I’ve not finalized the design yet, because I’ve had to set it up in a few spare minutes here and there while on the road for the Promo tour. It will be prettier later.

Instructions

You need to edit two files:

1. the comments.php that comes with the Brian’s threaded comments plugin (it’s the one you use instead of your theme’s comments.php), and
2. briansthreadedcomments.php

First decide what to call your author highlighting class. I’ll use authorcomment in the example.

Open briansthreadedcomments.php in a text editor and add your special class definition after the last .comment definition (around line 338). For example;

.authorcomment {border:1px solid #FFCCFF; background: #fff url('path_to/pimp_my_comments.jpg') top right no-repeat;}

Then in comments.php, you need to add a snippet of code:

Scroll down to about line 53, find this part:
<div id="div-comment-<?php echo $c->comment_ID ?>" class='comment<?php echo $odd?>'>

Add the new part in red:
<div id="div-comment-<?php echo $c->comment_ID ?>" class='comment<?php echo $odd?><?php if($c->user_id == 'your user id') echo ' authorcomment';?>">


Replace ‘your user id’ with your actual Wordpress user id number.

Also note that there must be a space between the single quote
and the class name: ‘ authorcomment’ .

Then upload the two files and you should be done. You can see this hack in action in the comments below.

If you’re using Brian’s threaded comments, I hope you’ll find this useful

Thanks to my brother and my boyfriend (two different people, duh!) who helped me with this.

The point of this particular meme is to divulge eight random facts about yourself, then “tag” eight other bloggers to do the same. You tag them by linking to them, which sends an automatic notification link that they can see in their blog’s admin panel.

So without further ado, here are eight random facts about me (betcha can’t wait):

1. If a task is more than moderately interesting, I’d rather learn how to it myself than have someone do it for me.
2. Because of no. 1, I know how to build bicycle wheels from scratch.
3. Because of no. 1, I haven’t been bored since I was nine years old.
4. I can’t stand hot, humid weather…
5. …or cold, clammy socks.
6. I’d move anywhere in the world if Google offered me a job — even a job as cleaning lady.
7. I sometimes dream that I’m best friends with Madonna, and that we get up to all kinds of zany antics together. It’s always a disappointment to wake up.
8. My first crush was at the age of 6, on the cartoon character Speed Racer. Nowadays I’d be more likely to fall for the mysterious Racer X.

Surrealm,
Intgod,
Stratoblogster,
Mr.Joe, and
Brian May (heck, why not?) — consider yourself tagged!

Unfortunately, I don’t know 3 other blogging musicians to tag. So if you want me to tag you, lemme know!

I’m so pleased with my pink guitar pick RSS icon that I thought I’d share it the source files with you. Resize and color to your preference (although you’ll get extra points for pink)!

Get the PSD file or the PNG.

Tired of all that default news stuff that makes the default Wordpress Dashboard so slow to load? I sure was — it was taking 3 to 6 seconds for my Dashboard to load because of all the feeds. By removing the “Other News” and “Wordpress Development Blog,” feeds, my Dashboard now loads in between 0.13 and 0.20 seconds, and I’m a happy camper.

Part 1 shows you how to get rid of ALL the resource-hogging newsy stuff. Part 2 shows you how to keep just the Wordpress Development Blog’s most recent post (in case you want to do that).

[Note: I use Wordpress 2.0.4. Haven't tried other versions. This tested fine in Firefox 1.5.0.7 and IE 6; Validates as XHTML 1.0 Transitional. Been using it myself for a week or so, no problems encountered whatsoever.]

Instructions – Part 1
You have to edit one of Wordpress’s core files here, but it’s a really simple edit. As long as you know how to edit a file in a text editor and upload it to your server, you can do it. All you have to do is comment out some of the code in the index.php file that resides in your wp-admin folder.

1) Go to your wp-admin folder and open index.php in your favorite text editor (Note: it’s always prudent to save a backup copy first!).

