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Cha-Cha-Cha-Changes

Well if the new design wasn’t a dead give away, Up the Tree has been upgraded to a new piece of blogging software. Although the move seems to have gone successfully, I am sure there may be a few hiccups – so if you see anything out of the ordinary please give me a holler.

My new weblogging software, “WordPress,”:http://wordpress.org/ while superior in many ways to my old blogging software, “MovableType,”:http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/ has one major downfall… every page that WordPress creates is dynamically created and must be a PHP file. This seemingly harmless caveat means that all my old static pages must be renamed or reorganized. This doesn’t bother me particularly, because I can always keep all my old weblog files in the background, but more I am worried about my RSS feeds which had been simply named *index.xml.*

*The .xml thing doesn’t work with WordPress.*

The only fix I can find right now is to create a redirect for my index.xml file which would load my new RSS feed location. The only problem with this approach is that the browser address actually changes with a redirect which I would assume might create a problem with some RSS readers. Does anybody have a better solution? One that would be completely transparent?

_Thanks for listening to my techno-jumble, I promise not to be as dorky in future._

9 replies on “Cha-Cha-Cha-Changes”

I love that you know all this techno-crap. It gives me a headache but it makes for the best blog/website/podcast ever!. You rock Benny…and I just wanted to be the first "comment" on the new look. I really am diggin' the new design, you crazy little designer you! Much love!

Thanks Jos. I am looking forward to a new podcast with my main man soon. Although it may be fun to kick-it with pals, you're still my co-host!

Yay! WordPress!!! Looks nice…

I didn't have a problem with the .xml thing but had the opposite problem – I had created a PHP feed via DirCaster, got listeners and then wanted to use a blog os I could create a site for Radio Clash…uhoh…so meant I had to use WordPress because of the php thing. Very happy with it tho.

I think the whole redirect thing needs to be worked out, not just for RSS feeds but also the mp3s (enclosures)…because of bandwidth issues I don't know who downloads my shows as I have them on a seperate server with no logs. I wish I could just redirect the podcasting client to download from another server if needed….sigh.

How's LibSyn? I've wondered whether to sign up with a service like that or use Feedburner so I can get better stats on how many ppl listen to Radio Clash. Currently I have no idea…could be 10 (well actually I know it's at least 80 from clicking off websites and the blog) or 1000…?

Yeah Tim, the issue is when technology updates, you really don't want to have your listenership have to update all their RSS links every time you move from one system to the next. While I don't think I'm going to be moving anytime soon from WordPress I would rather just keep my old *index.xml* up and running and not have to labor my audience with updating their feeds.

So far the .htaccess redirect seems to work fine and I may put out a test post over the weekend to check if all the iPodders pick up the file.

To answer your question LibSyn is fantastic service and while very much in it's infancy, has a shit-load of promise. Their stats are ugly, but very accurate. They not only tell you how many downloads you have, but also how many Ipodders are connected. Last month I has 160Gb of downloads… thats about 8,000 shows, but I had no idea how many subscribers I had… now I do and it doesn't look like I have as many as I expected… those are the brakes I guess.

I would check out their sample _sandbox_ user at "LibSyn" :http://www.libsyn.com/ and check out how their stats work.

Oh, and thanks "Mikey":http:loft405.com for the e-mail about helping me out. Unfortunately it's a problem that doesn't have a quick fix.

Yeah I'm a big believer of 'why mess friend/users/audience around for sake of technology'…it's why I had my own domains back in 1999 for email when everyone was goin MSN/AOL; so I didn't have to keep changing them…

it's why I went phpBB and my own server for mutantpop when everyone said it was a stupid idea to do all that work when you can easily go for proboards.com (interestingly after several Mashup boards got pulled almost all but 2 boards are now phpBB – who was the silly one? ;-)

And it's why I went WordPress instead of Blogger…I have an almost psychopathic hatred of putting my work/sites/words/music in the hands of someone else, on their system…it's why I'm also wary of 'we'll make it easier' tools like LibSyn and Feedburner…that said the stats would be cool, but I again I don't want to shift everyone onto another URL – feedburner etc.

Also as a new WP user, I have to give you a bit of info.

Install WP HashCash http://elliottback.com/wp/archives/2004/11/29/spa… as soon as possible.

Tell everyone you know who has WP sites with open/non moderated comments to do same or have some comment spam protection in place.

Because I went through hell trying to stop a spambot, and it's best to stop it before it happens, then the spammers might go spam someone else…rather like keep coming back. I think it's like getting any parasites, once they find a way in they keep coing back.

Spam Karma works well too if they get through http://unknowngenius.com/blog/wordpress/spam-karm… but interestingly, they haven't! I run both just in case.

Thanks Tim, I have installed and activated the plug-in. Hopefully now my little site will be free from ads about medications and penis enlargement. Thanks for the heads-up, you rock le casbah.

Ben! The new site layout is spectacular. I've gone and stolen your PodcastAlley code again, hope you don't mind. Loved hearing that Freddie Robinson in the background on your recent podcast.

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