No more Rails for blogging here at least, but that’s not to say I don’t really really enjoy programming in Rails, I just think that Wp has a lot more to offer than what I can cook-up in Rails with the time I have!

I
have been developing a major project for my sister, involving
e-commerce, secure multimedia downloading and streaming, RSS jiggery
pokery – all under a new CMS called MODx (which is fantastic0.

I have also upgraded my host to a grid based server from Media Temple, as my shared server was starting to feel the load.

I
have been working with the Google Maps API, php and the Sugar CMS to
produce an app involving geo-coding UK postcodes… more later.

…and I’m about to embark on my second year of University after passing with just over 66%! WOOT!

The first project that has just been uploaded is the Facebook + MovableType Mashup plugin. 

Please visit: http://code.andycallaghan.com

I must be doing something right: Visitors increased three fold from April to May. This may not sound like a big deal, but if my stats keep improving like this, I should be getting upwards of 12,000 visitors a month by next month.

From last month, the most popular visitor origins were as follows:

1. USA
2. UK
3. Australia
4. Japan
5. China

Good to see Microplop not banned by the Great Firewall of China just yet then…

Blog on! 

WP is simply no match for MT. WP is a very good platform to get started on, but thats about it in my opinion. MT pre-builds it's pages from cgi scripts and mySQL so it means that all the pre-processing is done in one big lump rather than whist the person is trying to view the page, slowing WP down.

Even if WP-cache enabled and homepage caching, it simply isn't as good as MT. So, I hope you like the theme, as I'm going to be chopping and changing it from time to time.

If you’re interested, quickly drop me an email to andy<at>microplop<dot>com and don’t hesitate to comment on this post, and I’ll get back to you asap.

www.andycallaghan.com

Have a lot of fun.

In the beginning, there was ukHost4u.co.uk. Microplop.com was hosted there, and all was good…

(Okay, I can’t keep this up, as it’s too difficult! (well it is the Bible I’m trying to copy!) )

I setup a reseller account at a US based hosting company, under a different website name (i’ll release this later, when it’s finished). Then I created private nameservers to use under this new domain, which all my customers would use. I transferred all the data from ukhost4u to the new host, and all was dandy. I did this using cPanel’s backup and restore feature. I could see the site perfectly on it’s IP based name.

I then tried to change the nameserver info on 123-reg.co.uk. All my domains were registered with them, but they didn’t allow nameserver updates. (for me anyway, they never worked)

… so I transferred all my domains over the www.iyd.com (which costs a hell of a lot, especially to a poor lowly student). This sounds like an easy task, but 123-reg refused to give me my EPP auth codes without either ringing their non-existent-50-pence-per-minute number, or by emailing them. After waiting a few days I emailed again, and kept emailing them. After 13 days, they responded to all 9 emails at once, each one getting humorously more and more sarcastic!

Once I got the codes I transferred all the domains over to iyd.com, and was able to change nameserver info.

After all this, the websites weren’t directing properly using the nameserver info:

• My computer in Reading Uni had no problem viewing any of the sites on some days. On others, nothing was seen -404 errors. And on others, the 123-reg.co.uk holding page could still be seen! Rudeness!
• My computer at home in Kent, had similar problems but on different days!

This confused the hell out of me! The nameserver settings were all correct, and a whois showed the correct nameservers listed.

After much stress and much changing of settings, I deleted the accounts on my reseller server to begin from the top. When I tried to remake the accounts, WHM said that the DNS zone info already existed so it couldn’t possibly make an account of the same name. When I went to delete the DNS zone from within WHM, it didn;t load for ages (literally left overnight!) – so I emailed my new host for them to complete it for me.

Much to my surprise, they replied 3744 times quicker that 123-reg as they replied and fixed my problem in 5 mins!

So here we are now. All grown up but slightly limping from the hideous experience of changing hosts!

Morale?
123-reg and nameservers: EVIL!

Secondly: Sincere apologies to anyone who today, and for the last few days have seen or visited a link to pornographic content which was maliciously placed on my website. Bloody script kiddies…