Rclone is an amazing command line app for syncing files virtually anywhere. With recent added support for SFTP it's become a core part of my daily backup script. You can connect any number of remote storage systems. If you're only working with a few websites, then importing SFTP credentials isn't necessary as you can manually…
This past month I had a number of customers report that their website was running slow. This seemed to affect every web request, with some requests taking well over 4 seconds. I suspected a bad plugin was causing the bottleneck. Typically the first troubleshooting step is to create a staging site and deactivate plugins…
Over the last few months I’ve had privilege to be part of WP Engine’s SSH alpha SSH access is a big deal for WP Engine and for the entire managed WordPress hosting ecosystem. It’s currently under limited beta, however I do hope it’s released publicly soon. Using WP Engine’s SSH is similar to other…
Managed WordPress web hosts typically do nightly backups. That’s a great start however if something is important you should have multiple backups. My secondary backup method is a daily script which runs on a Backupsy VPS with lots of storage. There are two parts to the script. First an incremental sync download each WordPress…
Recently one of my customer’s WordPress sites was filled with random hidden span tags containing a single word: “Save.” The source is a mystery, however I suspect it came from bad code rather then something malicious. It was showing up at random spots throughout the website and causing some display issues. Manual removal was…
Using a staging site is great for troubleshooting, however you don’t typically want your staging site sending out email notifications. Luckily there is an easy solution to this problem by using both the Log Emails and Disable Emails plugins. With these two plugins installed and activated, all outgoing messages will be disabled and logged within the WordPress…
WordPress makes is fairly straightforward to update your themes and plugins. Tools like ManageWP make it easy to update everything for all of your WordPress sites. That said, keeping your paid themes & plugins updated can take extra effort. Here are some tips to make sure your WordPress sites receive all of their updates.…
The main WooCommerce plugin is free but WooCommerce is more than just a single plugin it’s an entire ecosystem unto itself. Recently WooCommerce changed how they handle their paid extensions. They switched from license keys to a license activation system which requires you to connect your WordPress website with your WordPress.com/WooCommerce account. Without license…
Having your website send emails successfully is more difficult than it should be. Earlier this year WP Engine moved all of my dedicated servers over to Google’s infrastructure. Google’s has some pretty strict rules with emails which help keep their infrastructure spam free. While this does present a bit of annoyance, there are workarounds.…
In March I gave my first WordCamp talk at WordCamp Lancaster called “Staying Sane While Maintaining Hundreds of WordPress Sites”. It was a great experience and I will plan on a future talk. I was hesitant due to the fact that it was my first time and is therefore a little rough. Even so,…