This blog was recently ported over from S9Y (Serendipity) to WordPress. I’m really loving WordPress. There’s a huge install base and community of users and developers. The OS running on my home server is the latest Debian release.
The current WordPress theme is called Amazing Grace by Vladimir Prelovac. I added a Page Template called “nobars.php”. Nobars.php contains all the code from index.php and footer.php minus the call to the get_sidebar() function (which oddly resides in footer.php). I then added modified style information to widen #content to 1000px. I use this Page Template for the “QSO Query” page so all the information is displayed horizontally without scroll bars. I also modified the header.php file. I changed the code that normally displays all pages in the top row and categories in the bottom row to display selected pages in both rows.
I also modified the stock images used in the header and added about 15 more. I had to change the random number limit parameter to a higher value. I changed the RSS image to one which shows a pile of tiny QSL cards.
I have also modified the search function to look for QSL Cards by name in the NextGen Gallery.
The Javascript Widget that displays ZULU time in one of the side bars has been slightly modified also.
I would like to geocode all the QSL Card images so I could plot the location on a world map, but experiments with Google Maps showed that the plotting speed would be a factor. I haven’t given up yet though.
The perils of hosting a web site.
The Internet is a real cesspool. If you don’t believe me, create a web site with any content and look at your Apache logs. If you use WordPress, you will almost immediately start getting content spam. Write an article about your new HF rig and the first comment will be something like “Hey, nice web site. Click here to buy Viagra, get your penis enlarged or buy drugs for less.” It soon becomes impossible to keep this crap out of your web site unless you use something like Akismet to intercept it. In the 5 minutes I’ve spent adding to this article, I have a pending nonsense comment from Akismet. A quick check of the IP address shows the source is some middle eastern terrorist haven. I used .htaccess to block the entire Class C network this spam came from. The Communist Chinese are by far the biggest offender. Probably 10 percent of the hits to this web site are from Red China. I have never talked to a Red Chinese ham. If you do manage to talk to one, he will probably be some bastard Commie Party official who has the special priviledge to get a license and transmit from this dictator run paradise. I use “Apache Log Viewer” from http://www.iannet.org/ and the Red Chinese hits show up in red because they trigger a 403 Forbidden HTTP status code (because they are blocked by my .htaccess file).
Keep your software up to date and your server patched. The bots will quickly find targets of interest based on the type of software you are running. I would not dream of running a web site using Microsoft IIS. You will be a target of a million bots and 13 year old script kiddies wanting to turn your web site into a zombie for Spam or DOS attacks. I also run a web site for genealogy. What could be more innocent than a web site dedicated to your family history? I use a package called PhpGedView for genealogy and since there have been several exploits discovered in previous versions, I get a constant stream of hits looking for these exploits. If you don’t keep on top of things, your innocent little web site will be turned into a Spam generator or DOS zombie.
I have a contact page on all my web sites for the convenience of visitors looking for more information. When someone fills in the form, I get an email. Recently, I was getting flooded with emails caused by bots that discovered this page. Tracing the IP addresses, I discovered they were coming from Tor sites (see http://www.torproject.org/). Tor is a handy way to anonymously surf kiddie porn sites and harass people on Facebook. Like I said, the Internet is a cesspool. Since there are thousands of Tor sites, it’s nearly impossible to block them all. My solution to this particular irritation was to change the URL to the contact page. Don’t use the word “contact” in the URL for your contact page. If the bots find it again, I’ll just change the URL again.
Is it all worth it? More and more I think not.