Conscious Design

A New Yahoo!

Koop — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 14:59:45 +0000

This is, at the very least, a good PR move for Yahoo!. They have decided to rebuild their network from the inside out and rip down the walls between their services. With earnings slacking a bit and the constant pressure from Microsoft, they’ve done well in recent weeks — scrambling to keep their identity.

The Little Things

Koop — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 19:41:39 +0000

I’ve been through a lot of Wordpress upgrades to 2.5. Each time I notice something different. There are many promising little features.

Here are a few:

a separate panel for managing tags and categories
fancy media uploader
auto plugin upgrades (my personal favorite)
improved wp-config security
a back button after editing a post
drastic improvements in overall admin css by Happy Cog

Yahoo and Google Search

Koop — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 20:03:25 +0000

I love moves that are “designed to frustrate Microsoft.” This is terrific — even if it doesn’t amount to anything in the grand scheme of things.

Busy Times

Koop — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 18:04:02 +0000

We’ve been busy upgrading Wordpress versions. 2.5 has some terrific features and merges the style of Happy Cog with the meat and php of Wordpress.

Recently, I’ve had the pleasure of checking out Pictura Gallery and creating some slideshows for them. I’ll make sure to link to their site once it’s up and running.

2.5 RC1

Koop — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 16:58:56 +0000

2.5 is finally here. Well…almost. Wordpress has unveiled Release Candidate 1 for the 2.5 series. I am testing it on KOOP and WORDCHASM. The dashboard is a little bit slower, but the new features make up for that.

The only problem I’ve noticed thus far is a lack of cross-compatibility when it comes to browsers. I’m having more luck in Safari than with Firefox on the Mac. That is a rarity. The image uploader and html writer does quirky things in Firefox thus far…

Goodbye Netscape

Koop — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 17:03:46 +0000

You once were a proud browser — boasting some solid features. But, you weren’t well-maintained and you gave us all massive cyber-migraines. On March 1st we’ll say goodbye to a piece of the mid-nineties.

Yahoo! Strikes Again

Koop — Sat, 09 Feb 2008 04:23:20 +0000

I was initially enthused that Yahoo! did not immediately accept Microsoft’s hostile takeover bid. However, now it appears that they are biding their time for a higher offer from Balmer. This corporate greed has to bottom out at some point, but it doesn’t look like it will be anytime soon.

ELGG

Koop — Sat, 09 Feb 2008 04:17:58 +0000

I’ve been testing ELGG, the open source social networking software, for a week or so now. Overall, I’m pretty pleased. Its short comings fall in the speed department. Simple calls seem to take longer than they should. That, I’m sure, could be sorted out by a caching module of some sort.

Check out my test run if you want. It isn’t anything fancy yet, but I am intrigued by the flexibility of ELGG. It isn’t quite as flexible as Wordpress, but it does a lot out of the box.

Prologue

Koop — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 15:01:11 +0000

Matt Mullenweg and Automattic, creators of Wordpress, recently launched their new Twitter-based theme, Prologue. It really takes a lot of the work out of blogging. Prologue users can stay logged in, type away on a home page, then post.

Streaming

Koop — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 03:49:54 +0000

Things are about to get interesting. Netflix has a bit more competition w/ Apple due to announce their latest feat.