Thanks.

Yes, there are a number of groups that advertise online that say they will fix one problem (supposedly) for a flat fee. They make me nervous, I must say. I also am not at all sure that my situation is one they can fix. But I definitely might try one of those groups, if I can’t get a web developer to do it.

At some point I will look into that. Remind me later if I forget.

Just thought I’d ask. Good luck with everything!

Longish article, not very encouraging:

“How to Find THE Top WordPress Developers for Hire: 7 Proven Ways”

https://www.collectiveray.com/wordpress/wordpress-tips-and-tricks/wordpress-developers-for-hire.html

Cornflour seems to be on the same page. Please, please be very careful and make sure you’ve got at least 3 WORKING back-ups. We want to make the probability of disaster as close to zero as possible.

Having a fourth back-up is not overkill and is easy to do. Just copy a working back-up to another device and check that the file sizes are the same. Even better: on a Mac or Linux/Unix machine you can run the diff command on the 2 files to ensure they are identical. Windows probably has a similar utility but I don’t know what it is.

OK, I admit that this might seem too desperate, but I just typed “wordpress troubleshooting service reviews” into Google. An example of what popped up is “NetCrafted WordPress troubleshooting” (https://netcrafted.com/fix/).

They charge a flat fee of just $69 per WordPress issue. If they can’t fix the problem, there’s no charge.

Maybe a last resort. Frankly, I don’t know what the the risk would be.

I have a friend who works as a web developer, but she has no experience with blogs. I’ll contact her on Monday and get back to you via email. My first reaction is that she’s not the right candidate, but we’ll see.

Also, why not contact Joe Malchow, who manages all the technical issues for Powerline? He might be able to recommend someone who has lots of experience with blog software. His contact information is listed here http://malchow.com/contact/

As far as the issue of “this job’s too small,” why not offer them the current blog problem troubleshooting, as well as the migration to the new site? Together, that might be enough to tempt someone into helping you.

Know any good web developers I could hire?

So far I’ve gotten nowhere with that. My theory is that they all want bigger jobs.

Sorry about that spam filter. Wish I knew why it’s happening. I have the same filter on the new blog as on this one, so it’s puzzling.

I just made a comment at the newneo, but it was caught in the blog’s spam filter, so I’m repeating it here.

I think the new blog would be a good place for you to write a general call for help and suggestions. All the comments and replies could then be collected in one place — except mine, of course.

My own suggestions are few: 1. Make several back-ups. Store them in different places. Can’t say this enough. 2. Hire a web developer. If you’re having trouble finding one, ask for recommendations. 3. Install mySQL. This is free software, and it’s easy to install. Many years ago, I used it for a small project, and I can’t remember much about it. Your goal wouldn’t be learning how to use it. You’d do nothing more than look at your files. They wouldn’t look anything like your blog, but it’d be reassuring to know that they’re still there, and that your back-ups were successful.

Good luck. Stay methodical. Don’t hurry anything. Open the check-book. Later, ask us for funding.