With some time on my hands and the urge to spice up my blog (both functionally and aesthetically), I’ve decided to go outside the Wordpress blog and see what additional yummies I can add to my site.

For those who aren’t bloggers, or rather, those who are, but using blogging sites to do so, I’m currently using a free software called Wordpress.  You’ll need to find a web host to host the site for you (or you can create your own if you’re technically adept, have the resources and time) and the out-of-box software is very easy to install.  Some web hosts can automatically do it for you (like mine - Webhost4life - they’ve just written scripts to install it) and most will help you debug if you run into installation or upgrade issues.

Wordpress rocks.  It makes blogging easy.  You can download wordpress themes virtually anywhere in the web (just try a search on wordpress themes on google) and there are a multitude of plugins available to ease your blogging pains (of which I was doing just this morning). 

If you’re a semi-competent coder (I don’t know if I would define myself as semi-competent, but competent enough to figure out the php - it’s called winging it and I did it for 3 years at IBM coding Java as a “consultant”), you are able to tweak and custom the themes and graphics to your liking - thus truly making your mark on the web.  Other than that, you don’t need a drop of coding blood in you.  The plugins and themes are a few clicks to install and activate and provide functionality through the roof.

Some things I’ve added that are super cool and tickled my fancy are a spam protector called Askimet.  It’s not a captcha (I’m still looking for an easy one to install that isn’t buggy) but will help you sort your comments in identifying whether it’s SPAM or HAM (genuine comments).  I’ve also loaded in a cool gallery called NextGen (in the works to publish) for my pictures and a statistics tool to help me monitor who and when are visiting my site.  On average, I get about 100 unique hits a day, but I have no idea from where or why they are visiting me - so some reporting would be wonderful.

In general, I’m very happy with Wordpress.  I love the open source community.  I love the technology and the productivity tools.  I love the add ons and plugins.  I love the ability to customize.  I love the ability to blog and make neat my website.  I love it all!  Truly, blogging hasn’t been so easy since white bread and it just gets easier.  I love it!