Things I got done over the weekend:
- Installed our new wireless router. Our old NetGear one had been hanging up on a regular basis — like, multiple times per evening. A power cycle and waiting for the wireless to reconnect and all was good as new, but annoying. The LinkSys I replaced it with appears to be much more stable.
- Installed Margie’s new Logitech wireless mouse. She’s still having problems with it, unfortunately. On the other hand, it was a great opportunity to clear out some unused cabling and stuff around her computer.
- Got the 100Gb backup drive for my machine pretty cleared off, so I can keep doing backups to it. It had multiple images of my notebook from back a year or so ago when the damned thing was crashing regularly.
Things I did not get done:
- Didn’t get the wireless on the old printer to work with the new router. Annoying.
- Didn’t finish migrating Margie’s document files from her old machine to her new one. Yes, this is waaaaaay overdue.
- Didn’t finish figuring out what I’m going to use the second backup drive for. Margie’s backups? Offline storage of photos and other high-space-taking items from my machine, possibly including a lot of my MP3s?
- Didn’t get installed the Brother Multi-Function Printer / Copier / Scanner / Fax of the Gods that Margie picked up for us. Which will be really keen, once installed. And, being up-to-date wireless, hopefully it will work with the new hub.
- Didn’t install MT 3.3 yet.
Les has various notes on the Movable Type thang. I find it fascinating that 6Apart is moving away from the blogger/blog count restrictions on the free MT license — it’s either a sign of a problem with their client base, or a sign that they’re making more money in other directions (like enterprise/corporate blogging efforts) and find the word of mouth more valuable.
The corporate features of “Movable Type 3.3 Enterprise Edition” sound pretty spiffy, if you were doing a corporate blog thing.
Features exclusive to Movable Type Enterprise include:
LDAP authentication
Oracle 10g database support
Cross-blog publishing and aggregation tools
Increased Administrator controls over customization of user interface
Activity feeds allowing administrators and authors to be automatically notified about blog activity
Integrated password reset capability
Administrator-level search features
Powerful anti-spam protection with solid feedback management tools
Compatibility with the existing range of Movable Type plugins, templates, and APIs
Customizable email integration
Couple of those I wouldn’t mind having on my own blog. And if I were a corporate blog guy, I’d definitely be jazzed about some of this. MT33EE also gets you support escalation, especially for high-severity problems. It gets 6A an annual maintenance fee. Cool.
For us normal mortals, MT 3.3 has a variety of new feature thangs:
Tag Support: Easily discover posts by topic
Tag Feeds: Easily discover and subscribe to feeds of entries by topic
Widget Manager: Rearrange page content by drag-and-drop, and integrate with third-party services
Transformer Plugins: Remix the entire Movable Type interface by using simple, free plugins
Activity Feeds: Manage your entire blog, its comments and TrackBacks, and get information on your blog’s status with customizable feeds for administrators
Style Catcher: Choose from hundreds of flexible designs without editing any HTML
Feed Widget: Include content from any standard feed right on your blog
Feeds for search results: Site visitors can subscribe to a particular keyword
Enhanced Task Scheduling: System or plugin actions can be automated and performed at scheduled times, without complicated setup or configuration.
Enhanced Activity Log: Every action in the system is recorded for administrators, and results can easily be filtered or exported for reporting
Flexible URL Archiving: Ultimate control over your blog publishing, letting you choose the web address for all of your content to optimize for search engines.
Templated search results and email notifications: Customize search result pages or email messages to match your design or to include advertising.
Simpler Settings: Blog configuration now displays fifty fewer settings and controls without sacrificing any advanced options for power users.
Smarter Defaults: New simple entry screens make it easier to start creating content, and improvements like resizeable posting areas make authoring more productive.
Which looks pretty nice (though I still think Tags are overrated). I suspect I’ll need to dedicate a couple of days to the upgrade, though, to make all the new bits and pieces work properly. I’ll be sure and give you all fair warning.
Our LinkSys wireless router would go on the fritz at least once a day. We finally got an ethernet cable and strung it between the rooms to avoid the disconnects and power cycling.
Part of it may also be environmental — microwaves in the area, or 2.4GHz phones, can cause a problem with 802.11. Thus far (very limited sample) the LinkSys seems to be more stable with the microwave than the Netgear was, and we intentionally use 900MHz cordless phones.
When I moved servers for my Sky Sea Stone . Net site, I went ahead and paid for the upgrade (I have something like nine plus authors and at least as many blogs), and have been thinking of ways to move servers for my main AlKiMe set (still on 2.661 or whatnot…) If they’ve released numbers of blogs/authors for free, I’ll be gladly upgrading that set…tonight if possible! While I don’t begrudge them the money, I think there were a lot of mistakes made in the implementation, and I’m glad to see the changes.
I think 6A didn’t handle the change well, and alienated a number of people. I’m hoping that some of that momentum will shift with this change, but I’m also concerned that a lot of the “little people” blogging stuff has moved onto other platforms.