Since I’ve been getting some emails, for those just joining the fun, or those who know what’s been going on, a quick site status recap:
- In order to solve the “page link” issue for the controls at the bottom of the page, the theme support folks told me to update to the new version of the theme. I did, and that didn’t fix the problem.
- After growing impatient waiting for support last night, I began what ended up being a multi-hour download of the site backup so I could grab what I needed to restore it to the way it was earlier Friday. That download completed when I was asleep. Today I find the backup is corrupt so I am now downloading another, older backup in hopes that it isn’t also corrupted. This takes hours, not because of my slow speed, but that’s how the web host is setup and it’s not a file I can access anywhere except by downloading via a cpanel/web interface.
- Temporarily I set the site theme to the way it was in early December as that’s what I had easy access to on my machine. Thus is just until I can get into the backup!
- As soon as the download is done and I can pull the files I need, I will make the site the way it was earlier this week.
- Support has advised me that the way to solve that problem is to set the theme to a WordPress default, delete the theme files, re-download and apply them (and then I’d need to re-apply the settings and customizations). You can imagine just how much I look forward to that knowing how little any of you want to have that happen. Don’t worry, I will not do that until some future time, so that problem will remain.
- So far, in my attempt the past few days to re-research and then follow directions to solve this page problem, I’ve spent over 6 hours, and we’re just here. I’m not sure that’s progress, but that’s where we are.
I now have to go play outside in the snow with my wife and my cats (one of whom is enjoying her first snow) so please consider this an open thread. I will be back later to check the download and so won’t really be sitting here responding to comments. I might look at them later or tomorrow.
When I have the files, I will quickly apply them and the site will be back to the way it was Friday and earlier. I’ll still add some requested style tweaks, but I’m going to hold off on touching anything else until we do the new comment system in February. Considering some comments/emails, I’m sure that will be celebrated by many. I remind them that I’m the back end guy, not the front end guy, and I’m trying to fill in for him since that thing fell apart. I make no pretenses at being a front-end developer or programmer; I have managed them, and associated projects/products, etc., but for Balloon Juice, I offered to help in areas that are not my normal bailiwick.
Baud
The internet was a bad idea.
Germy
@Baud: Buncha tubes.
Ruckus
Alain
I do find this iteration to be one of the best as far as usefulness. Personally I think it works fine, but that’s from my end and I’m not that picky. (even though some days I sound like it)
Corner Stone
I feel like using the word nonplussed more. This whole debacle has been very nonplussing for some.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Baud: You’ve got my vote, but I hope you understand I still expect a cabinet position, especially since I’ve been birtherized off the ticket for not actually being from, or even in Idaho.
different-church-lady
@Baud:
Baud
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): Would you like to be Ambassador to Idaho?
Baud
@different-church-lady: WordPress was a crime against humanity.
TaMara (BHF)
I am sorry. Enjoy the snow.
srv
@Baud: I blame Al Gore
Origuy
Remember yesterday, when Ted Cruz said his health insurance lapsed because Obamacare? Well, not really.
Yeah, and we’re supposed to trust him with health care reform.
Anoniminous
I blame Émile Baudot. He invented the multiplexed printing telegraph and everything has gone to hell from there.
Plus with a name like Émile Baudot … yeah: French.
P.S. And Obama
P.P.S. And either Hillary or Bernie, depending.
Mary G
This snarling vicious Balloon Juice jackal appreciates you taking all this time and trouble for us. You could make me happy posting pictures of your cats!
Gin & Tonic
@Anoniminous: Probably our Baud’s great-uncle.
Amir Khalid
@Anoniminous:
It just occurred to me that the French name Baudot is pronounced rather like the Malay word bodoh.
NotMax
Gives us an opportunity to coin a fresh tech term:
Downdate.
mikefromArlington
For sake of a better thread.
I’m enjoying following some of these Pro Cruz Facebook posts:
still lol’ing. I’ve got more if you want them. :)
Baud
@Gin & Tonic: My traditional family name is actually Baudet.
raven
FIDO, fuck it and drive on and don’t pay any attention to these
twerps.
