WP Plugin: Optimal Title

This plugin will soon be deprecated…see Optimal Title Functionality Now in WordPress Core.

IMPORTANT!!!

Due to recent XSS security issues fixed in WordPress 2.1.3, the code for Optimal Title also had to change in order to fix the vulnerabilities. It is recommended that ALL users of this plugin upgrade to version 3.0. Due to changes in how Optimal Title works, that should be the last upgrade you will ever need. For more details, see the update details section below…

Optimal Title is a WordPress plugin that mirrors the function of wp_title() exactly, but moves the position of the 'separator' to after the title rather than before. This allows you to have your blog name tacked on to the end of the page title instead of having it appear first.

Having your page information appear before your blog name in the title is advantageous because it provides more meaningful search engine results and browser bookmark names. The text that appears between your <title> tags is used to generate both of these things, and will often be truncated when viewed. Because of this, it is more effective to have words directly relating to the content of your page appear before common markers. Not only will the titles be more meaningful, but the they will also be more scannable when being viewed in a list. For more information on this concept, see Dr. Jakob Nielsen’s article Microcontent: How to Write Headlines, Page Titles, and Subject Lines.

Installation

Download Optimal Title v3.0 and unzip the archive.
Upload optimal-title.php into your wp-content/plugins/ directory.
Activate the plugin on your WP Admin » Plugin Management page by clicking the corresponding “Activate” link under the Action column.
Follow the usage guidelines shown below…

Usage

In your header.php file, replace the function call wp_title() with a call to optimal_title(). You’ll also want to position your blog name after your usage of Optimal Title in order for this to work as intended. You should end up with a line that looks something like this:

<title><?php optimal_title(); ?> <?php bloginfo('name'); ?></title>

For a more complicated version that checks to make sure the plugin is installed and also includes support for a tagline on the home page, this is actual code I use on this site:

<title><?php if ( function_exists('optimal_title') ) { optimal_title('|'); bloginfo('name'); } else { bloginfo('name'); wp_title('|'); } ?><?php if ( is_home() ) { ?> | <?php bloginfo('description'); } ?></title>

Parameters

Optimal Title uses the same syntax as wp_title, from the default WP installation, and thus functions in the exact same way…

<?php optimal_title('separator', display); ?>

'separator' - string - The text to place between portions of the page title, such as the blog name and the category. Defaults to '»' (»).
display - boolean - Should the title be displayed (TRUE) or returned for use in PHP (FALSE). Defaults to TRUE.

Version History

v3.0 (06 Apr 2007) - Complete rework on how the plugin works; now should be compatible with all WordPress releases no matter the version.
v2.0 (26 Mar 2006) - Updated to be compatible with the latest WordPress release (including WP 2.x version support).
v1.0 (08 Sep 2004) - Initial release to the public.

v3.0 Update Details

Upon the suggestion of Lee Kelleher, the way in which Optimal Title works was adapted in order to be more efficient, future-proof, and secure. The plugin no longer generates the title text itself, but lets the built-in wp_title() function handle the generation, then rearranges things afterward. Because of this change, Optimal Title will have the exact same security implications as the default installation of WordPress itself and should never need to be upgraded again…in other words, if your WordPress installation is up to date, you’ll never have to worry about the security of using Optimal Title. That also means that the plugin should work for ANY version of WordPress, past, present, and future.

This entry was written by Aaron Schaefer, posted on September 8th, 2004 at 11:47pm, filed under WordPress and tagged Plugin, SEO, WordPress. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post. Trackbacks are closed, but you can post a comment.

310 Comments

Craig Hartel

Posted September 9th, 2004 at 3:54pm | Permalink

A most excellent idea! Simple to use and set up. Thanks for your contribution to the WordPress community!
Sadish

Posted September 10th, 2004 at 7:55pm | Permalink

Good Work. I am using it now!!! thanks !
Ozh

Posted September 11th, 2004 at 4:06pm | Permalink

simple & smart idea. Congrats
Ozh

Posted September 11th, 2004 at 4:16pm | Permalink

Tip for anyone : using the $display param goes well with something like :

<title><? optimal_title('«'); ?><?php bloginfo('name'); ?><?php if (!optimal_title('', FALSE)) echo ' » Your tagline' ; ?></title>

So that when loading index.php, instead of just “Your blog name” in prints “Your blog name - Your Tagline”.

At least that’s what I like
Aaron Schaefer

Posted September 11th, 2004 at 4:35pm | Permalink

Thanks for the tip Ozh…I was actually going to implement something like that myself, but hadn’t gotten around to it yet!
Robert

Posted September 12th, 2004 at 3:01pm | Permalink

cool idea and very simple to implement. (good instructions always a plus - so you win!)

thanks for the creative plugin! heaps of praise coming your way!

i’ve installed it and will watch to see what changes this brings about in search results.
Murray

Posted October 2nd, 2004 at 5:57pm | Permalink

This plugin is working great for me… Thanks Aaron!
Computer Scrapper

Posted October 22nd, 2004 at 11:45am | Permalink

Thank you very much for that great plugin!
Ozh - special thanks for the tip.
Chad

Posted October 27th, 2004 at 4:37pm | Permalink

Nice job Aaron, thanks! Keep up the good work.
Jeffrey Yasskin

Posted December 7th, 2004 at 12:33am | Permalink

Thanks for the plugin. I’ve modified it a little bit to also reverse dates and default to $sep=”&laquo”. The version I’m using is at http://jeffrey.yasskin.info/dump/optimal-title.txt
Tom Kirchner

