Generally I dislike plug-ins, as they usually make additional calls to the server for CSS and Javascript files. These calls ruin page-load times. Hence, I often code the functionality myself, although sometimes that’s too time-consuming. So, here’s a list of useful plugins.
- WordPress SEO by Yoast: Mainly use it for writing appropriate title and description meta tags.
- W3 Total Cache: Often deeply difficult to set up, but dramatically improves load times. It minimises and combines Javascript and CSS files, zips the HTML, and caches each page.
- WP Better Security: It is worthwhile protecting wordpress sites. Hackers do attempt to hack my sites, using Chinese and Dutch IP addresses. WordPress is frequently updated, when security vulnerabilities are discovered. However, that makes it relatively easy for someone to compare the latest version with previous versions, to identify security issues. This plug-in does a good job of making a hacker’s life more difficult.
- Advanced Custom Field Widget: Provides an easy way to put different images and text on the sidebar of every page.
- Contact Form 7: is the standard plugin for contact forms
- Don’t Break the Code: WordPress tends to reformat paragraph tags, and it is difficult to add javascript using the wordpress editor. This plug-in stops WordPress massacring beautifully hand-crafted HTML.
- Optimize Database after Deleting Revisions:
