First off, I am happy to announce that I have just updated the EMUtalk.org blog so that it is now using WordPress 2.2, which is a much more robust version of this software. I don’t want to get too geeky about this, but WP 2.2 supports a variety of different plug-ins that give much easier functionality to the site. For example, most will probably notice right off the bat that there is now a “recent comments” section in the left-hand column, which ought to make it easier to keep track of updated chatter on posts you’re following.
WP 2.2 now allows posters to switch between “visual” and “code” modes, and for those of you posting and who know any basic HTML, I’d strongly encourage you to use the code mode.
Second, expect a few more updates to come sooner than later. I don’t want to make any promises about the time-frame or nature of these changes, but don’t be alarmed if the “look and feel” of EMUtalk.org changes, hopefully for the better.
And third, I’m happy to announce the end of the EMUtalk.org fund raiser. It’s been a successful campaign, with $101 raised through amazon.com and another $10 or so raised through cafepress.com sales and people handing me some money. I kind of like these non-official fund raisers, and right now, EMUtalk.org is of a scale where simply passing the virtual hat makes sense. So thanks to all who contributed, and to those who didn’t pitch in but are thinking of doing so: catch up with me next spring/summer instead.
Thanks for putting the links to recent comments on the left, Steve! That will really enhance the site. I wish your funny comment about emus didn’t get displaced, but I am happy to know of the activity on earlier posts that I may have forgotten about.
Sitedad,
This new version makes symbols show up where words are, or rather in the middle of them
Well, it does that for some of the old posts/comments, and these are probably texts that were written with something like MS Word before. I don’t think this will be a problem in general. But the best rule-of-thumb advice I can offer in terms of avoiding this in the future is to make sure you are writing either in “plain text” with some kind of word processor, or write directly in this space here.
I was going to mention the odd symbols, but Jessyca beat me to it, evidently. I suppose, then, that there is no way around it, and that those particular posts will just have to be taken as-is? Shame. In any case, I look forward to seeing what you have in store for the site.
I, too, like the recent comments addition. It makes sense and I think will come in handy.
Hey Sitedad –
EMUTalk looks better, and I thank you for this work on updating the EMU Community’s best means of communicating with itself!
But it seems slower to me – slower for me to move between posts and such. Also, i liked the feature of posters getting the text of comments added to their post emailed to directly to the poster.
There might be a way to fix the odd character thing, but I think that the basic evil-doer in this case is the visual editor that comes with WordPress. Many suggest to not use this at all– that is, to write comments and posts in code. I think that some of the gobbly-gook posts might have also been written in something like MS Word and then pasted into the space, too.
As for the slowness thing: I noticed that today myself, Mark, but I think that might have more to do with a hiccup on the service provider’s end of things. My guess is that it will just kinda go away. Hopefully. There’s no reason why the slightly updated software would be any slower.