My apologies – when I first implemented the new cookies feature, I had not set up the expiration dates properly, so your cookies were probably lost when you closed your browsers. This would have made it look like there were 440+ new entries every time you visited the site. I have fixed the problem, and now your cookie should be stored properly even after you quit your browser. Phew.

To those reading this via RSS feed, this will have no impact on you. Only people visiting the site directly in a web browser will see this.

Also to you folks reading this via RSS feed, you might also be interested in subscribing to the RSS feed for blog comments. Stay up to date on not just new entries to our blog, but also any new comments on our blog entries!

I am currently toying with some new features on our website. We are now sending and requesting a client-side cookie. This is a little bit of information that is stored on your computer, and it allows us to remember who you are. In our case, we’re using it to display a greeting message on the blog, and to keep track of the most recent blog entry you have read. On each subsequent visit to our site, you will see a notice informing you of whether or not there are any new blog entries since your last visit, and if so, how many there are.

Since this is brand-new, you are initially going to see that there have been, well, a plethora of new blog entries. Next time you visit, though, everything will be set up, and you’ll see the proper information.

You may have heard bad things about some cookies, especially those that keep track of your information for advertising purposes. I can assure you that the cookies we serve here at World Wide Wood are quite safe, and I hope that you will find them delicious! So if your browser is set to block cookies, be sure to enable cookies from the prwdot.org domain. If you have cookies turned off entirely, then there’s not much I can do for you. In that case, you will see the same first-time greeting message every time you come to our site. Sorry!

In the future, this feature could be expanded to keep track of other things, like your name, or maybe even your choice of color schemes!

For the technologically inclined, I did this using PHP’s setcookie() function, the $_COOKIE array, and some SQL queries directly to the Movable Type mt_entries table in MySQL.

On an unrelated note, I have made a few tweaks to our site’s left hand navigation bar – hopefully more people will see and take advantage of our RSS feeds. These can be used in news readers like Bloglines to keep track of our recent posts. Just another way we make it easier to get all the World Wide Wood goodness you need.

Let me know if you have any questions or comments about this new feature!

If you’re curious about what websites and blogs I watch on a day-to-day basis, you can now check out my ***blogroll|http://prwdot.org/?p=peter_blogroll***. This is powered by ***Bloglines|http://www.bloglines.com/*** and reflects an up-to-date list of the sites I monitor through the Bloglines web-based aggregator and Notifier service.

Well, I think we’ll stick with font size “three” for now, which is 12 pixels. Four is borderline for comfortable viewing, but three is just about right. And it’s what we’re already using anyway. Heh. Oh well.

I did change the font sizes in the title of each heading, as well as the spacing between blog entries. Did anyone notice?

It’s that time again… which of these font sizes is the smallest one you are comfortable reading?

This is font size one. This is font size one. This is font size one. This is font size one. This is font size one.
This is font size two. This is font size two. This is font size two. This is font size two. This is font size two.
This is font size three. This is font size three. This is font size three. This is font size three. This is font size three.
This is font size four. This is font size four. This is font size four. This is font size four. This is font size four.
This is font size five. This is font size five. This is font size five. This is font size five. This is font size five.
This is font size six. This is font size six. This is font size six. This is font size six. This is font size six.
This is font size seven. This is font size seven. This is font size seven. This is font size seven. This is font size seven.

Check out the left side of our page – you should see a new “Email Us!” link. It’s at the very bottom of every page, too. Feel free to use that whenever you want to send either of us (or both of us) email. It should make the task easier and more fun, as you won’t have to bring up your email client or log in to webmail to send it!

Enjoy!

Today, ***Six Apart|http://www.sixapart.com/*** has announced a new pricing and licensing scheme for MovableType. You can read the pricing information page ***here|http://secure.sixapart.com/***. Basically, what it boils down to is that if your MovableType installation has more than a one user and/or more than three blogs, you’ll need to pay to use it.

SixApart provides this ***interactive selector|http://secure.sixapart.com/licensehelp.html*** to help you figure out what your pricing scenario would be, based on your usage of MovableType. Currently, prwdot.org has four active blog users and three active blogs. According to the selector page, I would need to purchase Movable Type 3.0 Personal Edition Volume License I, for US$119.95 in order to cover our usage.

In the words of The Simpsons’ Moe Szyslak, ‘B-whaaaaaaaa??’

What does the paid version get you?