Posted January 12th, 2005 at 8:08pm | Permalink

Thanks for the plugin! and thanks to Ozh for the tip, too - both work great.
Robert

Posted February 5th, 2005 at 5:57pm | Permalink

thank you, this plugin is now implemented in my blog.
Eric

Posted March 18th, 2005 at 5:44pm | Permalink

Um, why not just modify the template, since you already are doing that with this plugin…

I mean, I don’t see what advatange this has over doing :
<title><?php wp_title(''); ?> » <?php bloginfo('name'); ?></title>
Aaron Schaefer

Posted March 20th, 2005 at 5:19pm | Permalink

Um, why not just modify the template, since you already are doing that with this plugin…

The problem with the original function is the order of the output…if you did as you suggest and simply do:

< ?php wp_title(); ?> » < ?php bloginfo('name'); ?>

it would output something like:

» Entry Title » Blog Name

rather than:

Entry Title » Blog Name

The only thing Optimal Title does is switch the position of the automatic separator so you don’t have the erroneous characters at the front of your title. This also makes a difference in nested archives, such as the date, which use multiple separators and will appear as 2004 » November » Blog Name when done correctly.
LcF

Posted March 24th, 2005 at 1:15am | Permalink

nice! I use it at my weblog - http://www.liewcf.com
dju`

Posted April 5th, 2005 at 6:20pm | Permalink

To improve Ozh’s tip:

<title><?php optimal_title(); ?><?php bloginfo('name'); ?><?php if (!optimal_title('', FALSE)) { ?>
Jens Wedin

Posted May 13th, 2005 at 1:38am | Permalink

Works like a charm, thanks a lot for the plugin.
Mark

Posted May 20th, 2005 at 1:57am | Permalink

Great Plugin, thx it works …
Gemme

Posted June 9th, 2005 at 11:05pm | Permalink

Looks very interesting. The thing is that I use the latest version of Wordpress, being 1.5.1.2 and in that index file there is no wp_title. At least I can’ seem to find it. I would love to use this plug in so any advice is very welcome
Matthew

Posted June 11th, 2005 at 5:58am | Permalink

It works fine for me in 1.5.1.2, & I have just installed it today, as I had been tryng to work out how to achieve this for a while.

I think you may be looking in the wrong file, which is why you are having trouble getting it to work. Look for the TITLE tags in your header.php file in the themes folder for the theme that you are using.
Julian

Posted June 18th, 2005 at 12:02pm | Permalink

Thanks to your plugin I’ve got a nice title-structure on my WordPress now. A few hours ago I wondered about how to tweak this part of my installation - now it works just fine at http://exbook.de
Abina

Posted July 13th, 2005 at 5:17pm | Permalink

Does anyone know how to set this up so the blog title is displayed only on the first page? on the other, the title is only displayed with the “Entry Title” ?
Bazil

Posted July 13th, 2005 at 9:58pm | Permalink

Like a Glove, this was exactly what I was looking for…Thanks for sharing
corey

Posted July 25th, 2005 at 11:07pm | Permalink

Great plugin, installed in under 5 mins and extremly useful, thanks.
Karel

Posted August 22nd, 2005 at 11:45am | Permalink

Wonderful, wonderful! I plan using it on my website (still in beta, no link, sorry).

This does strange things with date archives though, on the lines of 2005 > year >> month).

Many thanks for sharing this!
Karel

Posted September 4th, 2005 at 5:15am | Permalink

OK, here is the link: http://www.boskapel.nl

For date archives I used the normal title, for everything else I used optimal_title.

Again, many thanks!
Erica

Posted September 18th, 2005 at 1:27pm | Permalink

Perfect! Makes SEO better! You have answered what I have been trying to find how to do.

I am using it at http://www.girlgeekette.net and http://beta.aleeya.net
(Beta.aleeya.net soon to replace http://www.aleeya.net)
James

Posted October 1st, 2005 at 3:21am | Permalink

Friggin’ sweet! Thanks a ton, dude.
Ed

Posted October 11th, 2005 at 2:08pm | Permalink

Hey I just wanted to say Thanks! I little confusion on the install as it is actually header.php that needs to be edited and not index.php but once I sorted that out this was an easy tweak. Thanks for sharing!

http://www.edwardmortell.com/blog/
maximum

Posted October 13th, 2005 at 1:40pm | Permalink

See my Title - http://blog.crime.su/
It’s good?
Dustin

Posted October 13th, 2005 at 3:11pm | Permalink

Works great once i used the tip from dju’. Thanks! I was wondering how I could grab the information automaticly for my technology blog http://www.atlas-tuesday.com.
Alec Tang

Posted October 19th, 2005 at 7:05pm | Permalink

Thanks For sharing, perfect tool that I need.
Karen

Posted October 23rd, 2005 at 4:48pm | Permalink

I am really new to this stuff, but your plug-in was very easy and clear, except that, like someone else, I had to add the code to the header.php. But it works like a charm. Thank you so much.