Anne Laurie
Like Ruckus, I agree this is the best (workable) version of the site — I can live with it, as it stands.
Sorry if I was curt last time, Alain — I was in a hurry…
raven
@Baud: Well you can call me Ray or you can call me Jay. . .
A Ghost To Most
@mikefromArlington:
I applaud and wonder at your strong constitution. Just reading that one comment brought my blood to a simmer.
raven
“I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue, shoot somebody, and I wouldn’t lose any voters,” Trump reportedly said.
Amir Khalid
@raven:
That says something scary about Trump and his fans.
Redshift
@raven:
That was definitely a Poe’s Law moment. I thought it would probably turn out to be from a parody, but multiple news organizations are reporting it now.
I’d like to believe the theory that he’s trying to see how far he has to push things to get voters to turn against him, but sadly, I think it’s more likely that he’s just that much of an ass.
NotMax
@raven
When satire and reality collide.
We Have a Serious Problem
Poopyman
@raven: I was thinking that it depended on who he shot, but on further thought it probably doesn’t.
And he’s probably right.
raven
@Poopyman: See NotMax’s link!
different-church-lady
@mikefromArlington: Don’t you just hate it when a country uses its sovereign powers to desovereignize itself?
NotMax
@raven
Better than even chance Trump read New Yorker (or was handed the article) and interpreted it as complimentary.
Ruckus
@NotMax:
Would that it were so.
At some point satire can always be pushed too far and then really does blow up. Problem is conservatives don’t do satire. They don’t do nuance. They don’t understand either. tDump does satire, that’s his whole life. Nuance he doesn’t get. Does that make him half a conservative?
PurpleGirl
Alain — enjoy playing in the snow with your wife and the kitties. You don’t have to tell us/me, but what kind of kitties do you have, how old are they, what are their colors?
(Note, I haven’t read the thread, so I don’t know if you’ve talked about the kitties up thread.)
scav
@efgoldman: Fair number of ‘merkans can’t distinguish the state of the nation from the status of their personal imagined TV show, let alone the Voice of God from the uncensored promptings of their ID.
raven
@efgoldman: I thought the Steeple was in Beantown.
Corner Stone
@efgoldman: It’s got a shot of Giant in there. Timely!
Ruckus
@efgoldman:
A high point in governability, that one was. And I always understood that art imitated life, not the opposite. Of course I’ve been wrong once or twice.
raven
@efgoldman: Damn, right near Pat Lang!
Steeplejack (phone)
@efgoldman:
Interesting pics. Your daughter is about five miles east of me. She’s very close to bro’ man’s Sighthound Hall, which is in the tony Woodmont neighborhood a few blocks from her.
It continues to snow hard here, and the wind has kicked up a lot, so it’s getting a little whiteout-y.
Steeplejack (phone)
@Corner Stone:
That particular Giant is awful. It’s old and clunky, but it’s sitting on primo real estate. They need to raze it and put up one of those super moderno Giants. Or, please, God, Wegmans.
WaterGirl
@Steeplejack (phone): Whiteout weather can be lovely from the safety and security of a nice warm home.
I am particularly fond of hoarfrost, which can be breathtakingly beautiful.
BD of MN
Open thread? OK, here’s my question about handling and drinking red wine. I’ve always been a $10 a bottle kinda wine drinker, pop the cork and slurp away. I was given a bottle that turns out to be a rather hoity-toity French Grand Cru (2009 Clos Fourtet, Saint Emilion), and I see various reviewers talking about decanting for various periods of time prior to drinking. Now I’m a homebrewer (award winning), a certified beer judge, and have witnessed a whole lot of over the top beer geekery, and a lot of the language by these reviewers just reeks of snobbery and pretension (that sounds an awful lot like some of the pretentiousness I’ve come across in the beer geek world).
So, to decant, or not to decant?
