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Welcome to WordPress’s 6.0 “Arturo”

We welcome the latest version of WordPress called 6.0 “Arturo”. The update was inspired by Grammy-award winning Jazz musician Arturo O’Farrill. Based on earlier reports, the update is said to have enhanced features and responsiveness that can further your creative expertise.

“The overall aim is to consolidate and expand the set of customization tools introduced in 5.9 for creating themes with blocks, with a special focus towards usability and refinement,” Ventura said. “This new release could be considered a conceptual wrap for Gutenberg: Phase 2. This doesn’t mean the customization phase would be concluded with it, but that its main features would have been established.”

According to reports, the update has over ‘1000 enhancements and bug fixes’. You can download the update here.

What’s new:

1. Improved writing experience:

There are new and improved features in terms of your written content whether it be creating a new post or editing an existing one to create an overall better user experience when engaging with that said content.

– The select text feature that can now expand across multiple blocks allows for easier copying and pasting.

– A short cut key called the ‘two open bracket’ to access your list of recent posts and pages.

– Create customized buttons and any update or new buttons created will retain it’s specifications automatically.

2. Style switching

The famous Gutenburg blocks received an update which allows one to have multiple style variations. It enables short cuts to switch the theme of your website much quicker within a single theme. Users are now able to change the look and feel of their website with just a few clicks.

3. Extensive template range

There a five new templates to choose from with the updated version 6.0. This can contribute to existing content and by further improving the layout, font style, imagery or just the general aesthetics. Create a new mood for your website by making use of the new tools provided:

– Featured images can be used as a cover block.

– One can switch between stack, row and group variations to position groups of blocks for a much more flexible layout.

4. Block Locking

A new feature has been added to the 6.0 update. A feature called ‘Block Locking’ doesn’t allow an end user to remove an important block in your piece. This feature contributes to the security of your content by identifying authoritative figures on your account.

The latest updated is the pinnacle of the work of over 500 people situated in various countries with a vast array of knowledge to contribute towards. The results are mind blowing and where one can draw the conclusion from the ‘1000 improvements’.

Based on a quote from a spokesperson from WordPress, version 6.0 continues where 5.9 was left off. The focus will be around bringing a full website editing experience while further enhancing the block editor. Version 6.0 is equipped with the design experience that can contribute even further to existing users.

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WHAT ARE WORDPRESS BLOCKS AND HOW TO USE THEM

WordPress is an excellent content management system that for building your website whether it be a blog or your online hobby.

Writing content for your website can feel repetitive at times due to the duplicate work that one has to churn out continuously. Write, post, and repeat. That seems to be the common ebb and flow of blog content production. To alleviate this, one can duplicate content by using the blocks editor. The blocks editor allows you to duplicate the content that can be posted across pages. This can cut down on your production time in terms of drafting the content. WordPress blocks are the components for adding content in the WordPress block editor.

How to use WordPress block editor:

Whenever you have a new content piece to publish, anything that comes to your mind whether it be in the form of a written piece or an image, will be converted into a block. WordPress has made the layout simple and clean that is extremely user friendly and allows one to make adjustments accordingly to their specific idea in mind. Think of it as your page being broken up into various segments that is packed with content.

As soon as you’re on your blog page, the title display pops up with the option of adding a block. To add a block, navigate towards the right hand side of your page where a ‘+’ sign is situated inside of a black block.

Adding a block

In order to get started with a paragraph, click on the black button as displayed above. You would want to start off with a suitable heading that correlates with your topic. In order to add a heading, click on the heading block and select the style, layout and overall appearance of your heading. You can adjust the size of your heading by clicking on the heading level which will adjust to the size accordingly.

Adding a heading in your paragraph

In order to add images to your content block, click on the ‘+’ icon and navigate towards the image button and upload the media that you wish to portray to the public. In order to upload the image, click on the blue button that says ‘upload’. There are various other options to upload your media from such as inserting from URL and your Media Library. You can make edits your image in terms of its shape, orientation and even adding in captions.

Once the content block has been expanded, there are various other sub sets of options to play around with. There are coding blocks to make us of, embeds and other forms of media to integrate into your content.

Block editor content features

What are the benefits of using WordPress blocks

There are various benefits that comes with WordPress block that can add great value to your content in terms of productivity, layout and optimization.

