Tag Archives: Wordpress

About 1/3 Of The Christmas Lights Are Already Up.

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by Anura Guruge
on November 28, 2022

Click to ENLARGE.

This is only the start. It is far from over. More lights will go up around the windows. Then she will do the steps & the trees. Then I help her put up the lasers. We have 4 right now. I invariably get a new laser — the latest on the market each year. So, we might have more.

This is ALL Teischan’s work. She spent 2-hours on Sunday putting these up. For the last 4-years, since she was 12, she has INSISTED that she do all the lights on her own. I just lay out the initial 2 outlet ‘taps’. She takes the power off those. We now have some extension cords buried in the ground (& under the walkway). That makes things slightly easier. I suspect we will see the next installment of lights this coming weekend.

I will record the progress, photographically, for you. SMILE.

WordPress 6.1 Gallery ‘Image Stacking’ Problem — A Partial Fix.

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by Anura Guruge
on November 28, 2022

Click to ENLARGE. From the ‘WordPress Support Forums’.
Click to ENLARGE. How to insert that ‘Additional CSS’ to YOUR Website.
Click to ENLARGE. Actual examples from this blog.

I visited the ‘WordPress Support Forums‘ last week to see if this annoying bug had been fixed. It appeared that it was still OPEN though there was a ‘problem ticket‘ against it, i.e., with luck it would get fixed in a future release (as it MUST). I also found the above fix.

I have never, in my life, used CSS, let alone Custom CSS. But, it looked easy enough. So, I did a quick Google to see how to add Custom CSS to a WordPress site. It looked easy. Just go to APPEARANCE (in the WP menu) … click on it & you get the ‘Additional CSS’ option (as I show in the 2nd figure).

The fix is only PARTIAL.

It ONLY works up to 3 images –> i.e., 3 images side-by-side. After that, like with my 6 images, it becomes a LONG, thin strip. But, you can scroll through the images. You should have noticed I have been using this with my daily, “Anura’s Picture Of The Day + 6 Others,” posts.

Just trying to help. Try it out. Not difficult.

Got The ‘WordPress’ 6.1.1 Update, Today, BUT ‘Image Gallery’ Is Still NOT Working.

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by Anura Guruge
on November 15, 2022

Click to ENLARGE.

I got the notification that ‘Hostgator‘ (per my settings) had automatically UPDATED me to ‘WordPress 6.1.1‘. I was kind of excited. Was hoping that it would fix the ‘Image Gallery’ problem.

It does NOT!

‘Image Gallery’ Is Still NOT Working With ‘WordPress’ 6.1 — BUT ‘TILED Gallery’ Does — So, A Workaround.

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by Anura Guruge
on November 3, 2022

Click to ENLARGE. Problem with standard (normal) ‘Image Gallery’.

But, TILED GALLERY works.

Click to ENLARGE. Tiled Gallery at bottom, from today.

A few minutes ago I decided to check if ‘WordPress’ has managed to fix the ‘Image Gallery’ problem. They hadn’t.

So, I tried a few other things, e.g., ‘Table’, to see if I could find a workaround.

The 2nd thing I tried was ‘Tiled Gallery’. Much to my amazement it worked! That is great. I can live with that — for now. The one BIG problem for I is that it does NOT support the ‘scroll through images’ feature; i.e., click on one image, it ENLARGES, & then you get the option to scroll through the other images. That is NOT there from what I can see. But, for now, I can live without that.

Glad I found this workaround. Hope this helps.

Latest ‘WordPress’ Version, I.E., 6.1, Breaks ‘Image Galleries’ (Once Again).

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by Anura Guruge
on November 3, 2022

Click to ENLARGE.
Click to ENLARGE.

This site got automatically upgraded to WordPress Version 6.1 on Tuesday. I permit automatic upgrades Just for my own convenience. Maybe I need to turn that off.

On Tuesday night, i.e., November 1, 2022, I saw to my horror that my Image Galleries, on this Blog, that I use daily with my “Anura’s Picture of the Day + 6 Others” had stopped working.

I immediately suspected the new WordPress BECAUSE this happened with a prior new release too — within the last year. It got fixed a few days later. Yes, it could be due to the cocktail of PlugIns I have — & I do have a few that relate to Galleries because I am a heavy (& basically a daily) user of Galleries.

I real don’t have the time, motivation or energy to chase this.

For NOW I worked out a semi-acceptable work-around. I am using columns, i.e., two columns with an image in each. Not the same as a gallery & it is more work for I. But, that is how the cookie crumbles.

Another busy stretch for I — albeit of my own making. Working on a number of projects, all book related, that have caught my fancy. Well, please wish me luck. I need as much as I can get. Thanks.

One Year Anniversary Of This Blog: guruge.com/blog.

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by Anura Guruge
on June 12, 2022

Click to ENLARGE. Link to this the inaugural post.
Click to ENLARGE. The calendar display on WordPress showing when posts were posted.
Click to ENLARGE.

There are 962 posts on the blog! That comes to 2.6 posts a day. I am cool with that. Makes sense. I aim to do at least one and ideally three a day.

