How to transfer self hosted vps wordpress to cpanel hosting

Another case for hostingformula presented by my brother 🙂 . He use vps for his blog that backed by wordpress. Not critical blog actually. He use it for daily ramblings and so on. Unfortunately his vps expire and he already get cpanel hosting for his next place. He ask me to transfer his blog as soon as possible.

The plan for his blog are :

Request for ssh access

Many cpanel hosting support ssh but this feature not enabled by default. You have to open a ticket and ask for activate ssh access for your cpanel account. Note : every hosting company have different policy including ssh port. Usually its not 22 but you ask for exact port for sure.

Use scp

My brother cpanel hosting is very limited in space. He’s current use around 400 MB and his cpanel hosting space is 500 MB. Very tight huh 🙂 . Scp come for rescue in this case. The exact command for scp transfer from vps to cpanel :

scp -P 24579 -r wp-content usernamecpanel@ipaddress:.

24579 is ssh port  (your webhosting ssh port is vary)

-r is recursive mode transfer

wp-content ; wordpress heavily use wp-content folder to store plugins, uploaded image, backup etc. I need only this folder as I can download latest wordpress code from wordpress.org .

Fix Permission

Many cpanel hosting use suphp . You’ll need to fix permisson for folder (755) and files (644) or you’ll get annoying error message when you access your wordpress blog.

Quick commands :

find wordpress_folder/ -type d -print0 | xargs -0 chmod 0755

find wordpress_folder/ -type f -not -name “*.pl” -not -name “*.cgi” -not -name “*.sh” -print0 | xargs -0 chmod 0644

Done. The plan is complete now 🙂

Maybe I’ll let my brother to do it himself now and I’ll check his work.

Bonus Plan

To avoid downtime he need to set cloudflare account and activate it for dns only. When everything is fine then he can activate proxy function.

Cpanel tip : Speed up your wordpress with proper PHP version

I don’t have much money for using expensive web hosting or vps or dedicated server for my wordpress blog. Is there any way to speed it up without touch plugin or something else?

Well, using cache is the best way to achieve blazing fast wordpress but one trick I found is using proper PHP version.

Yes, using latest PHP version is dead simple way to make wordpress faster.

By default cpanel user don’t get latest version, for example in my cpanel I see this :

php-cpanel1

For latest PHP version you can refer to php.net site :

php-cpanel2As you can see there are 3 version :

  1. PHP 5.6.11
  2. PHP 5.5.27
  3. PHP 5.4.43

Since I use cpanel I can not compile nor install latest PHP version as I used to using VPS but I can use closest version to 5.6.11.

Click “select php version” under software and services menu.

php-cpanel3

By default native php (the ones that come with server operating system) will be shown.

php-cpanel4

Choose 5.6 from drop down and click save as current.

php-cpanel5

Of course you can choose extensions. Only use the one that you use. For example if you only use mysql then you need to disable pgsql (postgresql) from extension.

How do I know if I already use PHP 5.6?

Create new file using file manager facility and save it as coba.php with these lines :

<?php

phpinfo();

?>

save and open from web browser. If you see like this one then your previous configuration is working well.

php-cpanel6

WordPress and Cpanel main domain

Last Cyber Friday 2014 I got chance to try namecheap hosting. Its shared hosting package that normally priced $9,88/year . The price is only for 1st year but worth to try since I only got it for $0,98. The price is very good but since people often neglect it I prefer to act vice versa. I’ll use this hosting package for my family blog.

Domain and Sub Domain

The blog itself consist from :

1. Main domain

2. 4 sub domain but my wife told me to only activate 3 sub domain.

Size

Size of family blog (main domain + all sub domain is around 500 MB) in zip format.

$ du -sh zip
508M    zip

Traffic

The traffic is not big :

– less than 100 uv (unique visitor) for main domain

– less than 1000 uv for all sub domain (my wife blog is more famous than my blog hahaha). More

How to move wordpress to easyengine based vps

Its almost the end of year. Many offer came and out include hosting. My friend just have her hosting account expire and the reason why she not continue her hosting plan is cost. She got her hosting package last year for $10 (from facebook group). The package cover free domain + 12 month of hosting and when renewal process came she can afford it. Its $104 now. Ten times from previous invoice. She already knew it and try to find other solution to keep her blog alive.

