The Essential Plug-in
When deciding on WordPress as your CMS, you will need a collection of plug-ins to extend your functionality. To address this issue for the beginner here or anywhere is a exercise in futility. At the time of writing this article, there are over 21,000 free WordPress plugins available in the WordPress plug-ins repository, which provide an endless combination for an endless collection of personalities that use them.
However, the one plug-in that you must have …… that everyone must have, is a good caching plug-in. There are two to choose from, either the WP-Super Cache or the W3-Total Cache. I’m not so sure that one is any better then the other, but, WP-Super Cache seems to be the preferred system.
The one saving grace about having such a sea of choice in plug-ins, is that most are pretty easy to understand and configure. However, such is not the case with either WP-Super Cache or W3-Total Cache.
Caching is a tricky subject …… one that I care not to go into with this post. There are many different areas of site performance that need to be addressed to provide your site with solid caching. I have made an attempt to go over some of the basics with this support forums post over at “Down The Rabbitt Hole.com“. I actually have a more advanced tutorial that I am working on that has alluded my attention due to my present work load. So check back from time to time for updates.
Caching is also a tricky subject with your host. Sooner of later you will be knocked of line for your sites performance. I’m not so sure that this is entirely your fault, rather a concerted effort by your host to maximize their resources. I’ve been knocked off several times and I can assure you that I run a pretty tight ship. Unless you have a dedicated server which is the exception not the rule for most Blogs, you are at the mercy of your hosts demands for increased performance.
To be absolutely clear here with this post, I’m making this point; learn everything that you can about caching plug-ins and site performance as soon as possible after establishing your Blog Online and stay behind your efforts with continued education on these most critical of subjects.
