Digitalquill - My Life and Times » General

Datafeed Import Plugin For Drop Shippers

Digitalquill — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 12:40:49 +0000

Until recently I have been mainly working with Affiliate Marketers while developing the Datafeed Import Plugin for WordPress, however, it is clear that the needs and requirements of affiliate marketers are reflected by the needs and requirements of those involved in Drop Shipping.

I have established that the Datafeed Import Plugin for WordPress will work equally as well for Drop Shippers as it does for Affiliate Marketers.

Many Drop Shipping companies or networks provide Datafeeds in a similar way to affiliate networks. These datafeeds are in CSV, XML and RSS formats just like those that the datafeed plugin is designed to work with.

If you are a drop ship marketer, please do get in touch, we will give you a free copy of the plugin if you are willing to trial it in the drop ship environment.

It seems to me that Drop Shippers face the same task as affiliate marketers with a slightly differing end result. You need to create a website rapidly, without fuss and without having to code a website from scratch. In this way the WordPress platform is the most logical system to use. It allows you to quickly setup a fully functioning site, change how it looks and works and extend its functionality with plugins.

The Datafeed Import Plugin will then allow you to rapidly populate that WordPress site with data from your Drop Ship datafeed as long as that datafeed is in a well formed format (XML, CSV, Pipe, RSS).

This cuts down the time spent developing a site and frees up your time to market and sell your products and earn your commissions for your drop shipping.

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Google Page Rank Monitor Software

Digitalquill — Sat, 02 Jul 2011 16:16:52 +0000

About two years ago I wrote a script that would check the Google Page Rank of all my sites on a monthly basis and record that Page Rank so that I could look back over time at any particular sites PR history.

This is great tool because I can see the impact of changes I make, or efforts I put into the promotion or SEO of a site. I also have the site configured to alert me if a site loses Page Rank. Although much of the time one can not put a finger on why a site loses Page Rank, it is always good to investigate, significant changes to the Google Algorithm such as the so called Panda updates affect different sites in different ways, if after such a release the software alerts me to a drop in page rank for a site I can take action.

Today I have been looking at that script with fresh eyes, and have made some major improvements to it, it now records Google and Yahoo Back Links, Indexed pages in Google and Yahoo and Alexa rank.

I have plans to make this into software that I can release. I need to do some work on the interfaces and write an installer for the software, but I believe that others in my position will find this software useful. When I get a couple of days free, I will do this work and release it on my website, but for now my priority is getting Version 3.0 of the Datafeed Import Plugin Ready for its Beta testing and subsequent launch.

If you are interested in getting a copy of my Page Rank Monitor Software, please leave a comment on this post and I will get back to you.

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Task Management For Bloggers And Affiliate Marketers

Digitalquill — Tue, 28 Jun 2011 16:22:57 +0000

I have for some time now been a self employed blogger, affiliate marketer and Internet software developer, as such there are many strands to my business and the ‘to to’ list mounts up. As a project Manager I required a solution for me to manage those tasks. I did not require project management software to produce fancy graphs and charts for me, I needed a simply way of recording the things I needed to do.

I looked into many systems and providers of such services on the web, both paid and free, but in the end I went for some free OpenSource Software called myTinyTodo, this is a very simple, no frills to-do list software that is written in PHP and Ajax and has a MySQL back end. It allows me to have multiple to-do lists so that I can run one for each strand of my business and also have lists on-going for the other non-business related projects.

Why is working in this way good for me?

As I said I am a Project Manager and I love to know what needs to be done and when it needs to be done by. I also have my fingers in many pies, and, it is often hard for me to maintain a tight grip on where I am with each strand of the business. As such working in this way is good for me on several levels.

Tick, Tick, Tick

I simply love to tick things off lists, I gain satisfaction from completing something from the task list, as such I make sure that I put everything onto the to-do lists, that way, when I look back at the days work I can actually see how productive (or otherwise) I have been.

Recording Ideas

Through working in this way I am also able to benefit from an unexpected side effect of this organisation, when I have an idea for a new project, a new niche or angle, or a new blog post I want to write, I don’t have to do it there and then and I don’t have to try and remember all those ideas. I can simply make an entry in the to-do list, write a few basic notes and leave it there until I have the time or the priority of that task becomes greater.

Breaks down larger projects into tasks

Working in a task by task system allows you to break down the bigger project into smaller manageable chunks, this stops you becoming swamped and overwhelmed by the size of the job ahead of you.

The Family

I use the task list software to manage much more than my business life. We have some significant projects happening at home and working in this way, helps keep track of all the outstanding work.

Focus on the bigger picture

When constructing the task list you can keep in mind the end goal of what ever project you are working on. When working blindly trying to complete a project it is all to easy to get bogged down into a small insignificant part, but if you have simple achievable tasks to complete, each one moving you towards your end goal, then eventually you will get there.

Mobile access

As this software is hosted on my web server, I have access to it 24/7 via my mobile, this means that where ever I am, what ever time it is I can always add a task to remind myself, I can always record that idea that pops into my head.

But doesn’t having a huge list of jobs demoralise you?

I guess, sometimes it does, but on the whole it helps me with efficiency, I don’t have to sit down at my desk and think, what do I need to do today? I can simply open up the task list and know that everything I need to do is there and recorded, so If I trust it and work through the list I will achieve what I have set out to do. It is also the fact that I design each task to be easily achievable, that way you always feel you are achieving rather than being daunted by the scale of what lies ahead.

