Lorelle, the consummate WordPress blogger, wants to know what you look for in a WordPress host. She hates hers, and is shopping around.

What do you look for?

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MySQL 4.1 has a bug that prevents WordPress 2.1 from displaying accented characters correctly. Instead, they appear as ? marks.

To fix this, open /wp-includes/wp-db.php
and look for this line:
$this->dbh = @mysql_connect($dbhost, $dbuser, $dbpassword);
(it’s around line 52).

Immediately after that line, add:
mysql_query("SET NAMES 'utf8'");

Save and re-upload the file, and you should see accented characters as usual.

Via

If you are a WebbleYou customer and require accented character support, please contact us and we will be happy to make the necessary changes. No alterations to the database are necessary.

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Lorelle has a list of template and function differences between WP2.0.x and WP2.1. They are quite substantial.

Most importantly, WordPress 2.1 requires a server that is running MySQL 4.x. MySQL 3.x will not work, and will cause error messages to be displayed.

If you have any questions about upgrading, please contact us. We do all WP upgrades upon request, at no charge to customers.

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WordPress just announced the release of version 2.1, which WebbleYou, as the premier host of WordPress-powered independent weblogs, will be installing and supporting immediately.

New customers who sign up today will have WordPress 2.1 preinstalled, and existing customers may request an upgrade (at no charge) by contacting WebbleYou support.

WP 2.1 has a slew of new features, including:

• Autosave
• Tabbed WYSIWYG/HTML editor
• More time-saving Ajax features, so you can edit your blog without reloading pages
• Improved Dashboard and Page writing features

WordPress has also announced an aggressive new upgrade schedule, with the next release set for April 23rd. More at the WordPress Development Blog

Note that there are expected to be some plugin compatibility issues, which you can read about and check on.

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Alex King, one of the leading WordPress developers, has a great social-web plugin called Share This. You may know Alex from your blogroll if you never deleted the links that get pre-installed with every copy of WordPress (consequently, he is the #1 Alex in Google search results).

Share This saves you from cluttering your site with eight million links to social bookmarking sites, and lets you follow each post with a single icon. Users can click this icon to see a multitude of social bookmarking options:

You can see it on Geektronica.com or on Alex’s blog.

Some install notes:

• Your theme needs to use the wp_footer(); function
• You may need to adjust the CSS in the plugin file to get the colors to look right on your site
• You will need to upload the Prototype.js JavaScript library to get it to work. This is included with the download, and goes in /wp-includes/js.

WebbleYou is proud to support the use of this plugin. Please contact us if you are a WebbleYou customer and would like to use this plugin on your site.

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Lorelle on WordPress has a post on the upcoming release of WP 2.1, which will be a fairly major feature, interface, and architecture update.

Judging from Aaron Brazell’s recommendations to plugin authors, it looks like not all current plugins will continue to work with WP2.1. If you are planning to upgrade, then, it’d be best to do the following:

• Find out if others are using your plugins with WP2.1 successfully before upgrading
• Back up your WP files and WP database before upgrading, in case you decide to go back to 2.0.6
• Be prepared to give up a plugin or two, at least until it’s upgraded for 2.1 compatibility
• Conditionalize your plugin calls, so your site doesn’t show errors when you deactivate plugins

As always, we will be testing and supporting WP 2.1, and will be upgrading existing accounts upon request.

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WordPress 2.0.6 has been released, and as always, we will be installing the new version for new accounts.

If you are an existing customer and would like to have your site upgraded, please contact us and we will perform the upgrade.

This is a good time to mention the importance of backing up your database. If you don’t have the WordPress database backup plugin, contact us and we’ll add it for you.

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We are proud to announce that our new Toronto datacenter is now online, and we have resumed setup of new accounts.

Along with the new datacenter come several other improvements. First, we are pleased to introduce our new control panel, which will allow for greater flexibility, scalability, and expanded service offerings in the near future.

Second, our server architecture will allow for greater resiliency and speed. Our new hardware is significantly faster, and our 5×1 RAID configuration serves MySQL databases at unprecedented speed.

Third, we will soon be unveiling more hosting plans and payment options to meet virtually any need.

Thank you for your patience during this transition.

You can sign up for hosting here, and order a domain here.

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WordPress 2.0.5 is now available, and as always, WebbleYou will be preinstalling, supporting, and (upon request) upgrading to this version.

This is not a major feature release, but the WP team recommends upgrading because of the enhanced security of this release. We will be testing the new version to make sure their are no bugs that will affect users (one remains to be seen).

This is also a good time to remind everyone to use the WordPress database backup plugin, in case something happens while you’re using your site (our systemwide backups aren’t good for restoring individual databases). If you need help with any of this, or have any questions, please contact us.

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WebbleYou is proud to release the alpha edition of the LogoFriendly theme, which is in use on this site. This theme is highly customizable, and very easy to use. Read more

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