“But I can’t upgrade!”

Yes, yes you can. Literally thousands – if not hundreds of thousands of installs have upgraded already.

“Oh really? I thought we’d be stuck on WPMU…”

Nope, you can upgrade manually to 3.0, then 3.1 and then 3,2. Please do it incrementally. We even wrote here in this blog about how easy it was to upgrade back when 3.0 came out. The developers spent a lot of time ensuring you could safely upgrade. Now tho… you need to do it manually.

“But I have all these plugins! and themes! What if they break??”

Most of them will not, especially the themes. Having actually done upgraded where things broke, when you have a plan in place you can dig your way out. The biggest issue I saw with mu-specific plugins “breaking” were menu items moving. That was it. The plugins still functioned.

“But I don’t have time! / My boss won’t let me..”

You DO have time to upgrade. You do not have time to clean up a hacked site. Upgrading allows you to move forward with your site, getting new functionality, a better experience for your users, and the knowledge of a job well done. The peace of mind is icing.

“Okay fine, you convinced me, what do I do now?”

1. Look at your site’s monthly traffic. When are the low times? The weekend? Monday morning? Most sites are generally low traffic on weekends, like Friday nights. Some niches (like Realtors) are completely low traffic Mondays and Tuesdays (everyone hits their sites on the weekends). Pick one of those times a week or two from now. It’s almost the end of August and once we hit mid September, traffic will be on the upswing again, I promise.

2. Make a list of the plugins you are using. If you’re back as far as WPMU, then you probably have a pile of code in the mu-plugins folder. These do not auto-update, and many plugins you are probably using in this folder actually have been updated. Go through them one by one, look at the plugin header and find out if they have new version. Get a new copy of all of them.

3. Get copies of the WP versions you need. They are all kept publicly accessible. Kinda why they call it “open source”. Look in trac here under Tags and see the zip archive at the bottom of each page. Save a copy of each version you need. If you are pre 2.9.2, you need wpmu upgrades first, which are over here. 3.0 and up, use WordPress trac.

4. Read over all the docs.
http://codex.wordpress.org/Upgrading_WPMU
http://codex.wordpress.org/Updating_WordPress#Manual_Update

5. Let the members of your site know there will be scheduled maintenance on the day or evening you’ve scheduled for your upgrade. Write a post, stick in an admin notice, email everyone – any or all of those options.

6. Upgrade day – get rested and clear your calendar. Make multiple backups and copy your install files somewhere safe that you can roll back to just on the off chance you wind up in a Worst Case Scenario. As long as you can put everything back to pre-upgrade state, you will be fine. I promise.

Extra notes:
- some plugns like BuddyPress etc definitely need to be deactivated.
- there are new htaccess rules you *have to* put in your htacces file
- do NOT replace the old MU specific define in wp-confgi with the new multisite defines. This will mess things up!
- when you are stumped, be sure to read carefully any messages on the screen, google to find posts from other people who had the same issue THEN post in the forum.

“I really need someone to do this for me..”

I totally know what you mean, how you feel and I understand. The first few years of running my own install, I freaked out about pretty much everything. Alas, Ron and I are (still) super booked. But! We know of a great and long list of developers and freelancers experienced with WordPressMU and multisite who will be happy to help you. Tell them I sent you.

You can do it! Now go Upgrade Today!

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In 3.1.2 this is no longer. users with no blog or site have a user dashboard with no attached blog or site – not even the main site. they will not be listed as users on the main site, but they will still be listed as users in the network and have their pseudo-subscriber access. (This basically means when they are logged in, they are logged in to all sites in the network but do not have admin area access to all blogs. they can just comment if “must be logged in to comment” is checked on any blog/site.)

If you still need users added to the main site/blog (for example in cases where you have a forum synced up with the main site for support) then you will need to add users to the main site when they sign up.

This plugins may help: Multisite user management.

Note: this behavior does not affect BuddyPress profiles.

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Support for this folder has actually been in single WordPress since 2.8.

In WPMU, you never saw any reference to this folder from the backend at all. Just drop the code in, and the plugin was already running.

In 3.0, support for this is naturally still there, but the folder isn’t created for you. If you do encounter a plugin (like domain mapping) that needs to run in this folder, simply create it via ftp or through your webhost’s control panel.

Also in the backend, if you are using the mu-plugins folder, is this:

A listing! You’ll note on this example site (other than we really need to clean out the plugins we were testing), must-use plugins are now listed. This will only be visible to Super Admins – regular administrators, even with access to the Plugins menu, will not see this.