As this lists also contain all my ideas, I like to look at them as being little packets of seeds, each of those tasks is something that may bring great things, you can not buy those ideas, so the more there are in the system, the more chances I have of achieving what I am setting out to do.

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Humber Bridge Half Maraton 2011 – 1 Mile Point

Digitalquill — Sun, 26 Jun 2011 18:22:48 +0000

It was the Humber Bridge half Marathon today and since a friend was taking part and it went across the end of our road we wandered down to give some support for the runners. I took this video of everyone passing by httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17GmgCV63iU Related posts: Orangery Extension Part 30: Insulating And Plaster Board On External …

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Amazon Import Plugin For WordPress Live Demo Now Working

Digitalquill — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 07:46:01 +0000

I have just put the Live Demo of the Amazon import Plugin for WordPress Live again. I had hope to get this done yesterday, however, I took a pause from work to do some DIY and keep the wife happy!

The demo is the same as the Datafeed import plugin for WordPress Demo in that it re-sets its self every hour, this should give enough time for anyone to try the plugin and see how it works but do keep in mind that it does reset every hour on the hour.

As with the Datafeed Import Plugin for WordPress I will be releasing an update for the Amazon Import Plugin for WordPress very soon. This will bring the plugin up to V3.0 and has some very exciting features in it to help content developers.

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Humpbird Email Client For Three Year Olds

Digitalquill — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 17:39:49 +0000

No I’m not releasing some new software, Eva my three year old daughter has just joined me on my knee while I was checking emails.

“Its Humpbird” she exclaimed

“No Thunderbird Sweetheart” I replied

“Humpbird is better”

There’s no arguing with that…

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A Time For A Change – Self Employment And Full Time Affiliate

Digitalquill — Wed, 08 Jun 2011 18:49:58 +0000

I am writing this post on Holiday in the Yorkshire Dales, we have a fantastic cottage in Carperby, with stunning views over Wensleydale. I am sat in the study, looking out on the hills bathed in the evening sun, the sheep are contentedly grazing on the wet grass after a day of on and of rain, Eva is in bed and Cheryl and the In-laws are happy eating strawberries and cream, watching TV, round the log stove.

My plan is that I will work on several streams to my business, the most obvious being the WordPress Plugin Development, with more time to dedicate to this work, I will be able to not only develop the plugins I have further, but also finish off some of the plugns I have 90% developed and put time into coding up some more of the ideas I have for plugins that will help affiliate marketers and bloggers.

I also hope that I will be able to bring my affiliate marketing business back to where it once was. With time and effort I will be able to get all my sites, that are still down from a server failure 12 months ago, back up and running, and start to build their reputation once again.

I am starting out with a great deal more knowledge than I had before, I have read a great deal, and hopefully, picked up some useful hints and tips from the best in the business.

Over the last few days I have been looking back over the last 7-8 years that I have been doing affiliate marketing, and analysing what has worked and what has not. As a result I have decided to keep my affiliate marketing to about three niches, these are niches that I am interested in, knowledgeable about as I work in those sectors day-to-day, and are also sectors where I was successful in the past.

I did have a great spread of sites in many niches, I will become (at least in the first instance), more focused. I will then branch out into other areas. It was notable that the niches I was successful in were those I am interested and knowledgeable about, but there were also some strange exceptions, my greathampers site was very successful, so although this is outside my chosen niches I wil get that sit eback up and running and populated with content. I will not however, spend a great deal of time promoting that site, if it is successful I will re-consider, but I will leave it to tick over for now.

I also have several other business interests, including consulting on building your businesses online presence, but I hope that the mainstay of Digitalquill will be WordPress and online software development ad Affiliate marketing.

Keep checking back both here on Matthouldsworth.com and on my other Blog Earning From Affiliates to keep up-to-date with my activities.

I intend that I will work smarter, not harder and hopefully work a Three day week, meaning I can also spend more time with the family, take more holidays to the places we love, like here in the Yorkshire Dales and who knows, eventually, if we are not tied to a location for work, re-locate to where we belong, here in the Yorkshire dales.

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Feather WordPress Theme Review

Digitalquill — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 10:12:04 +0000

Elegant themes have just launched another wordpress theme ‘Feather’, this is great news for me as I have only been a member of Elegant themes for two days and already they have added another theme. The Feather wordpress themes has unlimited colour schemes, and has many backgrounds and textures to suit many sites. It also includes dozens of fonts so that you can make your site that bit different from everyone else and change the theme to the style you are looking for.

The theme can either be used as a CMS type theme or as a blog or both, the front page supports a slider area at the top with featured posts/pages below that. The theme also has its own advert management system which could be useful for those wanting to monetize their wordpress site. It also includes a design for a gallery section, and different layouts for pages, site maps and search results.

If you are a member of the site you get it included with your membership. You are also provided with a PSD file.

I am planning on making use of this wordpress theme for a project I have in mind, we will see when I get onto it, but overall thoughts are a nice theme from Elegant Themes.

Elegant themes run their business slightly different to most Premium theme websites, in that you sign up for a yearly membership (Just $39) and you get all the themes they have at no extra cost, as as you read at the start of this review, any new themes released during your membership are also included. As a wordpress developer I would recommend that you sign up for this service as it is by far the most cost effective way of getting premium themes, even if you think that you will only use one or two themes it will still be cheaper than most other Premium themes.

