Moo! Organization

May 9th, 2005 | Tags:

Another re-org. Perhaps this one will go better that [the last one][1]. As with the last time, the categories have again been shifted about. Perhaps this time I really know what I want to be writing about.
* Software has been folded into [Computing : General][cg] and [Computing : Mac][cm] (a new name for [OSXcellence][cm]).
* [Funny Stuff][otw] has been renamed [On the Web][otw]
* The entries from Television and Radio have been split into [In the News][itn], [On the Radio][otra], [On the Tube][ott] and [On the Road][otr].
* [Policial][itn], which was always misspelled, is now part of [In the News][itn].

[1]: http://moo.plaidcow.net/2004/02/re-alignment
[cg]: http://moo.plaidcow.net/archives/cat_computing_general.html
[cm]: http://moo.plaidcow.net/archives/cat_computing_mac.html
[otw]: http://moo.plaidcow.net/archives/cat_on_the_web.html
[ott]: http://moo.plaidcow.net/archives/cat_on_the_tube.html
[otr]: http://moo.plaidcow.net/archives/cat_on_the_road.html
[otra]: http://moo.plaidcow.net/archives/cat_on_the_radio.html
[itn]: http://moo.plaidcow.net/archives/cat_in_the_news.html

The main inspiration for this re-org came from [NSlog();][5] and the [reorganization he did][6], along with the hints on [starting a blog][7]. Some initial how-to ideas came from [Quiet Confusion][2], though the majority of the code was adapted from Arve Bersvendsen at [Virtue Ivis][3] and his notes on [decrufting Movable Type][4]. A take on [The Tweezers Edge Comment Fields update][8] was also implemented.

[2]: http://quietconfusion.com/2003/02/artificially_intelligent_ia/
[3]: http://virtuelvis.com/
[4]: http://virtuelvis.com/archives/2005/01/decrufting
[5]: http://nslog.com/
[6]: http://nslog.com/archives/2003/02/22/grrrr_site_organization.php
[7]: http://nslog.com/archives/2003/03/13/starting_a_blog_with_movabletype.php
[8]: http://tweezersedge.com/archives/2004/05/000418.html

The first hurdle which initially stymied me on this update was a lack of defaults from [Movable Type][mt]. Actually it wasn’t that the defaults were lacking, I just couldn’t figure out what was being used when nothign was enetered in some of the fields. Trying to replicate the file structure by duplciating the default values for “Archive File Templates” was quite and adventure…why not just include these values in the manual? Or, better yet, keep the default in the code, but have it pushed out to the GUI if it is missing?

Much of the new design comes from an article on [Nifty Corners](http://pro.html.it/esempio/nifty/) by Alessandro Fulciniti. the rest comes from me wanting everything to be gray and not having a program to create any kind of graphical logo.

Even with this upgrade, there are a few things that I am looking to fix still:
* I am still not happy with the listing of multiple comments (either in the pop-up or on the individual archive page). I thought about putting each individual comment in their own bubble, but I didn’t think that would look good either. (Fortunately, no one has been posting comments, so I haven’t had to worry too much about it.)
* The referrers script is currently not being included on any of the pages. (It is supposed to be included on the main page, but I have been unable to get the set and check variable working properly in MT.) Eventually I would like to move to a self-hosted referers script that I can have more control of (and which offers better speed), but I have so far not been able to find ay good, free options.
* The main archive page (which isn’t linked from anywhere) is not complete.
* A method to change color schemes is needed.

Let me know what you think.

No comments yet.
You must be logged in to post a comment.