I often get asked what I use for a blog engine.  I use Wordpress.org on a hosted server.  I use Wordpress primarily for its community and huge network of plugins and tools.  I would prefer to use a .Net based blog engine of a PHP one, but its hard to beat the stability and extensibility that the community provides to Wordpress right now.  One day I may move to another engine.

Knowing that I use Wordpress inevitably leads to the question of what plugins I use.  Here is a list of the plugins for Wordpress that I view as “Indispensable” right now.  If you notice, even this list of plugins is generated by another plugin called WP-PluginsUsed. I keep this list updated on my about page as well, but it is useful enough to also warrant a full blog post.

If anyone ever has any questions about my blog or what I use, feel free to ask!

Indispensable Plugins

  AJAX Calendar 2.4.9
» John Godley (url)
A version of the WordPress calendar that uses AJAX to allow the user to step through the months without updating the page. Additionally, a click on the ‘expand’ link shows all the posts within that month, inside the calendar. Caching of content can be enabled to increase speed.

  AJAX Login 1.0
» Jonas Einarsson (url)
Enables AJAX login, registration and lost password retrieval.

  Akismet 2.2.1
» Matt Mullenweg (url)
Akismet checks your comments against the Akismet web service to see if they look like spam or not. You need a WordPress.com API key to use it. You can review the spam it catches under “Comments.” To show off your Akismet stats just put <?php akismet_counter(); ?> in your template. See also: WP Stats plugin.

  All in One SEO Pack 1.4.6.15
» Michael Torbert (url)
Out-of-the-box SEO for your Wordpress blog.

  Broken Link Checker 0.4.10
» Janis Elsts (url)
Checks your posts for broken links and missing images and notifies you on the dashboard if any are found.

  Category Cloud Widget 1.7
» Lee Kelleher (url)
Adds a sidebar widget to display the categories as a tag cloud.

  Collapsible Archive Widget 2.2.1.1
» Ady Romantika (url)
Display Collapsible Archive in yous sidebar to save space.

  FeedBurner FeedSmith 2.3.1
» FeedBurner (url)
Originally authored by Steve Smith, this plugin detects all ways to access your original WordPress feeds and redirects them to your FeedBurner feed so you can track every possible subscriber.

  Google Analyticator 2.14
» Ronald Heft, Jr. (url)
Adds the necessary JavaScript code to enable Google’s Analytics. After enabling this plugin visit the options page and enter your Google Analytics’ UID and enable logging.

  Google XML Sitemaps 3.1.0.1
» Arne Brachhold (url)
This plugin will generate a sitemaps.org compatible sitemap of your WordPress blog which is supported by Ask.com, Google, MSN Search and YAHOO. Configuration Page

  OpenID 3.1.4
» DiSo Development Team (url)
Allows the use of OpenID for account registration, authentication, and commenting. Also includes an OpenID provider which can turn WordPress author URLs into OpenIDs.

  Search Unleashed 0.2.24
» John Godley (url)
Advanced search engine that provides full text searching across posts, pages, comments, titles, and URLs. Searches take into account any data added by other plugins, and all search results are contextually highlighted. You can also highlight incoming searches from popular search engines.

  Twitter Tools 1.5.1
» Alex King (url)
A complete integration between your WordPress blog and Twitter. Bring your tweets into your blog and pass your blog posts to Twitter.

  Wordpress Automatic Upgrade 1.2.2
» Keith Dsouza (url)
Wordpress Automatic Upgrade allows a user to automatically upgrade the wordpress installation to the latest one provided by wordpress.org using the 5 steps provided in the wordpress upgrade instructions. Go to Wordpress Automatic Upgrade to upgrade your installation Thanks to Ronald Huereca for making the plugin run in automatic mode.

  WordPress Mobile Edition 2.1a
» Alex King (url)
Show a mobile view of the post/page if the visitor is on a known mobile device. Questions on configuration, etc.? Make sure to read the README.

  WP-PluginsUsed 1.31
» Lester 'GaMerZ' Chan (url)
Display WordPress plugins that you currently have (both active and inactive) onto a post/page.

  WP-Print 2.31
» Lester 'GaMerZ' Chan (url)
Displays a printable version of your WordPress blog’s post/page.

  WPtouch iPhone Theme 1.5
» Dale Mugford & Duane Storey (url)
A plugin which reformats your site with a mobile theme when viewing with an iPhone / iPod touch. Set styling, page, menu, icon and more options for the theme by visiting the WPtouch Options admin panel.