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Property For Sale On Belvedere Road In Hessle

Digitalquill — Wed, 11 May 2011 17:38:06 +0000

The property we have for sale is now listed on right move. If you are looking for a house you can move straight into in the Hessle, Hull Area then this could be for you:

End-Terrace
Bay fronted stylish property
Large Garden and Veg plot
Off Street Parking
Through dining/lounge
Study/play room
Newly Fitted Kitchen
3 bedrooms
Newly fitted Bathroom
New carpets throughout
Newly Decorated throughout

Asking price £132,950

For full details view the listing on Right Move

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Second Kitchen Fitted In Less Than A Month

Digitalquill — Tue, 15 Mar 2011 19:04:51 +0000

This weekend I have fitted the second kitchen this month! The first at our home in our kitchen orangery extension, and the second in one of our other properties that we are getting ready for sale.

We were looking for a higher end ‘off the shelf’ kitchen for this property, clean, stylish and functional. We have gone for The Cottage Kitchen units from B&Q. I got a good sum off the price of the kitchen as Quill Developments has been approved for a B&Q trade account which will be a great help with future projects, unfortunate that it came after we did most of the work on the Orangery Extension as this could have saved us allot of money.

The B&Q kitchen cam flat pack so it all had to be setup, mostly impressed with the quality, although I was not impressed with the construction of the corner unit so I have modified it and added some strength and fixings to it to help. It is really designed to be supported by units either side of it, no problem in our situation as we have this, but I still thought it prudent to ad some strengthening to it.

The units (all 9 of them) went in, in what turned out to be a fairly short day, and then we have spent today fitting the work surfaces. I still have a little finishing off to do on the work surfaces and the handles and plinth to fit which will probably take another day or so.

I then have some tiling and painting to do and the floor to re-jig as the configuration of the units is now different and as such the floor (1 year old laminate). This will then bring the kitchen up to the standard of the rest of the house, it is newly decorated, has a new bathroom and new carpets throughout, it will make someone a very nice family home.

If you are looking for a property in the Hessle, Hull, East Yorkshire area please take a look at the house on tepilo.

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How To Install Under Floor Heating – Ufh

Digitalquill — Sun, 27 Feb 2011 19:26:24 +0000

If you have read the last few posts on this blog you will have seen that we have just installed hot water under floor heating in our new orangery kitchen extension. Several people have asked for e to post a little bit about how we went about this. No I am not the expert on the plumbing side, but I can give you an over view of what we did.

You may or may not know the situation we are in, we have extended the back of the house and combined two rooms into one. In doing so we have demolished two previous extensions and made the whole thing into one. In terms of the under floor heating this meant that there were four sections to the floor, the original to the house, two parts from past extensions and one I fitted to the part we extended. This means that there were differing qualities of work. Really I should have scrapped the two floors from the previous extensions, but time and financial constraints meant that I had to make do.

The joists therefore did not match up in terms of their widths or where they run. This makes the planning of the underfloor heating rather difficult.

However, I am jumping ahead a little here, I started off by lifting all the old floor boards, some original and some chipboard. We then cleared out all the debris from under the floor, debris that had been left from the build, by electricians and plumbers cutting things out. The purpose for this was two fold, if you have ever crawled under a floor you will know kneeling or laying on a broken brick is not something you want to do too regularly! and in addition the clearer your underfloor the better your air flow will be, especially if like us you are going to insulate under your floor it is critical to maintain a good airflow.

As I have just said we were insulating under the floor. The ideal way to do this is by cutting solid insulation such as 100mm kingspan to fit between the joists, this is a very costly exercise and would have cost us in the region of £650 just on insulation alone.

I therefore came up with my own variation on a solution that has been used by others, that was to use rockwool style insulation held up by chicken wire. Fortunately B&Q were (and still are I believe) running an offer on rockwool insulation where you can get it for £3 per roll. Using this offer the insulation cost me just £25 (les actually as I bought too much!)

The idea is that you tack chicken wire in a trough form between the joists, making use that you use enough fencing clouts to hold the chicken wire securely. Also making sure that there is no chance that the bottom of the trough will be anywhere near the ground under the floor thus maintaining an air gap.

We then laid the rockwool into this trough, and then covered the top of that insulation with foil backed bubble insulation. The purpose of this was not so much to insulate, although it does have some insulation properties its self, it was more to utilize the foil to reflect heat from the underfloor heating pipes back up into the room rather than having it carry on down into the insulation.

We taped the foil insulation together with aluminum foil tape, which if truth be told was a right pain as the tape we used was the stuff you have to peel the back off. Once adhered to the foil it is great but it can be frustrating getting the backing peeled off. We also used this tape to tape the insulation to the joists making, ensuing that we left a 20mm gap between the insulation and the top of the joists.

We chose the John Guest 30Sq Meter Hot water insulation pack from Screwfix. Mainly because John Guest is a well known make who we trusted, our research showed that people who fitted it were happy and the pack contained everything we needed to complete the job.

When the kit came, we found that the clips that come with the pack are designed for solid insulation, you twist them into the kingspan. This would be a very quick and simple way of securing the underfloor heating pipes, however, in our scenario with the insulation we used, these were no good, so I bought some normal pipe clips an we secured these to the joists.

The main problem when laying the underfloor heating pipes is the planning. Deciding what pattern the pipes should take, on a single room system there are two loops, these should be as close to the same size as possible. You also want to try and get the first run of the pipe, i.e. the hottest pipes across doors or windows, or in the areas where you will mostly be walking.

Once you have planned the layout, you will need to cut notches out of the joists to allow you to loop across each joist, we designed the system in such a way that we kept the notches to a minimum, basically one at each end of the room.

