Special Blog Post:
Unsightly Blog Maintenance... at Conclusion
Where was I?
Oh, yes: this blog. Maintenance will be going on this evening to the end of sophisticating the code, removing most of the vulnerabilities arising from the Blogger platform, and preparing for the launch of a new service. Should anything unusual (other than the above-mentioned, routine problems) occur, please feel free to post a comment. For that matter, please feel free to post comments on anything.
In news to chew—perhaps something to get folks riled up—some of you might not have caught yesterday's headline from the Guardian Unlimited on The Dark Wraith News Network over at the Message Board about an interview with Lt. Gen. Walter E. Buchanan III, Commander of the 9th U.S. Air Force and U.S. Central Command Air Forces. It seems that, in the interview, which he granted while he was in the United Arab Emirates for an airshow, Buchanan claimed that the civilian casualties in Iraq have been overstated, and he went on to say, "I would tell you first off I don't believe most of it and I am very much aware that some of that has been staged," the 'it' and 'that' in his bloviation apparently referring to civilians being maimed and killed by Coalition bombings. In other words, good readers, the top Air Force officer in Iraq is telling the world that at least some of those horrific scenes of baked corpses, burned flesh, and hanging limbs have been created for gullible viewers by Iraq's equivalent of our Hollywood special effects jockeys.
Amazing. It all looked so... so... real. And here it was just digital manipulation and make-up. Well, spank me, Moses. Boy, do I feel like a real fool for almost blowing my groceries on some of those photos.
Sheesh.
In other news, The Washington Note is claiming that there's been a Deep Throat sort of insider—a "high level official," mind you—who's been providing Patrick Fitzgerald and the FBI with juicy information from very early in the investigation of the outing of Valerie Plame. So the obvious question is, Who's the new Deep Throat; and does he or she really exist, or is this just more smoke being blown up the American people's collective used-food port by one side or the other?
These and other topics are on the table for comments. As I noted above, feel free to discuss anything.
The Dark Wraith is mindful that he should probably use a word somewhat more specific than "anything," what with the crowd around these parts.
The code that is the subject of this upgrade will be left in the blog for the next couple of days. It is still creating an error in both Internet Explorer and Firefox if the page is refreshed too soon after it is initially loaded, but the error does not spread beyond the frame where it occurs. You must understand that code that creates a transient error is a most vexing form of mental torture.
The Dark Wraith is on the verge of becoming rather fussy.
The source of the error has been found and corrected. Asynchronous Javascript and XML—otherwise known as AJAX—can bite me.
The Dark Wraith is going to bed, now.
The major part of the code upgrade is now complete. I have not yet resolved a minor issue with AJAXing a couple of frames because they carry javascripts inside them, but I'll figure that out over the next couple of days as I refine the code to make it more robust.
I must ask you, the people who come to The Dark Wraith Forums, to tell me to what extent the changes, which should not have altered in any material way the appearance of the blog, have affected the functionality. Does the loading sequence appear substantially different now from what it did before? If so, is it in any way disruptive? Also, have you noticed a slowdown in the speed with which the blog completes the loading cycle? Has it crashed during a load?
It seems to me that end users who have slow modem speeds (below 37 Kpbs or so) are going to find the loading time to be pretty high, perhaps as much as one minute if my estimates are correct. That bothers me, and I shall try to reduce the loading time at least to some extent. At one minute, some of the graphics are going to time out, which will cause the blogScream script to never start running unless the REFRESH button is hit (which will allow the graphics to reload from the point where they stopped). Speeding up the load might entail removing a javascript I put in awhile back, one that would require going back and repairing a lot of posts to rectify the coding in them that's based upon it. If I have to do so, however, I shall. Far too many Webmasters now simply accept the fact that users with slow modems will be unable to access their sites; and this slow squeeze-out of those who don't have high-speed modem connections, DSL, or cable modem is becoming another layer of marginalization of large numbers of people in our collective rush to the "connected" future. I don't want to be too much a part of that: the fact that my writings are available only to those able to access the Internet is about as much as I want to contribute for the time being to cutting myself off from an audience that is already so marginalized that it is easy prey for the radio hate mongers who rely on the listeners' inability and unwillingness to be expansively informed.
As always, I am grateful for the input about what's going on with the technical details. I can see only so much; and sometimes, even though I imagine myself objective, I don't see the problems that could be show-stoppers here at The Dark Wraith Forums.
Talk to me if you will. Tell me what you're seeing that isn't within the range of what is acceptable and expected when you visit a blog.
You might be noticing, by the way, that my humor is considerably better tonight than it was when I finally got the major problem with AJAX resolved. I shall keep that good humor... unless, of course, someone tells me that what I've done in the coding has made the blog a complete mess. In that event, I might get a bit fussy again.
The Dark Wraith still might be a bit on the fragile side from this latest backroom blog work.
Published 11/22/2005 03:39:00 PM
<< 43 Comments Total
Ignoring WMD, Niger documents, Iraq links to 9/11 and the like, Bushco does have a history of faking little things too, like The Sticker Shock of Bush's Economic Snow Job and The fake troops in Bush's new ad.
It's quaintly Republican for the pot to call the kettle black you know.
ANYTHING?????
Just as I suspected! First it's Lab Kat, then it's going to be everyone else coming over here to disuss anything. Good Lord, it's a good thing I bought extra cans of Spam to throw on the grill.
The Dark Wraith knew better than to say "anything."
Hey, Mr. Goat, thank you for those links.
Did you see the close call today with that judge who had the chance to throw out the felony charges against Tom DeLay? He didn't; but that's not a good sign: the smart money seems to be that he has every intention of throwing out the charges, but he postponed making a decision on the motion by DeLay's attorney to make it look like he will have done "careful deliberation" on the matter before he lets the weasel off the hook.
I hope I'm wrong, but that's the smell I'm getting from the skunk farm down there at that courthouse in Texas right now.
The Dark Wraith should probably buy some air freshener before he starts getting too interested in Texas political trials.
In my politically misbegotten younger days I used to think voting for judges was a good thing.
Damn I am glad I live in a state where the judges are appointed! Yes, you sometimes get a serious nutcase of a judge, but I prefer the fact that they are accountable to the legislature, but not running for re-election!
- oddjob
PS: It's old news, but since Mr. Goat's mentioned the faking ShrubCo. has such a fondness for, I thought I'd remind everyone of this one:
Saddam was captured in December, '03? The dates tell another story!
Hiya Dark Wraith.
It sounds like you have a fun night ahead of you. The wailing of lost souls might be pretty melodic. I hope they don't wail in rap!
If they start wailing in rap, Old White Lady, I'm gettin' my shootin' iron out.
The Dark Wraith does not cut slack for the eternally damned.
Good evening, OddJob. I wonder if history books will ever truthfully deal with that little issue. It seems the media of our own time is going to stay away from it as if it were the Plague.
The Dark Wraith wonders how many other misrepresentations will slip through the cracks of history's truth filters.
That will probably depend very much upon whether "the story" includes the legacy Shrub envisions himself to be leaving, or the real one. If it's the latter that actually wins out, the prevasive mendacity of this administration may well end up being one of the significant story lines, and if it happens so, the story about the staging of the most significant capture of the administration will fit in nicely as another facet of the whole.
(Did you notice all the "if's"?)
- oddjob
I have been fighting the template change nightmare myself so I hope yours goes better than mine has.
Thankfully I created a test blog of sorts so I can find all of the errors and see how IE may look great but Firefox doesn't and Netscape looks even worse. I'm really learning alot and I know more CSS than I ever thought possible but there are times I have to just walk away then come back to discover I forgot a tag.
I spent two hours in major frustration over placement only to discover I typed "align: left" rather than the "align: right" I wanted. Boy did I feel silly. (especially since my husband who knows very little CSS offered to help me and I poopooed his help because he didn't know CSS, and he found the error...)
:-)
Good evening, Lisa Renee.
Years ago, I was in the computer lab at The Ohio State University, where I had about eight feet of computer printout strung across two adjacent tables. My FORTRAN code lay there before me, executing with no flagged errors on those eight feet of paper, but not one single line of output.
Nothing.
Just the more than a thousand lines of code that were supposed to be numerically solving a system of partial differential equations.
Night after night, I had run that deck of cards; and night after night, when the resulting computer printout was stuck in the bin by a tech in the back, I had nothing.
It was, I believe, on a Wednesday night that a young Taiwanese fellow who had been in several of my classes stopped to share my pain. He stood there for no more than a minute before he pointed to a line about four-fifths of the way down and said, "That should be a zero."
Yes, it should have. The letter "O" I had put there was effectively redirecting the flow of the program, error free, in such a way that the entire thing produced nothing.
