I think when the domain name renewal comes up, I shall relocate the site to a real host, no longer using Namezero. If the previously mentioned Stephan will allow MBO to be hosted on his domain server then I’ll move it but I don’t think MBO needs anything other than a free host — unless I come up with a novel idea for the site, or sell crochet supplies over the Internet or something.

I read a newspost from Gabe on Penny Arcade the other day complaining that “kids these days” don’t appreciate games the way we “older gamers” do (God, if I was 50 years older this talk would be OK ;). I wonder if this new generation of gamers will feel the same way we “older gamers” feel about our early gaming.

That’s something not very interesting for you to ponder. Essays on my desk Monday, no fewer than 500 words, but no more than 600, I can’t be bothered to read you crap on forever.

I wonder what I should actually do with this site? The only functions that this site performs are being a design and coding exercise for me, and to be a hub for all things Mike, or something. It sounded cooler in my head, probably looks stupid there on the page. But what are you going to do?

Being friends with Stephan can sometimes be a rather precarious and dangerous thing. On Saturday, he, Trav and I piled around half a ton of paper into a rickety old trailer designed to handle three planks of wood on occasion, drove through a few busy city blocks, broke into an old wool mill, and piled the paper into a corner of said wool mill, in the dark. Upon returning the trailer, we ran out of petrol halfway up a goddamn mountain, again, in the dark. On the way down the aforementioned mountain, we blew up a fanbelt. I hear you saying, “You don’t blow up a fanbelt, they just fall off.” Well, with Stephan, things don’t fall off, they explode at the most inopportune times (ask me about the water pump on the way to the cinemas another time). So anyway we drove 50km home with no fanbelt — the pantyhose we used as a makeshift fanbelt lasted three seconds, it also exploded; well, it probably exploded.

Oh, I’ve been rambling, excuse me.

Justine has the next few days from work off, as she is rather sick at the moment. I won’t go into details because it’s really none of your damn business, but I’ll be spending those few days with her, uhh, looking after her. Yes, that’s it. Anyway, the site probably won’t be updated for a while because I’m using Justine’s sickness as an excuse for me to be lazy. Deal with it!

As you can see, I’ve finished the news section, and the archive section is done (well, 99% done ;). I could probably implement the photos section in an hour or so but won’t bother because as stated earlier, it’s not how I want it to be.

So no photos for you!

The members section is way off yet, I want it to function in a very specific manner and it might take a while to implement that, hopefully sooner rather than later. I could, of course, download a ready-made solution, but where’s the fun in that? Besides, you often need full access to the server to implement those solutions, something I don’t have.

On another note, I finished Jedi Knight 2: Jedi Outcast last night. The trip was better than the destination that’s for sure. I must say that it was extremely satisfying to carve up large numbers of Imperial scum armed with only my lightsaber and force power. Oh, I had guns and stuff but what fun are they? Especially when you can turn an enemies’ rocket around and aim it right back at him. ;D

Update:
Well, it’s not really an update, but I recently came across a US Government site, Section 508. This site details good practices in making US Government websites accessible to all users, unfortunately, this site has a nice little message at the bottom, “Best viewed with Internet Explorer 5+”.

Umm, aren’t they supposed to be encouraging accessibility? Just proves how bright some sparks are, eh?

Are websites second class to all other types of media?

On Sunday (last night), Justine and I went to see The Royal Tenenbaums using some free cinema tickets we’d been give a few months earlier. Checking this particular cinema’s website confirmed the film was playing at 9:45PM, and was not on the “No Free Tickets” list (confirmed by not having a NFT image beside it).

Well, you can guess what happened next, I’m sure. The girl behind the desk refused us admission to the film as it was indeed on the “No Free Tickets” list. So we decided, to avoid the night being a disaster of monstrous proportions, to see Gosford Park (which, by the way was quite good, probably better than the film we had initially gone to see).

So, I wonder, why do companies insist on putting wrong, outdated and inaccurate information on their website? I’m at least glad that this particular cinema’s website was up-to-date enough to show the right time, although still rather inaccurate. This is the same damn cinema that announced online bookings would be up-and-running over a year ago. Of course, they removed automated ticketing machines six months after they were installed, and I’m surprised when the credit card booking facilities actually work on a weekend.

*sigh*

Just another example that technology does not always make life easier. ;(

OK, the easy stuff’s done. Now all that remains is (a lot):

• News system.
  I have one prepared but want to add an archiving system, too. At the moment I’m adding news items the old-fashioned way (i.e. by hand, oh the horror), and will add an easy way to do it when I add in the:
• Member Area.
  Basically this will let you add news items, links and maybe quotes, and may allow you to modify the look of MBO (the information will be stored in the database, and set in a cookie upon login).
• Photos
  Again, I have one prepared but want to add a feature whereby having images in different directories makes different “galleries”.
• Actual content.
  This is taking a back seat to the design at the moment.

I have completed the layout — or what I think will be the final layout for the new site, as always it’s subject to change at my whim — and started implementing the random quote generator. I scoured the web for a while for some suitable quotes but haven’t added too many yet. Functionality first, then content, then