Laying the pipe is a very frustrating task, the pipe has been coiled since manufacture and all it wants to do is go back to its loop, so it really is a two man job if you can, once holding the reel and un-doing its coil action and the other laying and clipping the pipe in the desired pattern.

Once you have the pipes laid, they have to go into the manifold, you should consult a plumber to connect this into your central heating system. They will also need to add a room stat, this allows you to run the underfloor heating independently of the central heading in the rest of the house.

We then laid chipboard flooring over the top of the insulation and pipes, we made sure that we measured and marked the underfloor heating pipes so that we did not screw through them!

We have a 35Sq meter room, with one wall totally glass and the main part of the ceiling glass, the underfloor heating system copes very well with heating the area up. We have easily had it up to 25°C and I am sure that it will go higher, but I melt at those sort of temperatures so we keep it down to 20°C

All in all we are very pleased with the result, hopefully the insulation under the floor and the insulation in the walls and roof space will compensate for the glass wall and large orangery window we have in the roof.

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Simonstone Hall Wedding Brochure

Digitalquill — Tue, 15 Feb 2011 20:24:22 +0000

Many of the regular readers will already be aware of our history with Simonstone Hall in Hawes North Yorkshire. We were engaged there in 2007, then married in 2009 with several visits between and several visits since including our year anniversary last year. There is no hiding the fact that we love North Yorkshire, especially the Hawes area and we have yet to find anywhere better to stay than Simonstone Hall.

Outside Simonstone Hall

With this in mind it came as a great surprise to see that Simonstone hall have re-vamped their website and even more of a surprise to find that they have redesigned all their brochures and while idly looking through the Wedding Brochure, there we were staring out of the page back at me was Cheryl and I on our wedding day. Then even more surprised when I find another picture of Cheryl and our bridesmaids, and then again when a virtually full page picture us getting covered in confetti!

Seriously Simonstone hall is well worth a look if you are looking for a wedding venue, or simply somewhere to stay. It is set in the stunning scenery of North Yorkshire, views from every window across the rolling hills, sheep grazing in the fields, and Simonstone Hall its self, full of character with staff who wait on you hand and foot. That does not give it justice, the food served on every occasion we have been has been supreme and without fault.

Have a look at their wedding brochure

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Screwfix Direct Miss Out On Another £180 Order

Digitalquill — Fri, 11 Feb 2011 08:49:48 +0000

Last week I placed an urgent order with Screwfix, I paid extra on delivery to ensure that I got the order for Saturday so that I could get on with preparation for the plasterer to arrive.

The order did not arrive, which then caused me a great deal of extra expense buying what I needed from local stores.

When I emailed Screwfix to ask where the order was I received a copy and paste response:

Dear Mr Houldsworth

Thank you for your email regarding your order.

I am disappointed to read of the problems you have had with the delivery of your order and I apologies for the inconvenience this has caused. I am keen to make sure this is not repeated. I assure you that we are working hard to improve our delivery service.

I understand you have now received your delivery and trust that everything is now in order.

Screwfix Direct recommends that customers do not schedule or commence any installation work until after you have received your order and checked all the goods for any defects or missing parts. This will enable you to resolve any technical questions or to order specific additional fittings as necessary.

Once again please accept my apologies for any inconvenience caused.

Screwfix have refunded the additional delivery charge but have not given any apology for the problems caused to my project. Their recommendation the one does not start any work until you get your order is simply not a practice one, indeed this is actually Screwfix’s USP (unique selling point) over other online services in that they advertise that fact that as long as your order is in before 6pm they will deliver next day.

As a result I have stopped using screwfix for the time being until I get a satisfactory response from them. I have had another big order required for this weekend, however, I have bought these goods from B&Q and as such Screwfix has missed out on £180 worth of order.

I will have several more orders of this size in the next few weeks as I work through to the completion of my Orangery Kitchen Extension project, these orders will be going to B&Q until such time as Screwfix give me an adequate response.

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Twitter Journalism

Digitalquill — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 18:10:08 +0000

I have been following the revolution and protests in Egypt closely as I have a colleague and friend who lives out there, I am unable to contact him to see if he is safe, I hope that the Internet will soon be back up.

The events which started on 25th of January and have been on going for the last 9 days, there has been a constant stream of news on all the major news channels.

I was interested to note while watching the BBC news and following the relevant timelines on twitter that the BBC was actually lagging behind real current events on the ground.

Even with the disconnection of Egypt from the internet, people are still managing to tweet.

This is an interesting twist in journalism, we have always thought that live 24/7 rolling news channels give us access to instant news, but that is not actually the case, Twitter now shows that you can indeed watch the news unfold in realtime, no matter where in the world that news is happening.

This leaves the news corporations struggling to keep up, which I have noticed in turn drives the peddling of rumor, people who want to be the first to break the news of an event on twitter jump the gun and post based on nothing more than speculation. This does not seem to be by the mass populous, who always seem to tweet what they see and how they see it, but it is by ‘journalists’ of the news networks (seemingly especially the American news networks) who want to be the first to break the news of significant events happening.

This type of twitter journalism is journalist without editorial integrity, so although it is a very useful and interesting shift in how news is delivered it has to be taken with a pinch of salt, leaving the reader to filter and edit the information as it comes, and if I can say this, some people are more capable of doing this than others!

It is clear that events on the ground in this type of news story are constantly shifting, and the twitter journalism is a great tool for finding out what is happening, but one should always consider the adjendas of the people posting those tweets and make up ones own mind as to the accuracy and integrety of that information. This means that we all need to become news editors if this information is to be of any use.