http://artful-journey.com
ryan

Posted October 24th, 2005 at 6:23am | Permalink

works fantastic, been looking for something like this for a long time
Martin

Posted October 28th, 2005 at 7:26am | Permalink

Anyone who used this , have you noticed better SE ranking/indexing?
erica ann

Posted November 5th, 2005 at 1:12pm | Permalink

@ Martin above.. I am not sure if this would answer your question about the SE ranking and optimization…

but I have noticed dramatic improvements in a few ways. I actually have written a bit about how it helps in

http://www.aleeya.net/2005/11/05/optimal-title-plugin-wordpress-and-seo/

and explained why the change in title can benefit not just in search engine ranking itself, but in how the readers can benefit from the search engine results optimized by the title as well as other ways (Which all lead to more clicking from search engines.. which in a round about way can improve the search eingine results) in

http://www.aleeya.net/2005/10/24/the-psychology-of-page-titles/

and few other articles I have that are linked from the main one of Optimal Title Plugin, WordPress and SEO.
mai9

Posted November 13th, 2005 at 9:34pm | Permalink

I am surprised to see that this blog is not using the plugin!
jude

Posted December 1st, 2005 at 6:09am | Permalink

thank you for this fantastic plug-in. very useful for SEO.
Dave

Posted December 7th, 2005 at 7:08pm | Permalink

Found your site and this plugin through girlgeekette (erica in this thread) and her awesome walkthroughs.

One thing I wanted to point out that threw me off when installing this.

In the template I am using at least. The title information is in the header php file not in the index.php file. So for anyone who might not find it in index.php check your header.php file.

thanx for the awesome plug.

Dave
Stuart Robertson

Posted December 8th, 2005 at 10:03am | Permalink

I found it in the header.php file as well. This plugin along with Head Meta Description are really helpful in getting things setup the way I wanted.

Thanks for the good work on this!
harold

Posted December 8th, 2005 at 1:07pm | Permalink

thanks for this power plug-in , this is what i was looking for.

herold
Rionya

Posted December 11th, 2005 at 4:27am | Permalink

Wow.. nice plugin. I’m use this plugin on my website at http://article-articles.com.
chuck

Posted December 11th, 2005 at 11:04am | Permalink

I’ve uploaded the script into my plugins and have activated but where do I find the index.php file? I’m new at this kind of stuff so any kind of help is appreciated.

thanks,

chuck
chuck

Posted December 11th, 2005 at 11:20am | Permalink

found the index.php file but cannot find the wp_title() in the file

chuck
MacGears

Posted December 12th, 2005 at 7:22am | Permalink

Awesome tool! Thanks.

chuck, if you are using WP themes, edit the header.php file located the theme folder.

See mine for an example: http://www.macgears.com
NotHere

Posted December 12th, 2005 at 12:43pm | Permalink

Chuck,

Check to see if it exists in your header.php file.
misionpilot

Posted December 12th, 2005 at 10:53pm | Permalink

Chuck look in wordpress >> wp-content>>themes >> your current theme and then modify that index.php it should work…
Max Capener

Posted December 15th, 2005 at 3:26pm | Permalink

Hi

I have installed this plugin successfully and added the following code to header.php:

?

My question is that on my home page http://www.winningsleep.com/blog the title tag shows

Winningsleep.com ? Efficient Sleep to Maximize Energy etc etc..

It’s only a small thing, but how do I change the question mark to something like ‘>>’?

Winningsleep.com >> Efficient Sleep to ….

It’s one of those small things that is really annoying me because everything else works a treat!

Thanks
Max
Max Capener

Posted December 15th, 2005 at 3:30pm | Permalink

The code I entered is as per dju’s post. It didn’t display for some reason.
Patrick Cash

Posted December 17th, 2005 at 5:55pm | Permalink

I’m not too sure I have this correct…

I added:

?
to where the WP_title() tag was in the header.php file.

My site is:http://www.patrickcash.com/blog

What should I see if it’s working correctly?

Thanks!
Patrick Cash

Posted December 17th, 2005 at 5:56pm | Permalink

Well… I posted the code but it didn’t show….

If someone could help me out I would apprecite it…

Thanks,
Patrick
Rionya

Posted December 19th, 2005 at 9:43pm | Permalink

I found code with same function with this plugin. Just write this code in your head, all finish.

| dot com
Rionya

Posted December 19th, 2005 at 9:46pm | Permalink

I found this code with same function with this plugins. Just write :

| dot com

On your head.
Kep

Posted December 22nd, 2005 at 7:29pm | Permalink

GAK! I can’t get it to work with the seismatic theme. What am I doing wrong?
Wukung

Posted December 26th, 2005 at 4:48pm | Permalink

Thanks a lot for the Plugin. It truly helps our high-school online-magazine to be found as we like to be found.
Amos Wong

Posted December 29th, 2005 at 12:55am | Permalink

Nice plugin. I’ve used it in my other blogs.
I’m setting up a new blog and wonder if this plugin works with WP2.
Ross Shannon

Posted December 31st, 2005 at 1:15pm | Permalink

Good stuff, this still works in WordPress 2.0. I had coded my own awkward string replacement function to reverse the titles, but having this plugin is much cleaner. Cheers.
Murray

Posted January 3rd, 2006 at 4:01pm | Permalink

Hi Aaron… ’bout time you came out of the woodwork, eh! I miss your plugins and solutions!
jakob

Posted January 5th, 2006 at 4:20pm | Permalink

works, been looking for some time for your fix/plugin, found it, later dude
jakob
http://www.boyer-draeby.dk
seomontreal

Posted January 5th, 2006 at 10:16pm | Permalink

Hey Max!