Rage, denial, relief, gratitude, desire for homicide: every one of those emotions sort of rippled through me. Fortunately, I was so beaten down by that point that I said something meek along the lines of "It sure should be."
Twit.
Anyway, what I'm doing is trying to implement AJAX dynamic content modules. Once I do that successfully, every frame in the sidebar and the footer becomes nothing but a little htm file that I can change at will without have to ever go in and touch the template again. Blogger has become so impossibly slow and unpredictable at republishing the template that, every time I have to make a change, like updating the "Quoth the Dark Wraith" or the blogScream or the blogroll or the ads, it's a nightmare getting the template to publish, and half the time, the code gets damaged during the republishing process, which means I have to retrieve the code from the back-up file I make every time I touch the template, put that code back into the template, and try to republish again.
By implementing AJAX dynamic content modules, everything can be altered without ever having to deal with Blogger, which I am now convinced is administered by Satan's evil twin.
The problem is that there's some kind of a glitch in the AJAX implementation as I'm trying to use it. The dynamic content modules are loading beautifully on the first opening of the blog; but as soon as the REFRESH button is hit, it's like the browser has no clue as to where to find the little htm files, and error messages show up, and the dynamic content doesn't load.
What's even weirder is that sometimes, if I wait for more than about 15 minutes to hit the REFRESH button on the browser, the content loads perfectly, just like it did in the original load!
This is driving me absolutely insane. It's like an experiment that works sometimes and fails other times, but all of the factors are the same except for how long I wait between trials.
I swear, I'm going to become a Presbyterian if this doesn't work itself out. I'm getting some help (I hope) from a Dynamic Drive Administrator who knows how these Asynchronous Javascript and XML (AJAX) routines work. I am hopeful that he can see whatever it is I'm missing.
Failing that, the only recourse I have is self-imolation, and I really don't want to do that.
The Dark Wraith is rambling, isn't he?
Possibly the long wait is allowing some portion of software somewhere to recognize the refresh as a "new" first time, instead of an updating of the "first" first time?
- oddjob (who has only once ever written a program, and that not a very good one in my mind)
Actually, OddJob, you're on the right track, but you've got it exactly backwards: the script is checking as it should to see if dynamic content is already loaded; if it is, the code is supposed to drop the issue of reloading it.
Therein seems to lie the problem: for a certain period of time after an initial load, when the REFRESH button on a browser is hit, the script thinks the dynamic content has already loaded, so the script doesn't execute its job of calling the content to go in with the rest of the Webpage that's loading.
What's making the script first of all think that the dynamic content has already loaded when it hasn't in the refresh is the first issue. The second issue is why it clears its mind of the original dynamic content load event after a period of five to fifteen minutes is just beyond me, especially now that I'm certain that the time interval isn't stable: sometimes, a refresh is working after only a couple of minutes; but sometimes, it takes twenty minutes or more before a refresh will work properly and the dynamic content will load.
Aaaargh.
Grr.
Woof.
The Dark Wraith is descending into madness.
long ago, in my programmer days, i took my compiler printout to another programmer for help. this was a large program and i had test data with it. it would compile with no errors but would not execute. there were no error messages about execution. my buddy glance at the printout for at least 3 seconds before pointing to the first instruction. a "jump to end" i had put in to get a compile only, and forgotten to remove when i moved to testing. a huge program that properly executed one command---end. the program did test out and went into use.
i dreamt about programming back then. hope you don't.
six months ago i thought it might take ten years for the country at large to wake up to the bush disaster. now i think it might be sooner.
Good afternoon, Dread Pirate Roberts.
It has already taken five years, and we still have far too many people who see the whole battle that's emerging in Washington as "just politics."
Eventually, the disasters wrought by this Administration will be fully appreciated; but by then, it will be too late to rectify the diminishment of this nation that will have been Mr. Bush's legacy.
The Dark Wraith will, however, take some pleasure in telling former Bush supporters that they have no one but themselves to blame.
The accounts of programming goofs are refreshing. I recall my first programing class back in the days of the humongous key punch machines. Sat down at an open one in the lab to start my assignment. I had to pretend to get organized, for about ten minutes, while I casually looked for the freaking power switch. Too embarrassed to ask of course.
The Dark Wraith is going to bed, now.
I was going to say that you've mentioned, before, that wraiths don't sleep, but now that I re-read what you actually wrote..
never mind...
