WordPress - Ryan Sechrest

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WordPress

Accomplishments related to WordPress.

GitHub's Octocat standing on the trackpad of a MacBook.

How to enable WordPress to update your custom plugin hosted on GitHub

Most of my WordPress plugins are exclusive to a specific site, but every now and then I'll create a utility plugin that gets installed on multiple sites. Then, whenever I update that plugin, I have to remember which sites have it installed, and manually push that update to

Switchboard used for musical production with the mute button lit up.

cURL error 60: SSL certificate problem: self signed certificate in certificate chain in WordPress

Let's say you're developing locally using something like Valet or are running WordPress on an internal, corporate network. If you try to update WordPress, a plugin, or a theme and see this error message, it could mean that something (like Netskope) is injecting their own SSL

Brain floating on a colorful background.

Can’t install WordPress with LSCache on CyberPanel

It said it was successful, but the generic CyberPanel page still displayed when visiting the site. Upon further investigation, the issue appeared to be with this command: root@server:~# wp core download --allow-root --path=/home/example.com/public_html/ Downloading WordPress 5.5 (en_US)... md5 hash verified: 983821e81b5b8398469e5c1807c4abf4 PHP

Spider web strung across grass leaves.

Set up Mailtrap with WordPress

Mailtrap is a service that captures all mail sent by your site and prevents it from arriving at the intended recipient. It’s really useful for testing and debugging mail without having to write manual checks to ensure your users don’t get spammed with tests. Setting up Mailtrap with

Iron chain laying across the floor.

WordPress could not establish a secure connection to WordPress.org

I’m using Vagrant to work on a WordPress site and noticed the following error throughout several admin pages that attempt to connect to WordPress.org: An unexpected error occurred. Something may be wrong with WordPress.org or this server’s configuration. If you continue to have problems, please try

Yellow submarine docked above water.

How to update and deploy WordPress as a Git submodule

WordPress 3.8.2, a security release, came out yesterday. Now, if you’re already on WordPress 3.8, your WordPress installation will most likely automatically update, but if you are using Git to manage WordPress as a submodule, and have auto-update disabled, you have to do that manually. That

Tree with many branches and leaves.

Git error when switching branch after replacing directory with submodule

I’m working on updating several WordPress sites. Part of each site’s update includes converting the WordPress core and all frequently used plugins to Git submodules. While many recommend staying away from submodules all together, I’ve been using them for a while now and never had any issues,

Screenshot of Plugins page in WordPress.

WordPress: Peer certificate cannot be authenticated with known CA certificates

I was trying to upgrade WordPress on one of my servers, but kept receiving an SSL-related error: Peer certificate cannot be authenticated with known CA certificates. I verified the SSL certificate on the server and there are no issues with it as far as I can tell, but I’d

Wall with graffiti and letters PUSH.

Git post-receive hook to deploy WordPress and plugins as submodules

In a previous blog post I discussed how best to manage file and folder permissions when deploying with Git, but today I’ll show a specific example of what that post-receive hook might look like for a WordPress project that uses submodules. I have three servers that I can deploy

Server holding a beautifully decorated plate with salad.

Ajax in WordPress not working in IE8 and IE9

I recently ran into an issue where Ajax requests were not working in WordPress when using Internet Explorer 8 or 9, and while this may not be a common issue among WordPress users, you’ll most likely run into this problem if certain conditions are met on your site. 1.

Stacked crates of SPAM containers.

Prevent contact form spam in WordPress with Contact Form 7 and Akismet

If you’re running WordPress and have a contact form on your website, there’s a good chance you’re using Contact Form 7. You can get away with using it as-is for a while, but as time goes on, spambots begin to find their way into your inbox. At

Sign on the side of a building with a human throwing away trash.

Prevent WordPress from automatically purging trash from custom post type

WordPress has a constant called EMPTY_TRASH_DAYS that it automatically sets to 30. What that means is that WordPress will automatically delete all posts, pages, custom post types, etc, that have been in the trash for 30 or more days. // wp-includes/default-constants.php function wp_functionality_constants( ) { // more stuff

Plushy elephant with PHP written on it, standing on top of a MacBook keyboard.