This happened to me and it just has to do with copying and pasting. Look where the question mark is and just look at the code you posted - backspace or delete and get rid of it. Mine looked like a box rather than a question mark in my code, but showed as a question mark on the screen.
Gabe

Posted January 10th, 2006 at 12:03am | Permalink

Awesome plugin! Saved me a lot of pain!
Fred

Posted January 10th, 2006 at 7:38pm | Permalink

The optional title plugin evidently doesn’t work with my version of Wordpress. 1.5.1.3. wp_title() doesn’t exist in index.php, but it does in header.php. Changing that to optional_title() turns my blog page into a blank page.
Aaron Schaefer

Posted January 10th, 2006 at 9:14pm | Permalink

It should be optimal_title(), instead of optional_title(). I actually wrote the plugin all the way back before the theming engine was introduced into WordPress (the 1.2 days) and so the original location of wp_title() was in index.php, but as you said, it has since been moved to header.php…I need to update the installation instructions. Hopefully that should get you going…
Fred

Posted January 10th, 2006 at 9:52pm | Permalink

I tried optimal_title() but that didn’t work either.

Still getting a blank white page.
CountZero

Posted January 12th, 2006 at 4:24pm | Permalink

easy little plugin, works like a charm for me
weezil

Posted January 14th, 2006 at 2:23am | Permalink

Hi Aaron, great plugin.

I have it working nicely on a couple of conventional WP 1.5x blogs.

I have a couple more which use WP 1.5x and a Content Management System instead of a blog. These sites use Pages instead of Posts. Would it be difficult to mod the plugin to do the same thing with Page titles instead of Post titles?

cheers,

-weez
Tim

Posted January 18th, 2006 at 1:56pm | Permalink

Hi,
I am attempting to install this on WP2.0. Activated Optimal Title from admin. I have gone into my theme header.php.

Replaced this code:
» Blog Archive

With This code:

I am getting a blank page now. Can anyone advise me? I’m not a coder…

Regards
Vlad Stan

Posted January 21st, 2006 at 7:11pm | Permalink

Excelent tool. Very easy to use. Thanks.
booyaa

Posted January 22nd, 2006 at 11:39am | Permalink

works like a dream, here’s to my first google bomb!
PAC-MAN WORLD 3

Posted January 24th, 2006 at 10:15pm | Permalink

Thank you for the plugin. Works like a charme.
Took me 2 minutes to plug it in.
anusharaji

Posted January 26th, 2006 at 12:04am | Permalink

thats true….
thnx for the plugin
yoga

Posted January 29th, 2006 at 11:59am | Permalink

nice one sir. thanks for it works good with wp1.5
Scott Gingrich

Posted January 30th, 2006 at 4:17pm | Permalink

Thanks for the plugin…I’m new to Wordpress and have my first blog at http://www.thecrmcoach.com/blog and with plugins like this, I’m having a blast!
Scott Gingrich

Posted February 1st, 2006 at 12:16am | Permalink

When I upgraded to Wordpress 2.0.1, this plugin caused me a bit of grief. When I went to my blog, the page was BLANK. After looking in the error file, I realized it was bambing out on the optimal_tag. So, I temporarily took it out and presto, my site was back. After activating the plugin, I put the function back and everything worked like a charm. Great plugin! Thanks again.
CountZero

Posted February 2nd, 2006 at 2:36pm | Permalink

Manual Pingback:

So voila, here comes a commented list of the plugins currently used here at 4null4.de. It
LG

Posted February 8th, 2006 at 8:57am | Permalink

If you want to be sure not to crash your site when plugin is dissabled, use:
Colon Cleanse Man

Posted February 17th, 2006 at 5:33pm | Permalink

I love this plugin! I’ve been looking for something like and was resigned to try and figure it out myself.

You rock!
Christian Swanson

Posted February 17th, 2006 at 8:52pm | Permalink

Excellent Plugin I used it on my blog with no troubles. — Thanks.
Lance C

Posted February 24th, 2006 at 11:27pm | Permalink

This plugin was just what I needed!

check it out: http://www.thesolobusiness.com

implemented on Wordpress 2.0.1 flawlessly!
Daniel

Posted March 9th, 2006 at 8:51am | Permalink

Just installed it, works perfectly. - Thanks.
Steve

Posted March 19th, 2006 at 5:18pm | Permalink

May I add another word of appreciation for the plugin!

I was going about it a rather obtuse way, trying to *remove* the prepended spaces from wp_title, (had figured out how to nuke the raquo) without luck without muddling around in the core.

Sheesh, three hours later and here I am with relief and gratitude.

wp 2.0.2
The Sage

Posted March 20th, 2006 at 2:40pm | Permalink

I have noticed that instructions are not 100% correct.

I have tried to install the optimal plugin with no luck. Do only the header.php file needs to be edited? I have activated the plugin in the CP.
Jason

Posted March 25th, 2006 at 2:41pm | Permalink

Thanks a bunch. This is exactly what I was looking for. I edited the header.php file and then this worked.
The Blogateer

Posted March 25th, 2006 at 3:52pm | Permalink

Great Plugin Elastic Dog. I’ve Created A Video Tutorial For Anyone Having Trouble Installing This Plugin, And It can be Found Here:

http://www.blogateer.com/seo-tweaks-for-wordpress.html

Nathian

scragz

Posted March 30th, 2006 at 12:53am | Permalink

Wouldn’t this be so much easier and more forwards compatible?

function optimal_title($sep = '&raquo;', $display = true) {
    $title = wp_title('', false);

    // Send it out
    if ($display && !empty($title)) {
        echo "$title $sep ";
    } elseif (!$display && !empty($title)) {
        return "$title $sep ";
    }
}

Aaron Schaefer

Posted March 31st, 2006 at 10:49am | Permalink

It wouldn’t work correctly for titles with multiple levels, such as date-based archives…
Thomas

Posted March 31st, 2006 at 11:23am | Permalink

So simple yet so needed. Thank You!!
relaxedguy

Posted April 3rd, 2006 at 7:16pm | Permalink

Blank page syndrome. Changes permissions at the same time, ugh. How about moving the edits to the top so newbies aren’t looking at comments from 2004 which no longer apply to 2.0?
carlo

Posted April 9th, 2006 at 11:12am | Permalink

I would like to use this on my website. However, I was wondering if anyone knew how to insert the category into the title?

