New Site Status Report 20201201

OK – here is an update on the new site. I’m putting it here ON the new site, so people can start getting used to commenting over here.

I have decided to go for SMOOTHNESS OF TRANSITION rather than CLEAN FAST BREAK.

PATIENCE. It’s a virtue.

Most of the posts transferred. We only have about a week at the end of November, plus whatever days in December before we move, to be moved later. Almost all our images have transferred. If we’re not OCD and/or perfectionist about things, the copying of the sites has been 99.9% successful.

On the PLUS side, we can use more modern commenting systems that use modern technologies like REST and AJAX to avoid reloading entire pages for EVERY SINGLE COMMENT. In particular, we are now using the wpDiscuz plugin, which is a bit like Discus for WordPress.

https://wpdiscuz.com/

The main NEGATIVE, however, is that we are having a LOT of trouble getting comments to integrate with the WordPress-dot-com notification system which is part of their “JetPack” – what most of us refer to as “The Bell” or “The Bell Icon”, located in the “WordPress.com Menu Bar” – a.k.a. “The Black Band”.

While I was able to get SOME notifications about replies on the new site to propagate in the “bell notification system”, most people saw either spotty or no performance this way. This may be a function of whether individuals have properly identified themselves to JetPack on the new site – something that is frankly too tenuous to be trusted. We cannot count on this to communicate.

Bottom line – we no longer have “bell icon notifications” on this site. I will keep trying to get them, but they’re not likely to happen soon.

I do have some good workarounds that I’ve been using. The WordPress-dot-com comment page is actually a pretty good ticker of posts as they are happening. I’m not sure if everybody can see it, or how much they can see, but it may be a start.

https://wordpress.com/comments/all/www.theqtree.com

I did get the “Home” and “Contact” links to appear in the top menu. See above!

I will have the sidebar updated to match – ROUGHLY – the sidebar on the old site, very soon.

All our categories and key words transferred. All our old comments. I *MAY* lock the older posts, but not yet committed to this. WordPress has a setting for closing commenting after 14 days. It’s something I plan to consider.

During testing, we ran into some interesting capacity for EDITING OF COMMENTS that looked like a bug. Turns out that this capability has always been there for AUTHORS on their own posts. Daughn actually found and used this capability to deal with a flame war on one of her posts, once, in the early days of this blog. Otherwise, she followed my preferred practice of NOT editing things, but rather letting the record stand – 100% sunlight – no deletions except under extreme circumstances – KEEP THE EVIDENCE – DON’T DESTROY IT.

This is why we count on authors to show EXTREME integrity, and not everybody is an author here!

Now – one more point.

What would you think about actually becoming a FORUM? Or just ADDING ONE?

I found a plugin that we may REALLY like. It is a plugin for WordPress that creates a FORUM.

https://wpforo.com/

This is open source software, and is featured on WordPress-dot-org, too.

https://wordpress.org/plugins/wpforo/

There is even a forum USING the software, for discussion OF the software!

https://wpforo.com/community/

SO – if we wanted to actually become a FORUM – we could do it. We could even ease into it, by keeping our current model, but creating a “forum next door” with a link on our main page.

Something to think about.

Bottom line – there are MANY possibilities awaiting us. My first step is simply to get the new house ready for occupancy! From there – who knows?

Have a great week!

W