* Download for Movable Type 3.0 Developer Edition and Movable Type 2.661
* Professional support fron Six Apart
* Ability to promote your site on the Movable Type “Recently Updated” list
* Generous limits on weblogs and authors
* Application updates and fixes (not including major upgrades)
* A guaranteed path to future versions
* Access to fee-based services such as installation, advanced support, other services

The only thing I see of real “value” here is the professional support, which I’ve never needed in the past. Do they plan on making the product more difficult to use? In any case, I can see their plan having some success with people who are actually generating revenue from their MovableType installations, or who are taking donations to run their site… but what of the droves of people, like me, who run a moderate-sized installation with no additional funding source other than their own paychecks.

It reeks.

As many former MovableType users have, I’m already checking out ***WordPress|http://www.wordpress.org/***. I know ***Mike|http://www.refugeisland.net/*** loves it, as do others. So it’s certainly a worthy candidate. I’m also open to any other suggestions.

Welcome back to ***Scrabble This!|http://scrabble.prwdot.org/***

Sixteen (16) people responded to our survey before the cut-off date. Here is a summary of the data we received:

Demographics

• 69% of respondents were female
• 14 of the respondents were in their 20’s
• One respondent was in their 40’s
• One respondent was 70 years of age or older

Computer Usage

• 63% of respondents said they mainly used Windows to browse our site
• Only one out of the 10 Windows users did not use Internet Explorer
• Only two of the six people who did not usually use Windows used Internet Explorer
• Most of the respondents check their email via the web

Familiarity

• 38% of respondents do not know either Becky or me very well
• From the 62% of respondents who do know at least one of us, one knew both of us equally well, four knew Becky better, and five knew me better
• Three respondents said their interests were more similar to Becky’s
• Four respondents said their interests were more similar to mine
• Six respondents said their interests were similar to a little bit of both of ours
• Two respondents said their interests were not similar to either of ours

Site Viewing Habits and Feedback

• Most respondents visit our site a few times per week
• 86% of respondents liked or loved our recent website redesign from Huemor, one person disliked it, and the rest were either indifferent or undecided
• 44% of respondents would like to see a change in the colors on our site
• 25% of respondents would like to see a change in the page layout on our site
• 19% of respondents would like to see a change in the graphics and images on our site
• One respondent wanted to see a change in the fonts on our site

Site Content Preferences

• 8 of 16 respondents wanted to see more photography
• 6 of 16 respondents wanted to see more daily life anecdotes
• 6 of 16 respondents wanted to see more reviews
• 5 of 16 respondents wanted to see more crafty stuff
• 5 of 16 respondents wanted to see more recipes
• 5 of 16 respondents wanted to see more personal opinions
• 4 of 16 respondents wanted to see more religious discussion
• 4 of 16 respondents wanted to see more humor
• 3 of 16 respondents wanted to see more geeky stuff
• 3 of 16 respondents wanted to see more family stuff
• Only one respondent wanted to see more political stuff

Lima Beans

• 5 respondents said that they like lima beans
• 4 respondents said that they do not like lima beans
• 4 respondents said that their like or dislike of lima beans “depends” on other factors
• 2 respondents indicated that they “though this was about our website!”
• One respondent told us to “leave the beans out of this.”

Observations

• Our typical site viewer is a 20-something female, using Internet Explorer
• I rarely test my coding changes on the browser most people use, and yet I rarely get complaints about our site not working in that browser. I must be doing something right
• We update our site slightly more frequently than most people visit, so most people are probably reading a chunk of new posts with each visit.
• People older than their 20’s, for the most part, didn’t respond to our survey. I can think of at least eight people who regularly visit our site, are 30 or older, and did not complete a survey. I have two theories which may explain this. First, as you mature, you have a growing social life, family, and career. This leaves you with little time to browse the web, and even less time to fill out a survey. Second, many of the age 30+ people I can think of may feel that Becky and I know them well enough that their response to the survey is unnecessary.
• Photography was the most requested content in the survey – 50% of respondents want to see more on our site. However, we already have a great photo gallery, with over 3,500 photos. Isn’t that enough? If you wanted to see more photography, in what sense do you mean?
• For the 44% of our viewers who wanted to see a change in the colors on our site, what specifically would you like to see change?
• For the folks whose interests are not similar to mine or Becky’s… how did you end up at our site, and responding to our survey?

If you have any responses to questions I’ve raised, or any other comments on our survey results, please leave them in the comments section of this post by clicking on the ‘comments’ link below.

Thanks to everyone who participated!