She already red my post about utilize vps. Her blog is using wordpress and she want to try it after she see my other blog that load blazing fast. I told her about Vultr and she could try it for cheapest package.

I promise her to help the migration process in exchange she let me share the process for hostingformula.net reader (I won’t reveal domain name). Hope this useful for others.

Lets get start!

Backup WordPress

In general WordPress is PHP and MySQL application. To backup wordpress the step is quite simple.

1. Backup database

To see all database credentials see wp-config.php content and write it down to notepad or other equal application. I’m lucky the host provide ssh access. So I can use command line for quick access 🙂

# cat wp-config.php

This command will display the content of wp-config.php . If you just want to extract the database essentials use this command : (my assumptions that you already log in with ssh). More

How to fix hatom error in google webmaster tools : emphaino theme case

I used to visit google webmaster tools for checking error related to my blog. Update new theme, changing hosting, domain propagation sometime went bad after sometime. Google webmaster tools is my friend to detect such error.

When I log in to google webmaster tools I found “exclamation mark” next to “search appearance” of this domain.

hatom_wordpress1

Further click lead me to structured data error.

Wow, 191 item with error.

hatom_wordpress2

Click the number give me ore detail error about blog post that affected with that error.

hatom_wordpress3

Further check using richsnippets tools give me exact error.

hatom_wordpress4

Its seem that I only need to fix ‘updated’ error section. Raymondware give great explanation about other error that might encounter.

Solution :

Login to wordpress admin page :

1. Click Appearance -> Editor

By default you need to look for single.php and see the content.

Looking for ‘date’ section and wrap it with class “post-date-updated”. Unfortunately in my case ( I use Emphaino theme) I must digging more to find relevant php file that contain the target. Its in ‘content-single.php”.

hatom_wordpress5

Change :

<?php emphaino_posted_on(); ?>

Into :

<span class=”post-date updated”><?php emphaino_posted_on(); ?></span>

Save and retry look it up from richsnippet tools.

hatom_wordpress6

The error is gone now 🙂

Step by step install WordPress Multi User : part 1

I have request to create wordpress multi site, one domain connected with other properties with blogspot, weebly etc together with other domain (.net .org and many more) .

I this post I just want to share how to create wordpress multi site that connect with other TLD.

I use these stuff :

Schema :
1. db1 for main domain -> use standard wordpress installation
2. db2 for portal address (subdomain of main domain) -> for use with main page for manage client site.
3. db3 for client site (TLD domain) and host everything.

Lets get start with installation steps for WordPress Multi User :

WordPress multi user that known as wpmu already merge into wordpress.org code so you only need latest version of wordpress from wordpress.org

1. Install standard wordpress from wordpress.org for main domain

easy as 123

2. Install wordpress for portal use subdomain of main domain.

http://portal.domainname.com

Login to cpanel and click subdomains

More

Is GoDaddy shared servers compromised?

Today I got new case for clean up wordpress malware, I love this job since I have a chance to see new hosting company system and how they work. Web hosting my client use is Godaddy.

I prefer to use ssh and Godaddy provide it with easy to activate interface, I use ssh since their file manager not fit for my 10 inch netbook and their ftp java also not help me a lot for doing my job.

As usual, scan for base64 hidden code and checking .htaccess give me clue where the bad code reside. Cross check it using sucuri scanner and dump lynx result with my vps server . Everything is ok.

After a few minutes I recheck with semrush on how it goes on search engine and try to open it straight from google result. Ooops, the malware seem to go back and redirect traffic to their website (a russia domain).

More

A few notes around Godaddy Hosting

I never work with Godaddy Hosting before until  a client ask me to transfer wordpress blog that sold through flippa to Godaddy Hosting.

Little bit confusing for moment since you must click a few link to get hosting panel and I create this post for my future work 🙂

Access Godaddy Web Hosting

Login to your godaddy account and click My Account.

Click Web Hosting link under Hosting Management .

Existing web hosting located under Plan column.

To access it click Launch button.

More

How to backup primary domain wordpress file on shared hosting

One of my client ask me to backup his blog. He has 5 domain on shared hosting account. Let say his domain are :

  1. DomainA
  2. DomainB
  3. DomainC
  4. DomainD
  5. DomainE

DomainA is his primary domain for his shared hosting account and he want to backup this blog.

Shared hosting (cpanel way) usually add ‘add on domain’ inside primary domain. The structure like this :

DomainA

+DomainB

+DomainC

+DomainD

+DomainE

+wp-config.php

+wp-content

etc.

