Tag: wordpress tips

How to Bulk Upload Files to the WordPress Media Library with FTP without Writing Crazy CRON Jobs

03/08/2015 Aaron Belchamber No Comments

I’ve seen some interesting solutions to making sure files that get uploaded outside of WordPress that are meant to be digested by WordPress get handled.  Scripts, plug-ins, etc.  The crux of the problem stems from the fact that if you FTP files into your WordPress site’s “uploads” directory, those files won’t show up.  That’s because a user didn’t use the media manager to alert WordPress to their existence and essentially register the files in WordPress, which is basically another record in its database.

There’s a simple plug-in that will allow you to find any file on your webserver and transfer those files and import them into the media library.  This blog article, though somewhat dated, is still relevant.  I’ve used this “Add From Server” plug-in before and works as advertised!

Here’s the link to the article about the challenge “Add From Server” solves:

“How to Bulk Upload Files to the WordPress Media Library”

I hope I saved someone a little time and trouble with their website!

 

– Aaron Belchamber


Uploading .mpg/.mp4 Video Files to WordPress? Be sure they have an audio track embedded

03/07/2015 Aaron Belchamber No Comments

The newest version of WordPress is 4.1 and it keeps getting better and more convenient to upload and embed videos on your website.  Just a note of caution, however!

Be sure your .mpg/.mp4 video files have an audio track or it is likely your video will not be recognized or play in WordPress.

I’m not complaining, just hoping I will save others who may produce videos the trouble of having to rerender their video files with an audio track when they don’t have one.  This isn’t a deal breaker, but it’s also not efficient.  After all, if you have a video, say an animation that is without sound, you shouldn’t have to output an empty audio track, it’s just a little more work and makes the files just a little bigger.  Not a big deal in the whole scheme of things, but then again, in the aggregate, is still is wasteful and a bit annoying.

– Aaron Belchamber


WordPress Debug Toolbar plug-in comes in handy for WordPress Developers

01/04/2015 Aaron Belchamber No Comments

I recently ran into some issues with a heavily customized WordPress site.  Something was overriding something else somewhere, somehow...

The dreaded “find the problem then traverse back through the code” solution again raised its ugly head.  Oh, the futility, you time-sucking code bug.  Why didn’t the previous developer leave more DOCUMENTATION?!!!!!

Sometimes, you can at least speed up the “backtracing” involved by using more debugging tools that are available when the regular standby, WP_DEBUG constant doesn’t quite cut it for you.

To learn more, go the the Debug Bar WordPress page.  It helped, then when you resolve the problem, just deactivate the plug-in!

– Aaron Belchamber