Tag: wordpress

90 Percent of the Time it Works Every Time

Posted by Megan Jonas On July 11, 2015

Repeat after me: When in doubt, it’s almost always a plugin conflict. It’s almost ALWAYS a plugin conflict.

You know how sometimes, when you’re having a problem at work and you can’t figure it out, you just need to step away for a bit and the answer miraculously comes to you?

I have a very complex site I am working on, and for some reason, a perfectly coded membership system was generating 404 pages for all member profiles. The pages existed, the code looked good, but there came the 404 page, all the same.

Since the site is complex, with multiple layers and plugins to generate forums, a membership system, a link to an email service provider, and other items, I assumed that the code was the problem and started to dissect the files that were creating the profiles, to no avail. I couldn’t figure out what was causing this 404 response.

So I did what most developers would do, I googled it. And it was at that point that I was reminded – here it comes – when in doubt, it’s almost always a plugin conflict.

I turned off all the plugins except the membership forum system and voila! a working profile page. Then I turned the plugins back on, one by one, and discovered that the plugin that was generating the 404 page was the plugin that had the conflict (this should probably have been my first idea, right?).

So… a problem that caused me a sleepless night and several hours of work could have been pretty easily fixed by just remembering that – when in doubt, it’s almost always a plugin conflict. Despite the complexity and customization of the site, it’s almost always a plugin conflict. Despite my growing fluency in the code, it’s almost always a plugin conflict.

Because – all things being equal, the simplest explanation is almost always the right one.

Don’t Always Do The Easy Things First

Posted by Megan Jonas On July 10, 2015

Like any web developer just starting out, sometimes I have days where it seems like nothing works. Today is one of those days. I have one site where all of the out of the box solutions are failing in one way or another, forcing me to dig into code that I had no intention of changing. I have another site where, try what I may, I can’t seem to access the FTP servers. I have googled. I have changed settings. I have contacted support at the hosting company. Nothing is working.

On days like today, my inclination is to set these items aside and do the “easy” things first. Starting new projects, writing blog posts (procrastination alert!), and sending emails sounds like a better option than trying to figure out these issues.

But it’s not always a great idea to set aside the hard things. They need to get figured out at some point and that point needs to be soon for at least one of those sites. So I will continue to plug away at these issues and hopefully at least one of them will get solved.

Hosting Your Site or Why Your Developer Really Wants to Handle This For You

Posted by Megan Jonas On January 26, 2015

A few months ago, I attend WordCamp in Raleigh. One of the earliest sessions discussed how to turn this whole web design and development hobby into an actual, pay-the-bills kind of job. The head of that session explained that he handles the hosting for most of his clients – not actually physically hosting their sites on his own machines, but he purchases and administers the remote hosting from reputable third party companies and passes along the cost to the client.

At the time, the only think I could think is why would a client pay you $60 a month when they could easily set up a hosting account for somewhere around a fifth of that cost. It felt, frankly, like a little bit of a money grab and was, in all fairness, explained as a great source of passive income. I quickly forgot about that as an option and moved on.

Fast forward to the last three weeks, during which I have fought tooth and nail for clients to give me access to their FTP and hosting accounts so that I could make significant changes to websites. (P.S. why does everyone suddenly want a website facelift in January? Is this a new resolution trend, like going to the gym more and trying not to eat exclusively from the office snack machine?)

The first client involves a third-party go-between who doesn’t understand exactly how this all works. The second client hosts their site themselves and was extremely hesitant to give me access to their servers. Because of these back and forth and a general misunderstanding of how websites actually work, I am now three weeks behind on at least one of those projects.

And so I say to you, person who wants someone else to handle their website, please allow me to handle not only the design and development, but also the hosting. I promise I won’t gouge you on prices, and you get the added benefit of me being the person that handles server issues, instead of someone in IT, or even you yourself.

Hello, Tech Support?

Posted by Megan Jonas On August 21, 2011

When I worked at a traditional television network, there were two kinds of tech support.

Our IT guys worked primarily on our regular desktop computers, installing programs, updating systems, and setting up our Blackberries (I had three in the course of two years).

Our engineering staff worked on all of the servers, transponders, and other mess of wiring behind master control which actually made the network go up to the satellite and back down to cable systems across the country. These guys were amazing. I could give them incomplete coordinates for a satellite feed that I needed, like, five minutes ago and they’d find it, downlink it, and get it on the air.

Now that I’m working on a website, I find myself in need of an additional brand of tech support. Video for TV and video for the web are two very different animals. The shooting and editing are the same, but the encoding, uploading, and display seem to be a never ending headache.

We decided early on that we were going to build an HTML5 compatible site, with all of the bells and whistles. Unfortunately, the video standards are -not- standard, and trying to balance quality with file size is becoming a huge headache. We’re also working from a WordPress CMS, in the interest of ease for those colleagues who are not web people, but we’re finding the quirks of the system to be a little constraining.

Oh, and did I mention that we’re supposed to be live in 24-hours?

It’s going to be a long day, but when it’s over (probably Tuesday or Wednesday) we’re going to have a site up at Northwestern’s News 21. Wish me luck.

Megan Jonas