My suggestion is : only backup wp-content folder and put .sql file inside this folder.

Compress the folder and download to your computer.

Simple 🙂

Close all outbound link with nofollow wordpress plugin

One of my domain getting old ( 8 years old) and I believe full of link, either from comment or from the link I entered myself. My friend tell me not to let so many outbound link with do follow attribute  and since I move the engine to wordpress I can do it easily with wordpress plugin.

Name of that great Plugin is

WP Nofollow Post

Yes, I found its very easy to manage all link inside your blog to follow or do follow.

After install the plugin you can setting the plugin as seen on the picture

1. Enable the plugin by change status to enabled.

2. Choose where you want the plugin to work ; Post & Pages, Post or Pages only.

3. Enter domain you want to exclude, separate each with commas.

4. Enter Nofollow rels (let it as is)

5. Dofollow rels (let is as is)

Click Save Changes.

Note :

If you view source of this post you’ll see this code for plugin name

<a href="http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wp-nofollow-post/" 
target="_blank" rel="external nofollow">

Cool eh 🙂

Howto insert ads easily with ad injection wp plugin

Ad blindness is one factor that decrease income specially if the visitor came regularly. Many ways people do to combat that problem. Change theme, change font or change ad position.

When you change ad manually you’ll soon get bored for doing it over and over again. That’s why ad injection plugin came to rescue.

Installation process is straight easy as other wordpress plugin.

click add new under plugins section, enter keyword “ad injection” and hit search plugins button.

Click Install Now link to install and activate.

Ad injection menu will be available under Settings menu.

First step you must do is enable the ads by choose On.

Ad injection offer many combination that need to explore for optimum ads income.

More

Download failed.: Could not create Temporary file

Downloading update from http://wordpress.org/wordpress-3.0.3.zip…

Download failed.: Could not create Temporary file.

Installation Failed

Quick solution for that case (choose only one) :

1. Create upgrade directory under wp-content

Open ftp client and access wordpress directory

right click and choose “make directory”

enter the name  “upgrade” and click OK

chmod new folder “upgrade”  to 777.

2. Chmod wp-content directory

Chmod folder wp-content 777 in recursive and change back to 755 after upgrade process.

Manage Affiliate Link with Kaitora Affiliate System

Typing affiliate link each time you find suitable keyword will be daunting task and another problem will appear when the company decide to change affiliate link structure. Find the link one by one will be a nightmare 🙂

I just found a wordpress link called Kaitora Affiliate System and I’ll give it a try.

Installation Process

Installation process will be suitable for web hosting that support seamless upgrade and install process aka sudo php. If not, you must upload the file manually using ftp client like filezilla or coreftp.

Click Add New link on WordPress admin

Type “kaitora affiliate system” and hit search plugins button.

More

Upgrade Plugin in WordPress 3

I love WordPress 3! . Recent upgrade I made with hostingformula really exciting. I see many improvement that make self hosted blogger like us easier than before.

One of them is upgrade plugin.

Plugin upgrade notification

Yes, just see number near ‘Plugins’ section, there are 2 upgrade available.

Click the number

Clicking the number bring me to plugin upgrade page.

Choose select all to upgrade all plugins.

Note : make sure to check every plugin compability. I always 100% as my standard.

Click Upgrade button.

Wait for second, depend on your web hosting company speed ( I only need less than 5 seconds to upgrade 2 plugins)

All process successfully applied.

Enjoy the new plugin with ease and hassle free 🙂

See you in next post!

Call to undefined function get_featured_posts_id()

Yet Another Featured Posts Plugin

Yes, that plugin is the answer of that error.

My client buy a wordpress theme with that code as part of the theme and make little panic for while when I get this error message 🙂

Just visit to http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/yet-another-featured-posts-plugin/

and solve your problem 🙂

wp-db.php on line 958 error and wp_memory_limit

I got error message when I try to access Stats menu from my dashboard.

Fatal error: Allowed memory size of 67108864 bytes exhausted (tried to allocate 79 bytes) in /home/hosting/public_html/mydomain.net/wp-includes/wp-db.php on line 958

It seem I have memory limitation and need to reconfigure first some point in my wordpress.

Configure WordPress Memory Limit

Add this line in wp-config.php

define('WP_MEMORY_LIMIT', '64M');

Try again and I have no luck. Still same error.

