Almost ready for phase II of the new website rollout.  I have all of my administrative functions working properly, the front page widget is working as it should.

( I also fixed the Latest Releases widget to not display html special characters if one happened to get cut off by the excerpt code.  This was evident when Heart of the Wood was still the latest release )

The page to display the web updates is done and working as expected.

Just need to do a little more testing behind the scenes ( mostly to make sure the correct filtered images are displaying )

I’m considering adding a navigation bar with the front page options, which are the major sections of the website, to the top of every page.  Originally, I was going to only have a back link to save space on the page, using the floating menu for quick navigation, but most people don’t seem to be turning it on.

Not sure whether that’s a function of not realizing it’s there, or whether it’s proving troublesome for y’all.  If you haven’t tried it, go to the forum ( you can use the “Logged in as” link on every page to get here quicker ) and your settings, then the profile tab.  At the bottom, you should see the option to activate the floating menu.  It makes navigation as things are much easier.

Feel free to express opinions as a comment on the blog, or on the forum.

The young one came down sick, so I’m having to check on him every few minutes, but with the bulk of the phase II rollout now behind me, I’m going to try to get some writing done tonight.

Hope to be able to update this post with some progress on Lowborn in a short while.

Well, I got a little more done on Lowborn 07.  The weather seems to be determined to keep me from writing.  Within five minutes of opening Wordperfect, the weather alert box goes off, letting me know that yet another thunderstorm is riding up my ass.

Looking a little better today on that front, so I’ll see what I can do.

I’m nearly done with the remaining static pages for the next phase of website rollout.  Just have to finish my email contact form, and I’ll be ready to roll on to the website updates widget, the page for web updates, and my backend to manage it.

Almost all of this will be cut-n-paste from the Latest Releases feature, so it should go quickly.

Decided to go with my own Q&A spam prevention on all contact forms.  Capcha technology breaks down every so often anyway, and I’m a small, low traffic site.  Hoping it’s enough, but I’ve made it expandable if the necessity arises.

If anybody is annoyed by the Capcha to sign up for the forum/website and that’s discouraging you from signing up, give me a yell.  I haven’t set it to be extra difficult ( thus, easier for spambots to decipher ) but if it’s still a pain in the ass, I can go to the Q&A bot blocking.  Just leave a comment here ( no sign up required, though I have to approve your first comment )

Hmmm… does that use Capcha as well?  Can’t remember *laugh*  It probably does, come to think of it.  That’s kind of counter-productive, isn’t it?

If nothing else, I’ll have my contact form up soon, and you can send me a “please turn off capcha!” message that way.  My Q&A one is easily read by any human.

Been doing a lot of musing.  That idea for a Dark Nude Day story is framing up pretty well.  Also have a really cool idea for the first major ( non stroke ) multi-parter as Les.  Branching out into some Sci-Fi Action with this one.

Naturally, going over scenes for SOTM and Nobles stories as well.

Going to hit my word processor on either SOTM or Lowborn after finishing this post.

As far as the website, I’ve been working on some nuts n’ bolts stuff.  Almost finished the legal sections, and have a working form mailer going.  I’m working on the template for the sitemap ( will have two forms: visual, with screen shots as well as wording for navigation, and a text link sitemap )  Doing some planning for the characters and maps sections for the “My Worlds” as well.

Doing a lot of static page work right now, taking care of all of that before I move onto the next dynamic work, which will be the “website latest updates”  I want to have that in place before beginning to add new content to things such as “My Worlds”

Still optimizing my code and bringing it up to current standards, as well.  Figured out a couple more useful functions in the process of working on the form mailer that I’ll be taking advantage of in “My Work” and the associated backend functions.

I’ve been posting some images and other musings about the website on the forum, so check that out if your interested in more info about website progress.  Most of that is taking place in a thread for content suggestions, which naturally is open for just such suggestions.

Also posted some preview teasers for Lowborn and the next chapter of SOTM on the forum.

Had another long, bad day at work, and the weather isn’t helping.  Thunderstorm hell forcing me to shut down the computer quite often.

Despite that, I managed to get a little bit more written on Lowborn 07 tonight.  Nothing much, but I just about have my characters to the place where my next major scene takes place.

Worked a bit on the legalese page for the website as well ( copyright, privacy, terms of use, 2257 exempt, etc. )

Now, I’m going to try to get some sleep so I’ll possibly be in better shape to write tomorrow.

Had a possible idea for a Nude Day story as Dark in my fantasy world today.  It would be an “other dark” story right now, as it jumps to after SOTM, starring Mindblind and Christi’s oldest son ( of legal age to do anything sexual on Lit in that timeframe)

Could eventually become part of a Nobles Next Generation series, but I have enough on my plate as it is.  For now, if it comes out, it will be a one-shot story.

If I didn’t screw anything up, all the pages should now be running on the reduced style files, and all tables are eliminated from the code.  The next clean-up process will be removing all of the [br] tags, as they’re apparently frowned upon by modern standards.

Believe I need to go through and fix anything inside a div that’s just text ( no img, p, etc. tag )  Pretty sure I saw that pop up in the last “evaluate your code” thing I ran website pages through.

Doing that also reminded me that I need to add WxH dimensions to the latest releases database, in order to add those to the front page.  Also need to add that to the little quill and trophy icons on the “My Work” page.  There, at least, it’s a simple matter of adding them to two lines of code.

Pretty beat tonight.  Long, lousy day at work.  Might try to write a little anyway, as the young one appears to be winding down.  It will all depend upon whether I can close my eyes and visualize without nodding off if he does go down for the night.

Need to add a privacy policy to the bottom of my pages as well, since the forum and a couple of other things do gather information.  It’s standard browser/resolution/etc. stuff, but I can use that link to reiterate that I don’t sell or otherwise divulge any such information to any third party.  It’s simply for the purpose of making the website conform to the norm of visitors, then account for the outsiders as best as possible.  Should be able to put it in the footer without too much trouble, I believe.

Just peeked, and the young one is indeed in bed.  I’ll give it a half hour or so to make sure he’s out enough to turn off the television without him waking up on me, and then see if I’m coherent enough to write.