Monthly Archives: June 2008

WordPress or MovableType

These days, if you’re going to blog, or if you are already blogging, then you’ve probably come across at least one, if not both, these names.  Based on my own searches, I’m guessing these are the top two cms products available right now, but which is really the top?  And does it matter?

I have this blog running WordPress 2.5, and I have a second blog running MovableType 4.1 (but I don’t maintain that blog, I just use it for testing different software.)  I can say that the install was much quicker and probably, from the average user’s view, simpler to install and setup with WP than with MT.  WP just about set itself up completely once the process started, whereas MT required a bit more user input including creating the database myself.  (Not horribly complicated, but could be an intimidating step for some users.)

Both systems provide a dashboard for creating and managing content, which are fairly easy to use and navigate through.  Although, I personally prefer that of WP, I can’t say that one or the other is superior.  I think it’s a preference for look and feel, which varies day to day.  You’ll have to load each and decide if it matters to you.  They are both done well enough that this probably won’t be your limiting factor.

WP and MT allow addons, or plugins.  So this is probably a toss-up as well.  Although, some may argue that MT comes loaded with certain features that would require a plugin in WP.  To which I would aruge, again, that this is only an issue of preference and isn’t a final determining factor since features in one system are available in the other system.

Spam filtering, is probably one of the biggest issues after ease of use and installation.  I haven’t had much experience with the MT spam filter since I don’t actively blog with it, but I have had quite a bit of use with WP, and I can say that it has caught quite a bit of spam.  WP clearly sorts out the spam and labels it for my review and removal.  It’s a breeze.

Overall, I like them both, but probably will not switch this particular blog from WP to MT.  MT is a worthy blogging software, but I couldn’t find an easy migration tool.  If I decide to maintain a new blog in the future, I’ll revisit the issue and possibly switch to MT.  MT does appeal to my geek and tweak style, so it has that going for it.

Update: After snooping around each platform a bit more, I found that it is pretty easy to migrate entries from one system to the other using the import/export feature.  I did lose my formatting when going from WP to MT, but I guess if you don’t have a ton of entries, you could easily go in and fix that.  Although, there may be a way to keep the formatting.

Return From Camping In Time for Art Walk

How does he do it? That’s what you should be asking yourself, if you’re asking anything at all. If you’re not asking, then I’ll ask, “what’s going on here?”

Anyhow, Camping was great. Good to be out, ya know? I think we were in Plumas National Forest. Maybe you’ve heard of it. Maybe you’ve never been anywhere that inhibits the use of electronics and the Internet. (Inhibits? I don’t know.) In either event, the specifics on the specific: Echo Lake. That’s where we actually were. It’s just south of the Caribou Wilderness area. I’m in the process of planning a backpacking trip through the Caribou Wilderness with Thompology. We’ll start at Cone Lake on the north end and backpack to Hay Meadow on the south end. This will be made possible by a driver dropping us off and picking us up. Kind of like cheating, but not really. we’ll still have to make our way and survive. Not a real challenge, I know.

In other news, we celebrated the Second Saturday Art Walk through midtown Sacramento. It was the usual good times with many a new face. Nameless faces, mostly, and a few faceless names. It’s how we roll. Started the party with an Americano coffee from Old Soul coffeehouse on 21st between “H” and “I”. It’s worth checking out if you’re ever in the area and enjoy a reasonably tasting coffee. From there, you’re on your own. Drink with caution.

I’ll see what I can do about adding some visuals for y’all. I didn’t snap any photos, but I’m sure some exist.

Cheers!

Shopping At The Speed Of Now

It’s today, and I’m probably still out camping, hence another video post. I guess I could have just skipped it all together, but I’m getting a kick out of it. Anyhow, that’s not the point. I mean, it’s not the point that I’m off fishing, hiking, and cooking beneath the big open sky miles and miles away from all the nonsense.  No.  The point is, I have another video for you, and you should maybe, probably, if you have a few minutes, and aren’t too busy, watch it. Got that, chief?

It’s not that it’s a super hilarious clip or anything wacky like that, but it’s the folks from Improv Everywhere, and if you don’t already follow them, you may want to consider it. They put together some pretty interesting projects. I’d like to some day show up to one of their improvs, but I don’t know if I have it in me to figure out when and how they set up the meeting places and times. It sounds like more work than I’m willing to put up with, especially since I’m out camping. Camping. Ha!

