Author Archives: Richard

Looking to the future

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For the last week or so I have been messing around with a couple of pre-release operating systems.

The first one I tried out was Linux Mint 12.  As I am a fan of, and use Linux Mint, I like to know what’s coming down the road.

The most significant change that I can see is the new Gnome desktop. 

Gnome

For some reason they have shifted the main menu bar to the top of the screen, and I haven’t found any way (yet) to change its location.  Anyone who has driven a car will know that such items as the steering wheel, brake and accelerator pedals are in much the same position no matter what make of car.  Computer interfaces should follow the same pattern, and finding the menu bar is to me like finding the steering wheel on the passenger side of the car.

However, Mint 12 does offer an alternative interface they call MATE.  I booted into that.

mate

This at least has the menu in its old familiar place, but is a bog standard Gnome menu.  I like the Mint menu system that they currently use and can only hope that it will be imported into Mint 12.

The next system I tried out was Windows 8.

To an old fogey who has been used to everything from Windows 3.1 onwards, this is a massive departure from normality.  The first thing that greets you is a desktop and clock.

Win8-1

Notice that there is no Start button, or anything resembling a menu?  They are gone.  To get to the next stage you have to scroll with the mouse wheel.  That brings you to a login screen where you do the usual validation.  If you are expecting a normal screen to appear then, forget it.  What you get is a horizontally scrolling screen filled with “Apps”. ( I have a personal hatred of that word App, and seeing it plastered everywhere offends my senses!)

Win8-2

Clicking on any one of the tiles will launch that programme.  If you do want to get to the standard desktop you have to either click on its tile or hit the Windows key.

One thing that has virtually disappeared is the Title Bar.  Run any programme from its tile and the Title Bar is absent.  The problem then is that there is no Minimise, Resize or Close buttons.  I have yet to find a means of shutting down a programme that is supplied with the OS.

Shutting down Windows 8 is another nightmare.  The only way I can find is to go to the tile screen and to click on the User name.  This gives you the option to log out or switch user.  Choosing log out will eventually bring you back to the original login screen and here is where you find the close down button.

I don’t know how close this version is to the final release but as it stands I hate it.  It is full of bells and whistles that look flashy but lack any kind of function or intuitive use.  Extra steps have been introduced for no reason that I can see,.that just make a simple task more complicated.

It looks like I will be staying with Mint 11 for the foreseeable future.

Skype Send Files causes program crash

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A while ago, I was using Skype (beta 2.2.0.35, 64 bit, running on Linux Mint) and tried to send a file to the other person.  The act of clicking Send File however caused the entire Skype program to crash.

I did a bit of hunting but didn’t find any resolution to the problem. I did find rumours that the problem may lie in a bug in Ubuntu (upon which Mint is based). However I did find a way of preventing the crash.  It is probably the simplest fix I have ever found.

I simply changed the Style.

As I said – the simplest fix ever.

 

A fresh start with a new domain

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Seeing as Google has virtually washed its hands about the lack of searches, I thought it was time to do something drastic.

Originally this site was called “The Other Fellow”, and some time later I changed its name to “A Pipe and a Keyboard”.  I don’t know why I chose that name but it’s sort of stuck now.  The original domain was therefore a bit confusing.  To find “A Pipe and a Keyboard”, you had to enter theotherfellow.com.  Not good.  I therefore registered apipeandakeyboard.com and created a new site on the new domain containing the old posts and comments.  So far so good.

My intention was that when the new site was up and running that I would point the old theotherfellow.com at the new site, and delete the old site and its database.  Once people had gotten used to it, I would let the domain lapse and all vestiges of The Other Fellow would vanish.

Unfortunately my plans didn’t quite work out.  For some reason, the old domain has refused to point.  The new site is working perfectly with just a couple of very minor irritations that I can fix over time.

So if you are one of the tiny elete who have this site bookmarked, I would ask if you could change the domain name please.

Hopefully I will sort out the old domain shortly.