I'm glad you found the problem in the code. It always feels like such a relief, doesn't it?
Hope you have a good Thanksgiving.
Just wanted to say Happy Thanksgiving. You do seem to be feeling better - I hope you have plans to enjoy some turkey with family and friends. Take care, my dear - and be safe!
Good Morning, Dark Wraith,
Happy Thanksgiving! Hope you're all snug and full of grace - and real turkey, not spam, today.
Good evening to all of you who come to The Dark Wraith Forums.
I hope that you had a restful and happy Thanksgiving Day, abundant of food and whatever other pleasures are your delight.
The world, of course, did continue on its merry way, and I am certain that the neo-conservatives spent the day plotting further mayhem, trouble, and general tom-foolery; but it was surely a wasted effort: their mortal enemies—those who want freedom, liberty, and a country returned to its good and just ways—are now well fed, well rested, and ready to once again take the fight to the lowly runts of the Right.
... once, that is, the effects of Thanksgiving Day festivities of over-indulgence have lifted.
The Dark Wraith wishes you all well, this evening.
Hey Dark Wraith,
your ads look great!
What service do you use?
Or did you make the banners yourself and become an affiliate with particular advertisers?
Good evening, PoliShifter.
Putting together that group of sponsors was a lot like work. I had a few desirable advertising sponsors turn me down cold, but the ones who agreed are pretty impressive overall. The graphics you see are provided by the advertisers, but I remake them slightly (staying within the advertising agreements, of course) to make them fit into the visual and aesthetic layout of the blog. Specifically, the framing trick is my own, as are certain other features.
Although most of the sponsors offer "dynamic" ads—ones that change every so often as new sales or other promotions become available—I found that they were somewhat disruptive in that they employ javascripts that don't always work very well, which means they end up causing disaster with the loading flow of the blog and its own scripts. What that means is that I must keep an eye on my affiate sites all the time to see if new, non-javascripted versions of sales and other promotions are available to post. Some of the advertisers you see over there in the sidebar are really good about sending me e-mails letting me know about new things.
Although I initially did not want to introduce advertising here at The Dark Wraith Forums, the costs associated with this endeavor finally got the better of me. I finally modified my stance to allow for ads as long as they were from reputable companies, tasteful in appearance, played no games with spyware payloads, and offered products that my readers might like.
That set of rules I've been able to keep. It's all commission-based, of course, and that makes it a long road to get to the point where it's generating meaningful revenue; but I've started and run businesses many times, and the one thing I know is that patience is a virtue in the business world. Although one cannot wait forever for a venture to be viable, the idea that one has a product that's going to sell like hotcakes from the get-go is a pretty sure road to disillusionment.
Whether or not the commercialism I've engaged ever pays off remains to be seen. For certain, though, is that I have to provide blog content that brings readers here, and that's something I haven't done nearly well enough of late. In plain English, I'd better have some reason for people to come into my store because there are plenty of other stores for readers to get interesting and useful content where they don't have to suffer ads honking at them.
Capitalism really does suck; but then again, Communism does so with even greater gusto.
The Dark Wraith might have to go to posting more nude pictures of himself to draw the crowds.
There you go again, honey - threatening another bloggers challange. OK - could be fun, only this time, lets see a picture that's not dated 2003! Ooops - bloody hell - my cat just ate one of my books - well, he ate a corner of it and then gave it to the dog, who finished the job. Damn! And I was about to get eloquent, too! Later ----
I'll have you know, Madam, that last picture was taken about an hour before I posted it. It took five shots to get one where I was actually in the picture, too. Now that I've figured out where to stand and where to put the camera, the task should be easier next time.
And yes, I'm considering another challenge. Guy Andrew Hall over at Rook's Rant was lamenting that he was getting very low traffic, so I suggested a challenge. After I noted that he seemed to be politely ignoring me, he came back with a display of fearlessness rivaling the famous "Bring it on" line of you-know-who.
That means I'm going to have to bring it on. This time, the challenge is pure dare for fun and blog hits. And I'll send private e-mails to a select group of bloggers to offer them the challenge. That way, no one will know who was initially invited; folks will know only who accepted.
My Lord, what I won't do to stir things up.
The Dark Wraith will one day pay for these antics.
Unruffle those feathers there pardner - I'm not impugning your masculine presence - Lord, men are such touchy creatures! OK – so just what is it you are going to top the last one with? Come on – you’ve got to raise the stakes here. Guy Andrew Hall sounds like he’s suitably nuts – so how are you gonna match his kind of crazy? Hmmm? Go ahead - I double-dog dare you!
