Check your plugins
Before you update your Wordpress blog (If you are a Wordpress blogger) make sure all your “Need to Have” Plugins have updates too. Do this by visiting the plugin author’s page.
If not, you could have a bunch of techie issues to deal with… Not fun.
For example,
I have a amazon s3 Wordpress plugin that allows you to stream content on your blog securely. This means only your blog can stream that content. No one can copy the links to the content and stream it. This is good if you are trying to protect your content.
I’m working on an upgrade now so it works with Wordpress 2.8.4. If you upgrade your blog and use my plugin, it will stop working and you’ll have to delete it. What if you are using the plugin to stream loads of paid content? You are screwed basically.
So please, if you have some hot shot Wordpress plugins that does everything but take out the trash, please do not update your blog until you know for sure your sweet plugin has an update too.
And as the comment by Eileen says in the comments below, install another blog somewhere on your site and add all the plugins you use plus the template. This way you have a test blog to play with that is a copy of your real blog. Want to try something new and risky? Do it on your test blog first. Killer advice Eileen.
October 8th, 2009
Excellent advice! I upgraded WP on one of my websites, and soon discovered that the upgrade made the site nearly worthless for income. Most of my major plugins aren’t working… yet.
It’s actually worth keeping a very minor WP site, loaded with plugins, as your personal beta test of the upgrade-to-plugins compatibility. I didn’t have to check each plugin, just do a quick visual survey of my website to see what still worked and what didn’t.
As my plugins page advises me that there are updates to the plugins, I’m improving the site, but waiting to upgrade WP at my bigger income-producing sites.