The blog has had 28,128 views. That is 77 views a day. That is NOT great but better than 0. Much better than zero. My old blog was averaging 300 a day BUT it had been up for over 12 years and got stellar ranking by Google.

I am OK with the current hit rate. Yes, I would like more, BUT that is purely for ego. This blog is NOT monetized! Truth be told it is mainly for I. It is my journal. I can look back at any day & have a fair idea as to what I was up to — & of course the daily ‘Picture of the Day + 6 Others‘ is a huge help. I have been doing those posts, without even a single miss, since about 2016. That is a lot of pictures.

Well, here, with luck, is to the next 12 months. Wish me luck.

Please come & visit. Leave a comment or two. Thank YOU.

NOT Just On Twitter (Per ‘Elon Musk’), But Bots Are A Huge Problem On ‘WordPress’ Sites As Well.

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by Anura Guruge
on June 11, 2022

Click to ENLARGE. Link to WP description for this plugin.
Click image to access my February 2022 post.

Elon Musk has been vehemently complaining of late that there are too many bots on Twitter — i.e., more than 5% of Twitter accounts are bots.

Well, Twitter isn’t the only platform plagued by bots.

WordPress, from my experience, is riddled with bots.

At least in my case I see too many ‘hits’ on my site, i.e., this Website, from bots. They totally distort my traffic stats. I don’t do these posts for bots! I do them for human consumption.

Yes, as you can see from the second image above I already use a plugin to eradicate SOME blogs from this site. But, it doesn’t seem to be enough. How else can you explain all the visits I get from Azerbaijan. I am sure it is a lovely country & the people are stellar, BUT for the world of me I cannot see what folks in Azerbaijan find so intriguing about my posts! I get more hits from Azerbaijan than I do from Canada or any European country bar my native U.K. That somehow does not seem right.

I would love to learn what percentage of WordPress traffic is bot generated. 

‘WordPress’ Plugin To Foil ‘Bad Bots’ — ‘Blackhole For Bad Bots’.

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by Anura Guruge
on February 27, 2022

Click to ENLARGE. Link to WP description of this plugin.

I won’t mention the details for obvious (i.e., ‘security’) reasons but I had been noticing some incongruous traffic to this blog over the last few weeks. I had been waiting until I had some spare time to look into this. This afternoon, I did. I started by calling the OUTSTANDING, EXEMPLARY phone support at my hosting provider, ‘HostGator‘. [I am so glad that I picked HostGator as my new hosting company. They offer some really great support.]

They explained to me that this was probably BAD BOTS! I had never even thought of that. Yikes, BOTS visiting this blog. Is there nothing sacred?

They told me about this WP.org provided plugin: ‘Blackhole for Bad Bots‘. I checked it out. It is NOT a 3rd party plugin per se. WP.org supports it. I was game. Looked like exactly what I needed.

The only thing was updating the ‘robots.txt’ file. I needed help with that. HostGator AGAIN stepped in & did it for I. I am delighted.

Now, I have to wait & see if it works.

Just letting you know since this might be of use to YOU.

‘WordPress’ 5.9.1 Bug Fix Release Fixes The WP Gallery Image Rearrange Problem.

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by Anura Guruge
on February 22, 2022

Click to ENLARGE.
Click to ENLARGE.

Not sure how many of you noticed BUT when WordPress 5.9 came out last month (or thereabouts) it BROKE an important Image Gallery feature. You could NO LONGER rearrange the order of the images by just dragging them around. That was a PAIN. Yes, there were other ways to get the order you needed — e.g., insert them in the desired order etc.

I realized at once that this was a BUG in 5.9.

I did NOT have the time or energy to report it. I was sure that others would.

Well, it was FIXED in 5.9.1 that came out today. It was the only thing I checked & it worked. I was delighted.

‘WordPress’ ‘WP Carousel Pro’ Plugin TIP — Don’t Use Same Carousel In Multiple Posts.

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by Anura Guruge
on February 14, 2022

Click to ENLARGE. My latest ‘WP Carousels’.

I have at least one post a day where I use the ‘WP Carousel Pro’ plugin. Check out my daily ‘Picture of the Day‘ posts. They all have a WP Carousel at the bottom.

I like ‘WP Carousel Pro’. It does what it promises to do, & does so without any fuss or drama.

But, then on Saturday night I had a problem. All my carousels went haywire. I first thought that WP Carousel must be doing a software update. I had, however, also noticed that I had inadvertently included the same carousel in two posts. That is what happens when you use an old post as a template for a new one — something that I always do. Did not think that this might be the cause of the problem.

On Sunday the problem was still there.

But, before trying to debug that, I went ahead and deleted the inadvertently included carousel. That was trivial. Just deleting that block. I updated the post & went back to the blog to see how it looked.

BINGO. It was all back to normal. ALL the carousels were working perfectly. No problems. All I had done was deleted a reference to a carousel published in another post. I then realized that that was the problem. WOW.

I had not expected that to be the case. But, hey, I can live with that restriction.

So, this is just a heads up.