RobertDSC-Quad Intel Mac
Your work is appreciated, Alain. Thank you.
Poopyman
@Steeplejack (phone): Yeah, a lot, counter to the forecasted decrease over the course of the day. I’m starting to wonder whether the power will hold. Dunno if the wood stoves can keep the pipes from freezing. I’d rather not find out.
Steeplejack (phone)
@WaterGirl:
It is nice to look at. Just hoping the power doesn’t go out.
It is snowing so hard that it’s piling up on my (second-floor) window sills and affecting visibility. (It’s not piling up all the way from the ground. That’ll be tomorrow!)
bystander
@mikefromArlington: I went on Ted’s facebook page to sympathize about Obummer making him lose his insurance. I pointed out that if only he had kept his Canadian citizenship, he’d be covered. Wonder how long before that gets deleted.
Is it my turn to complain about every aspect of BJ before threatening to withdraw my Koch-sized endowment of the site?
Keith G
@BD of MN: Decant. The interaction of the wine with a bit of fresh air really does affect the taste in a good way.
PurpleGirl
@WaterGirl: Agree completely. Looking out a living room window my terrace is snow covered and the cemetery a block away is also snow covered. The maintenance crew has been working on cleaning our sidewalks. The blowing snow is lovely. But I’m safe and warm here on the 17th floor.
Anoniminous
@Amir Khalid:
Because of the way the brain processes auditory stimuli it is extremely difficult to find a polysyllabic word in one language whose pronunciation lacks meaning in every other language. It’s not my field but people who study that kind of thing derive a lot of amusement by “translating” between languages, the more scurrilous and/or ribald the “translation” the better.
Corner Stone
@bystander: I, for one, enjoy the fact that you worked in “BJ”, “withdraw”, “Koch-sized”, and “endowment” all in the same question.
Luzeelu
Please get rid of the little auto play. It’s rapidly sucking up megabytes and I have a pathetic data allowance. Thank you.
WaterGirl
@Steeplejack (phone): Yeah, when you can’t get the door open or see out of the windows it can be a bit freaky!
WaterGirl
@Luzeelu: Ugh. I hate little autoplay videos – it makes me not go to those websites. I don’t do well with things that flash and move out of the corner of my eye. That is definitely not an upgrade!
NotMax
@Steeplejack
Falls Church, hometown of Mama Cass Elliot.
Quick mention at tail end of <emDancing in the Street.
Ruckus
@Luzeelu:
On my computer imac and FF with adblock and noscript I just run the cursor over it and a block tap pops up, click it’s gone.
NotMax
@BD of MN
Couldn’t hurt.
Careful, slow decanting aerates the wine and allows for keeping any sediments in the bottle rather than in the wine.
@Anonimous
Snownado day trivia:
Back when Esso changed their name, research was done and it was determined that there was precisely one language on the planet which employed a double x. Thus was created Exxon, a word with no extant meaning in that language.
WaterGirl
@Luzeelu:@Ruckus: I even have an ad blocker and I am still seeing that stupid video ad!
Alain says he can’t do anything about it, but will talk to Cole. :: sigh ::
Edit: if I click on it it stops and leaves an arrow for me to press play, but normally NOTHING runs automatically, and of course if you post a comment it starts to play again.
PurpleGirl
@efgoldman: There is a Key Food in our commercial building. Key Food is a franchise operation. The previous owners of this location were letting it run down badly — not stocking some things, not filling in the shelves, not cleaning as often as they could, not turning over the fresh produce as often, etc. They were supposed to be closing to renovate the store and then we were told that they sold the store lease to another Key Food franchisee. Well, the difference has been incredible. The new people let the old staff go except for one person. (I was upset about that.) But in terms of the stock — they’ve exploded with new items, many more items, they keep the shelves filled. The fresh produce has improved in quality. I’m still a little upset that they let the old staff go but I like the new foods and the wider choice.
scav
@BD of MN: It’s also a chance to sip a bit fresh out of the bottle and then compare it later (and also with food). There can be a lot of difference, Entirely granted though, there’s a mountain of pretension and puffery built up over a lot of wine, but that’s how geeks and those into social markers roll. So, Play Scientist!
