In preparation for the release of Event Espresso (the new name of Advanced Events Registration,) we have just opened up our new forums.
Many of you have been using the WordPress forums to ask your questions about the Advanced Events Registration plugin. The only problem with that is that I don’t know anyone has posted anything there. I try to login and check every once in a while, but that is very inefficient and some questions go unanswered. I am hoping to change this with our new forums.
So please head on over and say hello, leave us some feedback in the “Suggestion Box” or show off your site in the new “Website Showcase.”
Beware of “pirated” premium plugins and themes that may add malicious scripts and open back doors into your server and/or your WordPress installations.
Apparently several people have had the misfortune of downloading a pirated version of my Advanced Events Registration plugin from some file sharing websites. One person’s site was entirely overwritten with spam posts and links pirated software. While another persons entire website was completely wiped out.
The website owner (whom I wont mention here) actually threatened to sue me because five years worth of content was completely removed from their blog. When I asked for a copy of their receipt from the purchase of the premium plugin. The person stated they had downloaded it from a free file hosting website. Can you believe it! So I stated the obvious, “You didn’t purchase the plugin from my website, so you will need to contact whomever you received the files from. I am not responsible for code that may be distributed by outside sources.”
Moral of the story:
Premium plugins and themes may be GPL licensed (or not in some cases.) Unless you get them from a trusted source, you may be taking a major risk using them.
Related information:
How Downloading a Premium Theme/Plugin From the Wrong Place Can Ruin Your Site
Downloading a Premium Theme from the Wrong Site can be Expensive
Download Free Premium WordPress theme :What’s the Catch?
WordPress Premium Developer and Author Piracy My Thoughts
The Ethics of WordPress Themes at a Premium
Coming soon to the pro version of Advanced Events Registration….Facebook Events integration.
With Facebook Events, you can organize gatherings and parties with your friends, as well as let people in your community know about upcoming events. The Events applications page displays your upcoming events, any invitations you have pending, and links to your own events.
This week I started exploring the possibility of auto-posting new events to Facebook. Imagine having a newly created event automatically appear in your Facebook profile. Lets take it one step further, invite everyone in your friends list to the event when the event is created. Is this possible? We will soon find out.
Using the premiere event management system for WordPress, the possibilities are endless.
I would love to hear from you, so please feel free to drop me a line and offer your suggestions. Your continued support and suggestions are what keeps me motivated to bring you the best event management system on WordPress.
Here is a very useful function I have written to install/update the database tables in your custom WordPress plugin. Basically I have used the examples given on the “Creating Tables with Plugins” page at WordPress.org.
In your main plugin file (ex. my_plugin.php) I define my plugin version:
define("MY_PLUGIN_VERSION", "2.16" ); //Declare the plugin version. This way we know the tables are always up to date. I usually declare this in my main plugin file. require_once("includes/functions.php"); require_once("includes/database_install.php"); register_activation_hook(__FILE__,'my_plugin_data_tables_install');
Then in my functions.php file:
function my_plugin_run_install ($table_name, $table_version, $sql) { global $wpdb; $wp_table_name = $wpdb->prefix . $table_name; if($wpdb->get_var("SHOW TABLES LIKE '".$table_name."'") != $table_name) { $sql_create_table = "CREATE TABLE " . $wp_table_name . " ( " . $sql . " ) ;"; require_once(ABSPATH . 'wp-admin/includes/upgrade.php'); dbDelta($sql_create_table); //create option for table version $option_name = $table_name.'_tbl_version'; $newvalue = $table_version; if ( get_option($option_name) ) { update_option($option_name, $newvalue); } else { $deprecated=' '; $autoload='no'; add_option($option_name, $newvalue, $deprecated, $autoload); } //create option for table name $option_name = $table_name.'_tbl'; $newvalue = $wp_table_name; if ( get_option($option_name) ) { update_option($option_name, $newvalue); } else { $deprecated=' '; $autoload='no'; add_option($option_name, $newvalue, $deprecated, $autoload); } } // Code here with new database upgrade info/table Must change version number to work. $installed_ver = get_option( $table_name.'_tbl_version' ); if( $installed_ver != $table_version ) { $sql_create_table = "CREATE TABLE " . $wp_table_name . " ( " . $sql . " ) ;"; require_once(ABSPATH . 'wp-admin/includes/upgrade.php'); dbDelta($sql_create_table); update_option( $table_name.'_tbl_version', $table_version ); } }
Using the function is quite simple and can save a few lines of code. especially if you need to install several new tables.
Here is an example of database_install.php:
function my_plugin_data_tables_install () { $table_version = MY_PLUGIN_VERSION; //Call the plugin version. //Install the first table $table_name = "my_first_plugin_tbl"; $sql = "id mediumint(9) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, time bigint(11) DEFAULT '0' NOT NULL, name tinytext NOT NULL, text text NOT NULL, url VARCHAR(100) NOT NULL, UNIQUE KEY id (id)"; my_plugin_run_install ($table_name, $table_version, $sql); //Install the second table $table_name = "my_second_plugin_tbl"; $sql = "id mediumint(9) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, category_name VARCHAR(100) DEFAULT NULL, category_identifier VARCHAR(45) DEFAULT NULL, category_desc TEXT, display_desc VARCHAR (4) DEFAULT NULL, UNIQUE KEY id (id)"; my_plugin_run_install ($table_name, $table_version, $sql); }
I hope this helps some of the WordPress plugin authors out there.