Happy Friday the 13th, by the way. It could be any day, I’d still be away from anything electronic on a camping trip. Today, at least. That’s what I mean. What? You’re mad!

Enough. Here it is.

Lisa Nova is a Twitter Whore

Who isn’t, right? Becoming a Twitter Whore.  I mean, if you’re doing it right, then of course you are and you have to be.  Who wouldn’t want to share with the world every little thing that’s happening as it happens?  I know I can’t help myself.  OMG! And on the off chance you’re a little confused as to how it actually works, Ms. Nova was kind enough to provide some instructional video. It’s kind of what she does, in case you didn’t know.  (You should know who Lisa Nova is.)

Part I

Part II

Genius, my man — pure genius.  WTF!

Broken Bicycle Madness

The good news is I was able to get to my bicycle before any of the crackheads tried to sell it for bail money.  Wait.  Would it be used for bail money or for more crack?  I’m not really certain how that works.  The point being, though, that I have the thing back in my own care where I don’t have to worry about it being sold for something silly or other.

The bad news is, I’m not really sure why the bicycle stopped working in the first place, which is what caused me to leave it until I could later pick it up.  I took it apart and put it back together, and then it worked.  But not knowing why makes me a little skeptical of riding it too far from home.  I was lucky last time in that I was with someone who could give me a ride.

Maybe it’s time to revisit one of these local midtown bicycle shops (Bicycle Chef, Mike’s Bikes, City Bicycle Works) and get a tuneup for the old clunker, or put it to rest and get a new bicycle beast.  We’ll see.

Apple iPhone Next Point Ooooh

I’ll admit, and let’s be honest, I’m not going to buy a new cellphone (any cellphone), and not because I don’t like what the Apple’s cooked, but because I don’t really want to spend money on gadgety nonsense.  I’ll be saving my drinking money for other things, like drinking and cab rides.  Get a grip, my man.

But while we’re here, let’s take a second to point out at least two of the new features on the next Apple iPhone that might actually make it a viable option for someone other than ane iTards.  (ooops.  just kidding.)  Those two features, of course, being support for 3G and GPS.  Now neither of these features is absolutely necessary for our corporate users, but what does come in handy is that AT&T is charging a higher price for the business plan.  I think that’s awesome.  (Man, you’re all over the place. I  know, better tag this one wandering.)

Like I was saying, the press releases say something about working with business email.  I’m not really sure what that means, and perhaps by the time we get around to reading this post there will be some clarifying information released on the matter.  In the meanwhile, I’ll continue to use my silly-ass blackberry with all its beautiful google plug-ins.  (Again, I don’t really need any of these features.  But the camera is great for collecting dust on a lens if you don’t have anywhere else to store your pocket dust…or lint.)

I think Mr. Steve Jobs did a great thing here trying to help the economy.  The product is reasonably priced and widely followed.  If only it’d been released before everyone blew through their stimulus checks.  But, fret not!  People will still spend.  I’d spend, if I were into the damn thing.  It’s neat, to say the least.  But I after what Thompology has said to me about the 3G network, I can’t fully support it.  I’m still waiting strong for the 700Mhz spectrum to have a thing done to it.

Enough.

Gas Dreams In California

As it’s showing right now over on gasbuddy.com, the top ten most expensive cities to buy gas in the United States are all in California (no surprise). And a few more past that, too. I think it’s at sixteen where there’s a break to some other place in the US.

What boggles my mind, though, is that four of the top six are in the central valley (Fresno, Stockton, Modesto, Bakersfield. I suppose you could also include Sacramento, but I prefer not to.) What is the reason for that? I mean, I get that California is going to be more expensive than just about everywhere else, fighting with Alaska and Hawaii for holding the daily top position — a lot of the California costs having to do with clean air taxes — but why specifically in the central valley are the prices higher? I don’t know.

I’m also unsure as to whether or not I actually care. Sure, more and more folks are complaining, but I haven’t a real reason to complain about the price of gas. I hope it gets into the $6 per gallon region. That’d be interesting to watch.