I guess there is also another aspect to this and that is one of documentation. Events are now being recorded at the time they happen, by hundreds of individuals, this effectively gives a time line of that event and documents its history. We are not asking people to recall what happened 2 days, 2 weeks, 2 years, 50 years ago, we have the history recorded as it happens.

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A Late New Year Post

Digitalquill — Mon, 17 Jan 2011 21:01:50 +0000

Ok so it is already over two weeks into 2011 and really too late for this kind of post, however, I was not so well over Christmas and New Year and and only just really recovering.

We had a good Christmas, although as I said we were all ill, Our two year old daughter Eva decided she was going back to bed after opening her presents of Christmas day, then after getting up for dinner, decided she was going to a lay down on the sofa and fell asleep for another couple of hours, so really it was a much quieter time that is should have been! No such luck now though she is back to her bouncy self!

As new year comes and goes, one looks at the past year and looks forward to the new year to come. What a year 2010 was!

I have been unwell for much of 2010, we have yet to actually pin-point the problem, but it has had a great impact on my energy levels and ability to push things forward as I would have liked, however, when I look back at what we have done in 2010 we have not been short of work!

Business

The Datafeed plugin for WordPress has grown into a mature product, we have done a great deal of work on the plugin, adding support for XML feeds, support for the All in one SEO plugin and more. The popularity of the plugin is growing daily. There is still a great deal of work I would like to do, enhancements to develop for the product that will bring it one even more.

Amazon import plugin for wordpress has been updated to version 2.0 bringing it into line with the Datafeed plugin, its new interface is far easier to use and the functionality that allows you to have multiple imports and multiple templates gives it that extra edge. It is now on a par with the datafeed import plugin, meaning that any enhancements I make for one can be integrated into the other and both benefit.

I also released a new plugin, the ‘Link Cloaker plugin for WordPress’ this takes some of the functionality that my other wordpress plugins have inbuilt and allows wordpress users to cloak or hide external links from their site and in doing so making those links more search engine friendly, improving the SEO of the site.

Early in 2010 I developed another WordPress plugin the ‘Advertiser Plugin for WordPress’ This is a great plugin with heaps of potential, however, it has really stalled at Beta testing. I simply have not had the time to test it and iron out any issues. I really hope that I will be able to move onto this and work on it in Early 2011, but it may have to wait until the building project at home is finished. I really do want to get this done as I receive maybe five or six inquiries about this plugin per day ever since I posted on this site about the work I was doing on it.

I have overhauled Digitalquills identity and created a new website for it. I have based this website on WordPress, and as many of you will know, my business has changed focus from web and multimedia development to more software development and creation of online tools for affiliate marketers and other sectors who need online tools to aid in their work.

Regular readers to this blog will know that two of my servers suffered a major hack and as a result of that I decided it was time to get two new servers. I fell out with Ultrahosting over their lack of support for me while I was trying to sort out that hack so I have setup two new servers with VPSville, who have so far been very helpful.

Home life

We have a had a very busy and eventful year, we did say after our wedding that we would take a year off from projects, but as usual this did not happen, we embarked on

Eva was 2 in March, she is coming along really well, she can’t wait to go to pre-school, she asks us daily if she can go, each time we say after your third birthday, its great that she is getting so excited about it.

We did have a little bit of the terrible two’s for a month or so, but she seems to be coming out of it now.

It was our first wedding anniversary last year, we celebrated by going back to Simonstone Hall in Hawes where we were married. We had a great weekend, I am sure that we will be visiting again, maybe for our second anniversary.

The major project of 2010 has been the start of the Orangery Kitchen Extension. This has involved a protracted planning application which took longer than it should have,

What will 2011 Bring?

Business in 2011

Early next month I will be releasing a major new plugin to my collection, this will be the Ebay Import Plugin for WordPress and as its title suggests it will allow you to import items for sale on Ebay into your WordPress blog. It will work in much the same way as the Datafeed and Amazon Import plugins, complementing them and adding an extra thread to the collection of affiliate marketing tools for WordPress.

The main development on this WordPress plugin has been completed. I am just using it on a couple of live projects to iron out any issues with the plugin before I release it. Keep checking here or on the Digitalquill website for more information about the product and when it will be released.

I will also be releasing a ‘Premium membership mod’ for Aardvark topsites, that will allow the site owner to sell upgrades to the free site listing plans. It takes payments via paypal subscriptions so the whole process of selling those premium slots on your site is fully automated.

Again, as with the ebay plugin I have completed the major development of this mod, and I will be using this mod on a couple of my Aardvark topsite websites for a month or so before I release it. I know that there are many people out there who want such a mod, there have been some mods knocking around, but I have tried them all and they have never worked for me which is why I have decided to produce my own.

I hope to build the affiliate strand of my business back up to what it was pre-eva. I have started this process, but it is very true that success is directly proportional to success is more true in affiliate marketing than many other sectors of work. I need to dedicate time to firstly getting my affiliate sites back up and running and updated, as I have not setup some of them following the recent server move. Once I have done that I can start with the marketing of those sites.

I have also been catching some good keyword domains with good search volumes. I need to get these setup with affiliate sites so that I can recover the catching fees from them. Once they are developed into sites, they will be a more attractive proposition for potential buyers looking for an investment.

Home Life in 2011

The main project at home is to finish off the Orangery and new kitchen extension. The new kitchen comes in Mid-February, I still have to do the underfloor heating, some plaster boarding and insulation, second fix electrics and sort our the floor before they come. I have taken some time off at the end of this week to try and get some of these things moved on. It will be great if we can have the work finished before Evas birthday. I think this is doable.