2) Scroll down to the following section of code, and “comment out” the entire block of html and, as suggested by Intgod, the php (the comment code you should add is in red):


<!--<p><?php /*_e("Below is the latest news from the official WordPress development blog, click on a title to read the full entry. If you need help with WordPress please see our <a href='http://codex.wordpress.org/'>great documentation</a> or if that doesn't help visit the <a href='http://wordpress.org/support/'>support forums</a>."); ?></p>
<?php
$rss = @fetch_rss('http://wordpress.org/development/feed/');
if ( isset($rss->items) && 0 != count($rss->items) ) {
?>
<h3><?php _e('WordPress Development Blog'); ?></h3>
<?php
$rss->items = array_slice($rss->items, 0, 3);
foreach ($rss->items as $item ) {
?>
<h4><a href='<?php echo wp_filter_kses($item['link']); ?>'><?php echo wp_specialchars($item['title']); ?></a> &#8212; <?php printf(__('%s ago'), human_time_diff(strtotime($item['pubdate'], time() ) ) ); ?></h4>
<p><?php echo $item['description']; ?></p>
<?php
}
}
?>
<?php
$rss = @fetch_rss('http://planet.wordpress.org/feed/');
if ( isset($rss->items) && 0 != count($rss->items) ) {
?>
<div id="planetnews">
<h3><?php _e('Other WordPress News'); ?> <a href="http://planet.wordpress.org/"><?php _e('more'); ?> &raquo;</a></h3>
<ul>
<?php
$rss->items = array_slice($rss->items, 0, 20);
foreach ($rss->items as $item ) {
?>
<li><a href='<?php echo wp_filter_kses($item['link']); ?>'><?php echo wp_specialchars($item['title']); ?></a></li>
<?php
}
?>
</ul>
</div>
< ?php
}
*/?>-->


3. Don’t mess with any of the other code. Leave it as it is. Save this new version of index.php to your wp-admin folder on your server, overwriting the old copy (you did save a backup of the original, right?).

4. Log into your Dashboard and enjoy the new clean look and über-fast loading time.

Ditch the “Other news,” but keep the most recent post in the “Wordpress Development Blog”.

If you want to keep the Wordpress Development Blog active but limit it to showing you only the first post (say, to stay abreast of any important developments) here is how you do it.

Instructions – part 2

You need to modify the same block of code as in part 1 above (don’t mess with any of the other stuff), but with two important changes:

1. Change the 3 to a 1 in the line below:


$rss->items = array_slice($rss->items, 0, 3); <--- change this 3 to a 1

2. Leave the Wordpress Development Blog section intact and just comment out the “other news” code block instead.

Your final code should look like this (the edits are in red):


<p><?php _e("Below is the latest news from the official WordPress development blog, click on a title to read the full entry. If you need help with WordPress please see our <a href='http://codex.wordpress.org/'>great documentation</a> or if that doesn't help visit the <a href='http://wordpress.org/support/'>support forums</a>."); ?></p>
<?php
$rss = @fetch_rss('http://wordpress.org/development/feed/');
if ( isset($rss->items) && 0 != count($rss->items) ) {
?>
<h3><?php _e('WordPress Development Blog'); ?></h3>
<?php
$rss->items = array_slice($rss->items, 0, 1 );
foreach ($rss->items as $item ) {
?>
<h4><a href='<?php echo wp_filter_kses($item['link']); ?>'><?php echo wp_specialchars($item['title']); ?></a> &#8212; <?php printf(__('%s ago'), human_time_diff(strtotime($item['pubdate'], time() ) ) ); ?></h4>
<p><?php echo $item['description']; ?></p>
<?php
}
}
?>
<?php /*
$rss = @fetch_rss('http://planet.wordpress.org/feed/');
if ( isset($rss->items) && 0 != count($rss->items) ) {
?>
<div id="planetnews">
<h3><?php _e('Other WordPress News'); ?> <a href="http://planet.wordpress.org/"><?php _e('more'); ?> &raquo;</a></h3>
<ul>
<?php
$rss->items = array_slice($rss->items, 0, 20);
foreach ($rss->items as $item ) {
?>
<li><a href='<?php echo wp_filter_kses($item['link']); ?>'><?php echo wp_specialchars($item['title']); ?></a></li>
<?php
}
?>
</ul>
</div>
<?php
}
*/?>

There you have it! I hope it works for you as well as it’s worked for me. BTW, instead of commenting stuff out, you could probably just delete it. But if you’re feeling squeamish about editing Wordpress core files, it’s probably nice to know that you can easily restore things to normal by deleting the comments.

Instructions

A printer-friendly copy of these instructions is available with images and without.