If it’s the homepage I would like the title to stay as (blog name) - (tag line)

If a category with a list of postings I would like it to be (blog name) - (category name)

If an individual post I would like it to be (blog name) - (category name) - (post name)

If anyone has any ideas please let me know
carlo

Posted April 9th, 2006 at 11:13am | Permalink

PS. Great plugin!!!
Anna

Posted April 9th, 2006 at 11:17am | Permalink

After some tweeking for 2.0, it works a treat.
Matt

Posted April 9th, 2006 at 6:39pm | Permalink

Great plugin!! A+ Thanks i’m using it on my site http://www.webcamall.com/
PaulZ

Posted April 20th, 2006 at 11:19am | Permalink

After getting excited about this plugin, I did some more research on WP2.0+ compatible ways of doing this. I found the following in the WordPress Codex for wp_title() If the code doesn’t show up please see the original article.

Separator with Blog Name and Title Reversed

This lets you reverse page title and blog name in the title tag from example above (Title of Post–My Blog) by removing the separator from wp_title(), then tests if wp_title() holds a value, and displays the separator between it and bloginfo() if it does.
Aaron Schaefer

Posted April 20th, 2006 at 5:08pm | Permalink

That method would only work for single level titles, where things like archives can have multi-level titles like: “2004 > September > BlogName”, so the method listed on the Codex would produce “ 2004 September — Blogname” with an extra leading space in there as well. It doesn’t look too bad in that example, but it could make a difference for other title structures (plus the leading space bothers me).
PaulZ

Posted April 22nd, 2006 at 8:06am | Permalink

Hi Aaron, thanks for pointing out those shortcomings. I don’t use multilevel titles on any of the blogs I manage and so I didn’t think of that.

In order to protect the the website in case of upgrade or deactivated plugins shouldn’t we do this?
stein

Posted April 24th, 2006 at 12:25pm | Permalink

Just what the doctor ordered! Was getting a bit tired of the monotone titles on googles. Thank you!
Leion

Posted April 29th, 2006 at 2:08pm | Permalink

I am using this now.
Thanks for it
Tim

Posted May 1st, 2006 at 4:21pm | Permalink

Hey Aaron,

Thanks for the plugin. Since installing and activating it, however, the titles for my archives are messed up. I’d like to keep it to where when someone clicks on the “December 2005″ archives, that “December 2005″ shows up in the title. I’d appreciate any help you could give. Feel free to email me if you need further clarification.
weezil

Posted May 28th, 2006 at 6:36pm | Permalink

Upgraded the blogs I’m running to WP2.0x. Optimal Title works fine in 2.02.

Better yet, our hits from search engines have gone up by 50% since installation.

Thanks again!
Jason

Posted May 30th, 2006 at 12:09pm | Permalink

After activating this plugin, it destroyed my blog outputting the text from the plugin in admin and actual blog shows it above everything. See my website link. Any ideas?
nigel

Posted June 1st, 2006 at 9:27am | Permalink

oh… jason, it seems not so bad as you descripted about.
BiZwiKi.CN

Posted June 1st, 2006 at 2:09pm | Permalink

Yes, I upgraded my blogs to wordpress 2.0.2, and the titles from both weblogs looks great under your work!! With greatful Thanks! And here are something I’d like to share with the others who may confused little. The function: wp_title() contain in the header.php file, and just make change as following the usage instruction. It work great for me, my both sides are list below, and I hope this amazing tool will work for yours too. Thank you.

http://www.bizwiki.cn/teamblog/
http://www.bizwiki.cn/nigel/
Anne

Posted June 2nd, 2006 at 12:12am | Permalink

BEAUTIFUL plugin!! Love it!!
CypherHackz

Posted June 2nd, 2006 at 9:51am | Permalink

Thanks for the plugin.
WebMolesto

Posted June 7th, 2006 at 3:02pm | Permalink

Working perfectly on my Wordpress 2.0.2: http://www.molesti.com
Keep up the good job !

WM
dougthecook

Posted June 9th, 2006 at 5:17pm | Permalink

Works perfect with Wordpress 2.0.3: http://blog.mysecurepc.com
Excellent plug-in!

