Turn off nofollow in WP?

[virgohippy]

Some people here have demonstrated an interest in establishing a blogging community. The easiest way to do this is leave comments on each others' blogs and to give them motivation to leave comments on yours with SE friendly backlinks.

Unfortunately, by default Wordpress has comments set to "nofollow" (I'm posting this because I just recently learned this myself - sorry to those who've left comments in the past ). WP doesn't have an option in the admin to turn this off so to change that you'll have to edit your code.

Edit: hony suggested a better way using the plugin dofollow.

How to disable "nofollow" comments in WP:

1. Open the wp-includes/comment-function.php file.
2. Do a find for "nofollow" in notepad, or whatever code editor you use.
3. Edit the line

$return = "<a href='$url' rel='external nofollow'>$author</a>";

change it to

$return = "<a href='$url' rel='external'>$author</a>";

4. Update the file on your server.
5. Give and get comments.

If you're worried about comment spam I've heard numerous people mention they're more than satisfied with Akismet. It's free and easy.

Pleasant blogging.

~

[hony]

There is a plugin called 'dofollow' for those who don't want to edit the code.

http://wp-plugins.net/plugin/sem-dofollow/

[virgohippy]

Now that takes the steam out of most of my thread.

Thanks for the suggestion hony. My code is back to normal and the plugin works just fine.

[hony]

Sorry that's me -- whenever I try to be helpful I'm just irritating! :-/

[walrus]

Originally Posted by virgohippy

Now that takes the steam out of most of my thread.

Thanks for the suggestion hony. My code is back to normal and the plugin works just fine.

I use the plugin cause I was too lazy to look through the code. I'd personally prefer the edit code mode as that's one less plugin to run. So I still thank you for posting the code mod.

For those who would want to use the do follow plugin I posted the link.

[virgohippy]

Originally Posted by walrus

I use the plugin cause I was too lazy to look through the code. I'd personally prefer the edit code mode as that's one less plugin to run. So I still thank you for posting the code mod.

If you don't mind keeping detailed notes of all hacks, which saves you hours of wasted "What the fuck?" time when you do upgrades.

I like using Plugins that other people have already written. Nothing beats add and forget.

[walrus]

Originally Posted by virgohippy

If you don't mind keeping detailed notes of all hacks, which saves you hours of wasted "What the fuck?" time when you do upgrades.

I like using Plugins that other people have already written. Nothing beats add and forget.

I'm no where near that organized but I do at least have a good enough memory when 9 months down the road I want to hack another blog up I'll know to search posts here from virgohippy.

[Fonz]

So, if you have a good comment spam filter like Akismet you would recommend using that plugin?

[walrus]

The short answer is yes but unless you are actively participating in doing comments with people it really doesn't matter.

[hony]

That's funny, I actually write my own plugins to avoid hacking the code. I have no hope of remembering everything I've done.

Now PHPBB -- now that's a different story; my own hacked code base is totally out of control. I cringe every time a security update comes out and I have to integrate it with my version.

[oldbrad]

Is the nofollow default on blogroll? I have some trades and don't want to be unknowingly nofollowing them, but i have searched se's to see my links to them and can't find any, but i cant find any code that says nofollow either.

[walrus]

No the "nofollow" is only a part of comments links.

It originated back before blogging had any means of spam filtering as the blogging brain trust figured that the "nofollow" would discourage spammers as they would not be able to gain link popularity because of it.

[oldbrad]

cool. i checked again before i saw your reply. I would have kicked my own ass if it had nofollowed my trades.

Thanks.