– The WordPress blocks are user-friendly with a highly interactive and clean interface.

– Blocks can make add various other forms of media that allows your content to more appealing and engaging.

– WordPress blocks are less prone to the issues related to copy-and-paste especially when it comes to content transferred from Word documents.

– Lastly, the content block editor provides a much more consistent experience in terms of what it looks during the production phases compared to the final. In simple terms, users won’t see the back-end side of the content that you have produced due to the blocks feature.

If you have an interest in WordPress hosting or you would like to change your current plan to a WordPress plan, Hostking has a wide offering.

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Protecting your e-commerce site from hackers

Stealing Money

E-Commerce sites form a large chunk within the web hosting market. As e-commerce sites are widely used by various entrepreneurs, this led to a surge in data theft. A number of data transactions takes place on these websites and contains extremely confidential information. There’s a vast number of users with information relating to their credit cards, email addresses, physical addresses and much more. Without beefing up on security on a website owner’s behalf and the users, it can result in data theft performed by hackers. Data breaches don’t only take place within corporate spaces or financial services, but within small business as well. Breaches are frequently occurring in various news reports with a 43% in total coming from small businesses.

Invest in third party fraud-protection services:

Third party fraud is where an individual or a collective uses or creates accounts in order to clone an account with another’s details. This is associated with identity theft and one can face severe consequences. This can be a challenging and daunting task for businesses to detect and to stop.

An extra layer of protection is without a doubt a no-brainer. When it comes to security, going the extra mile is always worth the effort. The protection offered by e-commerce building platforms serves as a good entry point in terms of security. It can help with identifying potential risks or suspicious activity but going through with next step is entirely up to you.

It is a gamble one has to take. There could be a mistake in terms of the incorrect email address or postal address entered when the user created the account. In a situation like this, security software filters out these user profiles. It could result in an actual hacker or a potential client that could’ve entered their details incorrectly. Visitors that have been rejected before can cost you potential revenue. Taking the time to review risky visitors is costly and requires a certain expertise to filter them out properly. Proper validation is needed when one is faced with such a situation.

Compliance with PCI/DSS standards

PCI/DSS stands for Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards. It’s a set of requirements that are used by companies ensuring that the credit card information is stored in a secure manner. The objective of these standards are to improve account security when transactions are performed. The PCI Security Standards Council (SSC) ensures that the security of card holders’ information are secured at all times. It contains informative and practical material with frameworks and tools to help companies maintain the level of security needed. Some requirements for PCI/DSS standards are password protection, firewall set-ups, encryption of transmitted data and protection of card holder data to name a few.

Use HTTP with SSL

For those that aren’t familiar with SSL, it’s an abbreviation for ‘Secure Sockets Layer’. An SSL is a certificate that acts as a protective layer between a website and a browser. An SSL certificate is used to authenticate a website’s identity and to encrypt any information being passed through the website. An SSL certificate is crucial when it comes to considering filtering and blocking hackers that would want to intercept information during the checkout process.

Setting up your credit card with limits

Credit cards are fairly easy to steal which contains card and cvv numbers. The details contained on your card are mostly your initials, card number and CVV digits. These details are considered as a first level of security and should be kept to yourself. The most important of all would be the cvv number. CVV stand for Card Verification Value. The CVV number is required for performing online transactions. The 3 or 4 digit number can be found at the back of your bank card. Normally, when your card gets stolen or when the details are captured, hackers or criminals will try to guess your CVV code. When setting credit card limits, one’s usage of funds is restricted therefore, if anything does happen to the card your bank account won’t be completely wiped. In some cases, the card issuer can issue a refund due to an unauthorized transaction. Credit card limits can be set nationally and internationally.

Our Online Store builder packages includes a free SSL certificate and is equipped with the latest PHP and MySQL versions integrated caching and HTTP/2. Find out more about about our Prestashop online store builder that are loaded with benefits and tailored to your needs.

