As all of you no doubt know, Tuesday begins the second year of Preservation in Mississippi, The Blog. I always like to start a new year with a fresh look, so instead of getting plastic surgery, I’ve done a little re-design, complete with a new header, the Durant School in Holmes County, built in 1941-42, and designed by N.W. Overstreet & Associates a couple of years after A. H. Town left Jackson to return to his native Louisiana. And within seconds of this new theme going up, new commenter Belinda chimed in that her grandfather Tom Gore helped build this school–very cool, and Belinda may be the new favorite for hanging around the MissPres universe into the wee hours of the morning waiting to contribute new information.
Let me know what you think. If you like it, you can rate this post with a thumbs up, if not, thumbs down, and you can rant or rave in the comments.
The only problem that I see in the new design is that I can’t see a time for when comments are submitted, only a date. That could become a problem during the next competition, there were some complicated threads during this last competition; it might be difficult to know who submitted something first.
Posted by W. White | February 7, 2010, 7:18 pmHmm, good point. I also noticed that this theme has a little difficulty with threads deeper than two. Gets a little wonky.
Posted by ELMalvaney | February 7, 2010, 7:24 pmName This Place 4.3 looks like a mess now.
Posted by W. White | February 7, 2010, 8:35 pmI can limit how deep a comment thread can go. Currently I have it set at 6, but I think I could change it to 2 and the new theme could handle that. At three everything goes wrong, as you can see here.
Posted by ELMalvaney | February 7, 2010, 11:00 pmI take that back, when I change it to 2, it’s retroactive to all previous comment threads, which is even worse.
Posted by ELMalvaney | February 7, 2010, 11:04 pmIt does allow larger pictures, but I wish the “Leave a Comment” was at the bottom of the post.
Posted by ELMalvaney | February 7, 2010, 7:38 pmIn the words of the poet, “Change is bad.”
Posted by Theodore | February 8, 2010, 8:39 amAh yes, the famous poet. What was his name?
Posted by ELMalvaney | February 8, 2010, 6:28 pmI, for one, love change. However, the new layout places all of your menus on the right side. This causes the need for much more scrolling up and down. Also, the icons in the comments section are cartoonishly large, but that’s just nit-picking isn’t it.
I do like the new header photo.
Posted by doakley | February 8, 2010, 9:06 amI like the new header photo too, and the main reason I looked at this theme was that it has a wider header than the old one, allowing me to use this photo. But the comment section is not as well-designed as it could be, and I do miss the left side menus. I’ll play around with some other themes and see what I can do. Maybe I can figure out a way to use this header in the old theme. Ideally, I’d like to host misspres on its own site and that would give me a lot more freedom with how it’s laid out, but I don’t really know how to do that and I don’t have time to learn, what with coming up with all sorts of cool topics and writing and all.
Posted by ELMalvaney | February 8, 2010, 12:48 pmCongratulations on the occasion of your anniversary! Thanks for providing thoughtful and timely topics on preservation in Mississippi, and for doing the news roundups…saving your readers precious time they would spend individually searching. Keep it up!
And as an aside the new theme doesn’t affect the mobile view.
Posted by Tsj1957 | February 8, 2010, 7:42 pmThanks tsj, and thanks for your participation from the start!
Posted by ELMalvaney | February 9, 2010, 12:02 amI’ve switched to a different theme that handles comments better, has links to comments at both top and bottom of the post, and still allows me to use my new header, although not in its full height glory. The only thing it’s missing is the author name with the post, which is a problem if and when we have guest authors, but maybe we’ll have to deal with that when the time comes. Let me know what y’all think.
Posted by ELMalvaney | February 9, 2010, 12:09 amAnd the smiley face is still there!
Posted by Carunzel | February 9, 2010, 9:19 amYes, the ol smiley face. I think WordPress uses it to count hits on the page or some such.
Posted by ELMalvaney | February 9, 2010, 12:38 pmThings I still don’t like: Recent Comments not right at the top so you don’t have to scroll down. And just realized there’s no search box! Also, too white. I’m not finding clothes that fit and it annoys me greatly.
Posted by ELMalvaney | February 9, 2010, 11:07 pmLike I told my ex-girlfriend, that first outfit was fine. Hurry up already, we’re already 30 minutes late! ****!
:-)
As a preservationist, you should know that change is bad.
Posted by W. White | February 11, 2010, 2:42 pmHmm, perhaps the “ex-girlfriend” part of that sentence is significant . . . :-)
I’m learning the lesson the hard way. It is not out of the question that good old Digg 3-column will make a re-appearance, but with Durant School as the header. I need to have at least one new thing!
Posted by ELMalvaney | February 11, 2010, 6:03 pmJust imagine how the white of Durant School will pop against the old background. It will stand out more than Bailey did.
I had several “conversations” with that girlfriend about her wardrobe and how long it took her to choose what to wear. For the record, I like Preservation in Mississippi, no matter the format, better than that particular ex.
Posted by W. White | February 11, 2010, 9:12 pm*sigh* I have one more, very different theme up my sleeve. Maybe if I’m snowed in tomorrow night, I’ll see how it looks when everyone is sleeping and then spring it on y’all as a surprise. If it’s bad, you’re right, this picture will pop pretty well in the old theme.
Posted by ELMalvaney | February 11, 2010, 10:35 pmOh, and I will take the flattering comparison with “that particular ex” as a compliment. I think.
Posted by ELMalvaney | February 11, 2010, 10:37 pmI like this one bestest.
Posted by Carunzel | February 16, 2010, 1:11 pmYay! This actually isn’t the “very different” one I was talking about in the last comment–that one was dark blue and pretty cool, but when I did the switch, I noticed all sorts of things that I knew would drive me crazy after a few days. So I kept poking around and came up with this one, which is still kinda white, but has other colors to it in a subtle way.
Posted by ELMalvaney | February 16, 2010, 1:53 pmYes, it is terribly white; looks like it already snowed here.
Posted by Carunzel | February 11, 2010, 9:43 am