Google Blacklist

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There is a strange problem with this site at the moment.

As regular readers (Hah! Are there any?) will know, I don’t post here very often and when I do, it is mostly technical stuff.  Dull, boring but hopefully useful for people who have had the same technical problems I have managed to fix.

Because of its nature, virtually all traffic to the site is from search engines, with Google representing about 99% of all searches.  The traffic levels aren’t exactly setting the world on fire, but there is a steady constant stream of visitors.

That all changed on the 25th last month.  For no apparent reason, all traffic ceased.  I did some quick checks, and sure enough, the site itself was fine, but there wasn’t a single referral from Google.  I tried a few terms that people had used, and this site didn’t appear anywhere in the search results, where normally they would have been very near the top of the results.

I checked a couple of blacklist sites (http://vebtools.com/google-banned-checker/ and http://onlinealley.com/seotools/googlebannedchecker/) and sure enough, both reported that the site was blacklisted.

My next port of call was http://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/ where I did a thorough check of the site.  However Google themselves were saying that not only was the site not blacklisted but that there were no problems with it.

I tried searching for the site using terms that I knew should rank highly (“the other fellow”, “pipe and a keyboard”) but the ranking was appalling.  When I did enter the site via Google, it was quite happy about it – no warnings about a potential treat or anything.

A couple of days ago, the situation righted itself.  Suddenly traffic started flowing again and 99% of it was from Google.  24 hours later, it stopped again.

googlegraph

The graph above is taken from Google’s Webmaster area showing traffic that Google sends to the site. 

I am stumped!

Moving a WordPress site to a new server

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Moving an ordinary website from one server to another is generally no problem.  The method is to copy across the files, and then to redirect the domain to point to the new server.  Sit back and wait, and shortly the new site will go live and the old can be deleted.

Moving WordPress is a little more complex.

The problem with WordPress is that it is heavily integrated, not just with its database and domain name but also with the actual structure of the server.  Recently I decided for various reasons to move this site and this is more or less the sequence of events.  Note that I could have made the job slightly easier by taking some shortcuts, but when working with a live site, it is better to be cautious and take things one step at a time.

Firstly I set up the new webspace and pointed a spare domain at it.  Once it was running, I set up a new database.  I then installed WordPress and made sure all was running smoothly.  At this point I had a full WordPress installation running that had no connection at all with the site I was moving.  Now was the time to start integrating.

The first thing I did was to download all the files from the old site.  I then uploaded all files – EXCEPT wp-config.php to the new server.  If I had copied wp-config.php, the new site would just point to the old database, which contains the live domain so any testing would just redirect to the old site.  At this stage I could test the appearance and plugins.  At this stage, the new site should be almost identical to the old site, but won’t contain any posts, comments and so on.

I then made a dump of the database from the old site, but did it in two chunks – All the tables EXCEPT _options, and _options on its own.  The former, I inserted into the new database and tested to make sure all the posts were correct.  The latter file has to be manually edited.as it contains absolute path references.

For example, one field in the old file contained the following –

“/usr/local/pex/vhosts/115120/webspace/httpdocs/pipenkeyboard/wp-content/”

That refers to the location relative to the root of the server and is going to be different on any other server.  All that is required is a simple find and replace to update the information from the new server.  If you are not sure, just check the _options record on the new installation, and you will find it there.

Once the file is edited, save and upload to the new database.

Now comes the nerve wracking bit.

First I pointed the live domain to the new site using my control panel.  If the IP address of the new server is different (more than likely it will be) then the live domain details need to be changed on the DNS server.  Once that is done, just sit back and wait.

During my waiting period, I repeatedly checked the live domain.  At one stage, it broke, giving pure text on the screen with no formatting or graphics.  That only lasted a few minutes however, as all the parts became synchronised.

So you are now reading this on the new server.  Hopefully you won’t notice any difference whatsoever.

If you do see any differences, then break it to me gently!