WIP

Just been farting around with my template again over at my TaoTest blog. After seeing the cute and excellent site design over at OrderedList I decided to take mine to a "low tech, single post" level. In order to do this effectively I would have to limit the size of the inital view of the latest posting to a few lines and then introduce a "Read More" item at the bottom for people to load the full thing up. I did a search for Blogger Hacks and found this posting by Nerdier than thou! on how to create such a thing. The only issue I can see with this is that you have to insert some CSS code into your post to get it to work correctly - which I don't want to do. I just want to make a posting and have the first portion of it displayed automatically. So... Off to JavaScript land I went and came up with something that actually works! Here's the code bit i stuck in my template: <mainorarchivepage> <script type="text/javascript"> var str_length=400; str = '<$BlogItemBody$>'; last_dot = str.indexOf('.',str_length); document.write(str.substring(0,last_dot + 1)); </script> <br><a href="<$BlogItemPermalinkURL$>">Read more!</a> </mainorarchivepage> <itempage> <$BlogItemBody$> </itempage> The blog post is written into the variable str and then the post is scanned for the next full stop after the number of characters specified in the str_length variable. To show more content, increase the value of str_length. The post is then re-written using the document.write command as far as that full stop character to allow for proper sentences to be displayed rather than being cut off in mid flow. The JavaScript is between the <mainorarchivepage> tags to allow it to be shown on the front page. A normal <$BlogItemBody$> tag is shown between the <itempage> tags to allow it to be displayed in full when you click the "Read More!" link. This is still a Work In Progress - so please don't take it as gospel - but I think it works ok. Not sure how it will work with pictures though. Rather than messing with CSS code, I was thinking of putting some keywords into the text such as !start! and !end! to signify the start and end of the posting you want to be displayed before the "Read More!" link. That should be pretty easy for JavaScript to sense and strip them out, and alot easier than going into the HTML code when posting.

360 Enabled

I have now got my Xbox360 and "w00t!" - what a belter it is. I unpacked the console when I got home, connected it to the net, signed into XboxLIVE and took out my free 1 month gold trial account. The plan was to show the kids the awesome power of the new console before they went to bed (as they seemed more excited than I was). This "great unveiling" did not take place though as it clashed with the start of Eastenders and I was forced to send them to bed "empty eyed". During the next four hours of TV that my wife watches on a Thursday night (Eastenders, 10 Years Younger, Celebrity Big Brother and ER) I dipped in and out of LIVE during the ad-breaks to download demos of FIFA 2006 RTWC, Fight Night 3, Fully Loaded, NBA Live and Quake 4. Plus a few videos, Live Arcade games and stuff like that. I am really impressed with the content on there that is free. More to come I expect - and hopefully more gamercard pictures too that I don't have to pay for! Come 11pm, the wife went to bed and I settled down with a fresh cuppa, poised to beat hell out of a computer generated assailant on Fight Night 3. And wow! The graphics were amazing! So realistic and crisp and clean. Forget buying a HDTV! The image was perfect! The gameplay is a little sluggish - but seeing the ripples on the guys face when you upper-cut him to the canvas is excellent. Jolly good fisty-cuff fun! I then moved onto play Fully Loaded which is a racing game with guns, missiles and other assorted weapons. The console version of the old Car Wars game I used to play years ago. Again, the graphics impressed but the game play was limited (although this is a demo). Race and fire, jump, crash etc. Very good fun and probably best played on LIVE against some real opponents I would expect. Die muthafunker! Third down was Quake 4 which initially looked very "PC Graphics" during the intro sequence. When the real game started though I was impressed and reminded of Doom4. Looks very very good. I wonder if this was a straight port from the PC version with not much tweaking? I was expecting a first person shooter deathmatch though - maybe that was on one of the other menu options. FIFA 2006 RTWC is just fucking amazing. As you may have read in my previous posts I have recently got really into playing FIFA 2006 on my (old) Xbox and usually play every day. So when I saw how detailled the graphics, character modelling and environment was... well... I just kept on saying "oh my god! - there is grass! They rendered grass!!". This is definitely my next purchase and have already been investigating the prices on eBay in readiness for my Valentines present. I was totally blown away by this title. The demo is only one half though - Brazil vs France. And the annoying thing is that you have to re-load the whole demo to play again! Grrr! Tossers! I then played Project Gotham 3 - buying a white Skyline as my first car and completing a few races and goals. I also played one online game but got my ass well and truly kicked! I am well gonna have to "up my game" on this title. Definitely one to put some time into. As with the other games, the graphics are so smooth and detailled. Very very good. Something that I have been waiting for since I used to play REVS on my BBC Micro back in the 80s. So, to sum up - the console is everything that I was expecting and a whole load more. I am totally blown away by the graphics and do not regret buying one at all now! No anti-climax! WOW! It must be a first for me. Before I used one I was slightly sceptical about the wireless controller and had a feeling that I would play with the cable attached - but now... no way! Its a really nice controller. The only thing missing was the IR Remote which they have now excluded from the Premium pack. Well. I am not too fussed about that really. Unless the DivX streaming from my PC to the 360 can be sorted properly - the old Xbox will be the media player for now. The fan in the console is quite noisy though and when you are playing from a DVD rather than the hard disk - it's even worse! Then again, it was 1am and the house was deathly quiet. Whats next? Dead Or Alive 3, more FIFA, getting XP Media Center Edition onto my PC and getting back into online gaming. I have also got a disk with the Beta of Final Fantasy 8 to load on (better take a USB keyboard home too as I hear the registration stuff is immense) and a copy of the Xbox360 retailler demo disk with playable levels of King Kong and Call Of Duty 2 on. Oh - and I also have my retail copy of Halo2 to play too. Deathmatch fun - here we come. Here's my gamercard.. come say hello! Technorati Tags: xbox, xbox live, xbox 360, taoski, fifa, fight night, pgr, project gotham, revs, carwars, quake 4, w00t!

