Site Design

[Cthulhu]

I could do a straight import / export of just the WP tables, but it'd mean some downtime and possible data loss (as in any changes during the transfer). It'd be like:

1. Make sure both test and production are both on the same WP version
2. Move WP database to test site
3. Do stuff
4. Move test WP database back to production
5. ?????
6. profit?

During 2, 3, and 4, and IDK how long 3 would take (can make a conservative guess that 2 / 4 would take... half an hour up to a couple hours depending on file size).

 

[Flintlock]

Yeah, maybe not worth it, then. I'll have a look into that plugin.

 

[Cthulhu]

Well, if the alternative is copying a fuckton of fields then idk. It's not likely we'll be able to transfer individual poasts via a database migration though.

 

[Fangu]

The plan was for you guys to note down the articles that needed changing, then do all of it on the production site, as our users will forgive us for 2-3 days of oddities. Not sure when you decided to change this. I specifically said "this data will be overwritten"

 

[Claymore]

Yeah, that is definitely the easiest way to do this and launch the new theme. Just pick out the most recent articles and possibly those that are looked at most often and update those as soon as it goes live. Then you can slowly blitz through the rest until completion.

 

[Flintlock]

The plan was for you guys to note down the articles that needed changing, then do all of it on the production site, as our users will forgive us for 2-3 days of oddities. Not sure when you decided to change this. I specifically said "this data will be overwritten"

When was this stated? Perhaps it was before I took on leading this project. I read through all the previous posts but perhaps I missed it. I have stated that I'd rather we tidy up the most visible articles *before* we go live, which might be what Claymore is alluding to.

I'm not sure what the point of making a list would be either because it's going to be basically every article.

 

[Fangu]

That's what you get for customizing

No but srsly, you can't mean literally every article? Are they really that heavily customized?

...in which case, I still think it should be a slap on the wrist (read: work) for whoever wrote them, not the techs

 

[Flintlock]

Most articles don't have custom styling, thankfully, but there are still other ways in which they need to be tweaked to meet the guidelines I proposed in that other thread. Like, certain authors have been flat-out ignoring the category/tag system I set up for years.

 

[Cthulhu]

That stuff needs to be automagic and wizardry and shit anyway

 

[Fangu]

Default tags by category? Sure it can be done

(It's not good enough, though. Each article should be tagged properly.)

 

[Lex]

The plan was for you guys to note down the articles that needed changing, then do all of it on the production site, as our users will forgive us for 2-3 days of oddities. Not sure when you decided to change this. I specifically said "this data will be overwritten"

This is actually what I suggested to Flint when I came to him about this last night (I assumed we'd just go live and fix shit as and when needed, hence my suggestion of a blitz-em-all day). His plan was to format that which needed formatting on the current live site prior to shifting the new theme over. My feeling against that is basically that we're not going to know how it looks (his correct counterpoint is that it shouldn't matter as long as individual custom styling is removed), but I still think some stuff might need slight tweaking even within the guidelines to look OK on another theme.

Anyway the compromise was what he's suggesting, which is how we ended up in this discussion.

For the record I'd still be up for going live and fixing as-we-go in post, but Flint made a good point that first impressions matter, and if the articles are all a bit fucked up that's going to impact people's impression of the new theme given that people will mainly care about it in large numbers only for the first couple of days (which is therefore the best time for feedback), so I get his motivation to want to fix most of them before going live.

Either way the two of us made a date to sit on voice chat and blitz through the most important/ prominent stuff, so whether we go live at the beginning or the end of that session is irrelevant to me. My only concern is having a proper visual representation of what I'm actually changing without having to copy/ paste back and forth, since that doubles the workload and therefore halves the amount we can actually get done in that session (realistically, we should be able to get it all done but not if we're having to spend an extra two hours doing copypasta).

i hope that explains everything XD

 

[Cthulhu]

Here's two options I can think of:

1. Create a fresh copy of TLS onto the test site, people do the thing, we copy / pasta everything back. Anything done on the production TLS during this period gtfo's, but the front page is not that busy and we should be able to exclude comments. Do we even give a shit about comments? IDK
2. We do the thing, but keep TLS 'in maintenance mode' for at least a couple hours until people fixx the front page articles.

Either way, stuff like categories can be fixed on the production thing already.

 

[Lex]

I like option number one. The day we have in mind is the 27th (one week from now), we have nothing big site-wise planned then and the work will be done on that day to go live as soon as we're finished. People only tend to comment on new articles and we don't need to worry about that for one day.

 

[Cthulhu]

I'll have to experiment with selective database imports / exports, then . The problem I have is that I can think of at least err. three different approaches to importing / exporting databases and shit, and all the tradeoffs.