Now I just have to fix my bicycle. It stopped working Saturday, so I had to leave it where I left it, and now I’m worried it won’t be there when I return for it. The question, though, is how to get it home so I can make the repairs. We’ll have to see how it goes.

Book Me This, Reader

It’s not easy to sit and think of every book you’ve ever read, but that’s where you might find yourself if you take a trip over to bookjetty.com. You can list any book you’ve ever read, or want to read, or are thinking about maybe reading some day in the far off future when you have absolutely nothing else to do but read. After you list them, you can rate them, and you can see who else on the site may have read that book, or that might want to read that book, and possibly drum up a discussion about it. I think it’s a grand idea, but the site seems to still be in it’s very early (beta) infant stage.  It could stand to use quite a few more users so you could find someone with whom to interact other than the site’s creator.  Although, I don’t know how you get anyone to admit he reads books, and if he is reading books then what is he doing on the Internet?  I have no idea.

Anyhow, I think there’s a bit of nonsense I can find for myself, and at the very least it gives me a reason to sit for a while trying to remember any book I might have read in the past.  And does it count if I know I read the book, but I don’t really remember what it was about?  Can you consider that reading then?  I don’t know.  It’s not important.  Read a book.  Check out the site.

My Life, On The Line — Plurk

It’s just like Twitter, but it’s the new kid on the block.  Oh my.  Here we go again, and it’s called Plurk.com.  Now you can write everything you’re doing every minute and, if you have friends, they can comment back.  Sweet.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m a fan of time-wasting social communities like this.  It just cracks me up that there’s always something newer.  But is it better?  Maybe.

The real problem is getting all your friends and followers from twitter to follow you to Plurk.  Otherwise you’re just writing to yourself.  (I guess that’s not so bad.)  Once you have some friends and such, then you can get to plurking, whatever that means exactly.  I do enjoy having  another place to collect tiny faces.  I get a kick out of that.

The layout is more appealing, and you can earn karma, which is like pretend money used for buying enhancements to your profile page.  (Collecting things is great way to hook people with an addictive personality.)  So far there doesn’t seem to be a stand alone client (like twhirl for twitter,) so you have to keep a browser page open.  And they’ve yet to implement support for my mobile browser.

Anyhow, I don’t know the load to their system, but maybe the service will have a better uptime and fewer hassles than that other service.  In the meanwhile, we’ll probably continue to use plurk as intermittently as the others.

For The Cost Of A Dime

Every so often I’ll start thinking about getting rid of just about everything in my apartment that I don’t really need and that wouldn’t be a hassle to unload.  Essentially, I only need a computer with an Internet connection, and a place to keep food fresh.  Maybe a few other things, but not the point.

Thompology suggested I sell all my DVDs on Amazon.com.  When he sold his this way, it was a quick and painless process which resulted in some extra cash.  Sounds great.  I want the easy process with very little effort, and I could use the extra money to further expand the research of my vice.  (Whatever that may be.)

I grab a few DVDs from my shelf, figuring I’d try it with a few before bothering with the entire collection.  No point in listing these things if no one is going to respond, right?  The first was The Matrix, which, if I was willing to, I could sell for $0.46 plus $2.98 shipping and handling.  Wow!  Not going to buy too much with that.  So I skip that one figuring it isn’t worth my time for $0.46.  I list Dumb and Dumber, which I can sell for $2.50 + $2.98 S&H.  I figure this amount is worth my time to start clearing the shelf.  I start entering all the information to set up my account and post the listing, when Amazon tells me their commission fee for this sale is $2.17.  Are you kidding me?  A joke and a half, surely.  But no, it’s not a joke, this is what they will take from my sale.  Fine, I’ll take the $0.33 difference since I’ve started the process.

The listing posts.

An order is placed within a few hours.

I make my way to the post office the following day to package and ship the order.  After spending $3.41 on an envelope and postage, it tuns out I am $0.10 in the hole on this transaction.  All I could do was laugh as I paid the fee, I’d come too far to turn back.  Not to mention, I’d already written on the envelope.   I say, “screw you, amazon dot com.”

Maybe this is just their way of teaching me I don’t know how to make money.  I suppose that’s not a bad lesson for the cost of a dime.