PlanetMike's Technology Journal

Update 2009-03-31: I am no longer maintaining this plugin. WordPress’ built-in system for notifying admins of updates to WP or plugins is much better than this hack. And under 2.7x, the reminder text looks really bad.

This plugin adds a reminder tip (in large red letters) in the top right corner of your WordPress admin pages. The text is a link to the appropriate page in the wp-admin area. Reminders include:

• Making a backup of your database (every Friday)
• Checking your spam for false positives (every Wednesday)
• Other tasks that are easy to forget (every third Monday)

This plugin does not modify any system settings. It only reads from the database to see what directory your WordPress is installed into. You do not need to edit your templates. I have tested WARP on WordPress versions 2.2.3; 2.3.1; 2.33; 2.5.x; and 2.6.x. While it works with 2.7, it doesn’t look very nice, so I’ve stopped updating the plugin.

One tool you can use to backup your database is the WordPress Database Backup plugin. If you use some other system to backup your database that is fine. The important thing is that you regularly make a backup of your database.

Checking your comments tagged as spam is assuming you are using Akismet.

Installation

1. Download WARP to the plugins directory under wp-content of your blog.
2. Unzip the warp.zip file.
3. Activate the plugin on your plugins page.
4. (Optional) I suggest you subscribe to my RSS feed so you can stay informed about any updates to WARP.

Uninstall

1. Deactivate the plugin on your plugins page.
2. Delete warp.php from your plugins directory, under wp-content of your blog directory.

If you discover any problems, or have any suggestions on improving WARP, please contact me.

Payment

Using WARP is free, you do not have to pay me anything. If you find it useful, and you’d like to pay me, any (or all!) of the following would be greatly appreciated:

• Subscribe to my RSS feed.
• Blog about the WARP plugin, tell your readers about it.
• Make a donation to me.
• Buy me something from my Amazon Wishlist.

History

• March 28, 2008: Version 1.01. Updated internal URLs, changed version number to 1.01 (some plugin lists don’t like version numbers greater 127) no functionality changes. Tested on WP 2.5RC2
• December 12, 2007: Initial release (version number 2007), with reminders through December 15, 2008.