Leaving Well Enough Alone

When things are working, what do you do?

Change them, of course.

That's probably the reason I changed Web hosts recently.

Not that I've abandoned Dreamhost. No, I like Dreamhost. I really do. And I still use Dreamhost for ItsAPundit.com.

But I've moved this little blog to Network Solutions hosting.

I've used Network Solutions for some time now. I've registered my domain names (currently, 11) with them for some time now. And my package includes Web hosting and email. So, as long as I have the service, I thought why not use it.

Let me reiterate, there was nothing wrong with Dreamhost. That's why I'm keeping my account with them. Their hosting of ItsAPundit works just fine. The whole process of people setting up their own blogs automatically works very well.

But, I like to try things out. So, I moved this little blog to Network Solutions.

That will cause some problems, to be sure.

For example, mail sent to my basilsblog.net address won't work for a bit.

Also, links to the old address format (such as http://www.basilsblog.com/?p=3263) might end up at unexpected posts ... or nowhere. Links to the newer address format (like the one you see when you click on the name of this post) work fine. That's why I went to this format several months ago: I knew this move was coming.

Most of the hits to the old address formats are kids (or grown perverts) looking for Jamie Lynn Spears naked, anyway, so no big loss.

What's the upside?

To me, I get to play with different Web hosting services.

To you? Actually, I don't see an upside to you. Sorry.

Blogrolling 2007-02-09

Items of interest from the blogroll.

• La Shawn Barber says Sean Hannity is plagerising Debbie Debbie Schlussel.
• Rev. Billy Bob Gisher (less people less idiots) makes a movie.
• Chaim (The Life-Of-Rubin) is thankful they agreed on something.
• Lone Pony shares last weekend's sermon.

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Headline News 2007-02-08

From CNN:
Anna Nicole Smith dies
Marries Methuselah, Lamech sues

From CNN:
Prehistoric lovers found locked in embrace
Bodies of Fred Flintstone, Betty Rubble found

From CNN:
Horse teeth give details of ancient big chill
Prince of Wales shows off climate knowledge

From CNN:
4 die as train hits van at Alabama crossing
Bush blamed

From CNN:
House Dems' Iraq vote plan: Keep it simple
Using small words so other Democrats can understand

From CNN:
Flipper stung by the slow home market
Lassie, Flicka unaffected

From CNN:
Six stadiums given Italy all clear
New rules require stadiums must be able to accomodate 52,000 rioters

From CNN:
Marine allowed to take back guilty plea
Had his fingers crossed

From CNN:
Lake effect snow buries upstate New York
Acts just like real snow

From WKMG:
Dryer blamed for fire killing 39 cats, dogs
Dogs no longer allowed to use dryer

Blogrolling 2007-02-08

Items of interest from the blogroll.

• aTypicalJoe looks at the astro-nut's photos.
• Laurence Simon (IMAO) has an idea on how to prevent a repeat of that situation.
• Harvey (Bad Example) looks at a photoshop.
• SarahK (Mountaineer Musings) deals with another dog owner.
• RightWingDuck says screw the poor.
• Spacemonkey (The Flying Space Monkey Chronicles) starts chronicling again.
• Laurence Simon (TBIFOC) deals with a customer service situation worthy of a Columbus Burger King.

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When Things Go Wrong

Missed writing Headlines last night. I couldn't blog.

Oh, I could access the blog. But I couldn't edit any posts.

You see, when I do Headlines, I'll have one window open to the blog and another open to news sites.

After I find a Headline that lends itself to something silly, I'll enter it in the post in the blog window, then save it as a draft. That way, if something goes wrong, I only lose the most recent Headline. I learned that the hard way.

But last night, something went wrong. Horribly wrong.

I couldn't edit the post I had started. And not only that, I couldn't edit any post. And I had no idea why.

My first thought was that a file was corrupt. You see, a blog ... and most Web sites and Web applications ... is made up of a bunch of files. And if something goes wrong with one file, the whole thing could crash. Or one critical piece could crash. And that's what I was encountering: the edit portion wasn't working.

All I got was a solid white page when I opened a post to edit it. And I had no idea why.

