Default wordpress excerpt length is 55 words. It’s easy to change the default excerpt length in wordpress in less than 2 minutes to desired length. I made changes to wordpress 2.9.2 code.

1. Login into Directory where wordpress is installed
2. Open the file Directory > wp-includes > formatting,php
3. Search for 55 or $excerpt_length = apply_filters(‘excerpt_length’, 55);
4. Change the value 55 to desired number of words and save the file.
5. Refresh the page and see the results ( you may have to clear the cache)

If you are planning to upgrade wordpress to latest release, do the following

1. Read Worpdress Support forums to see any upgrade problems
2. Backup Entire Database
3. Check for Minimum Requirements ( MySQL, PHP)
4. Check if all installed plugins supports the latest version of wordpress.
5. Deactivate all the plugins
6. Know how to revert to previous wordpress version, if upgrade were to fail.
7. Test the upgrade in local wordpress installation ( if downtime of site might be major issue)
8. Perform WordPress Upgrade
9. Upgrade WordPress Database if required
10. Check if Site is up and running.
11. Click on few links to to check if URL structure is maintained.
12. Activate the supported plugins one at a time.

WordPress 2.8.6 to 2.9 upgrade created couple of problems. It was because

• Some of the plug-in’s didn’t support 2.9
• db_version in Table WP_Options had incorrect value.

After I fixed the db_verison, site was up and running, but all the url was broken. It was due to unsupported some plug-in in 2.9

If you run into Password Recovery Error with WordPress Sorry, that key does not appear to be valid, do the following

• To correct this, fire up phpmyadmin ( it will be usually mysql.yoursite.com) in Cpanel,
• click on the database name,
  
• Select “wp_users” Table
  
• Click on Brose Icon ( first icon)
  
• Click on the Row to edit the password
• Click on the pencil icon for editing the table, then do the following:
• User pass > Function > MD5 and type in your new password
  
• Click the “go” button and all should be fine.

This should fix the problem.

List of WordPress Database related articles

• WordPress Database Backup and Restore – Quick Online Tips
• Daily WordPress Database Backup Quick Online Tips
• Blog Backup Strategy David Risley
• Manual wordpress Database Backup