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Why you should make use of WordPress themes & templates

WordPress Theme

WordPress themes are a collection of files, stylesheets, images and possibly, JavaScript that is stored in one folder. All of these files are compressed into a folder and acts as a contributing factor to the functionality and appearance of your website. It is a tool that can change various elements that’s on your website such as fonts, typography, graphics, button styles and the layout in general. When you opt for a WordPress package, the theme is a typical general, default theme provided by the platform itself. If you’re not satisfied with the theme provided to you, you’re more than welcome to select any from the various sorts to suit the industry you’re in. The range caters to any website whether it be a blog, online store, your small business or anything that you’re comfortable with. Choosing the right theme can communicate the message, feeling or your brand in general to the public. It is best to take your time with each and every theme that caught your eye and to assess whether it would be the right fit for you, your audience and your idea.

WordPress themes vs. WordPress templates

A WordPress theme contributes to the overall design of your website whereas the WordPress template contributes to a particular element of the website such as an individual page. Themes are the foundation for the front-end aspect of your website and caters to various components such as the colour palette, backgrounds, headers, footers and positioning. These two terms are often mistaken and interchangeable. Themes are available to download in a number of places. It can be found in the WordPress directory or from various WordPress theme marketplaces. You can design your own WordPress theme and allow individuals to make use of them due to WordPress being open-sourced.

WordPress templates are very much different to WordPress themes due to the fact that the templates are only meant to change the layout of a single page. To clarify a bit further, a website can only have one theme. At the same time, it can have different templates taking into consideration that a website contains different pages. For example, if you’re looking to change the body and adding a different footer, a template allows for this action to take place due to the focus being on a certain element that’s on a web page.

The pro’s of using a WordPress website

Flexibility & adaptability

WordPress has taken a chunk out of the industry by branching out and allowing various other industries to take part in what they have to offer. Generally, in the beginning WordPress was ideally for individuals that were looking into website blogs. Currently, WordPress has taken on bold strides to take their venture into e-commerce, small business and assisting at corporate level.

User-friendly for beginners

With its ease of installation and functionality, almost each and every user can figure out how to maneuver around the multi-functional platform. Whether you don’t have experience in coding or if you’re the top gun, there’s something for each and everyone. For those who don’t have much experience in coding, one can easily drag and drop elements during the design process. The platform allows one to add their own piece of coding to the mix if they’re not satisfied with any of the themes or templates provided to them.

WordPress themes are mobile responsive:

When one considers User Experience and SEO ranking, WordPress has got you covered. With the digital landscape constantly increasing, it’s of utmost importance that one looks after their website with the regards to the back-end and front-end aspects. WordPress offers various mobile-friendly themes.

The cons of using a WordPress website:

Constant updates

Update installations are important and falls part of maintaining your website. If you have not taken the necessary procedures in creating a staging site, it can be a nuisance. It can affect your uptime in the long run.

Speed

There are certain themes that contain generic code that can slow down your site and affect the uptime of it due to maintenance. Poorly coded plugins can also be a contributor to slow website speeds.

Vulnerable to hackers

With WordPress gaining popularity over the years, it has become a hotspot for hackers and spammers. If your page has a comment section on the blog page, spammers often fill comments with ‘spam-me’ content.

If you think WordPress should be the direction for you and your website, find out more on our WordPress web hosting packages. Our support team are always around to assist via the live chat (see image below).

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What you need to know about bandwidth

Bandwidth

A crucial factor before considering a web hosting package is to determine your requirements for your website. There are various aspects that one needs to consider but we’ll get into that later during our blog series. One crucial factor worth considering is bandwidth. An important step in the process is to calculate the amount of bandwidth required for your website.

Majority of web hosting companies list their bandwidth quota in the specifications list. The bandwidth range varies from package to package. The higher the package, the more bandwidth will be provided.

What is bandwidth when it comes to web hosting?

Bandwidth speed is considered as the maximum amount of data that can be transferred over an internet connection at a given time. Bandwidth shouldn’t be confused with data transfer. Although, similar in context the terms are different due to the fact that bandwidth refers to the amount of data transferred within a time frame. The emphasis is on time frame and not necessarily by the amount of data that can be transferred. Bandwidth is measured in GB/s (Gigabytes per second) or MB/s (Megabytes per second)

Factors for determining your bandwidth requirements

Bandwidth plays a role in the loading time of your website. Due to statistics, users normally leave a site if it takes longer than 3 seconds to load. If you are an owner of an e-commerce business, your site’s speed can affect a potential shopper’s interest or attention span. This can affect the decision making process of shopper leading up to a sale. Each task that’s completed in your network requires network bandwidth. Preparing your bandwidth requirements from a service provider entails the following factors below. The factors mentioned below serves as a guideline as to what to look for before considering a hosting package.

