What is it?

It is an extension to WordPress that allows you to send a SHA-1 token to someone that you know that will allow them to bypass the password protection on a post of yours for a number of times that you specify.

Why would I ever use this?

Three reasons:

1. You might not want several people to share the same password.
2. You might need to control how many times a person can read a post.
3. You might want to record some of the access attempts on your private posts.

How much does it cost?

Nothing.

What versions of WordPress is it made for right now?

2.5 (Still 2.5-SVN as of 10:57PM 3/10/2008)

What license is it released under?

GPL.

Will it improve my sex life?

If you have to ask, then yes.

It ate my homework, shot my dog and ran off with my woman. I want my money back.

There is no warranty. It's free, open source and can be modified by anyone. Caveat Idiotis (or something like that).

Why did you implement a logging mechanism?

Drama. Yes, drama. Many, probably most, bloggers actually use their blogs as online diaries. A lot of girls in particular have a problem with girlfriends sharing gossip, ex-boyfriends, etc. stalking or harassing them. Every access attempt using this plugin is logged. The reason is that I wanted to create a mechanism to allow people to see whether or not they are being stalked or someone is attempting to crack their private post(s).

Where can I download it?

Here.

Release Notes

Version 1.0 - 7/15/2006

• Disclaimer: this is my first attempt at writing a WordPress plugin.
• The plugin works on my installation of WordPress 2.0.3. If it doesn't work for you, please report any errors to me by posting a comment below :)
• While the plugin is activated, it will overwrite your password protection forms with a new form that combines the old one with a new one appropriate for the limited-use passwords.
• Logging works, but there is no form for viewing the log yet. That's coming in version 2.0.

Version 1.1 - 7/24/2006

• Bug fixes! Yes, lot's of new error checking code went into this release.
• Created a separate menu for managing the different panels used by the plugin.
• Created a new form that allows the user to see statistical information about the access attempts using this plugin's authentication mechanism.
• Starting to gauge the compatibility with WordPress 2.1.

Version 2.0 RC1 - 3/10/2008

• Bug fixes!
• Refactoring!
• A lot of new features!
• Works with WordPress 2.5 from subversion as of 10:54PM 3/10/2008!
• Download here!
• Are you tired of exclamation marks?!

I can't stress enough that a lot has been changed with the 2.0 series. A lot of code was updated to make it cleaner. To do that, I had to add a lot of code. You will notice that the PHP source code is probably 2-2.5x bigger in version 2.0 compared to 1.1. A lot of the changes had to do with me writing a small library to abstract away the process of generating the HTML for the forms, and creating PHP includes that contain large blocks of variables that hold information about the HTML to be generated. While a lot of code was added, it shouldn't have any impact on performance since most of it is just variable and function declarations from libraries.

If you like this work, please consider rattling the ol' tip jar!