Ghacks.net WordPress Plugin List

Back in 2010 I published a list of WordPress plugins that were installed here on the site. You can see the original WordPress plugin listing with a click on the link.

This article looks at the WordPress plugins that are installed today here on Ghacks. If you compare this listing with the one from 2010, you will notice that some plugins had to go, and that a lot have been added to the site.

WordPress plugins extend the blog in a similar fashion that Firefox add-ons or Google Chrome extension the browser. They most of the time add functionality that the default WordPress installation is not offering, and sometimes modify or remove existing features or options.

WordPress Plugin List

Akismet – Without doubt the anti-spam plugin for WordPress blogs. You need an Akismet key before you can use the plugin. I have tried other plugins in the past but non came close in terms of protection.All In One SEO Pack – The SEO plugin back then, and a good choice today. There are better plugins available, like Yoast’s WordPress SEO plugin but it still does its job. I’m mainly keeping it as I do not want to risk that a migration changes core settings.Broken Link Checker – An essential plugin that verifies that links posted on the blog are not broken or redirecting. A few dozen links break every week, and this plugin helps me correct the issues quickly.Category SEO Meta Tags – Categories in WordPress do not have their own meta tags, which in turn means that you cannot add your own descriptions to your categories. This plugin resolves the issue.Contact Form ][ – A contact plugin for WordPress. Easy to setup, does its job well.DB Cache Reloaded Fix – A database caching plugin for WordPress. Caches database queries to reduce the load on the database server.Google XML Sitemaps – Creates sitemaps and submits them to various search engines like Google, Yahoo, Bing or Ask.Hyper Cache – A caching system for WordPress that works well with DB Cache Reloaded Fix. Better than other caching plugins in my opinion.Internal Link Building – Create links automatically on your site.MaGiKS Geo Country – A premium plugin that I use to geo-target advertisement on the blog.PubSubHubbub – Helps you fight scraper sites (those that publish your RSS feed completely on other sites). This basically tells Google and other search engines that you are the content creator.Smart Archives Reloaded – Powers the Ghacks archive section.Subscribe To Comments – Adds comment subscription options. This basically sends out notifications if new article comments have been posted.Thank Me Later – Sends a thank you email to first time users who leave a comment on the site.WordPress Download Monitor – This plugin powers the download section here on Ghacks. I use it as a repository for programs that are otherwise no longer available on the Internet. This is for instance the case when the developer website gets closed.WP-PageNavi – Better page navigation for WordPress blogs. Also better for search engine indexation.WP-Print – Powers the print option that removes much of the clutter from a page before the printing.WP Minify – Reduces the size of CSS and JavaScript before it gets loaded by a site visitor. Speeds up page loading time.WPtouch Pro – Another premium plugin that powers the Ghacks mobile site.YARPP Experiments – Improves the functionality of the YARPP plugin. See below.Yet Another Related Posts Plugin – Displays related posts for each WordPress post.Yoast Breadcrumbs – Powers the breadcrumb navigation on the site.

As you can see, I have installed many new plugins in the past two years. Let me know if you have questions about a particular plugin, or if you’d like to recommend another plugin.

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Don’t upgrade to WordPress 2.3 yet About the Author:Martin Brinkmann is a journalist from Germany who founded Ghacks Technology News Back in 2005. He is passionate about all things tech and knows the Internet and computers like the back of his hand. You can follow Martin on Facebook or Twitter.Author: Martin Brinkmann, Wednesday March 7, 2012 -
Tags:wordpress, wordpress plugins

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How To Analyze WordPress Plugin Performances

I have been using WordPress ever since I started blogging here on Ghacks in 2005. It has been a pleasant ride most of the time, with the occasional rough bump down the road. As a WordPress administrator, you have access to thousands of different plugins that extend or improve the blog’s functionality. One issue that you may experience after installing plugins is that your site may load slower than before. Plugins can have an impact on the site’s load time, the server load and overall performance. The more plugins you have installed, the slower your site may become.

That’s a big issue in times where search engines are favoring fast loading websites. It also may mean that you have to upgrade your hosting to keep up with the performance requirements of your website.

P3, Plugin Performance Profiler, is a free WordPress plugin that analyzes the performance of frontend plugins. Frontend plugins are all plugins that are executed during page loading time.

Installation

Just open Plugins > Add New in your WordPress admin dashboard and search for P3. Click on the Install Now link to install the plugin, and on Activate on the next screen to activate it. You can alternatively download it from the official WordPress Plugin repository to install it manually on your blog.

Usage

Open Tools > P3 Plugin Profiler and click the Start Scan button to run the standard scan. The program will load several posts and pages from your site to calculate individual plugin performance data. You can alternatively run a manual scan instead, which allows you to pick the pages and posts that you want to load on the site. The benefit here is that you can specify exactly which posts and pages you want to use for the sample.

Once done, results are displayed in the program interface.

You should now see the average plugin impact on the site’s load time, the number of MySQL queries that are run per visit and a runtime breakdown by plugin.

If plugin impact appears to be to high, or if you have a plugin installed that is using a lot of resources, you may want to consider replacing it or removing it completely from the site. You can deactivate plugins before you run the test again to see if the deactivation has a positive impact on the frontend page loading times. You could furthermore install an alternative to see if it is lighter on the resource side.

There is however no option to compare scans with each other, which is unfortunately. It is also not clear why the performance profiler itself is listed in the results, as it does not really make a whole lot of sense.

Still, if you are hearing complaints from readers or are noticing server peak load times and resource usage, you may want to check out the Plugin Performance Profiler plugin to see which plugin may be causing it.

Enjoyed the article?: Then sign-up for our free newsletter or RSS feed to kick off your day with the latest technology news and tips, or share the article with your friends and contacts on Facebook or Twitter. Free Anti Spam Plugin Antispam Bee For WordPress
WordPress one click installation of plugins and themes
Don’t upgrade to WordPress 2.3 yet
WordPress 2.5 coming soon
WordPress 2.5.1 released About the Author:Martin Brinkmann is a journalist from Germany who founded Ghacks Technology News Back in 2005. He is passionate about all things tech and knows the Internet and computers like the back of his hand. You can follow Martin on Facebook or Twitter.Author: Martin Brinkmann, Sunday January 15, 2012 -
Tags:wordpress, wordpress plugin, wordpress tips

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