Happiness online: We can dream, right?

[matgb]

Several things online have made me happy today, most of them related to the previously mentioned DreamWidth project.

Firstly, when designing the site navigation structure, they used a card sorting usability test to get it right, and came up with this navigation scheme, based around a design by grrliz. I've used my LJ OpenID to login at the site, and while it's superficially similar to Horizon, it just makes sense. I was stoked about this project just fromt he basic ideas behind it, that they're actually following usability and accessibility guidelines? Yowsers. I uploaded a userpic. I was asked to provide "a description for visually impaired users". Userpics will get proper ALT text. If that means anything to you you know this is cool.

Secondly, they've got what appears to be a top notch comment importer:

we will import all of your content from LJ: entries, comments, tags, userpics, interests, profile bio, you name it.

Other people's comments will be imported as OpenID comments, so that if (for instance) I've commented on http://esmeraldus-neo.livejournal.com/ with my [info]synecdochic LJ account, and you import that into (for instance) esmeraldus-neo.dreamwidth.org, the comment will appear as coming from the OpenID identity synecdochic.livejournal.com. (That way people can still control their own comments.) We'll even have a way for people to tie their OpenID accounts to their Dreamwidth accounts, so I can say "hey, synecdochic.livejournal.com and synecdochic.dreamwidth.org are the same person; replace all comments from synecdochic.livejournal.com with links to my Dreamwidth account instead."

Such a simple, simple thing to do, but apparently beyond the ken of most other import tools I've encountered.

On the subject of importing or backing up, remember when I promised I'd write a backing up how to? Well, I never did. Don't really need to now, Wordpress.com (my preferred online backup option) has upgraded their importer and launched Even Easier LiveJournal Migration. Seriously, you create an account, go to 'import', and follow the easy instructions. Mine is here if you want to bookmark it somewhere in case of LJ dying unexpectedly, I'll be turning off the search presence over there, don't want it to look like a mirror. Thanks for the heads up foxfirefey. SRSLY people, you can mark the whole thing as private "your eyes only", just make sure you've got a copy of your journal, just in case?

Lastly, a completely non geeky post. I post a lot of anti-religion stuff when I'm in a ranty mood. I know that not all religious types are crazy bigotted loons, but idiots like Christian Voice tend to spoil it for the sane majority. Today, I got another reminder, several people linked to:

The Life and Opinions of Andrew Rilstone: An Immodest Proposal

Go read it. Really.

Anyway, my importer has finally finished, so time to shut down the PC. G'night all

Comments

[melsykes.livejournal.com]

No, you're quite right, most religious types are crazy bigotted loons! :)

[rho]

I am massively excited about Dreamwidth. There's a whole lot about it that's going to be really freaking awesome.

[matgb]

'Fey tells me D wants someone to set up a separate server running the codebase to test the code in different circumstances too.

Which means my idea of running our own install is something they actually want, which is nice. Now all I gotta do is get finance; I'll wait until they're on open beta though.

[andrewducker]

I'm really looking forward to Dreamwidth - so long as I can find a way to post to both it and LJ simultaneously.

[matgb]

I suspect there'll be a client or a cross poster. The Wordpress crossposter is good, it puts links back to your main post, personally I'd prefer to have the conversation in one place, which should be doable, even for polls, eventually.

One of the reasons I'm happy is that 'fey is heavily involved, and it was her I was working on for lj2wordpress, which was I think always a bit too much of a pipedream. Her list of wants is pretty close to being implemented, and it's a distributed model designed for multiple nodes, which is even better.

[mooism.livejournal.com]

What the alt text for my userpics should be:

• "avatar" or "user picture" --- when viewing someone's userpic page
  
• "[mooism]" --- in normal use, when my username is not already nearby
  
• "" --- in normal use, when my username *is* already nearby
  

The important thing about your userpic is not that it features some 19th century guy with a hat, a moustache, and a bomb. The important thing is that it represents you. So when people can't see your userpic, the important thing is not to describe your userpic, the important thing is to provide something else that represents you.

I'm arguing about the colour of the bike shed, sorry.

[matgb]

Ah, but I have over 100 pics, many of which don't represent me, they're both fandom related in some way and represent a mood or added content.

My keywords would normally make good alt text, but that's not always the case, and this makes people think a bit more. I'd have your alt text as "photo of mooism" so that it's clear.

[raggedhalo.livejournal.com]

Thanks for highlighting this -- am about to commence the export!

[matgb]

I found it froze a few times, but if it had definitely stopped (by looking at the journal page on WP), I just hit refresh on the import page, and it got everything.

It didn't finish until after I'd hit post and got these comments though, so there are a bunch of comments on my queue that are assigned to teh wrong post, not that that really matters. It's nice to know I now have a backup of my whole journal on three different servers in an industry standard format though, just in case.