wordpress

Tsk! To think that I have been using that slow Wordpress editor for so long…

I posted a question over at the Wordpress support forums in search of a web based editor I could use to post to my blog from work - without actually ever visiting it.

Not that this blog is subversive or contains illegal material , slanderous comments or items of a sexual nature . It’s just that I have started a new job and don’t want to make it obvious I am a blogger, that I blog and yes, I might be blogging about YOU.

The moderators over at the WP support forums came back with this site: WriteToMyBlog is a web based editor based on TinyMCE which allows remote posting to your blog - but via an excellent WYSIWYG editor. The editor is much better than the ones supplied with Blogger and Wordpress and it even handles a copy/paste from Microsoft Word - the enemy of working HTML!

I welcome my new interface to MegaTao.com and hope you will all heed my advice to start using it.

You can get a TinyMCE plugin for Wordpress too though - but I shall be sticking with WTMB.

I promised myself a long time ago that I would quit Blogger and get my own domain name, install Wordpress and start doing my own stuff.

I did half of that, well - sorta.  I did quit Blogger and I have moved to using Wordpress but I am still hogging on somone elses domain and don’t have any creative control over my template here.

http://www.taoski.com had already been taken, http://www.photao.com has been taken too, so I have been looking around at other possible domain names.  I decided that I did’nt want to go for http://www.taoskiblog.com as I don’t want to be limited to just a “blog” type domain name.  I also wanted to get myself a “cool” and “web 2.0″ sounding name such as Flickr or Labelr or something like that.

The only thing I have come up with a the moment is http://www.spangl.com.  “Spangle”.  Not too sure on it though.  I think the idea came from the obscure title of one of Nick’s postings.

But I have been thinking.

Are domain names so important now?  Most of the sites I come across are through links on http://del.icio.us or through other peoples blogs and Google.  I can’t think of that many occasions where I have given links to people by word of mouth.  So would it really matter if my domain was http://www.taoskis-wonderful-blog.com or http://www.tao-was-ere-again.com?

Some excellent free Blogger Templates here, including a port of the excellent K2 wordpress template!

Almost makes me want to stop writing my Blogger Template Overhaul series….

Via ProBlogger

Wordpress and I have now hit first base!  It has been just over one week since I made the cut over from Blogger and we are already holding hands and giving each other pet names.

"love you… pressy…"

Since moving over I feel all "grown up" and serious about blogging.  Joining Geeklimit has made this feeling more real and it feels great to be doing some proper technical blogging stuff, like.

As usual I have been obsessed with watching my stats and wordpress gives you a few builtin tools to track your visitors, popular posts and how people came to the site.

My traffic is slowly building and since taking this capture has rocketed after an influx of visits from Geeklimit.

Overall, I am very impressed with Wordpress and would recommend it to anyone!  There is a wealth of free templates available (although we cannot change them here on wordpress.com). 

I am already amazed by the Wordpress blogging platform!

Just this morning I have been able to:

• Import all of my posts and comments from Blogger
• Set up my sidebar using a drag-and-drop widget editor.
• Add a page that Blogger users get directed to with my popular posts listed.

So far, I am more than impressed.

In the (near) future I will be moving this to my own webspace, so the URL will change again.
Wordpress has many, many templates available but here at Wordpress.com you cannot edit the template code (at the moment).

Thats it!  I have had enough! 

I have decided to switch my blog from Blogger to Wordpress pending the purchase of some webspace.

At the moment, Blogger is having real issues with publishing and is sticking at 0%.
All the other Blogger users over at the Blogger Support Group are reporting the same thing too.

I have been planning to get rid of Blogger for some time now as they seem to have alot of publishing issues. I still have my "Bling Your Blog" series underway in Writely which focuses on customising a Blogger template so I might still publish that here.  When Blogger sorts themselves out, I will also import all my posts to here and make a new template that auto-redirects to this site.

Fancy that! A Blogger "how to" posted on a Wordpress blog!

I had this great idea.

I would install Apache and Wordpress locally, following the instructions over here and publish a work intranet blog thing to help us feed out information to the members of our (small) section.

