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Sorry. This site was down for a couple of days due to transferring to a new server. Now everything is back to normal. In the near future, it’ll be moved to this web address: http://www.learningwp.com. See you there soon.

Update: When I played around with my database’s ‘import’ and ‘export’ functions. I accidentally deleted this post. So I created this new one here.

I’ve just transferred this WordPress blog (WordPress 2.6.1) to a new host - hostmonster.com. The reason I wanted to switch to hostmonster.com is that not only it provides reasonable price but also offers unlimited hosting space, unlimited site bandwidth, and hosting unlimited domains. With $5.95/month, you can get as many as 100 SQL (Structured Query Language) databases. This is really a good deal in comparison to my previous host which only offered 1 SQL database with $9.95/month.

However transferring your WordPress blog/website to a new host is not an easy job; especially if you are new to this realm. If one day for any reason you decide to transfer your current WordPress blog/website to a new host, these are the steps I make it as smooth as it could be for you:

• First find a host that meets all your needs.

• Second use FTP to backup your WordPress files to your computer or laptop.

• Third backup (export) your WordPRess database to your computer or laptop using phpMyAdmin in your current host’s cPanel. Check WordPress Backup with phpMyAdmin out for more details.

• Next use FTP to upload your WordPress files that you’ve backed up earlier to your new host’s root directory or any directory you prefer.

• Next create a new database using MySQL ® Database Wizard in your new host’s cPanel. See WordPress Tutorial: Setting Up A MySQL Database With cPanel for more details.

• Next change the information about your database or the absolute path before uploading (importing) it to your new host. Make sure you choose binary from Character set of the file otherwise some punctuation like apostrophe will not show properly. See the screenshot below:

• Then download your wp_config.php file, which should be in your root directory, to your computer or laptop;  edit the following lines and then upload it back to the same directory:
  

  define(’DB_NAME’, ‘databasename‘); // Change database name to be your actual database name define(’DB_USER’, ‘mysqlusername‘); // Change mysql username to be your MySQL username define(’DB_PASSWORD’, ‘mysqlpassword‘); // Change mysql password to be your actual password define(’DB_HOST’, ‘localhost’); // 99% chance you won’t need to change this value.

• Finally point your domain to your new host’s name servers. In my case, they look like these: ns1.hostmonster.com and ns2.hostmonster.com. If you are not sure then you can ask your current host to have that done for you. Please be aware that DNS (Domain Name System) takes 24 to 48 hours to be completed due to DNS’ propagation.

Once you find out that everything is working properly, inform your current host to cancel your account. That is it. Any questions please ask in the comment section.

Technorati Tags: new host, transfer domain, transfer WordPress, WordPress blog

I missed the opportunity to upgrade to WordPress 2.6. Now WordPress 2.6.1 was released on Friday, August 15, 2008. It fixed a bunch of bugs. These include “several improvements for international users.  Styling of the admin for right-to-left languages is much improved thanks to the efforts of the Farsi and Hebrew translation teams, and a mysterious gettext bug caused by certain PHP configurations is now fixed.  For IIS users, 2.6.1 fixes several permalink problems. Image insertion problems in the Press This feature experienced by IE users are also fixed. Of note to everyone is a fix for a performance bug in the admin where those with a lot of plugins would experience slowness on some pages.” You may also want to find out the full list of over 60 fixes to see what WordPress 2.6.1 has to offer.

I just upgraded my existing WordPress version to WordPress 2.6.1 a moment ago. Everything went smoothly. If you are ready to upgrade to WordPress 2.6.1, then you may find the following steps useful:

• First of all you need to check whether you meet the minimum requirement. You can use the following code to check your minimum requirement.
  

  <?phpinfo();?>

  Here is what you need to do: Save the above code in a file as checkphpNmysql.php or any name you want. Then upload that file to your public_html directory, and run it as http://www.yoursitename.com/checkphpNmysql.php in your browser to find out your PHP version and MySQL version right away. Make sure you replace yoursitename with your own domain name.

• If you fulfill the minimum requirement, then you have two choices: (1) You can get WordPress Automatic Upgrade Plugin to upgrade for you in about two minutes. I’ve never tried it before so you are taking that choice on your own risk. (2) Alternatively you may upgrade to WordPress 2.6.1 manually.

• Next back up your database. Follow These instructions if you don’t know how.

• Use any FTP to back up ALL of your files in your WordPress directory to your PC (personal computer).

• Check your backups to see they are usable.

• Make sure you deactivate All your plugins.

• Download and unzip WordPress 2.6.1 here to your PC.

• Delete the old WordPress files except the following files:
  • wp-config.php file
  • wp-content folder
  • wp-images folder (only older installations from 1.5.x days will have this folder)
  • wp-includes/languages/folder; if you are using a language file, and it is here rather than in wp-content/languages/, do not delete this folder (you might want to move your language files to wp-content/languages/ for easier upgrading in the future)
  • .htaccess file (if you have added custom rules to your .htaccess, do not delete it)
  • Custom Content and/or Plugins (if you have any images or other custom content or Plugins inside the wp-content folder, do not delete them).

• Upload your unzipped wordpress-2.6.1 files to your WordPress directory.

• Run http://www.yoursitename.com/wp-admin/ as your normal login. From there it will direct you whether you need to upgrade your database or not. Make sure you replace yoursitename with your own domain name.

• If your WordPress is resided in a subdirectory called blog, then you need to run it as http://www.yoursitename.com/blog/wp-admin/ or http://www.blog/yoursitename.com/wp-admin/ depending on how you set up your blog.

• The last step is to make sure you reactivate those plugins that you deactivated earlier.

Did you see your new WordPress 2.6.1 interface? How do you like about it?

Technorati Tags: upgrade, upgrades, WordPress 2.6.1, WordPress blog