Good housekeeping makes sense!

If you keep a pet you feed and water it every day.

You might also empty the litter tray or take it for a walk!

A Joomla! CMS website should be treated in the same way :)

Frequent Checks

Perform these tasks often if you are always adding new content to your website.

1. Log into your website's control panel and look for messages indicating availability of a new release of the CMS or extensions.
2. If you have enabled the Redirects plugin, check for new broken links and fix genuine broken links to help improve your website's SEO.
3. Check the Users screen to ensure no new users have been created - a sure sign of a hack if you didn't create them!
4. Take the opportunity to visit a page you have not looked at for a while. Does it contain typing errors? Is it still relevant? If not then update it and thereby improve your website's performance in search engines.

Periodically check your website's PHP version

Use the System Information screen to see which version and release of PHP is being used by your website's Joomla! CMS.

Read more: About PHP.

Some Useful Links

Read more: How to check which version of PHP is being used.

Read more: Fix broken links with the Redirects Component.

Read more: How to manage Users.

Read more: Joomla! Templates.

Act on warnings to protect your website

Do you see something like the images below on your screen after logging into your Joomla! website's control panel?

If you do then the release of Joomla! CMS being used by your website is out of date.

The versions of one or more extensions are also out of date.

Joomla! CMS

From time to time developers announce new releases of their extensions.

Good housekeeping involves keeping Joomla! up to date and so you should aim to:

1. periodically visit your control panel and check for warnings, and
2. act on these warnings.

Remember to first back up your website.

Updating it may break it!

Joomla! Extensions

From time to time developers announce new releases of their extensions.

Good housekeeping involves keeping things tidy and so you should aim to:

1. avoid using 3rd party extensions unless absolutely necessary;
2. remove redundant 3rd party extensions;
3. keep the 3rd party extensions you are using up to date.

Learn how to keep your Joomla! CMS safe

If you learn nothing else about Joomla! we recommend that you learn how:

1. to keep your website up to date,
2. to perform a full backup before updating the Joomla! CMS and /or extensions,
3. how a Web Application Firewall (WAF) can improve your website security.

We tell you how to update your Joomla! CMS, its extensions and how to back up your website before doing so, in our WYNCHCO Joomla! User Guide.

Read more: How to update Joomla!