So, I'm logging on to the server and looking at the files. File sizes. Opening the files and looking at the code. And with all the possible files that could go wrong ... at least for someone who doesn't know all that much about the parts of the Web application.

Found nothing wrong.

Other than that it wouldn't let me edit a post.

I'm here to tell you, a plain white page when you're supposed to be on your blog is a scary thing.

After finding nothing wrong with the individual pages (that took a while), I decided to check the database.

Now, if you ever open a process to directly edit your database, you have to be careful. Very careful. Because one stray character ... or one missing character ... can blow the whole thing up.

So, I'm looking through the database, trying to find something that looks wrong. And, since I don't know exactly what to expect just by looking, I'm proceeding slow and careful, searching all the WordPress documentation I can find.

Finally, after all that, I decided to do something I should have done to start with.

You see, WordPress ... all by itself ... works rather well. But there's a lot it doesn't do.

But people come up with ways to make it do things it otherwise wouldn't do. WordPress calls these things you can add "plug-ins."

And it's a well-known fact (okay, not as well-known as it should be) that when something goes wrong with WordPress, the Plug-ins are the first thing to check.

So I turned them off. Every one of them.

Things started working again.

So, I had to go back and turn them back on.

That takes a while. You see, I'm running 27 plug-ins.

Yeah, that's a lot. I know it.

But I use Widgets in the sidebar. And 11 of them are for the sidebar. Others have to do with spam fighting (5 plugins for that), inline trackbacks that are so popular (4 for that), and other little things I like for one reason or another.

So, for some reason, one or more of the plug-ins caused a problem.

Turning them off fixed it. Then turning them back on, one at a time, things still worked.

So, if this happens again, I'll turn the plug-ins off to see if it fixes itself. Then turn them back on. Instead of spending several hours looking in the wrong place for the problem.

Lesson learned.

And if this saves you several hours of frustration and aggrevation, it's worth it.

Blogrolling 2007-02-07

Items of interest from the blogroll.

• ScrappleFace says Pelosi discovered why Iraq is a failure.
• JustDotChristina wasn't happy with the child's doctor.
• JackLewis.net has a roundup of blogging tips.
• Jaycee commentaries says we're wimps.
• Jeremayakovka remembered Reagan.
• Jim Rose says call the bluff.
• JRB Technology finds another issue with Windows Vista.
• The Improper Pundit is following GOP Bloggers lead on the Anti-Catholic John Edwards.

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Special Unit 2

Five or six years ago, there was a TV show that came on UPN called Special Unit 2.

It was one of the quirkiest, silliest, most entertaining shows I ever saw.

The whole premise was that all the monsters and creatures from mythology are real. Except vampires. They are the "missing link" in evolution. They evolved into pixies, werewolves, and such.

Silly? Yeah, told you.

But it was good, mindless fun.

They only made about 20 episodes (actually, 19; I looked it up). But I never saw them all. But I laughed out loud at the ones I did see.

Special Unit 2 (SU2) was the brainchild of Evan Katz. He's executive producer of 24. And wrote many of the episodes.

But SU2 was his baby. And when it went off the air, I was desperate for another fun, mindless show. Particularly after September 11 of that year.

The next year, I discovered She Spies. And enjoyed season one. Hated season two. Maybe I'll write about She Spies another time.

Right now, I'm remembering SU2.

The male lead (Michael Landes, who played Jimmy Olsen of Lois and Clark) is a typical sexist male. He's awesome.

The female lead (Alexondra Lee, who played Callie Martel on Party of Five) is smart and in charge. And way over her head. She's fantastic.

The captain of Special Unit 2 is played by Richard Gant (Sgt. Bill Dornan, Andy Sipowicz' nemises on NYPD Blue, and Hostetler on Deadwood), one of my favorite character actors.

And the resident "link" expert is Carl the Gnome, played by the always fantastic Danny Woodburn (Mickey Abbott on Sienfeld).

None of the characters want to be there. They all have a chip on their shoulder. They hate each other. And it all works. I loved the show.

But what prompted me to mention SU2?

I saw a commercial saying that it debuts on SciFi this Friday.

I've already set the TiVo.