1. Go to YouTube and find a video you want to embed. Again, I will be a brazen self-promoting hussy and use one of my own videos, from my band Stream of Passion ;-p

2. All of the code we need is inside the “URL” field, see the pink circle below:

Copy and paste the code from this field into a text document so you have it for reference. You’ll end up with something like this (The part you need is highlighted in red):

URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cnSnXSbmvVg


4. Now you just copy the important red part into the Extreme video tag in your Wordpress blog post. Go to your Wordpress dashboard and create a new post.

The basic format for embedding videos in your posts looks like this:

[gv data="data string"
width="width in pixels" height="height in pixels"][/gv]


Unfortunately, the height and width tags don’t seem to work very well for YouTube videos. The controls disappear, and the video alignment gets shifted to the bottom right corner. So you can just leave them out and the player will default to its usual size. Thus, for our example video, you’d type something like this:

[gv data="cnSnXSbmvVg"][/gv]


Publish your post and enjoy your video!

5. Changing the size
As noted above, I’ve not figured out how to adjust the size of YouTube videos. If someone knows a simple way to do this, please let me know! (And please post in the comments on the plugin author’s site).

That’s it! Enjoy embedding your videos. Feel free to get in touch with your comments and questions about the instructions here. Note that I can’t answer general questions about the plugin itself; for that you’ll need to contact the plugin author.

And make sure to visit the plugin author’s site and let him know how much you appreciate his work!

I kept notes as I worked through the installation process, and turned them into this tutorial. Even if you are fairly new to Wordpress, these instructions should help you get the Extreme Video plugin installed and configured. Take your time, read slowly, and you should be OK. If you like, you can print the instructions with images or without to refer to as you work.

Note: I am using the latest stable release of Wordpress, and my current theme is a variation of Reef Sandals’s Misty Look. If you are using other versions of Wordpress or other themes, your results may vary.

Download the files

Before you begin, download the plugin files. You can either get them from the author’s site, or download everything in a .zip file from me.

The contents of the zip hosted here are:

wp-ExtremeVideo.php [the plugin file, version 2.3 BETA]
flvPlayer.swf [the Flash video player]
gv.swf [the Google Video player — renamed to fit the plugin's defaults]

The files were downloaded from the author’s site on September 23, 2006, virus checked, and zipped.

Install and configure the Extreme Video plugin for Wordpress

1. I advise putting the .swf files in their own directory on your site. Use an existing directory, or create a new one one. On my site I created one called swf, and I’ll refer to this swf directory throughout in the instructions below.

I’m also assuming that you are using the files in my .zip file. If you are using the files downloaded from the plugin author’s site, you’ll need to rename googleplayer.swf to gv.swf. Once you’ve done that, the instructions below will make sense if you start with step 3.

2. Unzip extreme_video_2.3.zip

3. Upload gv.swf and flvPlayer.swf to the swf directory on your Wordpress blog’s website.

4. Open wp-ExtremeVideo.php in your favorite text editor.

5. Scroll down to line 77 or so, until you find this bit of code:

//* defaults to home url/gv.swf
DEFINE('GV_MYGVURL',get_settings('home').'/gv.swf');

Change the red part above to reflect the real path to gv.swf on your blog’s website. For our example, it might look like this if your domain is www.mysite.com, and your Wordpress install is in the root:

//* defaults to home url/gv.swf
DEFINE('GV_MYGVURL',get_settings('home').'http://www.mysite.com/swf/gv.swf');

6. Scroll to line 108 or so until you find this bit of code:

//Path to Flash FLV PLayer SWF< br />
DEFINE('PP_PLAYERPATH', "http://www.yourpath.com/flvPlayer.swf");

This tells the script where to find the video player on your site. For our example, change the red part to this:

//Path to Flash FLV PLayer SWF
DEFINE('PP_PLAYERPATH', "http://www.mysite.com/swf/flvPlayer.swf");


7. You are done editing! Save the wp-ExtremeVideo.php file and upload it to your Wordpress plugins directory.

By now you should have uploaded gv.swf and flvPlayer.swf to your swf directory, and wp-ExtremeVideo.php to your plugins directory. Here is what the directory structure should look like:

If this much has been challenging for you, take a break and pat yourself on the back. Have a nice cup of tea or coffee. When you’re feeling refreshed and strong again, continue to the next step: ACTIVATION, baby!

