Dani Iswara .Net

Ritual After Installing WordPress

After installing my (hosted) WordPress blog on server, I did a few things to manage my new blog. Some rituals will be written here.

Login to my WordPress (2.5.1) as admin.

Go to Profile (my name on the right-top of admin panel) :
Unchecked Visual Editor.
Updated Name and Contact Info.

Settings - General Settings :
Updated my blog title, tagline and timezone.

Settings - Writing Settings:
On Formatting, I chose to convert emoticons and XHTML codes automatically.

Settings - Reading Settings:
Front page displays my latest posts.
Blog pages show at most: 3 posts (2 columns theme).

Settings - Discussion Settings:
Checked all options in “default article settings” and “email me whenever”.
On the “Before a comment appears”, I set to “Comment author must fill out name and email”.
Some spesial settings on “Comment Moderation” section.
Activate “Show Avatars” with G ratings.

Settings - Privacy Settings :
Chose to be visible to everyone.

Settings - Permalink Settings:
Chose to “Day and name” as URLs structure (search engine friendly, descriptive, but long enough).

Manage - Categories :
Added some new categories.

Manage - Tags :
Added some new tags.

Manage Plugins:
Considering to install some new plugins (some of them are in trial purpose only):
Admin Drop Down Menu, Adsense Manager, All in One SEO Pack, Berri Technorati Reactions on Dashboard, Better Comments Manager, Browser Sniff, CommentLuv, CSS Naked Day, FeedBurner FeedSmith, FeedWordPress, Google XML Sitemaps, Live Comment Preview, Maintenance Mode, RSS Footer, Secure and Accessible PHP Contact Form, Sociable, Subscribe to Comments, Theme Test Drive, WordPress Automatic Upgrade, WP-SpamFree, Wp Super Cache, and Yet Another related Posts Plugin.

Design - Themes :
Chose themes or install / create the new ones.

Design - Widgets :
Added some text widgets (custom search, feed subscriber, short author profile, links to maintained posts, HONcode, ads) and recent posts.

Design - Themes Editor :
Edit some CSS and template files.
Add new pages as Archives and Categories.

Then Securing WordPress.
Following 3 tips from Matt Cutts and other tips :

• Update regularly (core and plugins)
• Lock down /wp-admin/ using .htaccess
• Delete WP version displayed on <meta name="generator" content="WordPress ..." /> in the header.php files, but on WP 2.5.1, I have <?php wp_head(); ?>[?]
• Make an empty index.html on /wp-content/plugins/index.html
• Use Admin SSL plugin (read its FAQ and plugins homepage carefully..).
  Remember this tricks (Mine? Not yet activated [again..]):

  http://example.com/wp-content/plugins/your-admin-ssl-location/admin-ssl-reset.php

Of course there is no 100% secure..let me know if you have another tips..