My first WordPress plugin, reached over 100 downloads in its first 10 days. Thanks to all users that contacted me for information and suggestions. If you’re using this plugin, and if you find it useful, please rate it on the official WordPress Plugin page.

Last.fm Radio will require a subscription fee. Nothing will change in the United States, United Kingdom and Germany.

From Last.fm blog

We’re announcing an upcoming change to the way Last.fm Radio works in some parts of the world. In the United States, United Kingdom and Germany, nothing will change. In all other countries, listening to Last.fm Radio will soon require a subscription of €3.00 per month. [...] Everything else on Last.fm (scrobbling, recommendations, charts, biographies, events, videos etc.) will remain free in all countries, like it is now.

Since [...] 2002 we have focused on playing the right songs to the right people, compensating artists for playing their music, and being the best music site on the web. [...] We’ve built up the largest catalogue of any web radio platform: over 7 million tracks are available on Last.fm Radio stations.

In order to keep providing the best radio service on the web, we need to ask our listeners from countries other than USA, UK and Germany to subscribe for €3.00 per month. In return you’ll get unlimited access to Last.fm Radio, and a promise that we’ll be hard at work improving the service for years to come.

Yesterday I received a message sent by Kelly from my contact page. Unfortunately I realized that Mail From plugin conflicts with Contact Form 7 plugin. So Kelly’s message comes from my own website. Kelly, I’m sorry but I can’t reply to your e-mail.

Testing

I tested these two plugins, but surely I didn’t notice the unexpected behavior of the Mail From plugin. So it’s crucial to plan and execute plugins combinations tests. Plugins conflicts may cause warnings or fatal errors. I’ll start developing a WordPress plugin that tries to test all installed plugins against conflicts and function overrides.

The Code

I just looked at the code, and I probably found the problem. Mail From plugin adds two filters to the wp_mail function:

add_filter( 'wp_mail_from', 'mail_from' );
add_filter( 'wp_mail_from_name', 'mail_from_name' );

while Contact Form 7 overrides wp_mail core function:

@wp_mail( $mail_recipient, $mail_subject, $mail_body, $mail_headers );

passing its sender string by the $mail_headers variable.

I was searching for stop motion videos, and I found this wonderful song. The video is amazing. I can’t stop listening this song these days. Plus this music video has come in to recent popularity on Digg.

Oren Lavie is the author of the song and also the man on the video. He is a singer-songwriter and theatre director.

[...] At the core of his melody-oriented compositions there is always the piano or the guitar with his singing, enriched by string arrangements (cello solo, quartet, chamber orchestra) and various, mainly non-electronical instruments added occasionally, giving each of the songs a unique style and color. [...] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oren_Lavie

I hope you’ll enjoy this video and have a relaxant listening.

Today I published the first release of BioDiagene’s website.

BioDiagene

BioDiagene is an emerging leader in genetic testing, providing rapid and cost effective diagnostic solutions for diverse pathologies. BioDiagene develops and manufactures innovative analytical instruments and integrated, ready-to-use reagent systems. Together these deliver an incomparable level of performance and user-friendliness that defines a new generation of high performance laboratory tools.

I developed a plugin that removes the BuddyPress admin bar. Guess what? Its name is Remove BuddyPress Admin Bar. You can download it from the official WordPress Plugin Directory or find more information in the Plugin Homepage.

BuddyPress

BuddyPress is a suite of WordPress plugins and themes, each adding a distinct new feature. BuddyPress contains all the features you’d expect from WordPress but aims to let members socially interact.

BuddyPress will extend WordPress MU and bring social networking features to a new or existing installation.

All BuddyPress plugins can be themed to match your own style, in just the same way as a WordPress blog. The BuddyPress plugins are bundled with a default theme to get you going out of the box.

As all BuddyPress plugins are independant, they can be used in two different ways. All of the plugins could be used to create a complete social network from scratch, or you could use specific plugins to add desirable features to your existing blog network.

I started developing community releases of WordPress plugins. I requested to add my plugins in to the official WordPress Plugin Directory. Today I recieved the approval from the team. For more information, see my WordPress Plugins page.

WordPress has been installed. The installation process is complete. Finally I’ve gone international with my website. I’m going to customize options and personalize my theme. But before I go ahead, WordPress needs to be secured, just a little.

First-time Security Steps

Here is a short and undetailed list of WordPress security steps:

• change the default admin password (I know it’s a random string, but there is a copy on your e-mail)
• create a new user, assign it the administrator role and log out
• log in to wp-admin using the new user, and delete the default admin user
• choose a strong password
• visit https://api.wordpress.org/secret-key/1.1/ and edit your wp-config.php file
• install WP Security Scan plugin
• install Secure WordPress plugin
• install Login LockDown plugin
• plan (and execute) regular backups, both for files and database
• keep WordPress and plugins updated