The SPAM finally got to me. I don’t know if WordPress will be any better at handling SPAM or not, but I can dream :). The design is still very much off the shelf, so I’ll have to play with that in the months to come and, of course, I still have to learn about how to use this software. But I’m hoping that it will be much better than MoveableType was. In my brief playing while evaluating and setting it up, I think I like it better. MoveableType 3.0 may have been much better, but I didn’t wanna have to pay for it.
So, if you’re curious, read on to find out how I set it up. It really was quite simple. I first downloaded and installed WordPress using their 5 minute install guide. After that, I followed the instructions for importing from MoveableType. The most difficult part was making sure my permalinks from MovableType (like the archives) still worked. To do that, I created an .htaccess file to leaverage mod_rewrite. It looks like this:
RewriteEngine on RewriteRule ^archives/0*(\d+).html /~jake/blog/index.php?p=$1 RewriteRule index.rdf /~jake/blog/index.php?feed=rdf RewriteRule index.xml /~jake/blog/index.php?feed=rss2
So, we’ll have to see how well this really works for me, but at this point I’d have to say that I’ve already committed to it.
I’ll save you a lot of trouble. Make sure your running the latest official WordPress (keep it updated, it’s simple to do, so no excuses), and use Spam Karma:
http://unknowngenius.com/blog/wordpress/spam-karma
I get about 1 slipping through every few weeks. Blacklist those that get through. No massive attacks anymore, no cleanup.
Only had 1 false positive in thousands of spams. So it’s pretty accurate.
Spam Karma worked fantastically for the older versions of WordPress, but I don’t even find it necessary with Strayhorn (1.5). However, maybe you’re getting more spam than I was/am (~30 a day).
Robert is right… I use spam-karma as well and I have yet to get one that slips through or one false positive. You’ll come to enjoy WordPress once you get used to it.
Be sure to check out http://wp-plugins.net/ for all your plugin needs
You can also try this: http://www.meyerweb.com/eric/tools/wordpress/wp-gatekeeper/
It asks commeters a simple question — “What is the color of an orange?” for example. Stops spambots and doesn’t keep out legitimate comments.
Hi
This post appairs blank on Planet Mozilla. Thunderbird, New Mail, To: tor 😉
Gary
It sure does, Gary. Weird. It looks like the RDF version of the feed isn’t working right. I guess I’ll have to investigate if it’s a problem with wordpress or my config. Probably a bug in wordpress being that I am running an alpha version 🙂
Personally, I suggest skipping Spam Karma and all the others in favor of lr2Spam, which simply adds a dynamic hidden form field which must be validated for a comment to be posted. Basically, it requires the commenter to have visited the actual post before commenting, which is something most spammers don’t fake yet. I haven’t seen a single spam since I installed it, and commenters haven’t noticed anything’s different. There’s no configuration beyond turning it on, and I really like it.
I’m quite up to the point where I can find the problem myself with the RDF feed generator and I don’t have the time at the moment to track it down myself, but I filed a bug with the authors of WordPress: http://trac.wordpress.org/ticket/1542
Actually, there are a lot of WordPress plugins that help prevent spam. Just check the WordPress codex.
I use Spam-Karma on all of my sites. Give it a try. I’m sure you will be happy.