A month ago, WordPress released version 2.5. It is a radical change from the versions that proceeded it. It has been rewritten to be more powerful, robust, and attractive. Before I upgraded, I wondered how it could get any better, and why such an overhaul was even necessary. Boy, was I shortsighted. The new version is fantastic, and much easier to use.

I don’t understand why it is labeled version 2.5, when it should have been called 3.0. It is a major shift from the interface it once had. At any rate, 2.5.1 is now available. If you use WordPress and haven’t stepped up to version 2.5, now is the time. You won’t regret it. Of course, before upgrading, make sure your theme and plugins are compatible with the new version. So far, I haven’t had any trouble with my existing configuration on compatibly or performance issues. WordPress continues to be a fantastic product and keeps raising the blogging bar.

This weekend, I deployed a new site theme. I don’t make a habit of writing a blog post about such changes, but my new theme, Elite, is a drastic change. I think this theme is the prettiest I have ever used. It is modern, dark, and easy to read. All photos are automatically aligned to the left, for better or worse. Photos with a white background may not blend as well as I’d like on the dark canvass, but I’ll overlook that potential problem. Also, the theme fails the W3C Markup Validation check, but for minor reasons. The main drawback to this theme is that, oddly, there is no header on the page that shows the name of my site. For that reason, I am writing this post to assure you that you are still at blitzcraig.org! Enjoy the new look.

When I am away from my desktop computer, I log on to Meebo to see who’s online. Tonight, I found a new widget in the offering that you place on your own site that allows visitors to chat with you through your own page. It is a project from the folks at Meebo, dubbed MeeboMe. It appears to be in the the alpha phase of development, but my tests worked without a hitch. And creating it was as easy as three very simple steps.

I have added my new creation to my Contact page. It shows my online status in the window. If I am not logged in, you can still leave offline messages and I’ll receive them the next time I log into Meebo. I think this is really cool. For now, I’ll certainly keep it on my page.

Well 2007 is nearly at its end and we will soon usher in 2008. Thanks to everyone who stops by and reads my blog. The brief backstory is that my blog formed its first roots on December 2, 2005. Therefore, it has now been two years since its inception. I still am enjoying posting to this thing and maintaining it. Thanks to WordPress for consistently releasing new and greater versions of their blogging software. It is indeed a pleasure to use. So turn up your glasses. Happy two years to me and whoever is reading this! Ha!

Today I have merged the Mac and PC cats into a single Computing category. I hope this reduces some clutter and redundancy.

I have added a new static page to my site, called Site. This new page will have site news and information about when my blog got started and general tidbits about the site as a whole. I made it a separate page after deciding to remake my About page as a bio page strictly for information about the author (me). In the past, I have made many posts on my decisions to change the visual theme for my blog. In the future, I won’t be making a new blog post for information such as that. You’ll find that info and more on the static Site page.

I’d be hard pressed to come up with a list of complaints about the awesome WordPress software that powers this blog. It is outstanding in every way and I recommend it to everyone. That said, I do have one complaint that has been silently brewing in me for some time.

I cannot stand it how often the built-in editor constantly screws up my paragraphs when I actually edit the text in a post. When I am typing and delete using my Delete key at the end of a sentence to remove extra text, my paragraph break is then missing in the saved version of the post. Likewise for editing the text of an existing post when I add or remove text at the end of a paragraph. Everything looks okay in my editing window, but after a save, my paragraph breaks are turned into line breaks. I can’t tell for sure, but some of this pay be due to the way I like to use the [Delete] key over the [Backspace] a lot of the time.

This may not affect everyone, but the issue drives me nuts. I just scrolled through some old posts and found two instances of this that I didn’t realize were there. I fixed them. Apparently, the automatic HTML coding in the program’s editor window needs some tweaking. Of course, I could in theory use my email program to post through an email account (which I do not do), or type my post in another program (like Word or Notepad) and cut/paste it into the blog. I have tried second method and the result isn’t always good. Besides, I’d still need to use the built-in WP editor to edit the posts that are already published.

The good news is that WordPress just released version 2.1 the other day. It boasts a new and improved text editor, so I have read. I have not tried this to see if my problem is resolved. For the moment, I’m going to stick with version 2.07 because I know as soon as I go through the hassle of upgrading, they’ll suddenly release 2.11 the next day. I’ll wait for that. I am not complaining in any way about the regular updates and releases they have for WordPress. This is a great thing. The best keeps getting better.

I added a new page to the site, titled Links. I am going to post a short list of websites that I visit almost daily. Not necessarily the best sites on the web, but the ones I frequent the most often. Over time, I’m sure I’ll update the list every now and then. Originally, I thought I’d try to find a way to make an automated list that would pull all of the links contained throughout all of my various blog posts. I don’t know if this could ever be achieved. For now, this is not going to be the case.

I thought I’d give a voluntary shout out to my web host, 1and1. I was sucked in by their multi-page ads that used to appear in PC Magazine and soon signed up. Their prices are outstanding, as is their service. If you want to start a website, or simply register a domain for email, I would recommend that you try 1and1. I have been a very satisfied customer for 2 and a half years now.

As you can see, I have drastically changed my site theme. This is new theme called Bluemoon. I have spent the morning customizing it to my liking. I really had to put in some work on the CSS file to display the margins and fonts the way that you see now. I really like the way it looks now.

I also added some new things to the sidebar on the right, such as the Calendar, Blogroll, and RSS feed link. The highlighted calendar days reveal days with blog posts.

After today, I am not going to post anymore about theme changes. I’ll toss that on the “About” page next time. But I do not expect a next time, since this theme is a definite keeper. Enjoy!