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Web Hosting

Finding a good host for your site(s) is always a challenge. Outages, slow loads, mysterious server emails and support people who don’t help you are all things that are endemic to the hosting biz, sadly. For me, downtime is the bane of my existence and it happens all the time, with all hosts.

Despite these issues, our current host is SiteGround and they seem to be doing an ok job at keeping things running and wrangling the errant server. For uptime, they are definitely the best I’ve used.[as of Nov 2017]

If your site is down and you’re not sure if it’s just your connection or the server really is down, you can use https://www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com/ to check. I also use https://www.siteuptime.com/, which offers free monitoring of one site.

You’ve got to stay on top of your sites. Your host will not tell you if your site is down and more often than not, they’ll deny it. So be proactive and monitor your sites daily.

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TypeKit and WP

I’ve installed the free version of TypeKit on misangela.com just to play with it. You get two fonts with the free account. I think I’ll put it on here, too, just for fun.

The way it works is you put a couple of lines of script in the header of your WP theme (and do some CSS wrangling) and it calls for the fonts from the TypeKit servers. Pretty slick, IMO.

The configuring of the kit is easy, but TypeKit is not that great with instructions – as are most techy sites/apps/whatever. Sorry, boys, but propellerheads write the worst instructions on the planet.

So, allow me to write a step by step of how to install TypeKit with your WP blog. I use the Atahualpa theme most of the time because I love how quick you can set it up. And you can tweak 95% of everything from within the dashboard without having to rewrite CSS, etc. YES it outputs some NASTY looking code, but I’ve never had issues with its speed or problems with the inline code. I leave it inline because I’m lazy, but you can tell it to link to the CSS if you wish. Whatever, I digress.

To use TypeKit with WP, first you must set up the TypeKit account and choose your fonts for the “kit” it serves to you. So, go do that. I’ll wait… ::insert Jeopardy theme here::

Continue reading “TypeKit and WP”

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Twitpic widget fix

I’m using the Twitpic widget on my blog and while I really liked the look, it was slow. A kind twitter user (who happens to work for Twitpic) hooked me up with a fix for the slow loading javascript.

You add /async=”true”/ right before the closing tag, like so:

fix for twitpic widget
Speed fix for twitpic widget

Works like a charm!