Changing Web Presence

42 Replies

Some of you may have noticed, but very recently my blog has changed address from trentsworldblog.wordpress.com to trentsworld.blog. Yep, I finally broke down and decided to get off of the free version of Word Press. I have been meaning to for years, but I had been trying to figure out how to use my other site. In case you haven’t guessed, I have a web site at www.trentsworld.com. Right now that site does little besides tell you to visit my blog (here), but I plan on changing it and turning it into a true “author’s web site”! My original thought was to convert that into my blog, but I have decided to keep the two separate.

Just letting you know that there is that name change in case you are linked here. The old name still redirects to the new name, and I am guessing will continue to redirect for the foreseeable future, but who knows? Some day the old links might produce errors. Also, checking it from a dummy site I have for testing, I have run into a few quirks. Nothing major or show stopping. If you see some odd behavior, that might be it.

Since I’m paying for it, I might start using some of the more advanced features. in other words, I may give the old place a face lift. At the very least you might see small changes, like the absence of advertisement…

Yes, this is a “nothing post”. On the other hand, maybe you were one that saw those quirks.

Have a great day!

(It was only a few months ago that I discovered how many ads people see when they visit from outside of the WP community. A huge amount! Hopefully the place is more inviting now :) )

42 thoughts on “Changing Web Presence”

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      I don’t know why it took me so long to move to the paid version. Well, part of it was because I wanted to figure out how to put it on trentsworld.com, but keeping both isn’t bad. The other web sites are still rough, but it is getting closer :)

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  4. Pingback: If We Were Having Coffee on the 30th of January, 2021 | Trent's World (the Blog)

      1. SHL2

        At the time I did it because I was running out of space. I tried the two blog thing and that was to hard to keep up with. Now I pay for my domain and for the personal WordPress and I like it better with no ads.

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        1. trentpmcd Post author

          I do remember when you had two blogs. It is funny, WP did not allow mp3 files, so I spent a little money to upgrade to allow them, which also boosted my space, but it ended up being a one time only charge! I also downsize all of my photos, no more than 1060 wide nor 820 tall, so the sizes are huge.

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  6. PurplePumpernickel

    I have been dithering about paying for my WP site. But hesitant because I’m not sure how much trouble it would be to migrate. If you don’t mind me asking, is there a simple way to seamlessly move from current free to paid site, without losing any historical posts?

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      I think by default, if you go through WP, everything stays the same. All of the posts are still there and all of my followers, etc. Looking at the stats for the blog, they are all still in place. I had read horror stories in the past, but they must have improved their process. Someone left a comment that when they went to the paid version they did not take the offer for a free domain name for fear of losing everything, so that is an option as well (you’d keep the old name with wordpress.com), but I wouldn’t worry too much about it.

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  8. dawnkinster

    Very interesting! I’m always afraid to change things because I’m afraid I’ll break it beyond repair. Which is silly. I should know better, I used to be a trainer and would always tell people, just try it, it won’t break.

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      I am not sure why I resisted for so long. I think because I had always thought that I would use the trentsworld.com site for the blog, and that would have been a very heavy lift. This is much easier.
      You do have a paid blog already, don’t you? So you either started this way or did the switch already.

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  9. Sue Vincent

    It was the ads that made me start paying years ago and I’ve not regretted it. Now I’d like to sort out a way to keep the blog going for a while so my sons can read it, if they wish, when I stop posting.

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  10. Shannon

    Congratulations on the upgrade! I have my author site and blog separate, but have a tab for blog on my website, which I’ve mapped and pointed so when you click it, you’re taken to my blog’s url. Only took a medium amount of frustration to figure out. 😁

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      Thanks! After I thought about it, I do think having the two is for the best. Actually, three – I have a subdomain off of my trentsworld.com web site named trentpmcdonald.com. Right now it just does a straight redirect to here. I may set it up to be the formal bio page, and then have the trentsworld web site having all of the static content (stuff about books and music, etc.) and the blog separate. I just need the time!

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  11. dprastka

    I was going to go back to free WordPress, partly because I am doing this for fun I wasn’t sure if it was worth the money. However, I didn’t know before I started paying for my domain (my horse stories.blog) that it would be complicated to let it go because it directs traffic and/or is how everyone can get to my-life-and-horse stories sight. I’m not even sure if I’m describing this all correctly but since I let it expire I couldn’t even visit my own site!! Lol – so I just renewed it all and it’s all good. Maybe someday I’ll write children’s books or something and I know there’s no ads, and I personally get a lot out of blogging. But I’m not the most computer savvy person around! 🤪 Thankful I have a son with a computer science degree, so he can often help me out. I upgraded over two years ago, and onward we go! I hope you’ll enjoy the upgrade. (I’m not even sure if I’m using everything I could be using. Maybe I’ll search out some more WordPress classes/advice). In the end, it really isn’t that expensive! 😀

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      Yeah, my main concern was with the links and being sure everything (and everybody!) would still access it correctly. i should have upgraded years ago, but, first I didn’t realize how bad the ads are, and also I had wanted to figure out how to move my blog to the existing name. Having the two sites is fine, I’ll just have to set up the other one. (Actually, I also have trentpmcdonald.com, but it redirects here). But, yeah, it is pretty inexpensive, so, why not?