Activate the Extreme Video plugin in Wordpress

Log in to your Wordpress dashboard, and click the Plugins tab. You should see the WP-Extreme Video plugin listed. Click Activate to (duh!) activate the plugin.

That’s all you need to do to configure and install the plugin for basic use. Now we’ll look at how to embed a video in a post. I will cover Google Video in this tutorial. For the YouTube instructions, see my tutorial here .

Embedding a Google Video in your Wordpress Blog with the Extreme Video plugin

1. Go to Google video and find a video you want to embed. For our example, I will be a cheeky tart and use one of my own videos. This is its URL, the address where it lives on Google. The part in red below tells Google which particular video you want to play; it’s the unique identifier for your particular video.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1528165567147684910


Once you are on the page of the Google video you want to embed, click the blue button in the right-hand sidebar that says Email - Blog - Post to MySpace. It’s circled in pink in the picture below.

2. Click the link to “Embed HTML” (see below)

3. A window with some code will appear (see below).

This code contains all the information you need to embed the video in your Wordpress blog. Copy the code and paste it into a text document so that you have it to refer to. My code for this particular video looks like this (important parts in red):

<embed style="width:400px; height:326px;" id="VideoPlayback" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" src="http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=-1528165567147684910&hl=en"> </embed>


(The &hl=en part just tells the Google player to use English — if you are using Google in another language, your code may look a bit different. You can leave that part of the code out, and Google will just use the default language.)

4. Now go to your Wordpress Dashboard and click the Write tab to open the Write Post window.

5. The basic format for embedding videos in your posts looks like this:

[gv data="data string"
width="width in pixels" height="height in pixels"][/gv]


Below you’ll see the code you need to embed a Google video (I have inserted line breaks so it will fit on the page. The data tag should be all one line in your actual post). Note that I’ve inserted the important red parts from the Google code we just looked at above:

[gv data="http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=-1528165567147684910&hl=en"
width="400" height="326"][/gv]


If you have correctly installed and configured the plugin and uploaded the .swf files to the right directory (as explained above), you should see the video when you publish and view the post. In your own case, the code will be different to mine — it will reflect the address of your particular Google video.

If you don’t see the video when you publish your post, then something is whacky and beyond my skill to heal, or you’ve got a typo somewhere. Carefully check your code and make sure you don’t have any missed quotation marks or other little mistakes.

6. Unfortunately, there is a problem with this plugin that breaks the “View this video on Google” link. If you want to fix this, you have to go back and edit your post. I’m taking you through this step by step just so you can understand the process involved — once you know what to do you can of course fix the broken link when you first embed the video.

To fix the broken link, you need to add the &playerId= code to your “data” string. After the &playerId= you put the same address number that you have in the docId. So for my particular video I need to add this:

&playerId=-1528165567147684910


The full string now looks like this (again, I have inserted line breaks so it will fit on the page – the “data” string should be all one unbroken line with no spaces in it):

[gv data="http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=-1528165567147684910
&hl=en&playerId=-1528165567147684910"
width="400" height="326"][/gv]


When you republish the post, the link to “view this video on Google” should now work.

Changing the size of the embedded video.

You can change the size of the player on your site. Just replace the values inside the width=”400″ and height=”326″ tags with whatever you want. I usually multiply each value by a decimal to keep the aspect ratio correct. A nice size for my example video is 80% of the original size. For example

400 * 0.8 = 320
326 * 0.8 = 261.

So the new code looks like this (again, I’ve added line breaks here):

[gv data="http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=-1528165567147684910
&hl=en&playerId=-1528165567147684910" width="320" height="261"][/gv]


Trying to make the Google player smaller than about 280 x 228 pixels is not a good idea, because the playback controls get squashed and ugly.

That’s all there is to it! You should now be up an running, able to use the Extreme Video plugin to easily embed Google videos in your Wordpress blog!

If you have questions or comments, please feel free to let it rip in the comments section, or drop me an email. Note that I cannot provide support for the plugin itself, I can only clarify any instructions I’ve provided here.

Please remember visit the plugin author’s site and let him know how much you appreciate his work!

For embedding YouTube videos, see my tutorial here:

How to embed YouTube videos in Wordpress with the Extreme Video plugin.