While you may be tempted to toss all your plugins in there – don’t. Like stated above, the code placed in here runs automatically and (depending on how the plugin is coded) on every single page load. Also, any files in folders will not be seen. There must be a physical php file there to be read.

Popular plugins that do belong in this folder are ones like Domain Mapping and New Blog Defaults. Please make sure to always read the readme.txt included with any plugin, as it will specifically state if it should be installed in this folder.

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And after I’ve been working with WordPress MU for so long (3 years? Already?) I can assure you that it had WAY more fiddly bits and the devs have distilled this down to as little fuss as possible.

What you need to know before you begin

I’ve been reading many questions and blog posts about the “new” multisite feature and wondering how it compares or not to WPMU. The functionality is basically exactly the same. There were no new features added.

If you are currently using WordPressMU and have multiple blogs/sites, you do not need to do this. You are already running a network and have multisite enabled.

Using multisite, especially if you are letting other users sign up, involves sometimes substantially more knowledge about servers that just being a customer on a shared host. If you have difficulty installing WordPress via something like Fantastico and have never done it manually, then running a network is probably not for you.

If you’re new, there’s a few things you need to be aware of.

1. The sites are virtual. They don’t exist on the server, just in the database.
2. The sites are siloed content. While you do have one username and password across the site, you still need to go to each one to do things like post.
3. Your webhost has to support it. By support, I don’t mean answer specific questions about functions, I mean support from a technical perspective. The subdomain sites are driven by the use of wildcard subdomains. For subfolders, mod_rewrite. The mod_rewrite function is also used to serve uploaded files in either format. in other words, Windows servers are a little more trouble.

Getting the Network menu item to show

This menu is hidden by default. If you followed along the development cycle, you may have noticed it was easily visible. The decision was made to effectively hide it so users would have to seek it out and be armed with knowledge (hopefully) before they clicked any buttons willy-nilly.

Find the wp-config.php file in the root of your site, make a backup first, then open it up and add this line.

define('WP_ALLOW_MULTISITE', true);

Please paste this somewhere in the middle. I like to stick it after the salts, but that’s just me. It absolutely cannot go at the beginning or the end. If you look closely, there are a couple of comments within the config file telling you not to edit above or below those lines. So don’t.

Save the file. Make sure it gets saved, too, as sometimes you may have a setup where the owner of the file is not you, but Apache. Get your webhost to change the owner so you can edit it, then when we’re all done, change it back for security.

Installing the network part 1

Now when you login, you’ll notice a new menu under Tools -> Network. Most of the options are pre-filled for you, based on your main install. This will now be the main site in your network.

You may or may not be given the choice between subdomains or subfolders. This depends on a few things.

• - subfolders are disabled if your install is more than a month old. Why? Because the subfolder setup stuffs a /blog/ in the permalinks off the main site to prevent collisions between page names and site names. In an exisiting setting, changing your permalinks on you would not be good. This will be dealt with in a future version.
• - If you are using an IP address or just localhost, you’ll only have the option of subfolders. Same as if you entire install runs out of a folder. (Like mydomain.com/wp/)
• - No choice: If your site URL is different than your home URL, meaning your WP install is in a folder and the index.php is a level above, then you can’t enable the network. No really, you can’t. There’s no .htacess tricks you can do. This setup really interferes with the individual sites lookup. Domain mapping won’t fix it either. People have been trying to wrangle it for 3 or 4 years now, and it’s just not possible.

I have seen some unexpected options show up depending on what part of the setup is detected first, so your mileage may vary.

If your installation is in the root of your website, that is the best place for it. You’ll have the choice of either as long as your webhost supports it.

Once you’ve clicked the button it’s on to…

Installing the Network part 2

Wow, wall of text.

There’s two textboxes here. The first one deals with more defines for your wp-config.php file. Copy them , and paste them right in your wp-config.php file you edited earlier. I like to put these lines right after the define multisite line we did earlier. This is just to keep them all together.

The next textbox has htaccess rules. The .htaccess file is a hidden file in the root of your site. Make sure whatever you’re using to look at the file system has “show hidden file” enabled. After making a backed up this file, replace whatever you have in the htaccess file with the new rules. These control how the blogs and extra files are served.