Eva will be three at the end of March, she has already decided she wants to have a party with a bonfire, BBQ, outside heater (no idea where she has got that from) to keep us warm, party food, and a disco… We will have to see what happens. I think we will be subject to the weather for this.

It will be our second wedding anniversary on the August Bank Holiday, we still have a trip to London to see a show, to get in before then, my treat to Cheryl for our last anniversary, just shows how busy we have been.

We are trying to get one of our properties onto the market and sold. I am not sure that the market is doing much at the moment so we will have to wait and see, but there is a a little bit of work to do on it first as it was extensively damaged by a water leak. We also need to fit a new kitchen, before we can get it onto the market. I am trying to balance the work their with the work we have to to on the Orangery.

2011 will be a good year, the next few months will be very busy as we get the Orangery finished, but hopefully things will become a little more relaxed after that. Eva will start pre-school after her birthday so that will give Cheryl some more time during the days to relax a little. I am sure that there will be plenty of things to do throughout the year! We always seem to find things to fill out time with!

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Happy Christmas 2010

Digitalquill — Sat, 25 Dec 2010 22:07:23 +0000

Happy Christmas to all my readers and fellow bloggers. I hope that your festivities have been filled with joy and happiness. We have had a great time although Eva has been poorly and in bed most of the day. Happy Christmas and seasons greetings to you all. Related posts: Happy Valentines… We Have A Kitchen …

Continue reading » Related posts:

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The River Humber Is Frozen!

Digitalquill — Tue, 21 Dec 2010 09:57:02 +0000

Noticed on the way to work that the River Humber is frozen, I don’t mean small patches at the edges either, significantly frozen over, with some larger ice blocks. Its not totally frozen but a good proportion is.

The car was saying it was -10°c, but still for a tidal estuary that will have a high salt content due to the tides to freeze over like it has is very interesting.

I have had a quick look on Google and apparently it happened in 1960

I for one am loving this weather, I hate the heat…

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Tuition Fees And A Loss Of Sympathy

Digitalquill — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 20:35:56 +0000

I have been watching the events in London unfolding over the last day or so with interest. The Vote for the raising of Tuition fees is something that I did have a very strong opinion on.

I was, and note the was, for as I will explain later, my opinion has been changed by recent events.

I was very much against raising tuition fees. I know the amount of debt that I came out of university with, and I studied over 10 years ago. Since then the burden of debt on students leaving university has increased dramatically.

I fundamentally believe that university educations provide individuals the best chance of success in life and as such should be something that everyone capable should go and do. I believe that it kick starts you life in many more ways than your academic studies, as an 18 year old, you are left, probably for the first time to cope on your own, cooking, cleaning, buying food and managing your own life and finances. You are given that freedom, and the responsibility to look after yourself.

This sets you up for your life and makes you independent. I am not saying that those who do not attend can not achieve in life or look after themselves, because they clearly can, but it does give you a kick start.

I also see the institutions of universities to be fundamental to the British economy. They are houses of research, innovation and development, without which the country would be very much the worse.

To this end my opinion was that those institutions and the students wanting to attend university should be supported by the state as much as possible. I understand that in these times of economic downturn we need to be frugal with our limited budget and as such any support has to be balanced, and I thought that there was a need to increase the fees, but by no means to the extent that had been suggested of between £6k and £9k.

However, following the scenes left by the riots in London last night and after reading how irresponsibly those protesters had behaved, my opinion has changed. There is absolutely no need to cause the damage that they have, defacing Winston Churchill Statue, attacking the Car of the Price of Wales while he traveled through London, injuring numerous police officers, defacing Parliament buildings and throwing bricks through windows.

There really is no need for this Anarchy. If they had protested peacefully, they would have kept my support and I suspect the support of many reasonable people up and down the country. However, those scenes were simply unacceptable. I will not put it as strongly as a college tweeted this morning, however, they have lost all support from me.

I know that by the time Eva is making that decision the world will be a very different place, we have put together a savings package for her so that she make the decision herself when the time comes.

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Protected: Its Snowing!!! – Ask For Password

Digitalquill — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 19:45:05 +0000

Humpbird Email Client For Three Year Olds No I’m not releasing some new software, Eva my three year old daughter has just joined me on my knee while I was checking emails....

Removal Of Kitchen Units

Digitalquill — Sun, 17 Oct 2010 17:19:46 +0000

We have spent the weekend removing the kitchen units from the bottom end of the kitchen to prepare for Wednesday when Cornerstone Services will be coming to put up a temporary wall and start making electrics safe for the removal of the roof and walls.

In order to do this we have setup a temporary kitchen in the back room, keeping out the things that we will use regularly and packing the rest into storage boxes. Hopefully it will not be too long before we can move back into a functioning kitchen. It may not be a new finished kitchen, but I have planned it so that the period of time that we are exposed to the elements and without any space to cook in is kept to a minimum.

I took the old boiler to the council tip which was very therapeutic as it caused no end of problems when it was in use, leaks, just not working, not heating water, over heating, basically it was junk right from the start. The new boiler we have is far better and is running like a dream at the moment.

We have even squeezed in time for a walk, it has been a glorious day here, hopefully this weather will continue into next week and the week after when the main part of our build is taking place.

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Euromillions £112 Million

Digitalquill — Thu, 07 Oct 2010 18:01:41 +0000

It has got to be worth a punt on EuroMillionstomorrow. £112 Million pounds jackpot. What would one do with that sort of money?