I have recently been fiddling with this setup on my machine at home and if you are lucky, you might even find my test Wordpress blog lurking over at http://taoski.blogdns.com - but only if my firewall lets you in, the Apache stuff is running and the kids are not playing Backyardigans games on the web.

It works pretty well - especially for testing out Wordpress - which is way, way, way more advanced than Blogger and looks pretty cool. I still intend to migrate to Wordpress and my own domain at some point - but as you can guess from my previous post, cash and my spare time might be a little tight!

Anyway. I get the site set up at work and its all working but Apache just keeps on crashing!

Crashing when I attempt to upload a file during a post, crashing when I try to post a test comment and crashing when I move the mouse too fast after drinking too much coffee.

I'm on the late shift tonight - so I might have time to play with it a little more.

Ahhh… the joys of a technical job… Don't you just love it?
It used to be all "exciting", "innovative" and "rewarding" but now it's just "boring", "samey" and "mundane".

I wish I had used my A-Level art and A-Level Graphics Design for something rather than just creating a pile of quickly deteriorating artwork under my bed or making the odd kiddies party invitation on MS Publisher.

A nice design job like DriverChris does would be nice….

09:50: Turn up to work with expensive "Michael Caine" glasses, expensive sharp suit and expensive coffee in hand.
10:30: Start "design" work after reading The Guardian and sending emails to your "pretend mates" on your Blackberry.
12:00: Off to the Wine Bar for lunch with "Fifi and Charles" from "The agency".
13:30: Back to work to sketch out that idea that came to you as you "piss-chased" some chewing gum round the urinal in the wine bar.
13:40: Get distracted for a while by minimising the windows on your Mac to "the dock" and back again. You forget the idea you had. Time to have a power-nap.
14:30: Play with your Mac a bit more and read some websites about design and Audi cars.
15:00: Team meeting in the office. See who's got the brightest pink shirt and discuss the future of "frameless fixed-width inline CSS templates" for your customer portfolio.
15:50: Return to the desk and fiddle with Illustrator/Photoshop/Quark until the boss goes home.
17:00: Off home on the tube with your iPod, another expensive coffee and copy of Stuff magazine.
18:00: Get home to your lonely flat. Cry in your Findus "sad and lonely microwave meal for one". Go bed early after watching Trinnie and Susannah, getting tipsy on sparking white wine and being all confused over your sexual preferences….

Is the grass greener? Who knows?

I won't. I am doomed to be stuck at this desk whilst a telephone headset burns a ridge into my skull, I fix the same faults I resolved 4 years ago and the world passes me by.

EDIT: Just found this alternative program for running Apache and MySql locally to run Wordpress: WampServer

Technorati Tags: apache, wordpress, xampp, blogger, intranet, work, design, ipod, audi, art

After "a good hard think" I have decided to make the switch away from Blogger.

Not that Blogger is crap or slow or full of spam blogs and is generally seen to be the AOL of the Blogging world or anything. Blogger has served me well over the years but I want more control over my blog, how it looks, functions and is accessible.

I am going to buy a domain name, some webspace and host a WordPress blog there.
I will also amalgamate this blog, my Photao Photoblog and Music Club blogs into one giant tri-headed beast.

Wordpress will also allow me to create sub-blogs for subjects - so I could have a personal blog, a tech blog and a blog about my pet rock, Mr Stone Knee Boy (joke! - honest). I kind of have a picture in my head of how it will all pan out and work - but we shall see. Webspace and a platform like Wordpress will allow me to customise the site to my needs.

The Newlinks boys made the switch away from Blogger quite a while ago and are still going strong on their nice Drupal based platform. Drupal is also possibly "in the running" for providing the front end for my new site. This is even more customisable than Wordpress but may be too much for what I need. I have got a website to design for Flights-Physiques.co.uk and wish I had got him to purchase a business hosting service so I could install Drupal or Wordpress. At least then he could update the news section of the site himself!

Taoski.co.uk is available as a domain name and I can use Wordpress to import all my Blogger posts and comments - so watch this space suckers!

Related links: Wordpress for beginners, Wordpress Themes, Working with Wordpress.

Technorati Tags: blogger, wordpress, blog, drupal, newlinks, pet rock, hosting, site, photao, music club