Sep 13
The Death Of A Blog
This blog (I mean my blog, the blog québécois, not Dodgeblogium) is destined to disappear in a few short days, probably by the end of this week or the next. But maybe you — yes, you! can save it.
No, I don’t want your money. (Let me amend that. I do want your money, but now I’ll have to think of another devious way to part you from it. Curses!)
Here’s what’s happening. I’ll shortly be changing my hosting package at 1&1. When that occurs, I am warned:
Please be aware all data will be lost when transferring to another package. It is the sole responsibility of the customer to backup any information in a timely manner before requesting an upgrade.
I’m guessing that the new account will be created on a different server. Whatever, this blog would seem to be toast once that happens.
I’ve backed up all my templates and entries, of course. So what’s the problem, you ask. You would ask that. It’s just that, er, um, well . . .
My name is gnotalex, and I . . .
Hello, gnotalex!
I . . . I’ve never installed Movable Type before.
“B-b-b-but,” you exclaim, “is this not an MT blog?”
Indeed it is, and I’d recommend you seek treatment for that stuttering problem. It was originally set up for me by the estimable King of Fools (actually twice, when he had to reinstall it after I accidentally locked myself out of the admin permissions).
I’ve been working with computers for a long time, and I’m sure that I’m more computer-literate than most. It’s just that I have a limited aptitude for programming them; a disability that extends to working with HTML and CSS (yes, I did more or less “design” this blog, but that was just trial-and-error tinkering with default MT templates); as well as, I fear, installing Movable Type.
I was looking at the MT installation documents the other day, in the hope that they’d gotten simpler over the last few years. No such luck. They still are as dense and mysterious to me as Revenue Canada tax schedules.
Also, if I have to start from scratch, I may as well move to the latest version of MT. I’ve been wanting to change to a 3-column format, but my difficulties with HTML and CSS (see above) have precluded that. I see that MT has several new styles that look like they’d fit my needs.
That’s all that’d be required. A fresh install of MT 3.2 (and if it wouldn’t be too much time and trouble, a separate blog in a subdomain for testing purposes). There’s no change of domain or other complications. I would also feel much more secure if there was someone out there that I could rely on for technical advice. I’ve only had a few problems with this blog and I was eventually able to puzzle them out — it would be nice, though, in the event of a real emergency, to be able to talk with someone who actually understands how this conglomeration of Perl scripts and MySQL ju-ju majik operates.
And the reward for all this? Not much. My eternal gratitude, and a spot forever on my blogroll, if you aren’t already there.
Yes, I am a cheap bastard, now that I think about it.
But don’t you worry about me. I’ll somehow (sniff) muddle through. It shouldn’t take longer than two or three months. (Sniff!) See you then. (Boo-hoo!)
So! Any volunteers? Leave a comment or email me here. (And do let me know when in the next week would be best for you.)
