Using a Static Front Page With WordPress
It seems that the WordPress guys are getting the static front page functionality sorted out. I know it's been available for a while, but the truth is it's never worked very well until now.
When you go into your admin pages and choose Settings, Reading, you can specify whether you want to display your latest posts on the front page, or one of your existing pages, i.e. a static front page. You can also specify a page to display your posts.
The good thing about the latest version, is that all the "behind the scenes" stuff works. For example, the front page responds to the is_front_page() function whether you're displaying a static page or your latest posts. Read more on Using a Static Front Page With WordPress →
I’m Ditching Post IDs In WordPress Permalinks
You probably know that you can change the URL of your WordPress posts by using a custom permalink structure. I've always done that, primarily for search engine benefit, and until just recently I've been using a custom permalink structure of;
/%category%/%postname%-%post_id%/
This was all well and good, until I needed to move one of my blogs. I couldn't do a database move and had to export and then import the blog content. That's when it all started to get messy. When I imported the posts into the new blog, all the post IDs changed.
You'd sort of expect that really, but what I never thought about was that it also meant all the post permalinks changed too, because the post ID formed part of the URL. Ummm.. bad. Permalinks are supposed to be permanent. Read more on I'm Ditching Post IDs In WordPress Permalinks →
Hi there. My name is Peter Coughlin. I am a freelance web developer living in the UK, and at the moment I am specialising in WordPress customisation.