Comments on: Changes at Productivity501

By: Mark Shead

Mark Shead — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 12:02:15 +0000

@Drupal can be a very flexible system. Unfortunately it just wasn’t stable enough for what I needed at the time. Or more specifically the image plugin wasn’t as stable as what I needed. If you have someone dedicated to customizing Drupal it could be a great choice. Things seem to get fixed a lot faster in WordPress though.

By: Vernon Blake

Vernon Blake — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 11:16:12 +0000

BTW, I really like the look of your site! I wasn’t second guessing your decision to use WordPress, I am just trying to decide which is the best alternative for different situations.

As usual, thanks for your feedback.

By: Mark Shead

Mark Shead — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 16:31:08 +0000

@Vernon – I used Drupal extensively for awhile. The plugins just weren’t as stable as WordPress–particularly for dealing with images. I spent most of my time dealing with trying to get Drupal to work right and very little writing. I switched all my Drupal sites to WordPress earlier this year.

By: Vernon Blake

Vernon Blake — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 14:03:56 +0000

I understand that WordPress is a type of CMS, but why did you choose it over something like Joomla or Drupal?

By: Jan

Jan — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 17:46:55 +0000

Personally I enjoy getting the asides. However, I think I’d limit them to 2 or 3 each day. Getting 5 or 6 seems a bit much.

Several of the links were really useful to me.

By: Mark Shead

Mark Shead — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 23:00:30 +0000

@Andrew – Thanks for the feedback. I think the number of asides will probably decrease and the novelty wears off for me. :) I’m looking at a way to separate them out and I think it might be possible. What does everyone else think? Would you rather have the asides as their own feed?

By: Andrew Conkling

Andrew Conkling — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 21:54:19 +0000

“Currently the asides still show up normally in the RSS feed and email subscriptions. Since the way these are presented is determined outside of Productivity501 it doesn’t look like there is a way to style them any differently.”

This is a bummer, because a week in, I already feel like there have been too many asides showing up in my feedreader. (At least, none of them was useful to me.) A way to separate them would be really nice.

By: Todd Lohenry

Todd Lohenry — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 23:51:36 +0000

Nice meeting you today, Mark. My blog is at http://blog.e1evation.com. I’ll be moving it to WordPress 2.5 shortly…

By: Mark Shead

Mark Shead — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 14:13:34 +0000

@Todd – I’m actually in Kansas right now. LYW is one of my consulting clients so I’m usually up there a few times each year.

By: Todd Lohenry

Todd Lohenry — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 10:12:59 +0000

Are you located in Northeast Wisconsin? Your links point to the Laugh Your Way seminar series at a local church…

By: Mark Shead

Mark Shead — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 16:37:46 +0000

@Gaz - Checkout this article about Intersections and Unions in wordpress. It was very helpful in creating queries to add in the right categories while excluding others. Also Wordpress has the option to put your Blog on a separate page. You create the page and then assign it to function as the Blog page. Then you can do something different on the home page, but still have the blog function as before.

By: Andrew Conkling

Andrew Conkling — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 16:26:57 +0000

Very nice. I especially like the separation between asides and full-on articles and the redesign of the main page. I’m sure some of these changes took a while to implement; know that we appreciate them!

By: Gaz

Gaz — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 16:01:56 +0000

Hi Mark,

RSS all the way, unless I’m commenting :-) Great new look!

WP2.5 is a godsend. Upgraded my blog, and created a new theme myself a week or two ago… but I’m still not entirely happy with it. I like the idea of a separate landing page, and should make some time to create one for my site too.

Any pointers on how to set up a landing page that autoupdates with latest articles in particular categories?

Gaz

By: Francisco Carneiro

Francisco Carneiro — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 11:42:49 +0000

The new look really is great! Congratulations :)
And I am one of the rss readers and it would’ve taken me ages to come here if you hadn’t pointed this out….

By: Jay

Jay — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 11:17:15 +0000

The new design has a nice sleek look and feel to it, while not losing any of the way I used the page itself (I’m one of the RSS only folks about 50% of the time).

Good work.

Now *I* have to start looking at WordPress again…