Monthly visitors
You should keep track of the monthly visitors to measure your website’s threshold. You can track your visitors via Google Analytics or WordPress metrics tracker.

Page views
In terms of page views, you need to find out how many pages a visitor opens when they visit your website.

Webpage size
Finding your web page size can be done by using online tools such as GTMetrix or Pingdom. The type of content being displayed and the richness can be another factor affecting your bandwidth requirements. If you have high quality imagery, videos and

How you will be using it
An important factor that needs to be considered is how the bandwidth will be used. An individual might use 1Mbps whereas the other could stream videos in 4k where it would take much more data.

Ideally, a hosting plan that offers 50% more than your current bandwidth. This will allow for much needed room to do a little extra than what you usually could do with your previous package.

How to check your bandwidth using cPanel

Once you have logged into your cPanel account, on the right hand side, there is a panel that will display your data. Under the statistics section, you can check your bandwidth usage or one could type the phrase ‘bandwidth’ into the search bar.

Another method of checking for bandwidth usage would be to log into your account and scroll down to the metrics section on the page.

At Hostking, there would be no need to be concerned about your bandwidth limit. Our WordPress hostking and cPanel hosting plans offers unlimited bandwidth. Bandwidth can be a confusing topic to grasp at first. If there’s any further clarification needed, our support team is available right throughout to provide guidance.

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Can a website drive sales to a business?

With the world being forced to shift its focus online within the current pandemic especially retail & shopping, it makes one ponder whether an online presence is considered a necessity instead of an option. According to reports, the worlds population has a total of 7,83 billion at the start of 2021. There are roughly 5,22 billion people using mobile phones which is 66,6% of the worlds population. There are 4,66 billion people that use the internet which forms 59,5% of the world’s population. These statistics are ever increasing with more users that are entering the online sphere. So can a website actually drive sales to your business?

Your business’s website & the internet:

Checking your cellphone & constantly hopping onto the internet has become a habit & to some, second nature. Your website acts as the window to the world. It’s a virtual representation of your brick & mortar store. The internet has created a global village & carries a few advantages with it. The digital age, especially the internet, has made communicating & sharing information much more easier. The internet provides different ways in which people can market & add more leverage to their existing strategies.

Platforms & campaigns for your website that can potentially drive sales to a business :

  • Google Ads:
    Business owners that have their website up & running on Google can make use of the online advertising platform, consisting of various tools to improve your ranking in search results. There are roughly about 4,39 billion internet users. Come to think of it, that’s 4,39 billion opportunities awaiting.
  • Display Ads:
    Google display ads are typically ads that are displayed through various forms such as text, images, videos & audio. These ads are normally presented on different websites especially if you’re reading through any article.
  • Sponsored Ads:
    To put it in simple terms, there’s two parties involved when it comes to sponsored ads. The advertiser, which is responsible for paying for the add & will post the content on an influencer’s or publisher’s page.
  • Google Ad campaigns:
    There are various campaigns that one can make use of through Google Ad campaigns. If your business is product orientated, business owners can make use of this option. YouTube has become the latest hot spot for millennials either streaming their favourite show or learning from tutorials. There are approximately 2.3 billion YouTube viewers that are active users.

We’ve provided the statistics, strategies & various forms in which a business can present itself on the internet. Your future website is just one click away from potential sales. You wouldn’t want to think twice about this. If you’re looking for a reliable web hosting service provider, your online journey is one launch away with our cPanel or WordPress hosting packages as a start.

If you’re not clued up about who we are or what we do, please read through this informative & well written piece that sums up Hostking in a nutshell. Click here

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WHY NULLED WORDPRESS PLUGINS & THEMES SHOULD BE AVOIDED

WordPress is one of the most common web applications that receives threats & attacks. Due to its popularity, majority of users promote their websites through SEO – which requires an amount of information from WordPress in the form of blogs. All WordPress users & page owners should provide an additional layer of security to their page.

