First of all, this is a new blog (since, as I discuss below, the original one was not installed correctly, and it was easier in the long run to start over). All the entries are here, but the comments are not, and, if you registered to leave comments, you'll have to register again. Sorry for the inconvenience, but, as I explain below, this is a one-time thing. Oh, and I need to go through all the entries and fix the links to other entries. At the moment, they will link back to the original blog. I'll fix that this week. All the other links (to the novels, to other sites) should work fine.

Also, as you've probably noticed by now, we're back to the original theme, called blix, or really a modified version of it, called Blixed 1.0.

There's a story behind that.

First, Stormville noticed that commenting wasn't working, as I mentioned last week. First I thought this was something which would require me to upgrade the WordPress software, but then I did some research and found out that sometimes this is caused by a problem with the theme, the templates that determine how the blog looks (and also, apparently, how it acts). I changed back to the original theme, and commenting worked again.

Which was a relief, since I'm nervous about upgrading, since the instructions consist mostly of repeated and urgent requests that you back everything up, both the application and the database, before even starting the upgrade process, a process which could (apparently) all too easily screw up everything.

But then the helpful person at the webhosting company pointed out that I should think about upgrading anyway, since earlier versions of WordPress had security issues. Including, as some reasearch revealed, the version I was using. Verve has an automated installation system (called Fantastico) which handles upgrades automatically. But it won't work with programs which were installed manually.

So, I installed the current version, with Fantastico, and now any upgrades from now on will be (more or less) automatic.

Also, seeing the original theme again, I realize that I always preferred it to the later one (newsportal). As I detailed here, the only reason I switched was to get a list of the most recent entries in the sidebar.

So, I'm going to stick with blix, and I did a little research and figured out how to get the list displayed in the sidebar anyway.

And then, obviously, I figured out how to use the sidebar for other things entirely. Changing the sidebar of a theme turns out to be pretty easy. And showing the list of characters there emphasizes that this isn't really a blog at all.

blog

I dislike the word blog, though I use it (because I don't know a better one). It's an unpleasant-sounding word, plus it doesn't describe this site, either with its original meaning ("a list of websites that I have visited and/or that I like," hence: "web log") or its current one ("a place where I tell you what I think about things").

I know some people who continue to use the term "online journal" instead of "blog," but this is certainly not an online journal, so I can't call it that. "Blog" at least has the virtue of having a few different meanings, even though none of them is an exact fit here.

Stormville said (about 4,275 years ago) that he wanted to create a concordance of my work. That's what this is, with occasional digressions into the mundane (my dialup doesn't work, DSL is a disaster, commenting is broken, etc.). Once this draft of the third novel is done, I'll have to see if I want to continue the weekly entries. They may become a distraction from the work of doing the revisions.

I know, a blog isn't a blog if there aren't any entries, but I'm increasingly realizing that this isn't actually a blog. I'm just using blog software to do something rather different.

blix

I think one reason I prefer blix is that newsportal looks like something I could have designed myself, if I really focused on it. Blix is better than anything I would have designed, though it is still clean and simple and easy to understand.

current chapter

Oh, and there's more of the current chapter up. You can read the new parts here, or you can read the chapter from the beginning here.