Wow…today is an amazing day here at Revellian Dot Com – I could never express just how great a day it is! Earlier, well actually yesterday on July 07 at around 9:30 PM, my site disappeared. It was replaced with a site comprised of Indian Writing. I was shocked to say the least as I thought my site had been hacked. It is a horrible feeling to think your site has been stolen. Initially, I called my host (Bluehost), and they told me that I had been hacked and there was nothing I could do. I had a knot in my stomach that sat like a hand grenade in the deepest trenches of my bowels; the sudden realization that everything you’ve worked on for years – wiped out in seconds by some evil hacker – what a horrifying feeling.

To be absolutely straightforward and honest, I must tell you that there are only a few people I thought of whom I completely trusted to check out my situation: Garry Conn and Andy Bailey – two guys that really know what they are doing. I also thought of contacting Brown Baron, Mike Wheeler, Bush Mackel, Mark Sierra or Madhur Kapoor – five other guys whom I consider experts on the subject. I am a psychic even if you do not believe in psychics, and I just knew instantly who would be available at that very instant: Garry Conn. He was logged onto Googletalk – so I asked for help. Garry stepped in and started asking questions, like how to log into my WordPress account.

It’s a really big deal to just divulge your most private of information to someone, but I know anyone of these 7 guys are trustworthy, which is really saying a lot. It’s nice to know people! Let’s get to the nitty gritty. I contacted Garry Conn, and he responded instantly. What was so awesome is that Garry has 3-way calling, so we called my host together – what a great feeling to have an expert on the line with you. The first guy we talked to from Blue Host was Darren (at least I think that was his name). Garry asked him several questions and told him he believed my site wasn’t hacked, but was instead a problem with my C-Panel (the backend of Blue Host). The guy was really unhelpful and basically told us to fix it ourselves. Garry was insistent that the problem was not a WordPress issue, but was a server side issue on their behalf. I actually have two domains, one of which is not being used, but both were pointing at a strange site.

We finally talked to a superior, who actually helped. In the midst of telling us what the problem might be, the higher ranking Blue host employee discovered the problem which stemmed from them having multiple customers on the same server. In my case, the idea of having my blog hacked by some form of code injection really scared me – this is why I asked for help. Garry handled the entire situation with absolute professionalism. I really didn’t even know what to say, but Garry did – he basically commanded the guy and finally the problem was resolved. So, my site was not hacked.

In the process, I learned that I have too many plug ins and a bunch of database tables that are unneeded. I am currently cleaning all that junk out of my system. Garry said he doesn’t use any plug ins at all. I learned some valuable information in the process. If you use a plug in, contact the author and ask if if it changes your database or if it only adds something on the surface. Sometimes, plug ins do things to your database that cannot be undone – so be extremely careful when adding one. He showed me a page on the WordPress codex, WordPress Database Decription. There are only 10 tables necessary for any WordPress blog. I am cleaning out all the ones which are not needed. Before you get into deleting any unnecessary tables, be sure to back them up beforehand. If you have any questions, contact one of us for help.

I had a fantastic conversation with Garry via the phone. We talked about everything from blogging, politics to life itself – a great conversation. I could go on forever about all this, but I just want to thank Garry Conn. He really helped me out and it means the world to me. There really are great people out there, and I consider Garry to be one of the best. My blogging spirit has been renewed. Be sure to visit Garry at Garry Conn dot com and check out his incredible make money on line ideas. He wrote a great post entitled Garry Conn dot Com is Fixed! Come Check it Out! which explains some turmoil he went through during a server crisis. Maybe I could have fixed it myself; maybe someone else could have helped me; all I know is that Garry Conn is the one who did it. When you face losing everything, and you get it back with no problems – what a great feeling. Thanks Garry!

Tags: blogging, mysql, wordpress