Anoniminous
@NotMax:
I’m in the throes of trying to name our start up and it is a royal pain in the butt. Either it is already taken or it means something unforgivable in some African dialect.
Ultraviolet Thunder
Oddly, considering the meteorological chaos going on elsewhere, today’s weather in Detroit was pretty pleasant for January. Every car wash had a line of crusty vehicles outside because it was dry and above freezing.
I’ll be around home until Wednesday, when I have to go to Greenville SC or somewhere like that.
Uh-oh. I just got a TXT from WordPress to reset my Editor password. I got a bad feeling about this.
Steeplejack (phone)
@efgoldman:
Like I said, she is very close to my brother’s house, and I am over that way frequently.
Ruckus
@WaterGirl:
It’s noscript that does it for me. Allows you to block any script that wants to run in a browser. Keeps things much cleaner and nicer. And when a script is inserted, as this one is, allows you to run your cursor over it and a tab (I put tap in my last comment. Can’t tell if it’s the dyslexia or my typing that is the problem) which has the word block in it. Click that and it not only stops, it won’t load in the first place. Of course if a different script is inserted by the website/ad folks you have to block that one as well.
Steeplejack (phone)
@efgoldman:
A normal-sized Trader Joe’s would fit, and they love cramped parking.
mclaren
Seriously, Alain? WTF???
Here’s what you do to solve the “no page 2” problem:
[1] Insert the number 2.
[2] Create a hyperlink 2
[3] For page 3, insert page 3 and so on. 3
Go ahead! Try it! Try it right now by clicking on these links! You’ll see it works!
How the FUCK is this hard?
Steeplejack
@mclaren:
Well, apparently it’s at least a little hard, because both of your links append a page number to this post, not to the date, and when you click them they take you to “2016 Is Upon Us” from February 2014. Go figure.
Probably you meant something like this.
Betty Cracker
Alain, if you’re still around, there’s a fairly new issue with the backend interface. Photo uploads made via iPhone or iPad load sideways. Doesn’t happen when using Windows laptop. Thanks!
Eric U.
anyone know why the page sits there and messes with the tab at the top of the browser constantly? I’m not sure what to block. Must be one of the widgets
Steeplejack
I hesitate to bring this up, because it is kind of obscure, and I haven’t been able to run down much information about it. But here goes:
I am having a problem at Amazon.com where quite often (in Firefox on Windows 10) I get a message saying that there is an error in a script. I have tried to debug it with no success. I deleted all my Amazon cookies, and it still persists.
The only other thing I can tie it to is that it started happening last week after I used the “shop at Amazon” link at Balloon Juice so this site would get a little vig on a couple of purchases. It’s a long shot, but is there some chance that some change in the ongoing site rebuild has affected the Amazon shopping link? Like, say, not sending the right “store code” or something and causing scripts on the Amazon site to fail?
kc
Alain, I was unable to comment on the site at all, from any device, for a day. No loss to the BJ commenting community, but it was most annoying because I couldn’t find your email address to let you know about the issue (and of course, I couldn’t leave a comment about it …)
Maybe consider posting an email addy where users can reach you regarding site issues? Apologies if you’ve already done it, but I can’t find it. Thanks!
Steeplejack
@kc:
Alain’s address is Please@getmechamot.com
Ruckus
Alain
Something seems to be causing the desktop site to be almost constantly reloading. This has happened before. iMac 2015 with osx 10.11.4 (although the about mac popup shows .3, apple store says .4 loaded within last 30) FF 44.0, internet download is 65mps so that should not be the problem. Server load/error?
Steeplejack
@Ruckus:
I don’t know for sure, but it may be the recently added Ora TV gizmo. I’m on Firefox with Windows 10, but you might see if blocking that gives you relief. It did for me.