Recently in Technical Issues Category

Due to technical issues I was having when uploading images - it wouldn’t bring up the menu to tell it to make a thumbnail, what size to make it, where I wanted it aligned or if I wanted a popup as well anymore. When installing MT5, you have to do a completely new install (this is a warning to all of you out there) and that means you cannot use the database you used with MT4. I did and that messed things up. So I uninstalled everything, started a new database and deleted the old one, then reinstalled MT4 because it’s the preferred method of posting for this girlie.

MT5 is more for those who are starting out fresh and new and don’t want to have to go through the weeks it would take to establish a website and blog integrated into one. Although, I have a bit of a bone to pick about this. The way MT5 seems to be setup is on a new install you have to start a website before you can start a blog. And then it messes up the urls from there, especially when you work with subdomains.

I think MT4 is amazing for creating an entire website with though. You can create Pages that have the same exact layout as the rest of the website. Those pages get linked in a widget, or if you want them elsewhere you can put them anywhere on the site. So I didn’t see a need for the way MT5 was set up or why it even replaced MT4. Or maybe I’m just not savvy enough to see the use for it yet.

I like MT4, it works for my needs. And soon I’ll have everything here back in order, including the other three sites that are also currently down and out. I am reuploading photos one by one so that they are listed in the database and with work taking up a lot of time and the Little Lady taking up a lot of time (she had food poisoning saturday and is still feeling effects from it) this has been on the low priority list. Let me tell you though, it is driving me batty. So as always, be patient and things will come together very soon. Laters.

For ages I couldn’t get my tablet working properly. There’s been a short in the wire for some time now. Not sure why, it hasn’t been mistreated and it certainly hasn’t been overused and abused. So finally I sat down and decided to figure out exactly where the short is located and what to do in order to fix it. As you can see in the photo above, the short is very close to the usb plug. That’s why no matter how I situated the cord it wouldn’t connect and work. You’ll also notice that I used a piece of yarn to tie it that way so it doesn’t move.

So far it has been working properly for over a week, which means I have a real mouse again and, if it works, I can start practicing with the pen tool again and figure out how exactly it works. That makes me happy. I paid 85 bucks and change for a small tablet years ago and I felt that I hadn’t gotten my full use out of it, since I rarely used it. Now it’s attached to the laptop, working, and that makes me happy. Laters.

So there were some issues which may have gone unnoticed since I don’t have billions of readers loading my site constantly. I made some changes to my Adify settings and added another skyscraper (I think I’ve made a whole 21 cents, btw) and it completely skewed the right-hand sidebar.

I didn’t know if it was an issue with css or an issue with a widget. Turns out the Social Widget needed some closing tags and after taking care of those everything is working out perfectly again.

I’ve also added more entries to the main page. I know more and more bloggers are going for ‘less is more’ and they have less entries (like some places I go have a lousy 2 entries on their page) and I personally find it annoying. If I haven’t been to a blog for a week I want everything right there on the front page and if they’ve blogged twice a day or more for the week I haven’t read then that’s my fault. But when you have 2 lousy entries on your home page, give me a break. I won’t bother clicking on ‘older entries’ either. I may be a fan but I’m not obsessed.

Anyway, the issue is resolved and even though I said they were resolved by FractiousKitty that’s really just Dusty in the greenhouse planter yawning at me from awhile ago. I thought it might help keep the right sidebar where it’s supposed to be with his oh so vicious look. Enjoy!

The most traumatic thing happened to me the other day when I opened Photoshop and it refused to open photos or images of any kind, even teeny tiny ones. It wouldn’t even create a new image. The program completely and utterly stopped responding to the point that it had officially died in my opinion. So I tried doing a repair. Didn’t work. I tried doing an uninstall/reinstall. Didn’t work. On the verge of tears I decided that the only thing I could do was the ultimate sacrifice ever.

Now let me remind you that this laptop was bought back when Vista was brand new and shiny and hellaciously spurned by everyone when they found out how buggy it was and that there were no drivers included in this bloated concoction of an operating system. This laptop was purchased when the wonderful and all-powerful Microsoft said ‘you will sell vista only or you will have no OS’ to everyone, basically screwing all of us to damnation. Just for that they made a special hell for them, I am told that there’s only vista available with no fixes, drivers or updates. Mwahahaha! Take that you bastards!

So anyway, on to the horror and trauma that I have had to endure during the reset. It was actually really freaking easy. Once I did a google and found out how exactly to cause the laptop to allow me to do the restore I didn’t have to do more than follow the prompts. It was eerily easy.

Then came the downloading of the updates. As vista update was downloading somewhere around 72 updates the first time around I was busy installing the installers that originally came with the laptop. This included Roxio software, AOL software and several other installers that there was no need to have on the computer being as no one ever used them.