Think again...

I had this great idea. I would install Apache and Wordpress locally, following the instructions over here and publish a work intranet blog thing to help us feed out information to the members of our (small) section. I have recently been fiddling with this setup on my machine at home and if you are lucky, you might even find my test Wordpress blog lurking over at http://taoski.blogdns.com - but only if my firewall lets you in, the Apache stuff is running and the kids are not playing Backyardigans games on the web. It works pretty well - especially for testing out Wordpress - which is way, way, way more advanced than Blogger and looks pretty cool. I still intend to migrate to Wordpress and my own domain at some point - but as you can guess from my previous post, cash and my spare time might be a little tight! Anyway. I get the site set up at work and its all working but Apache just keeps on crashing! Crashing when I attempt to upload a file during a post, crashing when I try to post a test comment and crashing when I move the mouse too fast after drinking too much coffee. I'm on the late shift tonight - so I might have time to play with it a little more. Ahhh... the joys of a technical job... Don't you just love it? It used to be all "exciting", "innovative" and "rewarding" but now it's just "boring", "samey" and "mundane". I wish I had used my A-Level art and A-Level Graphics Design for something rather than just creating a pile of quickly deteriorating artwork under my bed or making the odd kiddies party invitation on MS Publisher. A nice design job like DriverChris does would be nice.... 09:50: Turn up to work with expensive "Michael Caine" glasses, expensive sharp suit and expensive coffee in hand. 10:30: Start "design" work after reading The Guardian and sending emails to your "pretend mates" on your Blackberry. 12:00: Off to the Wine Bar for lunch with "Fifi and Charles" from "The agency". 13:30: Back to work to sketch out that idea that came to you as you "piss-chased" some chewing gum round the urinal in the wine bar. 13:40: Get distracted for a while by minimising the windows on your Mac to "the dock" and back again. You forget the idea you had. Time to have a power-nap. 14:30: Play with your Mac a bit more and read some websites about design and Audi cars. 15:00: Team meeting in the office. See who's got the brightest pink shirt and discuss the future of "frameless fixed-width inline CSS templates" for your customer portfolio. 15:50: Return to the desk and fiddle with Illustrator/Photoshop/Quark until the boss goes home. 17:00: Off home on the tube with your iPod, another expensive coffee and copy of Stuff magazine. 18:00: Get home to your lonely flat. Cry in your Findus "sad and lonely microwave meal for one". Go bed early after watching Trinnie and Susannah, getting tipsy on sparking white wine and being all confused over your sexual preferences.... Is the grass greener? Who knows? I won't. I am doomed to be stuck at this desk whilst a telephone headset burns a ridge into my skull, I fix the same faults I resolved 4 years ago and the world passes me by. EDIT: Just found this alternative program for running Apache and MySql locally to run Wordpress: WampServer Technorati Tags: apache, wordpress, xampp, blogger, intranet, work, design, ipod, audi, art

It's not what you know...