...and, you understand, this is the season for double dog dares!
Patience, women. The best things in life are worth waiting for, and this one is definitely worth waiting for.
A little while, anyway. I plan to lay the challenge on the table here at The Dark Wraith Forums on Monday. I shall update the post with the bloggers who accept the challenge through Friday, upon which happy day the challenge must be met.
The Dark Wraith just knows he's going to regret this one.
Dark Wraith,
did you just approach sponsors and ask them if they wanted to advertise on your site or did you apply to affiliate programs.
I initially thought blogging would be totally free. But I soon found myself buying more software, getting photohosting, and opening cafe press premium stores all which does cost some money.
I initially used adsense (and still do). What I did though was make about 25 blogs (and counting) for the sole purpose of generating adsense revenue.
I recently switched to Chitika on Pissed On Politics and Revolutionary Paradigm so we'll se how that goes.
All in all over the past 5 months I have made about $700 which has covered the costs associated with blogging.
Eventually I think I will buy more domain names and switch to websites (as I learn more).
I think your ads are excellent. They look nice, meld with the site, and are not obtrusive.
Good evening, PoliShifter. For some of the ads, I went through well-respected afffiliate services; for others, I went direct.
As I pointed out, I got my hind quarters kicked by some of those I solicited. In retrospect, with the exception of one prospect, I am not surprised by who turned me down. PBS declined, as did the Discovery Channel. Those were more than likely politically motivated, as was the decision by the Financial Times of London and the company known as OneShare.com (which sells single shares of stock in major corporations). At the time those potential sponsors came to my site to do their reviews, I had one or another of my more... shall we say, "pointed" posts at the top of the blog.
The one that mystifies me is International Male. I've been a customer of theirs for years, and this blog has among its readers those who are right smack in that company's target demographic. Again, that one leaves me mystified. Obviously, I am grateful to Les Wexner's operations (from The Limited), since his operations are well respresented. I should point out that I have at least three former students who are now well placed in that sprawling mega-retailer.
Over on the Message Board, I solicited advice for target advertisers, and I got some good feedback. I have been trying to secure one particular type of vendor to round out the advertised offerings, here, but it's still up in the air. I wasn't going to go with an online wine vendor until I found out that the one I've selected is able to send wine to recipients in 35 states, which is more than I was expecting and something that had been brought up to me on the Message Board as a possible issue with being able to generate revenues from online wine sales. The 35 states that my advertiser can do are where many of my readers here at The Dark Wraith Forums are located. Many of the states (but not all) that have laws against receiving wine through delivery are in red states out West (like Utah, Idaho, etc.).
I have one more possible sponsor to whom I've applied. It's a heavy, and it would be a prize. I strongly suspect the reviewers will decline my application, but I might be surprised. I am lucky for the ones I've secured. One more would be about all I could handle anyway, considering that I have to manage the ads both here on the blog and in the feed for blogScream, the latter task being a more exacting piece of work in terms of changing ads from time to time because of the complexity of the coding that goes into a given syndication run. I also put "microbars" into the news stream over on the Message Board; and although those are static (they don't have to be changed once they're inserted), getting each new one into the stream without causing the whole thing to fall apart into a mess of weird-looking stuff running across the top of the Board is a perilous exercise.
As you might already be noticing, the business end of publishing is complicated, especially when it's a one-man show. The advertising, the coding, and the other backroom work sort of makes me look back fondly on the days when I was just a gadfly commenter on message boards and blogs around the Internet.
On the other hand, I cannot imagine ever going for very long without wanting to run my own operation so I could spend my days and nights wondering what ever possessed me to do something like that.
The Dark Wraith probably enjoys the crabbing he does almost as much as he enjoys the blogging.
Good evening, one more time, PoliShifter.
Let me know by e-mail when you are ready to make the jump to straight, hosted blogging. I'll hook you up with the best Web host I've found, and their packages come with three different blogging architectures. I must warn you that the transition can be brutal, regardless of which one of the three you choose; but you can set up as many blogs as you want and run them through your own SQL databases on the host's server.
You'll end up on a steep learning curve unless you stick to very basic blogging. The fact that you want to run ads means right there that you'll probably have to learn some hard-core coding pretty quickly. It's not something that'll kill you; and if you want to get into the flow of modern Web architecture, design, and implementation, it's better if you start while you're a bit on the younger side.
