In which things are fresher
Written by Forest Pines; published at 4:41 pm on July 2nd, 2010.
Filed under: Geekery, Meta.
We’re now running on WordPress 3.0, the very latest hot-off-the-presses version I could find. I think everything works, but haven’t tested everything 100% thoroughly yet, so you never know. The PHP version has been updated, too; I did squelch a couple of bugs that popped up in the home-grown parts of the code when passing PHP v5.2, but I think I managed to get them all. Let me know if you can spot any problems. I even managed to remember to update the copyright date at the same time – only 6 months late there.
Keyword noise: update, upgrade, Wordpress, Wordpress 3.0
In which I try to update the site
Written by Forest Pines; published at 3:33 pm on January 6th, 2009.
Filed under: Meta.
An administrative note: I’ve just upgraded the site to WordPress 2.7, the new, latest version, before I start on the planned epic redesign. And: it’s different. To you, the site itself should look just the same as before. On the underside, writing and managing the site, it looks completely different. I’m all-at-sea. Everything has moved about, and it’s going to take me a few days to relearn how to work the thing. That’s upgrades for you.
Keyword noise: blog, learning, upgrade, web design, websites, Wordpress
In which we get hacked
Written by Forest Pines; published at 4:19 pm on April 5th, 2008.
Filed under: Meta.
It’s never a good sign when you come back from tent-shopping (a story for another day), check your email and find an emergency security alert from your web-hosting people. It’s an even worse sign when it says: your site has been compromised. Ah. Oh dear.
My FTP details had been compromised, apparently. This is intriguing, because my FTP password is unique, unrelated to any other I have, and stored solely inside my head. Either some sort of network-sniffing was going on – entirely plausible with the entirely insecure FTP* – there’s some flaw in my hosts’ FTP daemon, or the fault lay elsewhere.
Anyway, it’s prompted me to upgrade myself to WordPress 2.5, released recently. Upgrading WordPress is one of those jobs which I tend to put off and put off, for no good reason because it’s really not that painful; and there’s a good chance that WordPress was the loose link here. Old versions do have known holes, and if I’d upgraded sooner, the break-in might never have happened.
* I nearly said “FTP protocol” there. But that would be “File Transfer Protocol protocol”, which is Just Wrong.
Keyword noise: blog, blogging, cracking, security, upgrade, web design, Wordpress
In which we make sure everything is shiny-new
Written by Forest Pines; published at 11:59 am on January 7th, 2007.
Filed under: Artistic, Meta.
And on the subject of procrastination, I’ve finally got around to making sure this site is running on the latest version of WordPress. Hurrah! I’m normally slightly reluctant to upgrade, on the grounds that the upgrade procedure is very long and detailed, and involves deleting most of the site to reinstall the new one. So you have to take the site down,* and if anything goes wrong it might stay down. I know that doesn’t really matter for a frivolous site like this, but it makes me wary.
I’m thinking of introducing Guest Contributions to the site, partly to make sure I can keep to one post per day whilst still having time off occasionally. So, if you’d like to write maybe one blog post per month that would fit in with the style of this place, get in touch.
In other news, I’ve discovered** that classic 80s popular-science TV series The Secret Life Of Machines can now be found on Google Video. Written and presented by engineer and cartoonist Tim Hunkin, it really was a very good show that inspired an awful lot of modern “let’s see if we can make one in our garden shed” science telly. I’ve you’ve never heard of it before, go and find it.
* The latest press release from the FP Militant Invective Laboratories says: “Stop taking your site down – take it out for a drink instead! FPMIL tests prove that 87% of .php files prefer to be taken to a quiet bar for a drink, rather than be taken offline in the ordinary way. Most .php files prefer to drink rum and coke, although plain .html will generally choose gin and tonic as its tipple.”
** Thanks to boingboing
Keyword noise: blog, blogging, The Secret Life Of Machines, Tim Hunkin, upgrade, Wirdpress
In which we celebrate
Written by Forest Pines; published at 10:22 pm on January 31st, 2006.
Filed under: Meta.
I’m feeling rather pleased with myself at managing to fulfil two of my resolutions so far this month. I’ve upgraded to WordPress 2, and I’ve managed to post every day this month. Even when I didn’t have very much to say – this post is cheating, frankly.
Next month I definitely won’t manage it, because I’ve already got a couple of holidays planned. I do have a few things I’m thinking about posting though. For one thing, I need to tell you about Colleague M’s Sudden Surprise Resignation from work. And write that item about Jan Mark’s book Zeno Was Here that I promised the other week. Not to mention re-write that post about mythology and the Tower of London that I accidentally deleted the other day. Which would you like to see first?
Keyword noise: blog, blogging, Colleague M, Jan Mark, myth, mythology, new year, resolutions, upgrade, Wordpress
In which we see if it worked
Written by Forest Pines; published at 5:21 pm on January 14th, 2006.
Filed under: Meta.
Well, if you can see this, then the upgrade worked. Hurrah!
Keyword noise: blogging, upgrade, Wordpress
In which we plan an upgrade
Written by Forest Pines; published at 6:43 pm on January 12th, 2006.
Filed under: Meta.
I’ve decided: at the weekend, I’m going to upgrade to WordPress 2.0.
So, the site will be offline for a short while on Saturday. Hopefully it won’t be offline for very long at all, and everything will come back up fine. In fact, you shouldn’t notice anything different about the site at all. I just thought I’d warn you, though. Just in case the upgrade doesn’t go smoothly.
Keyword noise: blog, blogging, break, offline, upgrade, Wordpress
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