Move the blog with sub domain in my vps account and set the limit to 384 give me great result.

The problem is 64M already place as highest memory value I can use  as I stand in shared host.

Investigate WordPress database data

wp-db.php related to database and that clue give me hint to phpmyadmin and see the status :

More

How to install cache solution for wordpress blog

I love wordpress as I can concentrate on writing …writing..writing and sleeping 🙂

Of course static HTML files still the best for me and I’d love to use any solution for my blog that will make the load faster and comparable to static files as HTML did.

As WordPress come with support of thousand plugin I decide to use one plugin that use by big player outside.

W3 Total Cache

Yes, I’ll deploy W3 Total Cache for hostingformula.net as I aware I use shared hosting at bluehost.

Install W3 Total Cache

Login to wordpress admin panel and click ‘Add New‘ sub menu under plugins,

More

Upgrade to wordpress 2.9 : Carmen

New WordPress version ready to serve : 2.9

A lot of feature that I like specially ‘trash”.

Sometime I delete wrong post or get it deleted by my friends who try to practice blog ( what an excellent way to destroy my blog )

From wordpress.org :

The coolest new stuff from a user point of view is:

  1. Global undo/”trash” feature, which means that if you accidentally delete a post or comment you can bring it back from the grave (i.e., the Trash). This also eliminates those annoying “are you sure” messages we used to have on every delete.
  2. Built-in image editor allows you to crop, edit, rotate, flip, and scale your images to show them who’s boss. This is the first wave of our many planned media-handling improvements.
  3. Batch plugin update and compatibility checking, which means you can update 10 plugins at once, versus having to do multiple clicks for each one, and we’re using the new compatibility data from the plugins directory to give you a better idea of whether your plugins are compatible with new releases of WordPress. This should take the fear and hassle out of upgrading.
  4. Easier video embeds that allow you to just paste a URL on its own line and have it magically turn it into the proper embed code, with Oembed support for YouTube, Daily Motion, Blip.tv, Flickr, Hulu, Viddler, Qik, Revision3, Scribd, Google Video, Photobucket, PollDaddy, and WordPress.tv (and more in the next release).

Cool eh 🙂

Just reminder. When ordinary upgrade procedure not sufficient you might want to try other procedure as described here :

alternate upgrade wordpress method when new method fail

alternate upgrade wordpress method when new method fail

Upgrade to wordpress seem to be difficult for such conditions :

  • Self hosted wordpress in shared hosting.
  • Self hosted wordpress ( free hosting)
  • Self server with little memory

I face few problem when doing wordpress upgrade.

In this case ” You don’t have sufficient permission to access this page

Upgrade WordPress

Downloading update from http://wordpress.org/wordpress-2.8.3.zip.

Unpacking the update.

Verifying the unpacked filese

Installing the latest version

Upgrading database

WordPress upgraded successfully

That message display when upgrade process went smooth, but when something wrong like insufficient memory that might happen in shared hosting I choose to do in old way : WPAU way.

More

Upgrade self hosted wordpress 2.6.5 to 2.7 RC1

My wife can’t wait any longer for wordpress 2.7. He ask me to upgrade her blog to wordpress 2.7 RC1.

I agree to update her blog but I choose to upgrade mine first, in case of failed upgrade I can learn a lot before taking control my wife blog 🙂

Here’s the steps :

Backup

1. Backup my blog first, start from backup database using shell.

Use cat command to see username, password and database that I use for my blog

cat wp-config.php

Dump database

mysqldump -uonezero5_alam -p onezero5_alamsyah > alamsyah.sql

Compress all files in single tar.gz file

tar cvzf alamsyah.tar.gz alamsyah

I just curious to check how big my blog is 🙂

du -sh alamsyah.tar.gz
36M     alamsyah.tar.gz

Download wordpress 2.7 RC1

wget http://wordpress.org/wordpress-2.7-RC1.zip

Extract the file

unzip wordpress-2.7-RC1.zip

Move to my blog folder and copying all file

cd alamsyah

cp -avr ~/www/wordpress/* .

Don’t use u option, I use u (for update option but I get fail)

2. Upgrade wordpress

Update database by typing my blog adress

http://alamsyah.rasyid.net/wp-admin/upgrade.php

Done

Login to admin to see shiny wordpress 2.7

I can’t wait next 5 days before 2.7 release, please forgive me 😉