Doug
TechLowdown

Posted June 16th, 2006 at 1:27pm | Permalink

Thanks for the plug-in. I’m new to wordpress, but had no trouble getting it working.
HWR

Posted June 16th, 2006 at 8:27pm | Permalink

Great plugin Aaron, took less than 30 seconds to install. Thanks!
SELaplana

Posted June 19th, 2006 at 11:57pm | Permalink

thanks. I successfully got it and my blog’s title is now cooler than before. hope this could help my blog’s seo.
michelle

Posted June 20th, 2006 at 7:13pm | Permalink

good plugin. Im going to try now on my site about Celebrities
Nic

Posted June 21st, 2006 at 10:54pm | Permalink

Thanks for the plugin. First time designing a WP site, and I got it working in minutes. Very very cool.
damian

Posted June 23rd, 2006 at 8:25am | Permalink

I would love to use this plugin with my wordpress 2.0.3 (german version) but i can´t find header.php. I can find wp-blog-header.php, but there is no tag.
Any ideas?

http://www.metadenke.de
Karri Flatla

Posted June 24th, 2006 at 11:04pm | Permalink

Fabulous plugin! For the Kubrick theme, however, I did have to make the changes to the script within the header.php file and not the index.php file (just in case anyone is getting hung up on that!
Thanks again. Very cool indeed.
Karri
Ron

Posted June 25th, 2006 at 10:39pm | Permalink

Why isn’t the plug-in used on this site??
Sober

Posted June 30th, 2006 at 7:58pm | Permalink

Thanks. Works in http://www.nakkeskudd.no
kulimboy

Posted July 2nd, 2006 at 2:44am | Permalink

Thks .. I been asking for this plugin in digitalpoint forum and someone pointed me to this excellent plugin. Nice work..!!
web developer blog

Posted July 13th, 2006 at 2:51am | Permalink

Nifty little plugin!
Jez

Posted July 24th, 2006 at 7:25am | Permalink

This looks great - but I couldn’t make it work on V 2.0.3. Any ideas what I did wrong? After activating the plugin nothing would work and had to remove it. But I wants it bad!! Hope you can help.
Wang Internet = Internet Money Made Online

Posted July 27th, 2006 at 3:23am | Permalink

Works on my site too. Thanks. Hope the search engines likes it too!
pOg

Posted July 30th, 2006 at 6:12am | Permalink

it work on my 2.0.3 instalaltion.
thanx for the plugin
shah

Posted August 11th, 2006 at 1:05pm | Permalink

Thanks for the plug in. Work with WP 2.0.4. I use it at http://moneyblogger.net
Mark

Posted August 26th, 2006 at 4:18pm | Permalink

Thanks! Great plugin and with the Description mod outstanding
Jayakanthan

Posted September 3rd, 2006 at 11:53pm | Permalink

Thats great plugin searching for a while and a friends refers me to see this plugin.. thanks to my friend and the creator of the plugin…
Roy

Posted September 4th, 2006 at 10:51pm | Permalink

This is the code I have in my header, I am using WP 2.0.4 . I have looked at others who are using it and my url does not look like their’s. It show Blog Archive. Can someone show me exactly where to put the code to make it work. Thanks.

» Blog Archive
Job-Vacancy.org

Posted September 5th, 2006 at 1:10am | Permalink

Hi…
This is an excellent plugins.
HOWEVER …
Can you do something also in the result page of the blog?
because when we do searching using wordpress, it doesn’t seem showing us the optimal title, … it shows …. just like and index.page

cheers,
Vee

Posted September 9th, 2006 at 8:08pm | Permalink

Great job! Thanks!
tech-scope.com

Posted September 24th, 2006 at 11:24am | Permalink

great, im using this plugin for my site
http://www.tech0scope.com
between sir, the file that should be edited is header.php right?
Bogdan

Posted October 1st, 2006 at 3:02pm | Permalink

thanks for the plugin
Erika

Posted October 8th, 2006 at 12:37am | Permalink

Thanks for the plugin, works great for my site!

http://www.metropolitanchic.com

E
Rob

Posted October 12th, 2006 at 3:21am | Permalink

Great idea. Doesn’t work for me though on WP 2.0.4

I followed the instructions (using header.php not index.php) and my blog name still always comes before the topic title.
Rob

Posted October 12th, 2006 at 3:27am | Permalink

Interesting - it works for pages but nor for posts…

Any ideas?
Jay

Posted October 12th, 2006 at 1:26pm | Permalink

Nice, good job on the plugin
Paul

Posted October 13th, 2006 at 12:08am | Permalink

Thanks for this, what a great and simple idea. It worked like a charm for me in WP 2.0.4. at http://www.gorbould.com (though I wish I could figure out how to remove the little box special character in the homepage title, between the title and tagline. Shows up as a question mark in the source code….)
Me

Posted October 13th, 2006 at 10:42am | Permalink

hmmm, Uploaded the plug-in then activated it but got this error:

Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (path to optimal_title.php:56) in /path/wp-includes/pluggable-functions.php on line 272

Any ideas?
Ed

Posted October 15th, 2006 at 9:00am | Permalink

Thanks for this plugin - Simple yet effective! (and saves me digging around in code - which is always welcome )

Now implemented in http://www.edinoz.com
Buddha

Posted October 15th, 2006 at 1:01pm | Permalink

great plugin …thx m8 …
Me

Posted October 15th, 2006 at 8:13pm | Permalink

Thanks for this, just installed it at http://www.buckbeingnormal.com and now trying to work out how to change >> to -, I must be stupid but then it is 2.13am!
Ed

Posted October 16th, 2006 at 1:39am | Permalink

Thanks for the plugin. I use at at 2 of my sites.
My newest site is at http://autopitstop.net.

thanks for the good work
Norman Freeman

Posted October 17th, 2006 at 3:34am | Permalink

Great!
Works smoothly.
Thanks,
Norman

Norman’s Internet Marketing Blog
fruityoaty

Posted October 17th, 2006 at 2:55pm | Permalink

Thanks, it’s working smoothly on my site as well! I even plugged your plugin in my blog.
fruityoaty.com
Pinoy Webby