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20 Tips To Increase WordPress Security

Digitalquill — Mon, 20 Sep 2010 17:54:35 +0000

I have recently been blogging about how my web servers have been compromised. I am fairly sure that the attackers gained access to the server via WordPress.

I use WordPress as the backbone to 90% of my sites, this being so it is critically important that it is secure. I have therefore been researching methods to make those installs more secure. Here is what I have found:

The Obvious:

1. Keep up-to-date

Always use the latest version of Wordpres, there is no excuse not to, WordPress now has an inbuilt update feature which is very simple to use. Make sure that you use the latest version of WordPress, All plugins and all themes, even if those plugins or themes are not active.

2. Admin User

Although WordPress 3.x allows you to choose your WordPress admin username, many people still use ‘admin’ especially if you have upgraded from older version of WordPress and have a pre-existing user.

The problem with this is that it is known by hackers who can try and use brute force attacks on your password. If they do not know your username they have to do a brute force attack on both your username and password and get them to match and as such the likelihood of getting the correct combination is reduced

Change your admin user to something else using the SQL command:

UPDATE wp_users SET user_login = ‘YourChosenUser’ WHERE user_login = ‘Admin’;

3. Use a secure password

I use http://strongpasswordgenerator.com/to create strong passwords. Make sure you do not use dictionary words as many brute force attacks use dictionaries to work through tries on your password.

Tips are to use numbers and letters, mixes case and some characters.

4. Add Keys to the wp-config.php file

WordPress 3.x does this for you, but it is worth checking that you have the keys completed in your wp-config.php file. It should look something like:

define('AUTH_KEY', '19[9lL.u~lwAMWEv-HwZ+@Fm{1FP+define('SECURE_AUTH_KEY', 'JiSUZrIM5T!7$z;rcS];qL>L L)c@,Tqe~B=#M=V,Wgb:>F|h$d0g55)!_9Ol-');
define('LOGGED_IN_KEY', 'm~ v--9/-l+9=[$VD($define('NONCE_KEY', '%i.WRYyslvZ.C*Np5L5S27t4 ihJF,HMhy~$aEKV0#=/`I~$o-Mudefine('AUTH_SALT', '[J&pERV+!rfO6|n0OzNo5g7 P .cOia|{^4A$Ol4w`([o-JC3:|D3nTXDx4S9H');
define('SECURE_AUTH_SALT', '%P)h3cUD=EX/2z+EY@/~i;%TjlB(EL]RB]N,B)7Tr+Rw(L2:i(V+N+VS5i2Obu0I');
define('LOGGED_IN_SALT', 'n|yRYtIi#y5Q|-3|Y~-y]f0t|1n,aE7M@ubchoibda?RDdeCwRC|~e)-d?u*JJMc');
define('NONCE_SALT', 'w|1+voiV-[q5,F3,M@wOLvOJJz*>&3Ui9drlQ{Q>Ls2|#lZVzA46?&+6&Vrgg1x');
The Not-So Obvious
5. Database setup - user, password, and database
Make sure you create a database for each blog, if one is compromised you do not want it affecting any other sites you may have on your server.
Make sure you create a username for each of the installs, do not share them between wordpress installs and DO NOT USE ROOT!
The user should be a limiuted userm grant it SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE privileges.
mysql> GRANT SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE ON wordpress.* TO 'wordpress'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'newpassword';
mysql> FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
Make sure that your user only has local access to your database, so that it can not access your database remotely.
6. Do not use default wp_ table prefixes
Don't use the default wp_ prefix to table names. This method is useful but should not be relied upon for a security fix, one a hacker has got as far as being able to conduct SQL injections or other hack then this method will not prevent them getting further for very long, but it will keep them guessing. Do not use the default wp_ prefix instead use a random one.
This is rather more difficult if you are trying to secure a site that has already been setup, but you can use the WP Security Plugin to do this
7. SSL for wp-admin
SSL connections are far more secure than normal http connections so, force SSL for admin add the line define('FORCE_SSL_ADMIN', true); to your wp-config.php file Options All -Indexes to your .htaccess file
8. Allow access to your wp-admin from one IP Address
Although this method worries me, due to loosing access to my files I have implemented it to see how it goes. If you have a static IP address you can Secure the wp-admin files from being edited. By default all but the wp-config.php file can be edited via the wordpress admin area.
If you add a .htaccess file to your wp-admin folder and add the following:
Order Deny,Allow
Allow from xx.xx.xx.xx
Deny from all
This will then only allow you to edit those files from the IP address specified
You can use other options in the IP address such as:
A (partial) domain-name - Example: Allow from apache.org
A full IP address - Example: Allow from 10.1.2.3
A partial IP address - Example: Allow from 10.1
A network/netmask pair - Example: Allow from 10.1.0.0/255.255.0.0
A network/nnn CIDR specification - Example: Allow from 10.1.0.0/16
9. Deny access to the wp-config.php file
Perhaps a safer method than the above would be to specifically deny access to your wp-config.php file, thus keeping your database username and password more secure.
Add the following line to you r.htaccess file in the root of your site
deny from all
10. Move wp-config.php file to a directory below the one it is currently in
for example if your is the is setup as such:
/var/www/domain.com/htdocs/Site files here
you can move the wp-config.php file to below the htdocs folder i.e.
/var/www/domain.com/
WordPress will handle this change automatically and allow you to have the wp-config.php file below the web root which is a great deal more secure.
11. Add Apache Level security to wp-admin
AuthType Basic
AuthName "Domain.com WordPress Admin"
AuthUserFile /var/www/domain.com/.auth/.htpasswd
Require user domainAdmin
htpasswd -cm /var/www/domain.com/.auth/.htpasswd domainAdmin
12. Blacklist ip addresses
Edit the .htaccess file in the root of your site and add the following:

order allow,deny
allow from all
deny from 123.456.789
deny from 93.121.788
deny from 223.956.789
deny from 128.456.780