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  12. workinacresnothours

    They say a change is as good as a holiday. It will be great for your writing & music & getting things out there I would imagine. Add free always a bonus. When I am financial enough I am going to start paying I want my own name without all the numbers. lol.

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      Change can be good, though maybe not a holiday… Although the primary reason for the blog is to express myself, i do use it for promotion, and it’s not great to have a blog for promotion if it is full of ads for others! If not for that, I was happy to use the free version for quite a few years. But then, the paid version isn’t bad per month, it is just a big chunk since you pay a year up front.

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  14. Prior...

    hi trent – congrats on the changes – and two things that connect – first – i have been wanting to have a separate site like yours for a while – one that just had brief info and points to different sites – and i like how yours did that-
    and best wishes as you modify your site to make it more of an author home (or whatever unfolds)
    i have had the extra blog domain for a while but sometimes i wish i just stuck with the wordpress one because if i ever stop paying the blog domain links will not work and i wish i would have known that
    i am still working on fixing this
    but another author i follow had a private domain and when i linked him in posts – it no longer works as he went back to the
    included wordpress domain
    so – i am trying to find a way to use my wordpress domain while still keeping the blog one – i dunno
    just wanted to share that and best wishes with your modifications ;)

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  15. Marilyn Armstrong

    I’ve thought about changing sites entirely, but the whole name-change issue makes my brain go fuzzy. I don’t think I have it in me to rebuild another site. I’m having enough trouble just keeping this one alive. I really don’t like the block editor in WordPress. It’s not that I haven’t used it. I can use it. I just think it makes simple things twice as difficult as they were before and the “extras” you get using it aren’t thinks in which I have any interest. What I would like are the options I used to have that got stripped away and handed to “business” users only, like the ability to add plug-ins and change font sizes by point rather than “tiny, small, normal (whatever that means), and large” — especially because there’s no standard for these sizes. Large can be huge or normal and small can be normal or tiny depending on the the format. All the fancy photo layouts they offer are fine, but once you set them up, you can’t rearrange them or change them. You can only completely delete them and start over. Aligning things is more difficult and the colorful frames they offer look like they are meant for children who only work in crayon colors. But there’s nowhere to go. Maybe I’ll feel better about life if I ever get vaccinated and can actually get OUT of the house sometimes!

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      That is the problem, there are not a lot of options! As to my blog, currently the old name redirects to the new, and I hope that continues – it is one good thing about keeping it in house. So no problem there… yet. My webpage is hosted somewhere else. It is a bit more costly, but offers a huge amount more. But then, I tore down the web site I had previously built and am now just using a WP template there anyway! But I can add and manage plug-ins. Right now I am just using the ones my host provides and free ones. But I can still step out of WP mode and do other things with the site if I want – I was just looking at it and the offerings are pretty deep if you know what you are doing, like unlimited DBs, programming interfaces, DevOps tools, etc.
      Anyway, I’ll soon find out if paying for the WP site here was a mistake or not. So far it looks good.

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  16. tidalscribe

    Not a nothing post at all. I have been thinking of doing the same, but with my technical expertise worry it will all go wrong and my blog will evaporate completely! I too have a website and domain we set up when I first published on Amazon Kindle, I wish I had gone on WordPress in the first place, though I am occasionally surprised to hear from people who have been looking at it.

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      I started my original website back in the 90s when I created the web pages by typing in html by hand… lol. It went through many iterations before I went to WordPess and has been sitting there static ever since. As to the WP upgrade – going from a free version of WP to the paid one, and staying on WordPress, was pretty painless. My main concern was about links – if someone linked to the old address, would the links still work? So far, yes.

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    1. trentpmcd Post author

      Thanks, Penny. So the site does come with SSL certs (what makes it secure (https)), but after digging I find an article saying that unless I purchase a dedicated IP address some older browsers may show it insecure. OK, I tested on three modern browsers and they all showed insecure! So I just purchased the dedicated IP, and the site will be off line for 6 to 24 hours… Oh well, my timing is bad ;)

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