Rodent Regatta

Almost two weeks ago, I thought version 1.0 of Textpattern was about a week away. I was mistaken. I think my interpretation of a Textpattern support forum led to the mistaken notion. For those who read here believing you are seeing credible information, I’m correcting that entry with this one. I’m not sure anyone knows when version 1.0 of Textpattern will be released.

I’ve recently fought a couple of technical battles that didn’t end well. As one who has worked in the ”quality” field for many years, I’m not satisfied to pass over these failed attempts by merely deriding the technologies and the tools. I simply had to bail out in order to get onto other productive tasks.

Be assured, with some help, we’ll get this stuff figured out. While there may not be ”one best way,” there are ways to solve the problems. Many choices and decisions are ahead, but here are some things we’ll focus on:

• ”Correcting” RSS feeds – The goal is to get the proper mix of feeds in the best formats available. I don’t mean rdf, RSS 2.0 and Atom. I want to understand specifically how each of these syndication feeds can be built from scratch to validate and provide the proper amount of information.
• Firefox – There are two issues here. I get odd results using Firefox. I cannot pinpoint anything that’s wrong with my computer or the installation of Windows XP Pro. The second problem is the (suddenly) failed rendering of this site in Firefox.
• Planning – This site is going to get redesigned and possibly moved to a new content management system. I’ve got lots of things I want the new site to do. This may take some time, but I’ve got to figure out how to capture the details and put them in a sequence that insures they do not get overlooked as the redesign is started. Yes, there will be a new logo, but details are not finalized yet.

Having just bailed out of all efforts to make Firefox work, I’m tempted (and struggling to resist the temptation) by this excellent entry and comments at Douglas Bowman’s site. Most, if not all, of the discussion relates to the Macintosh. (I plan to join that happy band of users in the near future). However, much of it would be suited to any user of Firefox on any platform.

I continue to puzzle over ”what changed” that made this site suddenly stop rendering correctly in Firefox. For a long time it was fine. Now it is not and nothing has been (intentionally) changed in my code or CSS. While I wish all the Firefox users were seeing Rodent Regatta as it was intended to be seen, I have no idea how to return to that look. Something was altered, literally, overnight. At 10:30 or 11:00p.m. on Tuesday night, it worked. On Wednesday morning about 8:00a.m., it did not. I’m not content with ”things are sometimes just weird in…XHTML or CSS or browsers or whatever.” There’s some logical explanation for what is different and how it came to be different.

One of the things I miss most about Firefox is the web developer toolbar extension. I didn’t realize how dependent upon it I was becoming. In the struggle to learn CSS, XHTML, standards, etc., it’s an incredible resource.

In the last thirteen or so hours since we announced version 0.0.2, many people have reported bugs which we are trying diligently to fix. Designed primarily for a 12 inch wheel, we are learning that slight variations in size exist for many users. Future versions will address this need.

[If you have no idea what we’re talking about here, you might put your tongue in your cheek and read a bit more here. This is the last time we’ll give you a hint, because…well, because making things easy is not what the open source movement is about.]

It seems the market is ready for a pre-release version of an open source automobile. Version 0.0.2 involves a steering wheel cover which will be standard on our open source car. With no more (qualified) developers than we have on board at the present time, we’re not sure when you might actually have a steering wheel for the cover, or tires, or an ignition switch, but many open source fans have been quoted as saying in breathless tones, ”Wow, you should see this, it’s simply unbelievably great and so much better than having to buy a steering wheel cover for that silly $85,000 BMW. With the announcement of version 0.0.2, we understand that BMW is really scrambling to figure out how they’ll keep up. After seeing the steering wheel cover, we know why!”

To those who tried to assist with Firefox, I continue to say, ”thanks!” Why it sort of worked, then stopped rendering properly, then headed steadily downhill is something I may never figure out. Apparently, software is like that and software people know it. All manner and fashion of suggestions have come in pointing at anything but the application called Firefox. Ignorant user. Wacko CSS. You must have changed something in Movable Type. Delete your profile. Have you considered reformatting your hard drive? Delete Firefox and reinstall it – five times! Try these five edits of the registry, but be aware that they may cause some systems to fail. Which systems? Well, we don’t know how to predict which systems. I see; well, thanks, but no!