Kevin Shoffner

always pondering

WordPress

Removing /index.php/ from WordPress URL’s

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Occasionally, I have clients ask why their URL’s for WordPress have changed or maybe they moved from one hosting provider to another and they now see /index.php/ in their URL.  This does not only pertain to WordPress though, as it could affect other Content Management Systems (CMS) or even general software.

Recently I was helped setup a person who had moved their WordPress site and a great billing/time tracking online system, that I encourage you to look into, called Pancake from Hostgator to InMotion. But once everything was moved over they noticed this issue in all URL’s and it caused Pancake to really act up without being any issue with Pancake itself, and just made WordPress links look ugly.  So that’s when I realized it was time for me to do a quick walk-through on how removing/index.php/ from WordPress URL’s without a plugin being needed.

So I want you to go into your .htaccess file within the root directory of your website. Open it with your favorite text editor, and make sure this information is there and at the top of the file. Save and put back on the server.

<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ /index.php?/$1 [L]
</IfModule>
Note, if you are using Rackspace, you may need to add a little more code:


<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
Options +FollowSymlinks
# Options +SymLinksIfOwnerMatch
RewriteEngine On

# On some hosts (including Rackspace), you need to remove the "#" that comes before RewriteBase to avoid 404 errors:
# RewriteBase /

# Block access to hidden files and directories.
RewriteCond %{SCRIPT_FILENAME} -d [OR]
RewriteCond %{SCRIPT_FILENAME} -f
RewriteRule "(^|/)\." - [F]

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteRule ^(.+)\.(\d+)\.(js|css|png|jpe?g|gif)$ $1.$3 [L]

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php [L]
</IfModule>
I realize this is not the most exciting topic, nor the easiest to explain, so if you have any questions please let me know.

Clean USB SD Card for Mac

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If you have ever used a flash drive (thumb drive) or any type of SD card with your Mac, you may have noticed that after you have deleted files they end up in the .Trashes folder, and you could either lost card space or not be able to use your card or drive at all.  Don’t worry, there is always a fix.  And this is a simple one.

Most of the time you can just use the Disk Utility to click “Clear Empty Space” or even “Erase.” For some devices though, this doesn’t work. When I started using the HTC Re Camera, I loved it and before long it became part of my every impromptu pool, ocean, or hike camera. But it doesn’t really like the Apple Disk Utility as much as it does within the Windows Environment. Although the Re Camera is definitely not the only flash drive or SD card device that has this issue, it is an issue that you will need to know how to resolve if you use a Mac.

 

<1> Open Terminal, type cd /Volumes/<your thumb drive>

Remember the <your thumb drive> section is whatever your device is called. For instance if your drive is called “UNTITLED” the command should be:

cd /Volumes/UNTITLED

<2> Now type:

rm -rf ._.Trashes .Trashes/ .Spotlight-V100/ .fseventsd/

<3> Eject and use the thumb drive. The next time you plug in the drive those items and folders will be recreated

 

 

I have done this for a number of people and photographers who are not aware of this fix when the Disk Utility.

HTC M8 Stuck In Dock Mode

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Have you ever had your HTC M8 get stuck in Dock Mode? Even after restart, you see it send you randomly into Dock Mode or Car Mode…  After this happened to me recently, I spent some time looking around and troubleshooting on two different devices and found a few easy things to try.

First off – DON’T RESET YOUR DEVICE (yet)…

The first things to ask yourself if this has just started happening to you:

  • Have you installed any apps recently?
  • Have you been near a pool, the beach, snowboarding or maybe dropped the phone in some dirt?

 

Test #1:

Clean your USB Port… If you are the type of person that puts your phone through intense usage or really exposes your phone to the elements, this is where you should start. The first time I noticed this issue I had been at the beach taking some photos, and about 45 minutes later the HTC M8 went crazy. A few days later I decided to take an older HTC M7 and do a quick test. I dropped it into the sand (dumb, I know), but guess what? It started the Dock Mode almost instantly.

Test #2:

Do you have a Dot View case? Have you had any magnets around your phone? What I have noticed, and others around the web-based on a quick Google search, is since HTC has a magnet sensor in the device, it may go into Car/Dock Mode in some cases where magnets are nearby.