I've seen many people in their 40s and 50s who thought they knew Webpage creation because they knew HTML and FrontPage. The few that stepped out of the canned stuff and into the world of the raw meat for the first time in years are uniformly knocked for a real loop.
I still love my story about the very famous blogger who got indignant with something I wrote to him in an e-mail about his strength being in the writing and promotion of his blog and not in the actual coding of it. He protested that I was wrong, and summarized his proof of such by stating something to the effect, "I'm pretty darned good with HTML."
The statement in itself was proof positive that he really didn't know what was going on with modern Web page design.
(Establishing your credentials in Web page design by saying that you're good at HTML is like saying that you're good at modern electronic telecommunications because you just finished putting together a two-way radio with two cans and a string between them. Okay, it's not quite that extreme, but still...)
Anyway, let me know when you're ready to take the leap.
The Dark Wraith will put in some ear plugs and help you off the cliff.
Good evening, Dark Wraith.
You were asking if your readers noticed any slow loading of the site or other irritants. I have dial up and have had slow loading for some time. Once, back some months ago, I did enjoy the quick load, but I think that was because the speed of the modem/service was at the highest point. I haven't gotten that, though, for awhile now. Tonight, your site loaded as slowly as always. Of course, I haven't cleaned out cookies or the browser for some time (I meant to, but forgot - it's hell getting old, don't let anyone tell you otherwise:).
Anyway, If I don't stop by, anymore, it's because it just takes too damn much time to cruise the internet so I'm gonna turn to hate radio. I'm sure it's a lot faster and less taxing to the eyeballs... HAHAHA.. as if. I was going to brag that I know HTML, but I don't know that much... Have to google to find what I need, half the time. Your HTML page is very helpful, too.
Good evening Mr. Wraith
I'm not sure I noticed any difference at all, although I may not have been paying that close attention since I'm in need of some rather serious rack time.
Good evening, Old White Lady.
You are confirming something I have been seeing myself: at modem speeds below 53 Kpbs, the blog loads with a noticeable slowness. Right at that 53 Kbps maximum modems can handle, the blog loads completely within an acceptable (if not blazingly fast) period of time.
One result of the architecture change to AJAX is that I've now made it so the main panel loads immediately, and then the sidebar loads. The only problem with this is that the blogScream and the quote of the day are in the back of the queue, which is somewhat undesirable. That's why I'm going to need to do something to get that sidebar to break into view more quickly.
I am working on a "stacking" trick that will cause the frames in the sidebar to load from the top to the bottom. Once I've gotten that trick worked out, I can rearrange the frames somewhat so that the more timely content flows in and is visible first. That means the main page, the quote of the day, and blogScream are quickly visible for viewers to read while the less important and less volatile information gets finished loading.
And I probably shouldn't have been quite so harsh about HTML. I'm going to continue to show HTML commands in my periodic Coding Hack's Corner. For one thing, most of the HTML commands, although already deprecated in the current releases of browsers, will still work for a couple more years. For another thing, once they no longer work, their equivalents will be very much alive in cascading style sheets, which means that understanding what they look like and what they're used for now will make using their CSS progeny easier. In fact, I've been seeing this trick in CSS with which I'm only partially familiar that looks like the HTML commands can still be used once they are defined in the CSS by their equivalents there. I'm not sure if I'm ready to show how this works because I'm not sure how extensively it can be used, though.
Anyway, thanks for the input.
The Dark Wraith is feeling a little better about what he's done, now.
Mr. Goat, get some sleep. You scare me when you get that sleep-deprived, bleery look in your eyes. It's almost like you're doing an impression of the President. After a couple of days like that, it's almost like you're doing an impression of the Vice President.
Get some sleep. We'll wake you if anything important happens... unless it's the Rapture. You'll probably want to sleep through that, what with all the Right-wing, looney evangelicals being lifted out of their clothes and up to Heaven.
The Dark Wraith is going to avert his eyes when Karl Rove and Condoleeza Rice go by.
Hi Dark Wraith,
thanks for the insight and information.
I am still trying to validate the code on my Scadapaly website...
I am down to 53 errors after starting with 314 :).....
Thanks for the info again. When I am ready for the big plunge I will deffinately contact you.
Did you say MySQL...darn...I have not even started teaching myself that.