You also need to create a new folder under wp-content called blogs.dir. This folder is where site uploads will be stored. Just media uploads, not posts. They are held in folders with the blog/siteID number in front of them, and then rewritten via the htaccess file to hide that part to the viewer.

Once you’ve saved both file on the server, log out of the WordPress admin area.

When you log back in, you’ll see a new menu box called Super Admin. This area is for global management of your new network of sites. You may now add new sites at will. They show up instantly.

Help! I picked the wrong format!

In case you picked subfolders or subdomains, found out it wasn’t working for some reason or realized it was the wrong choice, you CAN change this without reinstalling. It’s a little tricky and comes with caveats.

Caveat #1 – you have to sacrifice any sites you already made
Caveat #2 – if you’re forcing the subfolder install, it WILL stuff the /blog/ permalink in there and you’ll need a plugin to remove. And I haven’t tested this.

Open up your wp-config.php file and find this line:

define( 'SUBDOMAIN_INSTALL', true ); 

It will be either true or false. True means you’re using subdomains, false means subfolders. Change it to the one you want. Keep the previous caveats in mind.

Don’t forget to subscribe to my feed so I can show you how to use it.

There’s still plenty of good and relevant posts here in the archives, like these ones I’ve hand-picked for new users:
enabling wildcard subdomains
Enabling a theme for just one site
domain mapping

Plugins that have instructions to go in the mu-plugins folder are still relevant. Just create the folder under /wp-content/ and use away!

You can also get this tutorials expanded with screenshots in a free ebook here: Enable Multisite ebook.

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With all the moving parts in one install, yes that does mean there is an increased risk of something breaking whenever one of those parts gets upgraded. You can mitigate those risks, however.

1) Backup. Every time you upgrade anything, you have to do a backup first. This way, in a worse-case scenario, you can put things back the way they were. Backups are your backup plan. The critical areas are your database(s) and the wp-content folder. How to manually backup wordpress mu.

2) Do your homework. Check the various support forums for each component that needs upgrading and see if there have been any reported problems. Part of lessoning the fear & panic is knowing what to expect, especially the pitfalls.

3) Relax & remain calm. The worst time to upgrade is late at night or when you are in a hurry. Mistakes can be made far more easily then, and if something does go wrong, you’re likely to be more stressed & overtired. (unless you work well at night, as some do) If you’ve made your backups & have support forums threads open in other tabs in your browser, then you know you can manage.

4) Wait. I’m not suggesting to delay critical upgrades indefinitely, but you can usually afford to wait a week when it’s more convenient to do upgrades on a number of plugins & themes & core, than spread out. You could spend every other day upgrading something if you clicked the links every time they showed up.

For extra credit: while WordPress & MU make it clickably easy to upgrade from the backend, another skill used in fixing messed up upgrades is knowing how to do them manually. Some of us rarely use the internal upgrade process, preferring manual control. The brief version of this is simply replacing the files on the server with new copies.

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This is not created by default. You must create it in the wp-content folder.

The “mu” does not stand for multi-user like it did for WPMU, it stands for “must-use” as any code placed in that folder will run without needing to be activated. An actual file has to be there; if all the files are in a subfolder, they will not be read.

You can now see the content of that folder in the backend, under the Plugins menu. When visiting, you’ll see a sub-item called “Must Use”, if you’ve created that folder and placed files within.

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More tips;
- a link to see all the latest posts to the forums
- the right search page
- in Firefox, use the Linky extension to open all unread threads on that page. Just select down the screen, right-click, open all in new tab. Wait until they load, then grab one & start reading/answering.

godaddy WPMU info

Stopping splogs
Cookies for comments yes it says comment but it does check for splogs too.
Hash cash Same deal. Don’t let the mention of comments fool you.
Stoping spam bogs in WPMU

Timthumb and WPMU

wordpress video plugin (probably not needed with 2.9.x)

Importing a single WordPress blog into WordPress MU the direct to database method, because nobody imports like the bava, NOBODY. Use this method for large sites where the usual export /Import is too big or when you want to also pull the users and options.

Handy MU plugins in the repo:
the wpmu tag results page There’s been some interesting ones show up lately. Subscribe to the feed tag to keep up.
Sitewide Tags
Unfiltered MU
Donncha’s Domain Mapping
Blog topics to categorize the blogs
New blog defaults

How to domain map blogs A writeup I did for WP webhost. This is cpanel-specific.

