Wordpress Plugin: Author Web

This Wordpress plugin displays the name of the author as a clickable link to the author’s website. “Why not use the_author_link?” you ask. Because the_author_link doesn’t account for those users who have removed the default “http://” from their profile.

The Problem:

Wordpress defaults author website url’s to “http://”. Wordpress has added a fix to the past problem of displaying “http://” when the_author_link() was used. However, the_author_link() does not work when a user has removed the “http://” from their user profile.

We ran into this problem at MyBiggestComplaint.com where many longstanding users without websites had already deleted the annoying “http://” default from their profile. When the_author_url() was updated to fix the problem of needlessly displaying the default “http://”, those users who had deleted the “http://” from their profiles where having user names popup in slots where an active url is supposed to be placed.

The Solution:

Download and activate Author Web plugin. Replace calls to “the_author_link()” in your theme with “the_author_url_web()”. That’s it.

See the plugin in action on a page with an author url and on a page where a user has removed the default “http://” from their profile.

Download Author Web Plugin