On another note, what do you think about .asp? A friend of mine told me to forget xhtml, css, php, and all the other goblygook and just learn .asp since their jitc will the future along with 64 bit processing. Another friend of mine told me to forget it.
Also, I hate to tell you this...I was praying it was my system.
I run Windows ME with IE and your site pulls up darn slow. I tried my laptop with IE and XP and the same happened.
I went to work today where I run Windows 2000 professional and IE and your sight still pulled up slow.
Your site will crash my Windows ME machine sometimes. But that is probably due to Windows ME and not your site.
I will be buying a new desktop next month...........
Oh, my internet connection at home and work is very fast...
Perhaps it is still me...As Rumsfeld would say "who knows?"
I still love my story about the very famous blogger who got indignant with something I wrote to him
I wouldn't perchance have interacted with you on that blog, would I?
- oddjob
The Dark Wraith is going to avert his eyes when Karl Rove and Condoleeza Rice go by.
LOL!!
You are one sick puppy!
:)
- oddjob
Perchance, OddJob.
Perchance.
Good evening, PoliShifter.
Lordy, man. You would bring up active server pages.
Fer cryin' out loud, let's just get PHP underway before javascript gets deprecated.
We'll deal as a culture with ASP in the next life (which will come very soon for me if in this life I have to throw every Webpage I've got out the window and rebuild in the active server page framework).
The Dark Wraith longs for the old days of the cave, the club, and the high tech guy showing off his new round wheel that I could smash to flinders with the club.
Dark Wraith,
I see no visual problems with your page.
But it did take 14 seconds for Dark Wraith Forums to load today, but its worth the wait.
Not sure if the problem is on my end or yours. Other sites load just fine for me.
On another note, all things are eventually deprecated Mr. Wraith one way or another.
Somewhere in the world there is an old guy or gal who knows how to operate a DeHoMag machine better than anyone's business. I am sure at one time he or she was considered a true techy back in 1936; a regular genius.
At the same time, this person has probably never heard of html and still wonders why we switched from punch cards to transitors and microships
Another thing that I noticed Dark Wraith is when I am in the comment section, if I click on The Dark Wraith Forums link at the top of the comment page to return to your home page, most of the time my browser locks up.
Or, I get a plain looking page that lists all the files and folders of your site. Almost like I was looking at your file manager through your web host.
Greetings Dark Wraith and forum community,
First time here, first entry. Came for the economics post, left with visions of white phosphorous dog agony and baby bits blown about by the masters of chaos.
I became of draft age in '75 but it was all over but the suffering by then so there was no real reason for concern. I actually considered signing up for several years thinking this would most likely be a relatively safe time for enlisted personnel. Probably the main reason I ultimately chose against it was that I had a dread fear of being called upon to kill people, or facilitate killing people, for no conceivable justification.
To this day the image of the young Vietnamese girl running naked down the road after having had her clothes and skin burned off by Napalm is still seared into my brain. One can only imagine the persistance of the memory of having actually gone through such physical pain.
What I'd like to add to the discussion is the suggestion that anyone interested in learning more about the psychological stripping of Basic Training (boot camp) read the chapter in Gwynne Dyer's book "War" titled "Anybody's Son Will Do". It was also a series on PBS with one of the eight episodes devoted to that chapter. It is certainly eye-opening material from a thoughtful and well-spoken indepenent journalist. Much like the Dark Wraith himself.
Kudos.
Good evening, LanceThruster. Welcome to The Dark Wraith Forums.
I recall having the book to which you refer recommended to me, and I was swift to renounce the thought of reading any such thing at the time. I wonder now if people go through cycles or if they permanently come out from under the revulsion to past experiences.
In some ways, it seems to me that our society as a whole is going through a time of psychological abuse. It amazes me, for example, that so many people are comfortable with what happened to that man at Miami International Airport: he had no bomb; according to witnesses, he never said the word 'bomb'; and he was merely storming off a plane after an argument with his wife. An air marshal executed him, and other law enforcement authorities held the passengers in the plane at shotgun point.
And yet, this is okay.
It reminds me of how the trainees react to the violent abuse they suffer. Something they presume is so much more important than themselves merits their acceptance of personal degradation, threats, and even the prospect of death.
It will take lifetimes to shake that mentality off.
Anyway, you need to keep coming here. It's good for your soul, you see.
The Dark Wraith should probably put a "Healthy Blog" label at the top of this Website.