 

[Shademp]

Now that the new CSS style has been applied to the Unused Text articles (*hats off to Fangu*) comes the step of customizing the page outside of the HTML editor.

Where in WordPress do I go to remove this column on the right and these comment sections at the bottom?

 

[Lex]

You shouldn't remove either of those.

You can turn comments off on your own article (somehow? I think?) but the sidebar should not be tampered with.

We're looking into a way to customise the sidebar for individual pages. For unused text articles Shad, I'd imagine we link there to more unused text articles. Or maybe even use it as an index of sorts.

 

[Flintlock]

Yes, the sidebar should be visible everywhere because it contains important stuff like our social media links. We can – probably, I haven't tried it yet – customise the sidebars per article/category/whatever.

Comments can be turned off by unchecking the top box here, which is article-specific:

I could look into turning them off on all pages. They should stay on for posts, though.

 

[Shademp]

Comments can be turned off by unchecking the top box here, which is article-specific:

I could look into turning them off on all pages. They should stay on for posts, though.

Thanks. At first I didn't find the option, but then I found I had to go to Screen Options and make that option available to check/uncheck. Edit successful.

 

[Shademp]

What is the current status of YouTube embeds on the new frontpage?

Currently, embedded YouTube videos don't pop up in my Unused Text articles (see the beginning of each numbered article).

Or more correctly, YouTube videos using the following type of embedding code...

<iframe width="425" height="349" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/2ggL0mU81cU" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

...don't show up. As always, keep in mind that I'm using the Text Editor and not the Visual Editor for the UT Articles, because the latter editor messes up the article appearance.

Meanwhile more simple embed-types show up, like with the first video for Part 10, where all I've done is to paste the YouTube URL. Embedding this way meant a bigger video window, which was intentional because I want the viewer to easier spot the differences between two recordings which are played side by side in the video.

Any recommendations on how I should re-embed these YouTube videos that no longer show up?

 

[Flintlock]

I recommend using [embed] to be consistent, but if you're particular about the videos in those Unused Text articles not being full-width, just change "http" to "https" in the iframe tag. It's that added security that's causing them not to load, not the new design.

 

[Shademp]

Videos amended. I have also gone ahead and removed Comments from my other "Page" category features, like the Toshiba DVD articles and the Version Guide. In some of these, I have also used the function made by Fangu to restore tables which are of the same style that I employ for my UT series.

The function I'm referring to:

<div id="unused-text">
</div> <!-- unused-text -->

Is the notification "Please note: this article has not yet been updated for our new site design. Expect visual quirks." at the start of each article something I can affect and remove if I deem that enough visual quirks have been fixed? Or is it preferred that I don't tamper with this notification?

 

[Flintlock]

I'll remove it.

 

[Shademp]

- Will the "lightbox" class be restored? Currently, images using lightbox don't show up for me, regardless of "http" or "https" in the URLs. For example in this article there is supposed to be concept art of Argento, the Restrictor and Usher at the very beginning. If the lightbox class won't ever be restored, I'd like to know what the alternative is.


- "Blockquotes" now always show up as the FFVII-style text windows for me. Like the quote seen when you scroll down this page:

<blockquote>
©2006 SQUARE ENIX CO., LTD. All Rights Reserved.
CHARACTER DESIGN: TETSUYA NOMURA
</blockquote>

How do I cancel or activate the FFVII-style window at will?

 

[Flintlock]

The reason the Lightbox images aren't showing up is because the HTML you've used isn't being picked up by our new plugin. Just as I suggested using the [embed] tags before, the standard practice in this case is just to use [gallery] tags. Here's an example from Force's recent Play Arts Kai article:

[gallery columns="5" link="file" ids="36134,36142,36135,36136,36141,36137,36139,36143,36138,36140,36194,36195,36196,36198,36197"]

The easiest way to generate that code is to click the "Add Media" button above the article editor, then choose "Create Gallery" and select the pictures you want to use:

After that, clicking "Create Gallery" in the bottom right will take you to the gallery options. To make the bigger versions of the images pop up when you click them, make sure to select "Media File" under "Link To":

Then you just click "Insert Gallery" and you're done.

EDIT: While I recommend doing that from now on, there does seem to be an easier way for your existing articles: just remove class="lightbox" from the links. I could make the changes for you but I'll wait for your permission. Perhaps you'd rather do it yourself now that you know how.

As for the blockquote, I think it looks great; what would you prefer instead and why?

 

[Cthulhu]

The FFVII-style blockquote should probably have a class; I don't think applying a default style to a block-level element like that is a good idea.