Add the ip address of the visitor you want to ban, you can add multiple deny from xxx lines to ban multiple addresses.
This may not be as useful unless you are actively monitoring your logs, but it can be useful if you get a great deal of SPAM comments from one user.
You can also use the Lockdown plugin to record all failed attempts to access your wordpress admin. You can then add the IP address to the ban list.
13. Stop WordPress serving anything other than images from the wp-content/uploads folder
You can secure the wp-content/uploads directory to stop it serving anything other than images
Order Allow,Deny
Deny from all

Allow from all

Remember if you want to include other file types in your WordPress posts you will have to add them to the list for example a pdf document, you would add pdf to the 'files' line.
14. Stop SQL injection attacks
Although WordPress should already do this for your you can ensure that you stop SQL injection attacks. SQL injection attacks are where malicious users use forms on your site to add code to database records.
Add the following to the .htaccess file in the root of your website.
Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING (\<|%3C).*script.*(\>|%3E) [NC,OR]
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING GLOBALS(=|\[|\%[0-9A-Z]{0,2) [OR]
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING _REQUEST(=|\[|\%[0-9A-Z]{0,2)
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php [F,L]
15. Remove your WordPress version
Sounds crazy but you should really do this. If hackers find a vulnerability in a particular build of WordPress then they will use search engines to find sites using that version and then exploit that vulnerability.
edit functions.php file of your theme and add the following line to it remove_action('wp_head', 'wp_generator');
16. Stop search engines indexing any of your WP- folders
add the following to your robots.txt file:
Disallow: /wp-*
This in combination with not allowing browsing of these folders will stop those files from being accessed.
17. Lockdown Plugin to stop brute force attacks
Using the Lockdown plugin to ban addresses after a certain number of failed login attempts will help prevent brute force attacks.
18. Use WordPress Firewall plugin
I have blogged before about the default set of plugins that I install, this is one of them, make sure you get it installed as it protects you against some of these holes especially SQL injection attacks.
19 File permissions
Here is a quick run down of some file permissions to check for your wordpress install are as follows:
../ 0755
../wp-includes 0755
../.htaccess 0644
index.php 0644
js/ 0755
../wp-content/themes 0755
../wp-content/plugins 0755
../wp-admin 0755
../wp-content 0755
On linux command line run 'chmod 0755 wp-includes -R' for example, or you can use your ftp client.
All my servers have ftp disabled as this is another potential security hole.
20. Backup, Backup, Backup
Ok this is not strictly a security fix, but it the worse happens it will help you to recover. Make sure you back everything up, WordPress install, uploaded files and critically the database. I use BackWPup which can up your data to Amazon S3. Very cheap method of keeping secure backups of your blog., or to FTP.
It is worth pointing out that if your site is hacked make sure you check all the files in the backup you are using before you restore. If a backup has run after the hack then any malicious files may be present in the backup.
If you are in this situation use the backup for your database and for any uploaded files and get a fresh copy of WordPress and any plugins.
Note:
Even with all these methods you may still be vulnerable, holes in your web server security, holes in plugins that you use or any number of factors could allow you to be compromised, but with these methods you are gaining more of the upper hand in the battle against hackers.
As a WordPress plugin developer I am looking into the possibility of creating a plugin that does some if not all of these methods for you or at least checks them and gives you advice as to how to improve the security. During this research I have found many plugins out there that claim to do this, some work better than others, indeed some do not work at all, but none are comprehensive and as such I think I will attempt to code one up that will do or check this list of 20 tips.
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Search Ranking For Simonstone Hall

Digitalquill — Thu, 16 Sep 2010 18:09:30 +0000

I have just discovered that this blog is ranking on page one of Google for the search term ‘Simonstone Hall’ I wonder if they will give me any free nights stay for all those referrals!!!

It is not the best search term I rank for but I thought it was fun. I will be working on moving it up those SERPs.

Seriously if you have found this blog with the Simonstone Hall search term it is well worth a stay. We have been many times now and had our wedding there in August 2009. I have yet to find anywhere better.

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40,000 Words And Still Counting…

Digitalquill — Sun, 12 Sep 2010 17:47:03 +0000

Just two months ago I posted that I had written 30,000 words on this blog. I have now reached 40,000. If I can get o 50,000 before Christmas that will be an achievement. Hopefully someone will find the content useful. I am just posting things as they come up. I have been posting more DIY related posts of late. I think that I will continue to do so as this is really what I enjoy. I have bought a couple more tools that I will review in the near future and of course we have the Orangery extension project and kitchen to fit so I will be posting about all that work as I do it.

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Racing Pigeons

Digitalquill — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 20:11:06 +0000

I leaned something new this evening! When I got home there was a racing pigeon on the drive, it was clearly struggling, probably having been hit by something or it was suffering from exhaustion.

After trying to contact RSPCA and other without success we called a friend in the know who told us to try and spread the wings out as they would be stamped with the owner.

After calling several numbers (it was difficult to read) and probably scaring some poor people asking if they looked after pigeons I finally tracked down the grateful owner who came and picked up the Pigeon within half an hour.

Apparently it had been released over a week ago for its first outing and never returned. No idea if it will survive but better it being with the owner than with us as we really have no idea!

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