Use Grunt To Lint And Uglify Your JavaScript Project

JavaScript is a forgiving language unlike Java or C#. Because of this, we can’t always trust that our code is correct. I don’t mean that the logic may not be correct, I’m talking about syntax and structure.

Lint via Wikipedia:

…modern lint checkers are often used to find code that doesn’t correspond to certain style guidelines. They can also be used as simple debuggers for common errors, or hard to find errors such as heisenbugs

In addition to needing to lint your code for errors, you may also consider compressing and obfuscating your source code. This can be done through the process of uglification or minification.

Minification via Wikipedia:

Minification (also minimisation or minimization), in computer programming languages and especially JavaScript, is the process of removing all unnecessary characters from source code without changing its functionality.

Linting and minification are two tasks that can easily be run with a task runner such as Grunt or Gulp. In this example, I’ll be demonstrating how to use Grunt to run these tasks.

Force HTTPS On All Pages Of Your WordPress Site

Because of popular request, I decided to make my entire WordPress blog secured behind an HTTPS connection. In addition to requests, I also read that search engines such as Google reward site owners that have complete sites behind HTTPS.

In a previous post I made, I explained how to generate and install an SSL certificate to an Apache web server, but things are a little different in terms of WordPress.

Using An SSL Certificate With Apache

When you have a website that transmits information from a user to your server it is very important to encrypt it. The last thing you want is someones password being sniffed by a malicious user when they register or sign in. By using Secure Socket Layer (SSL), data is encrypted between client and server preventing any malicious users from sniffing your password in plain text.

The following will help you install an SSL certificate to one of your Apache web server virtual hosts.

Securing Your Apache phpMyAdmin Installation

If you’re using a LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP) stack, chances are you’re going to be using phpMyAdmin. By default, your phpMyAdmin installation is not very secure and chances are your MySQL database has a treasure trove of excellent information for a malicious user.

By following these steps, you can make it significantly tougher for your phpMyAdmin installation to be exploited.