You know, if there’s one thing I’ve learned since moving to Utah, it’s that my life in Iowa was boring. I didn’t realize it at the time, but geez.

Wait, did I even mention that? My my, it has been a while. Since my last post and this website renovation I have moved to Utah to attend Brigham Young University in Provo.

Why did I not notice that, suddenly, my life is full of substance? I’m actually doing things. There are things I can actually write about! (Which explains why the ‘old’ blog posts from Iowa only count to… three.) I still don’t know why you would care, but regardless, this may help me with my grade in ENGL 150.

My blog is back with a new design. Sleek black adorns the header and interactive rollovers hopefully compel you to click around. Colors behind add contrast to the content which is now displayed black-on-light-grey which is much more appealing to the eyes than the old white-on-black theme. Some found it hard to see features on the old design, already squinting to read the text.

The Old Header (raised brightness and contrast)

For example, with the old design, did you know there was a “floor” between my small name at the top and the navigational tabs?

Did you know the background faded from black to dark, steel blue? Did you know the content had a shadow around it, and that the links on the sides were actually divided by small grey lines?

This new format features an elegant name in the header, featured pages which glow “onMouseOver,” and drop-down menus which aid in placing the growing amount of useful content. The nice thing is that it (should) display properly on all major browsers: IE7, Firefox 2.1+, Safari, Opera, and Google Chrome. To keep things pertinent, you can see what time it currently is where I live on the top-right.

The Old Navigation (shown with higher contrast and brightness) - difficult to see

To add something interesting, I’ll probably be changing up the background “flares” of the site once in a while… and did you notice the dancing man on the right side “black box”?

Maybe I should address the name change, or rather, new name… period. This blog is now powered by the latest WordPress version, and, with that, a new domain. “Blog von mir” means “blog of me” auf Deutsch and is accessible through http://blog.mwholt.com or http://www.blogvonmir.com. Both will take you to the former, which is here.

I recently wrapped up a project with a client who needed a simple product gallery website. Once finished, the site was moved to the permanent server, and my client proceeded to add products to the database.

It’s always a little bit unnerving to realize that people may spend hours depending on a script you write - even one you may be very accustomed to - and relying on its stability.

When he called me, a bit flustered, asking why during the past three hours, none of the products he meticulously added to the database was showing up on the site, a solution came to my mind, albeit with a slight delay. Now, granted, this type of question is never good to hear, especially regarding a script you wrote entirely by hand yourself: “Is there any way you can get them back?” My heart skipped a few beats immediately thereafter.

I knew he used Internet Explorer, which often has crazy cache issues. (Firefox does too, which I wish they’d fix.) I told him how to clear his cache, and while doing so, loaded his site on my own machine here. Much to my relief, his products appeared. IE had stored an old version of the product pages in order to decrease loading times… discovering that spells R-E-L-I-E-F.

The morning broke, and it was time to open windows in the barn. I took my camera with me.

Iowa ca. 1850

A vintage photograph taken by yours truly.