Strict Permalinks

Strict Permalinks does two things:

1. Restricts the post_name portion of the permalink to alphanumerics and hyphens
2. Disables permalink editing once a post is published

Like me, you may have been under the impression that post slugs are already restricted to alphanumerics and hyphens. In the current WordPress 2.8.5, a title that includes certain kinds of punctuation (e.g., “smartquotes”) will result in URL-encoded characters in the post_name field. Many browsers handle this oddity seamlessly, however this may cause difficulties when integrating with systems expecting a more limited URL syntax.

Upgrade

1. Use the plugin updater in WordPress or…
2. Delete the previous strict-permalinks folder from the /wp-content/plugins/ directory
3. Upload the new strict-permalinks folder to the /wp-content/plugins/ directory

Usage

1. In all cases the post_title to post_name conversion (i.e., the sanitize_title filter) will be limited to a-z, 0-9 and hyphens (-).
2. If a post is not yet published, the permalink can be edited as usual.
3. Once a post is published, the permalink editing interface is disabled.