This site uses many internal links to relate to other pages. It is very easy to create a post/page link to other page using WordPress editor, but once we modify the page slug, move the page to other hierarchy, or move the site completely with different domain, we will got 404 not found page.

For a workaround for this issue, we should avoid static link to a post or page, and use a shortcode that generates the link automatically based on post ID. We can find the ID of post or page in respected admin edit screen as screenshot above from https://team.cf7skins.com/wp-admin/edit.php?post_type=page for Page type.

Creating Shortcode Link

Creating a shortcode in WordPress is easy, we just need to register our shortcode function using add_shortcode and shortcode_atts to combind user shortcode attributes with default shortcode attributes.

Here is how the code looks like:

function cf7skins_link( $atts ) {
	$atts = shortcode_atts( array(
		'id' => 701,
		'text' => '',
	), $atts, 'link' );
	
	extract( $atts, EXTR_SKIP ); // extract attributes
	
	if ( $permalink = get_permalink( $id ) ) { // return string if found or false.
		$title = $text ? $text : get_the_title( $id );
		return "<a href='$permalink'>$title</a>";
	} else {
		return 'Error, the post or page does not exist!';
	}
}

add_shortcode( 'link', 'cf7skins_link' );

The shortcode takes two attributes or parameters, id for the post ID and title for custom post/page title. If title is not set, than it will use the post title itself. The function will finds the post ID, create the link if found, or display error message if not exist.

To use the shortcode, simply add a square bracket with link string, provide the post ID and custom title if needed.

[link id="144"]

That’s it, with a few lines, we can add post/page link automatically, and save the site from 404 suffering.

Every article you write should increase the awareness of CF7 Skins. When looking for ideas or topics on what to write, look no further than a Google search. 

5+ million CF7 Users, 1000’s have problems using CF7 each day, we are there with answers to help them solve their particular problems

For example, search ‘Contact Form 7 getting started’ or ‘Contact Form 7 how to start’. Take the top few suggestions that are shown and fabricate your own Google search result.

How do you want or imagine your article appearing in that top list?

Tip: Use a SERP preview generator to help ensure you stay within pixel and character limits. 

Once you know how you want the search to appear, write the article in that category or create the category you need.

For additional help or ideas already waiting, see what is happening with CF7 Skins Support and check out the CF7 Skins Google Sheets – Blog Content Planning

I think we should avoid using cf7skins-test.project.buzztoned.com for initially creating blog posts. Rather we should just use kb-dev.cf7skins.com as we do for most other changes to pages, posts & faq.

I originally did this so we were using the same theme as the live blog. I’ve found we can easily make any necessary changes when we schedule the post on the live site.

All blog posts eventually also get published on kb.cf7skins.com so they need to look OK on both the themes we currently use.

What you you think? Please add your Comments to this post.

Update

• we no longer use cf7skins-test.project.buzztoned.com at all
• we use blog.cf7skins.com & blog-dev.cf7skins.com when creating new blog posts
• blog posts no longer get published on kb.cf7skins.com

We are now using the Content Audit plugin to help us better manage changes to our documentation.

All documentation pages are now added to this system so we can:

• use it to see what work needs to be done on each site
• show list of items at each stage
• use it before Slack meetings to see work that needs to be done.

You can create filtered lists of the content.

When you visit each site as a logged in user you will also see Content Audit information at the top of each item.

See Using Content Audit for more information.

When using your a zip file to update an existing plugin, it seems it is not possible to just upload the zip as you would with new plugins.

If you do, you get an error saying the destination folder already exists. 

I expected WordPress to override this automatically, especially if it find the plugin is just a new version of the last one, but apparently not.

There are two ways to avoid this:

1. Remove the plugin completely before adding new version of it.
2. Use an FTP client to override the files.

Also see: [#9757] Allow Plugin/Theme updates from a uploaded .zip file

I'm looking for a better tool for documenting screenshots like this:

I'm currently using Awesome Screenshot via Chrome Extension but find it really cumbersome.

I'm Windows based so can't use any fancy Mac only stuff. I've also tried the following which I didn't like for various reasons:

• Skitch – very cumbersome, lack of useful features
• Photoshop – my skills to limited
• Illustrator – my skills are good but over-kill for screenshots used only in development
• Firefox Screenshots (Beta) – capture a region, save and share.
• Microsoft Paint

If you have any suggestions, please add them on this post.

You can also add a Comment if you want – you can do that on all our posts.