How to make a page template

Donncha’s blog the original (and only) dev of WPMU

Top pages from this here blog:
Installing in a subfolder mostly for previous version, as the 2.9.x branch fixes this
Make a listing of the blogs on your site
Free ebook on how to install WPMU

500 errors and 1and1 webhost If you’re having issues installing MU there.

installing on windows

Switch to blog and showing the main blog’s nav bar on other blogs. This code goes in the other theme’s header.php file.
just before the nav bar code put

right after the navbar code put

then it will always show the pages from Blog #1.
Yes it works for other code, but fair warning – switch to blog can get expensive. Think hard before using it on sites with lots of blogs.

When your permalinks don’t work, either mod_rewrite isn’t enabled, or isn’t explicitly enabled on your vhost in apache. You’ll need this line:
AllowOverride FileInfo Options

And the last one: Check your error logs!

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True – your host does backups, but can or will restore only in the event of a complete disaster, and it restores the entire web account. You should very much take your own backups and store them somewhere else.

There are two things you need backups of:
- the database, where settings and content live
- the wp-content folder, where plugins, themes, and uploaded files are stored. The rest of the files are replaceable, unless you made hacks to the core.

If you have phpMyAdmin on your server, database backups are easy. PhpMyAdmin has an Export function to backup the entire database or just a table, if you wish.

In the event your database is large and using phpMyAdmin gets too unwieldy, your host may have a database backup tool in the web account control panel.

If you have ssh access, making a database backup is even easier. After logging in, move to the folder where you want the backup to be stored for now. A good one woudl be a /backups/ folder on the same level as public_html for now. Run the following command:

mysqldump –opt -u dbuser -p dbname> dbname.sql

Replace dbuser, dbname with your own. This will give you a straight up SQL dump of the database, so let’s compress it. Run this:

gzip -c dbname.sql>dbname.sql.gz

I like doing it in two steps so I know it’s done right, but if you wanted to do it all in one go, try this:

mysqldump –opt -u dbuser -p dbname> dbname.sql | gzip > outputfile.sql.gz

Now you have the database backed up and not saved under public_html, because we don’t want the outside world to have access to it. If you did it in two steps as above, you’ll have a zip of the database as well as a SQL dump, so to free up some space, we can get rip of the dump since we already zipped it.

rm dbname.sql

Now navigate to the root of your install. It may be something like
cd /home/webaccountname/public_html/

Let’s archive the entire wp-content folder.

zip -r wp-content-backup-Dec-3.zip wp-content/

This puts everything under wp-content in a zip. The -r in there tells it to get all the subfolders too. I like to put the date I made the backup in the filename. Once filenames have stopped scrolling by, move this zip to the backup folder we made previously.

mv wp-content-backup-Dec-3.zip ../backups

This moves the file from where we are up one directory and down into the backups directory we made earlier. Now you’re ready to move both zip files somewhere else off the server for safekeeping, or continue with an upgrade.

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So! If you want to look before you leap into the wonderful world of WPMU, here’s some Site Admin screenshots. Most of the admin area looks exactly the same as regular WordPress. The biggest change is the addition of the Site admin menu, seen here:

wordpressMU site admin menu

Some of these areas you use a lot (blogs, users) and some hardly at all.
Admin landing page – sort of a placeholder, has links to elsewhere
Blogs menu – blogs management
Users menu – user management
Themes menu – approve themes sitewide here
Options menu – sitewide options control
Upgrade menu – contrary what this is labeled as, you don’t upgrade here. This is for *after* an upgrade to step through each blog and update any database changes.

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DNS did not exist in the early days of the Internet. Originally, what each system admin did was maintain a local list of host names and the IP address associated with each host (in the early 90′s I was one of those system admins). When it was a small number of hosts this worked ok. But, as the number of hosts being accessed grew, maintaining the local list became regular maintenance. Every time a service was moved from one host to another, everyone who accessed the service had to update their hosts file.

When you are setting up your DNS, what you are doing is adding the lookup information for your domain to the Internet’s DNS system. The types of records that you may have to add are:

• NS – This identifies a DNS server that is an authoritative server for your domain. Other DNS servers will query this one to get the domain’s current DNS records.
• MX – This is a record to say where the domain’s mail server can be found,
• CNAME – Canonical name – This is essentially an alias that points one domain name to another domain name.
• A – This is an address record and specifies the IP address that the domain can be found at.

The note to keep in mind with DNS is that it is separate and distinct from web, mail, ftp, etc. server setup.

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