Test #3:

Look at all recently added apps (ones you have downloaded in the last 24 hours or so. Remove them. Some people have also found relief in simply Disabling the Dock app. Personally I would rather know what was causing the issue instead of just turning off notifications. But if determined to do it – Go into the App Manager, not the app drawer. Settings>App Manager> it will open to “Downloaded” apps. Change downloaded to “All” by swiping left. Find the app “Dock”. Click “Disable”. Then reboot. Ideally, you should not see Dock to show up again.

 

 

 

If none of these troubleshooting methods work for you, I recommend restarting your device in Safe Mode to see if it continues. If so, you probably have a hardware issue (similar to what I mentioned in Test #1). If you don’t have the issue anymore while in Safe Mode, you have a software issue. 

 

Contact Form 7 Confirmation Message Tip

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Do you use Contact Form 7 for WordPress? If so, this quick tip will be helpful for you.

A number of my clients as for customizations and tweaks to be done to the plugin to make it function a little differently than the default, but there is one customization that is hidden but anybody can do.

Success Message Position

Many of my clients who use Contact Form 7 ask about the success message. So if you have ever wanted to move the Contact Form 7 Confirmation Message from the bottom of the form to anywhere else on the form, it may be much easier than you think. Just add the
[response]
shortcode to your form where you want it to display.

Let’s just say you have a form that requests First Name, Last Name, Email Address, and a standard Text Box. A form like that, will look something like this:

Generic Contact Form 7 Form

And your backend Contact Form 7 form settings and layout would look something like this:

<p>First Name (required)<br />
[text* first-name placeholder"First Name"] </p>
<p>Last Name (required)<br />
[text* last-name placeholder"Last Name"] </p>
<p>Email Address (required)<br />
[email* your-email placeholder"user@domain.com"] </p>
<p>Message (required)<br />
[textarea* your-message] </p>
<p>[submit "Send"]</p>

Good so far? Now if you were to click send right now you would get a little confirmation message on the screen that says something generic and it would be at the bottom of the form:

Generic Standard Contact Form 7 Message

This is pretty and everything, but we have a problem… Maybe your form is too long or you think your visitors will not see the confirmation… Now what?

The fix:

There is a built-in feature that is not shared by the developer very well, but is very useful. Simply add in the shortcode [response] wherever you would like the success message to be displayed after clicking Send and it will display there.

<p>[response]</p>

<p>First Name (required)<br />
[text* first-name placeholder"First Name"] </p>
<p>Last Name (required)<br />
[text* last-name placeholder"Last Name"] </p>
<p>Email Address (required)<br />
[email* your-email placeholder"user@domain.com"] </p>
<p>Message (required)<br />
[textarea* your-message] </p>
<p>[submit "Send"]</p>

The Success Message is going to be at the very top of the form now

New placement of Contact Form 7 Success Message

Genesis Customized Headers (advanced use)

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First and foremost – do not ever do this unless you

  1. absolutely know exactly what you are doing
  2. absolutely have to because of some unique reason
  3. absolutely know what you are doing
  4. have read and followed bullet points #1 & #3 perfectly

I absolutely love how the Genesis Framework has been developed and continue to find out things about it.  Every time I think to myself, “Gosh I wish there was a way to…” I realize Genesis developers have already done it some where.  You just have to keep digging.

In very, very rare occasions you will need to put some kind of Shell around your WordPress site.  Maybe you have an organizational brand that needs to be standard across the world, but you want to add a website using WordPress and Genesis.  If that’s the case, you may run into some issues with the required assets if you are not careful.

The piece of code we are changing is demonstrated in the screen capture here.genesis-header

In the most recent Genesis framework (1.9.1 as of today), a function such as genesis_header_markup_open will need to be adjusted.

Find the code by going to
genesis/lib/structure/header.php
and look for the function you are wanting to change.  I will change the Genesis header slightly below.

Original:

function genesis_header_markup_open() {

    genesis_markup( '<header>', '<div id="header">' );
    genesis_structural_wrap( 'header' );

}

Modified:

function genesis_header_markup_open() {

    genesis_markup( '<header>', '<div id="custom-header">' );
    genesis_structural_wrap( 'header' );

}

I’ve had to do this on rare occasions only because my clients had CSS or a structual issue where they were already using the 

ID=header

so I had no way other than to make this change via the Genesis framework. I deinifitely do not recommend this as a normal practice, as you will have to change this code every time there is any update to the framework.

I wish you lots of luck.