Testing HSU’s emergency alert system

Oh, hello. Yes, it has been quiet around here for a while. There is work being done behind the scenes that is taking much longer than anticipated, but I digress. I wanted to alert any of the university web pros that are interested to the fact that HSU will be testing its emergency alert system tomorrow, September 27, 2007 from 10:45 to 11:00 am Pacific Time. This will include switching our web site into emergency notification mode. I have developed two emergency templates— one for low-level emergencies such as power outages, tsunami warnings for the county (campus itself is out of tsunami range), etc, and one for high-level emergencies such as campus shootings, major earthquakes and the like. The low-level emergency template will be used tomorrow, and retains HSU marketing messages and most functionality. The high-level template removes all images and marketing, as well at most functionality, in anticipation of high server loads. Folks from the Web Office and from Public Affairs have the ability to switch the main site to one of these emergency templates and post emergency messages. I will follow up after tomorrow’s test with screenshots and an analysis of how well the system worked.

The state of Interllectual

This spring has been pretty tough for us. It has been non-stop vet visits and hospice care for Solstice and puppy care for Lola and several major colds for Andrea and Brian from the moment we got back into the country from Australia. Things are starting to finally settle down, and I am starting to re-evaluate my online commitments. I am working on a redesign of this site, to make it better reflect where I am in my life at this point, and to make it more of an exciting place for me to write. Twitter has kind of taken the place of Jangly Ganglia in my life, and I am trying to think of creative ways to combine the two. I am all about simplifying my online self these days. Luckily, Ellis Lab has released ExpressionEngine 1.6 with a Multiple Site Manager, which will help me simplify posting and create some exciting ways to blur the lines between my different projects. The new site will also feature animals in a totally different and more personal way, which I am really excited about. Those Australia photos and videos will finally see the light of day, too. So, Interllectual is not dead, or rather, is being resurrected behind the scenes. It should be too long until it surfaces again with fresh and frequent content. I have a lot to say, I just need a site that I love to say it on, and to feel like I’m spreading little pieces of myself all over the interwebs. It’s time to reel them in, and that is what this new site will do. I probably won’t post here or on Jangly much until the new design goes live. Hopefully that will be in a couple of weeks. I am active on Twitter, so if you need a fix, you can find it there. I also just joined Pownce– not sure how much I’ll use it, but you can send me goodies through there if you want, as well. :)

Textpattern to Movable Type Export Script

I am reposting this file here so it doesn’t get lost in the intertubes. Textpattern to Movable Type exporter This script, which I found tucked away in a corner of the ExpressionEngine Wiki with no directions, was written by Ryan Abrams and is still available on his site as of this writing. His site is abandoned, however. The script converts your TXP site to Movable Type format, which is a standard format that can be imported into many other CMSs, including Expression Engine and Wordpress. I have successfully used it to convert my site to Expression Engine (more on that coming soon), and have not lost any data. Comments were all successfully transferred, which is not the case with the other scripts I was able to find. Instructions for use:

1. download the script
2. Edit the configuration variables at the top to match your TXP install
3. FTP the script to your site as a php file. It doesn’t matter where you put it, but you need to be able to browse to it.
4. Browse to the script in your browser of choice. You will see a bunch of crazy looking stuff displayed, which is your content in MT format.
5. When the page is done rendering, view source and save the source code to your machine as text.

6. Delete the script from you server for security. Use the import utility of the new CMS to import your content from this file. For Expression Engine:

7. Upload the newly created text file to the site with your new EE installation,
8. use the “Import from Movable Type” utility in Admin > Utilities > Import Utilities.

9. There are a few of options in the EE import utility— I specified Textile as my default entry format. You may need to load the Textile plugin before importing the entries to have this as an option. All the other options are straightforward. The “Auto-create categories” option worked for me as well— no need to re-create all those categories by hand! I hope you find this useful.

Pretty happy with my decision to never be dogless

This weekend we drove 1000 miles to get a puppy. I think we got the best damn one. Anywhere. Solstice is doing a great job passing the torch on to Lola, and will be able to go in peace, knowing that Bri and I will have someone to make sure we take walks on the beach and spend at least a little time offline sometimes. Speaking of which, Lola is sitting on my shoulder biting my nose, which is my cue to go frolic in meatspace for a while.

SXSW 2007 in one paragraph

I heart Glenda, Veerle, Geert, Anton, Snookums, Derek, Craig, Craig, Jeremy, Chip, Faruk, Rob, Matthew, Ralph, Fatty, Stuart, Pixeldiva, Matt, Darren, Sitepoint Orange, the posse that rescued me from that creepy guy in the bar, and flathicks. I wish I spent more time with Jeff, Nick, Dan, Richard, Jake, Dylan, Lachlan, Patrick, Bryan, Aarron, James, Barce, Lisa, Cameron, Cindy all the pMachine guys, and everyone in the first sentence. I wish Chris, Elaine, and Jon were there. I don’t heart VIP areas at closing parties, United Airlines, panels on two floors, or long lines to get into crowded bars. I wish I met everyone I didn’t meet. I wish I didn’t meet only about two people that I met. The highlight, if I had to pick just one, was telling Jeremy that I keep his book in the bathroom. Which is true. I’m glad to be back home in the piney-wood hills with my little family, and I can’t wait to go back to the wonderland where I can party all night with geeks from all over the world.

Australia photos now online

I have finally gotten some photos up for you all to see: Australia 2007 Photos. They should be pretty up-to-date. Things are going great— we are having a wonderful time. Internet access is not as easy as I anticipated, so postings are kind of infrequent. :( Right now I have only a few minutes of access left, so I will sign out for now.