Posted October 19th, 2006 at 11:43pm | Permalink

This is a great plug-in specially in terms of SEO. Good job!
Derrich

Posted October 22nd, 2006 at 7:58pm | Permalink

I had to update my single.php file. This after I tried it in my index.php and category.php to no avail. Great plug-in. Thanks.

http://www.derrich.com/
Telefonmann

Posted October 27th, 2006 at 4:57am | Permalink

Is it possible to build this plugin into the theme ? User with a blog running on a bloghoster where no plugin-installation is possible are not able to use this fuction. Maybe someone have an idea ?
Michal

Posted October 27th, 2006 at 3:39pm | Permalink

It’s a superb plugin for SEO purposes.
Sfeather

Posted October 29th, 2006 at 9:42pm | Permalink

Great plugin.
Even without the benefits of the SEO gains, it just makes browsing a site so much nicer.
Easier to pick up exactly what you are to expect on the page.
Thanks.
Gray

Posted November 3rd, 2006 at 12:52pm | Permalink

Is there any way to show tags in the title, when on a tag page?

I am using Ultimate Tag Warrior and would like the tag name to be in the title as well.

Awesome plugin, by the way!
Pawe

Posted November 5th, 2006 at 2:33pm | Permalink

Big THX, This plugin is what I was looking since I started using Google analytics
because of my long blog title I wasn’t able to conveniently see what posts are most popular, among readers

Bye
KeepReadingUs

Posted November 6th, 2006 at 12:13pm | Permalink

Thank you for this plugin. Itw orks like a charm
Cheers
Yan Herndon

Posted November 7th, 2006 at 7:17am | Permalink

works perfectly

thanks!!
http://jointtech.com
jpfieber

Posted November 7th, 2006 at 7:20pm | Permalink

Working great at http://sojoe.info
Pinoy Stupid

Posted November 10th, 2006 at 4:35am | Permalink

Great plugin! Thanks.
Garrett Boon

Posted November 11th, 2006 at 5:35am | Permalink

I love this plugin. Thank you so much for making it available.
CasinoSmack.com

Posted November 17th, 2006 at 9:51am | Permalink

Optimal Title is looking great at Online Casino & Las Vegas Blog at CasinoSmack.com!

We’re also using Ozh’s tip!
CapsLock3d

Posted November 19th, 2006 at 9:40am | Permalink

great plugin!

thanks Aaron Schaefer,Ozh and dju`
ties n cufflinks

Posted November 21st, 2006 at 7:14pm | Permalink

Just wanna say thinks for making this plugin! It so easy to install and it makes a big difference with my SEO on my blogs.

Excellent tool well worth a download!

5 Stars from me…

BEN
Alex

Posted November 22nd, 2006 at 5:32pm | Permalink

Simple and effective. Props.
San Diego Web Design

Posted November 28th, 2006 at 8:41pm | Permalink

Yup. This is the bomb.
Used in my little blog http://www.mobinity.com
Joe Hong

Posted November 30th, 2006 at 4:18pm | Permalink

It works! That’s what matters! Thank you!
Juice Maniac

Posted December 5th, 2006 at 5:39am | Permalink

Great job at making a simple but critical adjustment to Wordpress. I simply love it!
Jeff Mills

Posted December 6th, 2006 at 3:29am | Permalink

Where in the file structures, do I find the index.php or header.php file at? I know that is a super lamo question. I see many index.php files under so many folders, dont know which one to mod.
sandeep

Posted December 6th, 2006 at 4:41am | Permalink

just another great plugin.!!!
Poyel

Posted December 7th, 2006 at 4:28am | Permalink

Thank you, works nicely.
Eugene

Posted December 10th, 2006 at 7:45am | Permalink

Hello again.
I leaved a comment yesterday, probably you considered it to be spam. But could you please help me, the plugin really doen’t work. Please contact me via e-mail if you can.

P.S. I tried to find your contact information but deed not succeed.

BW,
Eugene
cesar

Posted December 12th, 2006 at 4:38am | Permalink

Great!

working at http://www.inmoblog.com
Top 10 WP Plugins by John Chow » Continuous Learning

Posted December 13th, 2006 at 6:49pm | Permalink

[...]related, but yet somewhat unrelated, which can allow users finding some other interesting posts that might not be found otherwise.

Optimal Title

This appears to be a good idea, but I believe the setup is a bit silly. Basically the script provide one function, [...]
Luis

Posted December 20th, 2006 at 4:14pm | Permalink

I have problem, I have WP 2.0.5 and I can not find “wp_title()” at wp-content->themes->default->index.php Can you help me?
BBC

Posted December 21st, 2006 at 12:17pm | Permalink

Thanks much!
Erik J. Barzeski

Posted December 21st, 2006 at 6:37pm | Permalink

Is a WordPress 2.1-compatible version going to be released?
aRcHitEkCi

Posted December 22nd, 2006 at 5:46pm | Permalink

Damn Wordpress - why such trivial things can’t be simply integrated into the release? Eh… any news re WP2 compatibility?

Thanks!
andrea

Posted December 28th, 2006 at 2:11pm | Permalink

in wp 2.0.5 the title is in the header.php
Homeboy

Posted December 31st, 2006 at 11:25am | Permalink

Here we go http://www.guimods.com Just implemented (running wordpress 2.0.4 and works great!
Erik

Posted January 3rd, 2007 at 2:02am | Permalink

Thanks for the great plugin….however…

When I have several categories I just got the
name of the category and then my blogname in
the title…not the name of the post.