During another severe beating at FIFA2006 this lunchtime I also learnt that my XBox360 would be in my sweaty hands tomorrow. A Premium bundle with Project Gotham Racing too. Looks like my online gaming will be taking off again! But as usual, in total Taoski fashion - "Anti-climax... here we come". I was almost on the verge of telling the bloke to not bother getting me one after all - but it's too late now. I will have to seek out a version of Windows XP Media Centre too then I suppose! Technorati Tags: xbox 360, microsoft, xbox, anti climax, project gotham, halo, windows media centre

Infamy!

Sometimes, I do know what i'm talking about. Plus, hello to my two new readers, Wendy and Darren who popped round tonight for drinks and nibbles. We did'nt mention the wife swapping stuff yet... break em' in gently! ps.. i'm joking!

Shrinky Links

Just a collection of random links from my recent surfing... Shrinkydinks? Still going strong! A huge list of albums to download. Some nice wallpapers here e-books (site in russian) PayPal Sucks! - apparently! ZCult FM - a comic scans torrent site!

Nuff said

Dr Wicket will see you now

I was booked for what I thought would be an appointment for a heart echo scan at the local hospital yesterday. I turned up and was ushered into a room to see an ewok sitting at a desk, pretending to be a doctor. I had seen him once before when I was admitted the night I discovered I might have a heart condition and at the time, my wife and I both thought "Ewok!". It turns out that I was in fact turning up for a consultation with the doctor to examine the results of the 24 hour tape monitor I wore and the results of the Echo Scan too. But I had not had the scan yet..... ah! Problem. He called the Cardiology section and checked. Yes, they should have booked me an appointment and I should have had the scan by now - but they fucked up and forgot. There is a 5 month waiting list for the scan - so I can expect to go for this sometime in May and a return visit to see my furry Ewok friend in mid-July. Piss. The results of the tape monitor were good and show no cause for concern - at all, so I should be "encouraged" by this and I am safe to start going to the Gym again. He also told me that I need to be having daily, dirty sex as part of my rehabilitation. So wifey, if you are reading this..... Technorati Tags: heart, cardiology, echo scan, doctor, star wars, ewok, gym

Techno Porn

New Intel iMacs released.... Must resist.... Must be strong.... Hold on.... got no money! Decision made for me! Technorati Tags: apple, imac, intel, steve jobs, got no fucking money

I'm on the move

After "a good hard think" I have decided to make the switch away from Blogger. Not that Blogger is crap or slow or full of spam blogs and is generally seen to be the AOL of the Blogging world or anything. Blogger has served me well over the years but I want more control over my blog, how it looks, functions and is accessible. I am going to buy a domain name, some webspace and host a WordPress blog there. I will also amalgamate this blog, my Photao Photoblog and Music Club blogs into one giant tri-headed beast. Wordpress will also allow me to create sub-blogs for subjects - so I could have a personal blog, a tech blog and a blog about my pet rock, Mr Stone Knee Boy (joke! - honest). I kind of have a picture in my head of how it will all pan out and work - but we shall see. Webspace and a platform like Wordpress will allow me to customise the site to my needs. The Newlinks boys made the switch away from Blogger quite a while ago and are still going strong on their nice Drupal based platform. Drupal is also possibly "in the running" for providing the front end for my new site. This is even more customisable than Wordpress but may be too much for what I need. I have got a website to design for Flights-Physiques.co.uk and wish I had got him to purchase a business hosting service so I could install Drupal or Wordpress. At least then he could update the news section of the site himself! Taoski.co.uk is available as a domain name and I can use Wordpress to import all my Blogger posts and comments - so watch this space suckers! Related links: Wordpress for beginners, Wordpress Themes, Working with Wordpress. Technorati Tags: blogger, wordpress, blog, drupal, newlinks, pet rock, hosting, site, photao, music club