Tread lightly on the things of earth

FIXED: I misunderstood the v2.21 upgrade instructions—first upgrade to v2.21, then run mt-upgrade221.cgi. That works. Woo-hoo!

Oops, after running mt-upgrade221.cgi, I’m getting this pair of errors repeated on my MT maintenance page:

MT::App::CMS=HASH(0x8d69fe4) Argument “6-” isn’t numeric in addition (+) at /usr/pkg/lib/perl5/siteperl/5.6.1/MT/Util.pm line 37.
MT::App::CMS=HASH(0x8d69fe4) Argument “6-” isn’t numeric in addition (+) at /usr/pkg/lib/perl5/siteperl/5.6.1/MT/Util.pm line 44.

and the “Authored on” date on each existing entry’s edit page is of the following form
2002—0-6- 27: 0:0:

Q: Do new entries, like this one, show the same problem date format? Yes. Drat.

A few minutes later …

I observe that the problem is the same even when I drop all the way back to v2.11 state and then do a complete upgrade using MT-2.21-upgrade.tar.gz.

As I don’t have time right now to investigate the cause of this problem, I’m dropping back to v2.11 state then reupgrading to MT-2.2-upgrade.tar.gz (not v2.21), which appears to work beautifully (except, of course, for the 06.28.2002 announced “created_on columns were timestamp fields” bug that prompted the v2.21 release in the first place—but I don’t think that’s a problem for me).

Life on the cutting edge, baby!

I just completed the upgrade to MT v2.2, and I went the whole way: I migrated to MySQL data storage. I am awed by how smoothly that process just went. I think I love Ben and Mena.

In today’s episode of Mark Pilgrim’s 30 days to a more accessible weblog series, Day 13: Using real links, Mark firmly spanks the idea of using Javascript (specifically, Javascript pseudo-links) for any content that’s important:

“I can’t stress enough how important this tip is. Some problems, like not having a “skip link” past your navigation bar, severely reduce usability, but at least your page can be read eventually. On the other hand, this problem actually makes entire chunks of important content completely inaccessible. If your comments are hidden behind a “javascript:” link, they may as well not exist.”

I agree wholeheartedly—and not just for pseudo-links. You cannot assume that Javascript is present or turned on in your client’s browser—Mark points to the 11% of Internet users don’t use Javascript statistic—so why use it at all? There’s almost always an alternative method to do what you want that doesn’t make client-side assumptions.

<!— imported into MT from 2002 Radio entry via RE on 2003-12-10 —>

David Gammel writes about the effectiveness of his work team’s multi-author klog (short for “knowledge weblog”) at getting him back up to speed after a week of vacation. As a general benefit, David writes,

“Within our team, we have been surprised at how well the team klog has helped us to have a better understanding of what each of us is currently working on. We didn’t realize how much of our individual work was below the radar of our closest co-workers.”

David’s High Context weblog in general looks very helpful; I’ve added it to my news aggregator list. Thanks, David.

For example, David mentions a further useful resource, the KmBlogger wiki page (wiki’s top level is KmWiki). Great stuff there!

(See also What is a k-log?)

<!— imported into MT from 2002 Radio entry via RE on 2003-12-10 —>

I’m enjoying Mark Pilgrim’s ongoing series, 30 days to a more accessible weblog. I’m trying to be mindful of Mark’s accessibility pointers in my personal and corporate online publishing. Keeping content maximally accessible is a smart thing to do (quite apart from being the right thing to do)—accessibility doesn’t cost more, and it extends the life and reach of online info.

Today Mark points to a particularly interesting resource:

Vischeck simulates colorblindness and allows you to see what colorblind people see. You can check a single image or an entire web page.

<!— imported into MT from 2002 Radio entry via RE on 2003-12-10 —>

Dean mentions Martin Roth's Christian Blogs -- The Semi-Definitive List. I look forward to exploring these.

I love Martin's About this website comment:

Jesus preached a message that was revolutionary in its day: love, forgiveness, service, integrity, trust, humility, prayer, compassion, justice, and more. Yet too often in our world today we see self-interest placed ahead of love and compassion, rule by the powerful in place of justice and service, spin instead of honesty and integrity.

The message of Jesus has become revolutionary again. Christianity is the new counter-culture.

Yes, it is.

Now when I say Christianity, I mean following Jesus, which seems to me at odds with Christianity as presented by loud conservative folk and the popular media. I'm not even convinced that following Jesus and being politically conservative is a sustainable combination:

I observe that one of Yahweh's most enduring characteristics throughout scripture is his concern for people who are poor, downtrodden, and disenfranchised -- in their behalf he's intent on upsetting the apple cart, turning the status quo upside down; as Jesus puts it, "many who are first will be last, and the last first."

In contrast, I see modern conservative political thought/action focused on preserving the status quo, ensuring that the first stay first and the last stay last (justified in light of a manifest belief that Might makes Right). IOW, as I see it, modern conservative politics is at significant odds with the way God does things.

Christianity is about being in loving relationship with God, with other people, with all of creation, now. Having tasted its reality, I can never go back. But I understand the dismay/disdain some people feel when the "Christianity of the news" is all they have to go on.

2003-01-07 update: I see I never updated this entry with the info that Martin's list was transformed last year into the blogs4God weblogs portal.

My friend Hal is thinking about buying a 802.11b Wi-Fi base station. I bought an Apple AirPort base station when they first came out—at the time, the only sub-$1000 device I knew of—and I’ve been pleased as punch with it since. But I haven’t kept up with the alternatives, some of which I know are cheaper now.

Cory mentions two interesting Wi-Fi resources:

• Wired’s Setting Up Base
• Paul Boutin’s blog post, Which Wireless Base to Buy?
• 2002-06-22 update: MacWorld article, AirPort Alternatives Provide Shared Internet Access to Wireless and Wired Macs
• 2002-07-11 update: Cory links to TigerDirect’s $60 DLink DWL-1000AP, an IEEE 802.11b compliant 11Mbps wireless LAN access point

<!— imported into MT from 2002 Radio entry via RE on 2003-12-10 —>

I’m starting to experience that happy feeling of basic competence in deploying CSS layouts. Here’s my latest effort over in my MT learning weblog. I think when the design has stabilized a little more I’ll try rolling its look back into a Radio theme. That’ll be fun.

<!— imported into MT from 2002 Radio entry via RE on 2003-12-10 —>