Then it started installing the updates it had downloaded. The entire process from restore to factory settings to finishing the installation of updates took around 8 to 10 hours (give or take) and was almost painless. Once all the ‘shut down to install’ and ‘restart because you installed such and such’ was over I went to bed. I had also installed Live, Yahoo and Aim messengers and Avast virus scanning software somewhere during this time.

Since early this morning I have reinstalled Photoshop, Illustrator and Flash CS3 and they are all working beautifully. I have also reinstalled Microsoft Office 7 and a few other things that were needed. I’ve already began to collect fonts and brushes as well, being as I forgot to move them to a disc (oops) and that’s always fun to do, depending. Brushes for Adobe are easy to unzip and cut, then paste into their folder. The fonts I found are easier when you highlight them all, right click and choose Install All from the menu. That is the easiest time I’ve ever had installing fonts on Vista!

I’ve also made some major changes as well to the system properties. I turned off desktop composition completely instead of just for certain programs. No more flippy-floppy screen for me! I also turned off the elusive mouse shadow that I have never seen, menu sliding, shadows and more. The laptop is running better than it has in a very long time. I also plan to do a disk cleanup and defragmentation when I go to bed tonight. Yes, after reformatting the hard drive, installing vista and all these updates and programs, you should definitely defrag. Even when you buy a new computer, the first thing should be defragging it! I swear they do not do it before shipping it out. (And if you work for Dell or Compaq/HP or any other computer building company and you DO defrag before shipping out a system, please feel free to speak up!)

So I am back and I am still working on installing stuff in between doing little things to make it ‘mine’ once again, or at least my login anyway. I’m sure Honey will want access back as well once I get settled in. Laters!

If you’ve been paying attention you’ll know that I was having issues with my Movable Type installation regarding logging in and staying that way not too long ago. Well in the process of fixing the issue, which turned out to be real simple and easy to fix, I decided to go ahead and update my version from 4.2 to 4.261. Doing so added some more things like captcha to the comments and more recognized (like AIM and so forth) user names. So when you leave a comment if the email address you use is associated with say WordPress, it’s going to show the little WordPress logo. I know, cool.

So upgrading not only helped prevent pain in the arse spam comments it also helps recognize where people are coming from. Which is nice because I like to know where people have their blogs. Sometimes I’m particular about that. It still keeps your email address hidden away so you don’t have to worry about someone mining your info from here.

Another program I’ve grown to love over the years is Core FTP LE because it is the only FTP program that I have found that will upload the complete installation of Movable Type without once kicking me off the server. I used to think it was the host server saying ‘what the fuck are you doing!?’ and booting me. But from the last two times I wasn’t kicked off. I’m not even uploading the entire installation at once. I’m a little anal and I do one folder at a time and make sure the file sizes match. Getting booted during the upload of a file that’s over 100K is not only annoying but frustrating as well. The file may end up corrupted and you have to reupload it. The file may get skipped and you won’t realize it until something doesn’t work. I haven’t had any problems since using CoreFTP.

So I am officially using Movable Type 4.3 and you can get it here. If you’re interested in testing out CoreFTP you can get it here. No need to tell them I sent you I simply love their programs and have no issue promoting them. Laters.

I was having some major issues with my Movable Type installation today. There was some form of update through Windows Update that I think caused the initial problem, though.For whatever reason I was repeatedly being logged out of MT when I clicked on something. Click on ‘Write Entry’ and it took me back to the login screen. Click on a menu item and back to the login screen. Obviously such an issue is not conducive to blogging and needs to be fixed.

So I put a notice out using Twitter to see if someone at SixApart might be willing to lend a hand and a detailed forum post at the MT Forums. I didn’t have to wait long for a response either. Shortly after sending out my tweet SixApart direct messaged me that they’d have someone in their tech department check out my post and see if they could assist me.

After initially being confused (where do I access CookieDomain to fix it?) I was told to check out my paths in the mt-config.cgi file. Apparently since I use subdomains for the blogs I host it is not a good idea to have the ‘www’ in the path because then the cookie registers ‘www’ when there isn’t one. The cookies don’t match and it causes the site to kick you out because ‘you were never logged in’. That’s how I see it anyway and it certainly makes a lot of sense. I’m feeling smarter by the minute!

Before seeing the reply regarding the ‘www’ issue, I decided it would be a great idea to upgrade my MovableType installation anyway. I haven’t looked through anything to see what’s changed but I will when I’m done here. Excitingly, and for the second time in a row, Movable Type has upgraded successfully and easily! I am so thrilled. I can’t figure out why people use other programs and then complain when it comes to upgrading. Yes, I used to when it came to upgrading with MT but because I was always confused, now I’ve gotten really good at doing the installs and I make less and less mistakes when I create layouts.

Anyway, I want to officially thank Matt Jacobs (aka CapnDesign) for taking the time out of his busy day to help me out. Thanks, Matt. You not only made my day but you have made a loyal MT user happy in her loyalty. Laters.