Bridge your WordPress Blog with a Simple Machines Forum is a post from: Affordable Web Pro

I have a few websites built using WordPress as my CMS but there is one feature WordPress is lacking and that’s a decent forum for robust discussion on topics with features like file sharing and all the other wonderful toys bulletin boards have to offer. BBpress.org is weak at best and not even compliant with the latest version of WordPress.

I have been using Simple Machines Forum for my message boards for over 2 years now and it’s a wicked piece of software you can download for free and build a great website with. I love the admin features you find in SMF and I really like the packages feature that allows you to so easily add on features and even updates. Downloading new packages and adding a new feature to your forum has never been easier and the online template mods make site changes fast and easy. The ease of use and numerous features has allowed me to make some heavy modifications to my default forum installations.

One of my favorite mods is to combine my two favorite site building software applications using some modified software bridges to join them. The first is a WordPress plugin that merges the WordPress login and creates a new forum member for each blog user who to join. The combined accounts allow one login to post comments on the blog and topics in the forum. This plugin is the one I use to bridge my WordPress blog users and SMF forum members but its modified using some tips I got here in the SMF forums and it only works by using the SMF_WordPress package installed in your forum that you can download here.

This setup allows my members to use both sections of the site with one login but they do still have two profile pages. The bridge links select fields from the WordPress users page with the SMF members profile. The SMF profile has more options but with a little custom coding you can add these to your WordPress blog and create a very customized look.

This worked fine for me until I came to realize that what I really wanted was for each new blog post to have a forum topic for discussion of each article and to handle comments from the blog. I found a plugin for wordpress that does just that and now I am hoping to have it customized to do even more. The SMF Commenter takes each new post from your blog and creates a new topic for your forum so long as they are installed in the same local database. It creates a link back between the post and the topic and helps move traffic from both sides of the site. I’m hoping to show the discussion of each topic on the blog home page with some future modifications but for now I have to settle for a simple link between the two.

It is however really nice to have the automatic topic creation for each new post. This only works on posts made from within WordPress Admin. If I make a post using something like Performancing for Firefox then I have to save it as a draft and then manually post from within WordPress to get the plugin to create the topic but that’s good enough for the sites I have that need this.

If you have any other ideas on integrating WordPress and Simple Machines please make a comment and let me know.

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Open source development for educational purposes is a post from: Affordable Web Pro

I have begun to really consider my use of open source software and my desire to go totally open source at some point in the future. I’m planning a working vacation to Jamaica beginning on June 1 and I planned to take a computer with me to show some kids how to build webpages and put themselves and their communities on the web. I’d like to grab a few dozen cheap digital cameras and turn them all into vloggerrs but that’s another dream.

For now I think I plan to show them some basic web access and development using open source tools such as OpenOffice.org and NVU HTMl editor. I think a basic intro to web browsing with Firefox and the use of extensions will for the base and then I’ll show them some basic coding with the html from websites we visit. The whole idea has me thinking about my move from Microsoft based operating system to a free OS like Ubuntu. I really want to learn more and offer a totally open source development platform for my business but I think I’ll need a windows machine for quite some time just to cover some of my windows software needs for the office.

Any thoughts on a Ubuntu laptop for my business needs?

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Programming and Web Development Help is a post from: Affordable Web Pro

As a self taught webmaster I have become the master of the copy paste. Many of my websites are a compilation of code and scripts that I have patched together for my own uses. I am definitely not a programmer but as a webmaster I am forced to do a lot of programming and finding the right information is a daunting task. There are simply so many webmaster resources out there with many of the same junk scripts and overworked software applications that finding a great programming resource that offers professional web development assistance is hard.

Dream.in.code is a very active online community of web developers and programmers that launched in February of 2001 to provide free webmaster and programming tutorials, developer resources, and help to anyone interested in programming or web development. This programmers community is an incredible resource to a junior programmer like myself and finding information on my latest programming error was a snap with their dedicated members.

It looks like I have a new programmers and webmaster resource for all my php and database development needs.

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WSNlinks and SEO friendly link directory scripts is a post from: Affordable Web Pro

I’ve had a few directories over time but part of this years changes involved converting a dozen or so single page affiliate sites over to web directories utilizing a link directory software application. My goal was to try to use the platform as link exchange tools for the site and also as a way to generate some fresh content through new site submissions.

I took a look at many different packages and ended up selecting WSNlinks.com for a few reasons. First and foremost I chose WSNlinks for the robust tools and features available in their paid directory script. They offer a free directory script but I was looking for a little bit more in a link directory script for these sites and WSNlinks fit the bill. The script was well written from a users point of view. The admin tools are quick and easy to access and you can customize almost every aspect of the directory. WSNlinks is perfect for people looking for a quality SEO friendly directory script with more bang for the buck then any other in my opinion. I’ll spare you the run down but there are a lot of scripts and I tried the top ten I think and WSNlinks is my choice for the better tool to manage multiple sites with.

For SEO purposes you can’t beat this script for site enhancement and management tools. The built in HTACCESS and modrewrite takes care of SEO friendly url’s’ and there are more tools for setting these sites up then I found in any other script at the price point. Even the free version lets you do some cool stuff like set who can submit links and categories but the advanced features in this make it my favorite directory script.

The Sponsor level paid links directory is very cool but my favorite part was the DMOZ importer which allowed me to suck down a category navigational structure based on the webs leading directory and build each site in a matter of minutes when compared to the days it may have taken me in the past with our tools. The DMOZ importer in conjunction with the Tulip JAR file allows me to select whether I want to import just the category structure or if i also want to import the links from DMOZ as well. If you want to kick start a new directory then the DMOZ import is the way to go. You can have a brand new directory up and running from a clean install in minutes once you’ve done one the first time. First time installation and total configuration was very easy and the customization options will have you fiddling around with settings for a long time.

WSNlinks offers a private message system, comments and various levels of users permissions to allow you to set just what members can or can’t do. This script also offers a very unique tool in the Integration Generator which will help you configure your site to work with a large list of other scripts. In one case we took the WSNlinks directory script and integrated it with a PHPBB forums allowing users to cruise from the link directory to the forums under one login. The features we’re very well received in the forums and we have had a great participation across both sides of the site. Integration is not for every site but tying the forum to the directory was a very desirable feature on a portion of our network and has worked out very well.

I was able to take domains with less then 3 pages on average to each site and with the help of these SEO friendly directories no have 1000′s of pages of cached content on Google servers and a big boost in traffic with the introduction of so many new keywords. The domains I used had existing PR value and I was able to boost sales of links by increasing the number of indexed pages to sell links on. I integrated the CARP RSS feed system from GeckoTribe and have the beginnings of my own CMS system. I’m considering a new version with a WordPress blog integrated but the trouble lies in making it sync with WSNlinks logins properly. There are some issues with password formats outside or my skill set I am working on my but I think I can get it to happen. I’ll showcase my work on that in later posts possibly.

A healthy directory program is an important part of the Index MAX network of sites and should be a consideration for all network managers. Directory scripts like this make better sense to me for use as domain holders then landing pages.Even if it’s a lower grade content you can still get more indexed page then by parking domains at your registrar.

I suggest you test drive the demo at WSNlinks.com when you want to setup some directories.

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