My Favorite WordPress Plugins
February 16th, 2009 | 
Author: In support of Plugin Developer’s Day I list my favorite WordPress Plugins, the plugins that I use at DougWeb.com and PopularWireless.com. WordPress plugin developers truly make the blogging experience a positive one. A blog without a developer’s plugin is just a naked blog.
Akismet is absolutely essential. It may be the single most important plugin a WordPress blog can have. Akismet deals with spam. It prevents spam from appearing on your blog so you don’t have to. In addition to using Akismet I also have moderation set so that I have to approve all comments. Some think that’s lame but I consider it safe. Some link spammers get through and I do not want their link spam visible on my blogs where unsuspecting readers might click through. Akismet rocks!
This unique plugin optimizes your blog for search engines. It works right out-of-the-box. No set up necessary.
This plugin allows the blog owner to include a news item at the top of the blog page. While you can now make any post stick to the top of a WOrdPress blog after version 2.7 this plugin includes additional time and event based functionality.
Blog Copyright (by BTE)
Simple plugin that inserts a formatted copyright statement into the blog footer.
This is a neat contact form for a WordPress bog. AKismet users are protected against spammers that WILL try to use the form.
The DDAY widget is an event calendar that shows the number of days preceding the date of a specific event. You can also show how many days since an event took place. You have to enter all of the dates yourself. It is an entertaining plugin, great for a blog that has an organizations with lots of events.
I like flickrRSS because I can show the first several photos from my favorite flickr sets. This was the easiest of the various plugins for me to master.
A spell check plug in for those folks not using a browser that includes one.
I use Google Analytics. This plugin makes using the service very easy on a WordPress blog. The fewer blog templates I have to edit the better.
This neat plugin creates a sitemap that Ask, Google, MSN, and YAHOO can use. Each time to you crate a post or a page the map updates or you can update it at will.
I STRONGLY encourage membership in Project Honey Pot. The only good spammer is one that has been identified and put out of business. Data from Project Honey Pot is used to block identified IP addresses from spamming your blog.
This replaces WordPress Admin menus with a CSS drop down menu bar. I really like the functionality of these menus. There are fewer clicks from here to there within the blog. The default side-mounted menus are hard for me to get used to. The top menu bar makes the blog look more like a Windows application. My only gripe is the noisy way the TOOLS menu wraps when it wraps at 15 items.
Do you find yourself adding links to favorite words, names, titles, or places? Using this widget you can do it automatically.
In my opinion, this is the better of the various sharing plugins.
Sphere Related Content
Sphere functionality allows your users to find other articles on the net asscoiated with the same topic. It is a very slick service that adds a suit-and-tie appeal to a blog.
Times to Come Stop BOT Registration
When I found this plugin my anti-spam arsenal was complete. Spammers are the vandals of the Internet. This great plugin skims the pond scum from the surface of the Internet. When a comment spammer’s bot tries to register the plugin prevents it. My impression is that the plugin is 99.9 percent effective. I knew that lots of the new registered users were not real but until I used this I had no clue many of the new registrations were actually done by BOTS.
When my website was hacked by a religion of peace to leave a message of hate and discontent I needed to know when it happened. Using this plugin I was able to determine what file in my site was modified and when.
This unique plugin gives you a visitor-by-visitor view of your blog. You can see the spammers, bloggers, registered users, and so on. Using a GOOGLE Maps API Key you can even see where your users are from on a real-time basis.
Giving each user a wavatar is fun. It adds character to the blog.
I like the idea of displaying a custom welcome message. That’s what this plugin does.
Take advantage of this service from WordPress.com. You get a day-by-day, page-by-page, post-by-post view of the success or lack of same of your blog. Between WordPress.com stats and Google Analytics I have a pretty good idea what I’ve done write or wrong with my blogs.
This CAPTCHA type product helps prevent bots from posting comments on your blog. It is easy to set up and easy to use. A very good choice for new bloggers because of its simplicity.
This plugin allows me to backup my database. Backup often.
Plugins by Lester “GaMerZ” Chan
Lester writes really great and extraordinarily useful plugins. Looking over his work you can only be amazed. Using his plug ins you can only be impressed. Lester rocks. I use these plugins by Lester:
Displays a printable version of your blog posts.
Everything you need to do about your server environment. Lester!
My host uses a shared database environment and does not provide access to the required mySQL options like mySQLdump so backups using this plugin are not possible but other essential functions are possible. Again Lester rocks!
My favorite of Lester’s plugins. You can ban an IP address from accessing your blog. Spammer IP addresses are blocked here.
This very fast caching module can improve the responsiveness of a popular blog.
Comment here or on the Faster-better BBS
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Can I have a cuter Wavatar?
You can go to the Gravatar site and make one that is associated with your email address you use for blogging and that should show up on your posts. The images created here are completely automatic. Each is associated with your email address and I have no way of changing them. They are totally random pictures.
I may have missed some really great plugins.
WP Easy Uploader
This plugin rocks. I no longer have to have an FTP client with me. When I need to upload something to a directory I have already created this terrific plugin does the work.
WP Footnotes
Every once in a while I like to be a bit more academic about a post so pull out my copy of Turabian and use the functionality in WP Footnotes.