyPress.

There are so many websites that are dedicated to making money online, and not so many focused on WordPress MU. BuddyPress is a new plugin and yet to be launched so it could also be worthwhile looking into this niche.

Whatever the case, I am back on board and will start blogging regularly once again. I might just start blogging and see where it takes me!

Working with WordPress MU

// November 9th, 2008 // 4 Comments » // Projects

I have been spending a lot of time this weekend on the backend of Explore With Me trying to find the best plugins and widgets possible for my soon to be users.

Hosting other peoples blogs is going to be a massive task, not only will I have to provide support, I will also have to make sure that users have access to the best themes, plugins and widgets.

As the hosting will be aimed at travellers wanting to create their own blog, I have to find themes and plugins that appeal to that niche.

A few weeks ago I found and implemented 30 travel themes that I found at a website called WordPress Travel Themes. This was a great find as all I had to do was upload the themes and then activate them all. Anyone who signs up for a blog at Explore With Me can now choose any of the 30 travel themes.

Once I found the themes the next step was to find plugins that would be suitable for a travel site. I have only implemented a few of them at the moment, however below is a list that I would like to offer travel bloggers.

• Flickr Sidebar Widget: This is a sidebar widget to allow bloggers to show their latest Flickr photos from their recent travels.
• Twitter for WordPress: This widget allows you to display your latest tweets on your WordPress blog. This is great for travellers as you can keep everyone up to date with your travels.
• YouTube Widget: Allows your users to show their latest YouTube videos on their sidebar. Great for all that travel footage!
• Travel Map: I have yet to find a Travel Map plugin that I can use for WordPress MU. I’d like to find something that would allow the blogger to plot their travels – something similar to “Where I’ve Been“
• Current Location: Another plugin I have yet to find, though I think it would be good for the bloggers to be able to show their current location on a map.

I think these are the main features I would like the bloggers to be able to use. Smaller plugins such as weather, timezones and travel itinerary would also be a nice touch.

What else do you think a travel blog should have?

Creating a Social Community with WordPress

// October 28th, 2008 // 1 Comment » // Projects, Wordpress

When the initial idea of Explore With Me was discussed, we wanted to create a travel blog as well as allow other travellers to sign up and create their own travel blog. This is when I discovered WordPress MU. After we figured out we could host other blogs, we then decided we should create an online social community for travellers.

This is when I said “OK, good idea, but how the hell do we do that!?!”

I then turned to my trusty friend – Google. I searched for “WordPress + social community” and to my surprise it actually brought some good results.

This is where I met BuddyPress.

BuddyPress is currently in development. It was created by a guy called Andy Peatling who started the development earlier this year. Since then Andy has landed a job with Automattic – the guys who develop WordPress, WordPress MU and anti comment spam plugin Akismet.

BuddyPress is a plugin designed to work with WordPress MU and allows people like me to turn their WordPress MU blog into a social community with functionalities such as adding Friends and Groups, sending Messages and writing Comments.

At the moment the plugin is still in development. The final version is due out at the end of this year.

I am currently running a beta version of the plugin on Explore With Me. Please feel free to sign up and test it out.

Check out BuddyPress.org for more information and don’t forget to visit Explore With Me!

Explore With Me & WordPress MU

// October 26th, 2008 // No Comments » // Projects

After getting Explore With Me up and running a few weeks back I pretty much had to start all over again when I decided I wanted to use WordPress MU instead of the standard version. WordPress MU has the ability to host endless numbers of blogs on the site – the way sites such as WordPress and Edublogs works.

We had the idea to allow our audience to create their own travel blog through Explore With Me. We thought it would be a good idea to host blogs created by other travellers and then later on we will setup a social community type environment so travellers will be able to connect with one another.

In our quest to be the “one stop shop” for everything travel related we thought it would be a good idea to setup a social community specifically for travellers. There are a few sites that do this already, however before Facebook there was MySpace and before MySpace there was Bebo – so if done properly we aim to be better than everyone else offering this type of service.

The configuration of WordPress MU meant that we had to export everything we had already done and then import it back into the WPMU database.Though if we started from a fresh install it would have been much easier to setup and configure. The setup is a little different to the standard WordPress, however anyone with basic knowledge of web hosting and web site configuration should be able to manage.

Not only do we now have to take care of our own blog we have to make sure that our members have the latest and greatest themes, plugins and other WordPress hacks that will enable them to create a professional looking travel blog.

We will also have to create a support forum and a few “How To” guides so our members can learn how to use WordPress and if they come across any problems they can share it in the forums.

The configuration of Explore With Me is nearly done, so now it is working the backend making sure members have themes, plugins and anything else that I can think of.

The social community plugin won’t be available until the end of the year so that will be the next big phase of the site. Though we will aim to launch in a few weeks and then add the social community when it becomes available.

If you would like to help us out and test the site – please sign up as a member and create your own blog. Any suggestions are welcome as I am new to this so I am bound to be missing a thing or two!