Well, about 14 hours ago WordPress went 2.0!! It is amazing! They have REALLY revamped things. I’ll have to relearn how to do some tasks, but it is genrally very amazing. For example, now I can create new categories from within the post instead of saving, going to the categories page, creating it, and then coming back. (using AJAX - like flickr.com) It allows me to be a LOT more flexible in my tagging and I love that. Also, the preview is not just the text and images anymore, they make it look EXACTLY like your page! It’s really awesome and I’m glad I upgraded. They have continued to create great blogging software that puts all other blogging software to shame!

Wordpress has listed some hosting sites which allow their users to use wordpress for blogging. Why didn’t they show my server? hehe….

WordPress is almost at 100,000 downloads. This is easily attributed to the fact that the program is awesome. I don’t know how I ever truly blogged before using this software. Blogging is ridiculously easy and the plugins add infinite possibilities for expanding the blog’s potential.

Another reason for the increase in downloads has to do with others promoting WordPress. A recent Linux Format Magazine cover DVD came with WordPress source files available on it. It was from the previous release, but as people work with it and find out about the upgrades they are sure to continue to use it. Once again I recommend that anyone with their own server (or access to one) use it for their blogging needs.

First of all, congrats to the WordPress team! In just two weeks they were able to have 50 000 downloads of the blog software this site is running. I HIGHLY recommend them if you have your own server and want to run your own blog.

Second, for those who are used to the format of my old blog where the posts are never ending to the bottom and then you click back to go to the previous posts, this blog software handles things a little differently. You will onlly see on one page (plus clicking back) posts from that month. So, this blog doesn’t only have two posts, it also has a bunch of february posts which can be access by click on “february 2005” under archives.

The upgrade went off without a hitch. The new features are pretty neat, although I’m trying to see how to get back my original template. Overall, the new features are a great improvement over the previous version of the software, but, as usual, there is some getting used to with the new features. Still, the folks at Word Press have really outdone themselves. Definitely check them out if you have the luxury of your own server and want to blog.

Well, they have released a new version of my blogging software. For the first time ever I will be upgrading a blog. In a way, it’s a very good thing because I’ve been putting off learning how to backup my databases for a few weeks and part of the upgrade process is to backup the database files. It will be interesting to see how things change. I know they have built in some stronger spam filters, but I haven’t had any trouble with that, yet. Of course, this is a relatively new blog, so most search engines probably don’t know about it yet. I will probably be upgrading today, so if the blog is inaccessible, I may be in the middle of an upgrade process.

One of the things I love about word press over Tripod’s current mode is that I can make a post belong to several categories. This is extremely useful because on Tripod, for example, I have the categories of “Linux”, “Computers”, and “Technology”. Since the category I pick is sometimes a function of the one I first find, it may not always make be easy to see which is the best option when I’m trying to find a post I previously made. Since I have over 600 posts at Tripod, being able to find a post is a bit of a daunting task. Additionally, by being open source, plugins have been developed and I intend to try a few of them once I get a change. It looks to me that I am now about 90% sure that I will be converting over to Word Press full time once I get my server up again in Sept/Oct of this year. It seems pretty likely that we’ll be going wireless here within the next week.

Today I begin what may be one of the most interesting projects I have yet to take on. This blog is hosted on my server. That means it is completely under my control. I don’t have to pay money for it and I can write whatever I want without any censorship. Additionally, it’s pretty freakin’ exciting to be running my own blog.

That said, I am not 100% sure if I will be completely migrating over to this blog. To begin with, I don’t want to lose my blog over on tripod. I have had so many insights on that blog and I would definitely need to find a way to archive it or transfer it over here somehow. At this point in time I’m not sure how that would work. Also, I don’t really have the time for that. Finally, from the time that my apartment complex demands to have my cable modem so that we can switch to wirelss access (thus effectively killing my server) until at least until I move into my townhouse some time around September, I will only be able to blog through Tripod. Once I get my server set up, however, I intend to permanently have it up.