Is there a way to get that?
/Erik
László Patai

Posted January 3rd, 2007 at 3:06am | Permalink

Thank for the excellent instructions.
bobby

Posted January 4th, 2007 at 5:08pm | Permalink

TITLE is in the header.php, NOT INDEX.PHP.
Spicey

Posted January 7th, 2007 at 5:42am | Permalink

Hello and thanks , im using this plugin for my blog in the swedish seo competition the with some strange swedish words as internetvärd.
Take a look at http://www.seoblog.se and thanks again and keep up the good work.
Leonard

Posted January 7th, 2007 at 11:04pm | Permalink

This plugin is a good idea and may be the orginal, but it does not work (properly) on WP 2. Besides the index.php change to header.php the format of the title tag has also changed. I’d recommend rather using the SEO Title Tag by Stephan Spencer. My post on this at WordPress Tag Cloud and other SEO tips.
Fenton

Posted January 8th, 2007 at 2:41am | Permalink

i’ve been figuring out how to rotate the post tittle and blog title for such a long time. Much efforts have been made but not much success. But Aaron, you are great. Your plugin is my blog savior. It’s now successfully installed at success insights

Thanks, man and god bless you.
Aaron Schaefer

Posted January 8th, 2007 at 4:36pm | Permalink

This plugin is a good idea and may be the orginal, but it does not work (properly) on WP 2. Besides the index.php change to header.php the format of the title tag has also changed…

I’ve been meaning to post the updated code for this plugin, and now it is done. I actually fixed it back in March of 2006 and have been emailing it directly to people who have been in contact with me, but never updated the site. All information should now be current and the plugin is fully compatible with the latest releases of WordPress.

If you find anything that is still out of date, let me know and I’ll fix it up. Thanks for the reminder!
Brian

Posted January 12th, 2007 at 3:47am | Permalink

A short note to say thanks for an excellent plugin. Was half way through sorting this out the long way when I found your work. Saved me a bit of time

Thanks once again
blau

Posted January 15th, 2007 at 11:04am | Permalink

Thank you Aaron for this useful plugin. It seems Optimal Title is compatible with next wp major release 2.1
http://codex.wordpress.org/User:Spencerp/2.1_Plugin_Compatibility#L_-_O
Lee Kelleher

Posted January 15th, 2007 at 5:07pm | Permalink

Hi Aaron, (I would have emailed, but couldn’t find it on your site)

Great plugin! I’ve been using it for a while now.

I was thinking about the code behind it and how any changes to wp_title() in future released would need to be “mirrored” in Optimal Title … so why not just use wp_title() to get the page title, then use some array magic to reverse the title sections?

I coded it up here:
http://wordpress.pastebin.ca/317830

It would cut your existing code down from 80+ lines to under 20 lines!
Let me know what you think.

Cheers,
- Lee
John

Posted January 17th, 2007 at 12:49am | Permalink

Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /home/sites/site649/web/wp-content/plugins/optimal-title.php:84) in /home/sites/site649/web/wp-includes/pluggable-functions.php on line 270

Is what I get when I try activating it.
WesleyTech.com

Posted January 21st, 2007 at 10:48pm | Permalink

Thanks for your work on this very handy plugin.
I just got it installed and running on http://WesleyTech.com.
Ardamis

Posted January 22nd, 2007 at 1:54am | Permalink

I’ve written some instructions on optimizing the WordPress title tag. This method requires a few simple changes to the core files, but corrects issues with unwanted separators and unwanted spaces, without the need for another plugin. Only recommended for those people who don’t mind changing the core WordPress files.

Optimizing the Syntax in the WordPress Title Tag
ademmm

Posted January 22nd, 2007 at 1:13pm | Permalink

works fine great job thx
Scott at Realepicurean

Posted January 23rd, 2007 at 10:27am | Permalink

Just an incidental: It works fine with Wordpress 2.1 (over on my blog)
Rafay

Posted January 23rd, 2007 at 4:22pm | Permalink

Damn awsome lugin ma friend. Works brilliant at my blog
http://www.pod35.com

thanx alot
Zurevla

Posted January 26th, 2007 at 1:37am | Permalink

Thanks for your work on this plugin.
I just got it installed and running on http://zurevla.nl

Thnx!
nanotechnology

Posted January 26th, 2007 at 2:56pm | Permalink

Very easy to use and useful plugin. But i think adding “>>” at the end of title automatically is not a good idea. At the end, we can add it to the template easily if we want!

I am using a modified version (without automatically added “>>”) on our blog.
Jan van der Reis

Posted January 26th, 2007 at 9:02pm | Permalink

This Plugin Rocks!!! Thank for contributing…
Kamarul

Posted January 28th, 2007 at 2:38am | Permalink

Very usefull plugins kind of SEO plugins, thanks man.
Dan

Posted February 1st, 2007 at 12:21am | Permalink

the second block of code you posted would look like:
ElasticDog | WP Plugin: Optimal Title

How do you write it so that the front page comes out:
WP Plugin: Optimal Title | ElasticDog
Dan

Posted February 1st, 2007 at 12:22am | Permalink

Excellent Plugin BTW
Thoughts In Binary

Posted February 2nd, 2007 at 5:01pm | Permalink

Thanks for the updates! Very useful and easy to install.

ElasticDog.com