Site Overhaul and New Commenting System
Major Sitework
Google Analytics tells me that a surprising number of people (more than I expected, anyhow) are actually visiting and reading this blog, so I feel that I should let everyone know that I’m trying to do some major sitework at the moment, so posting has been slow.
Overall, my main goals in this overhaul are these:
- Make it easier to find interesting articles, especially I write more. This is my overarching goal in this rework.
- Create a front-page with major categories, recent articles, and featured content. This goes along with the first point, though is more specific.
- Update the sidebar to be more useful in navigation and finding interesting articles. Perhaps have Adsense be less prominent or deemphasized, especially since I’m not looking to make much off of it (originally, I was hoping it would offset some hosting costs).
After this, I expect to be posting at a far more rapid clip, especially since I’m deliberately designing the site in a way where it will look very odd if I do not. Think of it as self-motivation, on my part.
Regardless, I’ll try to continue to add content during this time, so I can justify a place on your RSS readers. Let me know in the comments if you have any suggestions. Speaking of which…
New Comment System
I enabled a new comment system on the blog in place of my original self-hosted one. It’s called Disqus, and is meant to connect with other blogs in a social-network/media manner using persistent commenter identities and forum-like comment format.
Overall, I think it’s an interesting idea, and if nothing else, I had nothing to lose since I haven’t exactly had extensive pre-Disqus commenting at this point. Also, the interface with this is, I expect, far cleaner than my own cobbled-together solution—which is not altogether surprising, since I’m creating this site’s theme from scratch and am still in the process of learning how to use Wordpress.
Let me know what you all think, and do comment, if you can. I appreciate any and all feedback—if nothing else, it makes blogging a little bit less lonely, even if I do know you are all out there browsing through thanks to Google’s all-seeing statistical eye.