Nulled Plugins:
A nulled plugin is a replica version of the premium WordPress products. These plugins are distributed in a deceitful manner through the internet. Nulled plugins are considered as another form of web attacks & should be avoided at all costs.

Why nulled plugins should be avoided:
Security: Nulled WordPress plugins are known to carry malware which are extremely hazardous to your website. The malicious code contained in the plugin can be a bit of a challenge when trying to detect and fix it. There is a possibility of you losing your data during the process.

Privacy: Nulled WordPress plugins contain different variations of malicious code that’s hidden. This might include code that steals information from your WordPress site. This can be extremely dangerous if you’re running a website that contains personal information of users.

SEO rankings:
Nulled plugins could completely tarnish your WordPress SEO rankings completely. It can add spam links to your website that potentially redirects your traffic. It creates bad back links which in turn damages your ratings.

Automatic updates:
In order for your automatic updates to occur, a license key might be needed. You may have to perform these updates on your own if your plugin is missing a license key. It’s time consuming & a complicated task to perform in general.

So what does one do?
To answer majority of the concerns regarding the topic, do not install plugins from unreliable sources. It is best to pay for premium products rather than downloading it from untrustworthy sources.

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Using WordPress to support E-learning activities

The global coronavirus pandemic has placed an enormous amount of pressure on various industries within the world. Some businesses had to shut down while others are treading above water.

Educational institutions are finding & creating various avenues to keep the academic year alive. Another factor is to maintain a smooth flow of communication between the educators & their respective students. Long distance & e-learning platforms have gained a renown presence as of late but that might not be enough to aid for rescue.

WordPress is a platform used to generate content in the form of blogs. The platform is used by a variety of businesses ranging from e-commerce to portfolio websites. The platform is really versatile in terms of its content management system.

Benefits of using WordPress to aid with online learning:

Open-sourced platform
An open sourced platform allows anyone to have access to its features & functionalities.

Easy to use admin panel
Not everybody has a budget to allow for extra expenditure. Majority of individuals will usually hire developers & designers to tweak their website. WordPress has a general advantage over other e-learning platforms. There is a user friendly administration panel that allows users, even with or without a technical background to access & understand it.

Convenient way of accessing material
Due to the ongoing pandemic, this means that students won’t have access to libraries or student centres. It’s fairly simple for the teacher to upload notes & the same way it is for students to have access to it.

Ease of collaboration
It is important that individuals ensure that there is the same level of collaboration during the process of educating. WordPress has a few tools & features in place that allows students & educators to make comments & to engage in a professional manner.

Customizable themes & plugins
In order to attract students from different backgrounds, your e-learning website has to be unique & attractive. With themes & plugins readily available, you can customise every aspect to improve the functionality of your website.

Majority of activities are gaining an online presence. It’s never too late to start your journey with WordPress.

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STEPS FOR ADDING RECAPTCHA TO YOUR BLOG PAGE

The article below will describe how to install the reCAPTCHA plugin to your WordPress blog page. This plugin is a free service provided by Google that protects your page against spam & threats. It uses various techniques to tell humans apart from bots.

Before installing the plugin, make sure that you are the administrator of the page.

To add CAPTCHA protection to your WordPress page, follow these steps:

1) Firstly, you are going to have to log into your WordPress account as an administrator
2) Under dashboard, click ‘plugins’ and then click ‘new’
3) Into your search bar, enter ‘CAPTCHA’
4) Search for the plugin
5) Look out for the Google CAPTCHA (reCAPTCHA) & then click ‘install now’
6) Once the plugin has installed, under your dashboard, click the plugins tab & then click on ‘installed plugins’
7) Once you have found the reCAPTCHA plugin, click ‘activate’
8) Click on the ‘settings’ button

Once the plugin has been launched you have to create a public & private key. In order to complete the next step, you have to click the authentication button.

Once that is completed, follow these steps below:

1) Once the keys are received, type the public key text into the public key text box & the private key text into the private key text box.
2) Once completed, under ‘options’ click ‘save changes’
3) CAPTCHA should be activated once the steps above are completed. You can test it by going to your WordPress front page & click the comment link. You will see the WordPress CAPTCHA in the submission form.