How to use PHP variables in jQuery in WordPress

Often times you need access to server-side data in your JavaScript. Most people accomplish this in one of three ways: 1. Echo out JavaScript in PHP 2. Place data in HTML attributes for jQuery to grab 3. Make Ajax request to PHP I won’t go into the pros and

Tree trunk with large number of exposed roots.

Remove post type slug in custom post type URL and move subpages to website root in WordPress

I recently had a need to rewrite the URLs of all parent and child pages in a custom post type so that they appeared to live at the website root, but in reality, continued to live in a custom post type within their hierarchy. Preface The situation: 1. I have

Squared notebook with a checklist on one of the pages.

Prevent checked categories in meta box from appearing at top in WordPress

I previously shared a jQuery snippet that enforces parent checkboxes to be checked when a child is checked and children to be unchecked if the parent is unchecked. This works really great in theory, except that WordPress, by default, moves all checked checkboxes to the top of the category list,

Parent and child walking on the beach while holding hands.

Automatically check parent checkbox if child is selected in WordPress

To keep all posts in WordPress organized in terms of categorization, it helps to make sure that when a user selects a category that’s three levels down, i.e. has two parents, that all the corresponding parents get checked. What follows is a short and sweet JavaScript solution to

Open notebook calendar displaying a monthly planner page.

MySQL query for getting three most recent posts for last 12 months in WordPress

I recently had a need to retrieve the last three posts for the last 12 months that had at least one or more posts in WordPress. Another requirement was to display a “more” link that would redirect the user to the archive of that month, provided there was at least

Wooden table with two succulent plants on it.

Dynamically insert data into MySQL table based on select query result

I was working on a new feature for a site, and while it closely resembles WordPress’ native post formats, it offers more flexibility and control. Users can choose from predefined post layouts and it will display the post using a custom layout and branding. Since this is a new feature,

Many colorful and empty frames stacked next to and behind each other.

Proportionally constrain image based on fixed width or height using PHP

The following post isn’t WordPress specific, however I’m using this in a WordPress environment, so you’ll find several references to it. Array containing the file details I have a custom meta box that allows a user to upload an image (or any file, really) to a post,

Sand clock sitting on a bed of pebbles.

No value for post_date_gmt and post_modified_gmt when creating drafts in WordPress

I have a custom post type containing records that get dynamically updated every 24 hours from an external source. All those posts are initially created as a draft and only published to the site once their content has been confirmed, if at all. Since I use the GMT timezone for

Large group of seated people in a dark room.

WordPress cron not executing scheduled events

I recently tried to schedule an event to be executed twice daily in WordPress MU 3.5 via the wp_schedule_event function, but for some reason the event never fired. I confirmed that the event was indeed scheduled properly, but when reviewing the timestamp of the event via wp_

Orange arrow, on a brick wall, pointing down.

Update a field in a MySQL table based on two fields from another

I have a custom post type in WordPress for employees and used a combination of first and last name as the post title. Both the first and last name are also stored in individual fields in the post meta table. Later I decided to change the structure of the post

Silhouette starring up into the night sky.

How to use PHP’s namespaces and constants within your WordPress plugins

Recently I switched from using a class to emulate a namespace in my WordPress plugins to actually using PHP’s namespace, which is available in PHP 5.3.0 or greater. I’m going to demonstrate some things that all my plugins thus far have in common. 1. Create a

Three website mockups colored in water color.

$wpdb queries not working properly on child sites in WordPress multisite install

I’m working on a WordPress multisite plugin that uses a global table to store logs. When a user performs a certain action on my site, I’m executing a function similar to this one: function add_log($source, $user_id, $action, $status) { global $wpdb, $blog_id; $table_name = $wpdb-&

Piggybank leaning on its nose on top of a pile of coins.

Prevent autosave on a custom post type in WordPress

I have a custom post type that doesn’t use the WordPress editor or its contents externally, but every time a post is saved or programmatically created, I do write contents to the post_content field so I can search for certain data in the WordPress back-end. The problem is