Three-Letter Acronyms & Four-Letter Words

I am currently in the process of setting up a Wordpress based blog.

Serendipity has been nice, but Wordpress seems to be where it is at these days.

As with many of the technological choices I have made over the last few years, I do not jump in feet first. I tend to follow Jeremy.

He was into PHP before me.

He was into Linux before me.

He was into the iPod before me.

He was into the X-Box before me.

He also was into Serendipity before me.

This is not to say that I follow him blindly, I only get into it after watching him (and sometimes helping) go through the initial steps.

If you have ever read the Crossing the Chasm, you know the term "Early Adopter", I do not necessarily fit into that group, I would definitely place Jeremy within that group.

I think that I am right on the cusp in between "Early Adopter" and "Early Majority".

In general, I do not buy first generation tech. I usually wait for the 2nd gen release or service pack before jumping on-board. Those folks that buy first gen tech are your "Innovators". I think that sometimes Jeremy falls into that realm.

Now, the upcoming Google Android Powered Phones, I WANT to be an "Innovator" and if the supplies don't last, then I will settle for being an "Early Adopter".

So, I guess it really depends upon what the particular technology is.

Now, back to why I started this post.

I am setting up a Wordpress powered blog.

I am just in the initial setup phase, so it will probably not be until sometime this weekend that I actually get it all up and running, but I am sure I will be able to 'download' all of my old posts into it. Just not sure how yet, going to have to figure that out.

But I am looking forward to taking advantage of some of the cooler features that Jeremy has had on his www.ayankeeintexas.com site for a while now.

Laterz

I went to do a blog entry last night.

And I couldn't log into the ol' blog here.

Which freaked me out. First thought, Hackers! Damn Hackers always messing with folks.

Nope, not hackers. The server was fine and so was the database.

Trouble shooting time.

Suspect #1, What changed recently?

Answer: I had installed a user profiles plug-in, testing it here before using it on the Jaduka Blog. Well, I didn't like the results, so I un-installed it. That had to be what caused the problem. The user profile plug-in, fscked something up. Right?

I began by making a copy of my blog directory, in case I messed something up while trying to 'hack the gibson' here.

I then copied the 'include' directory from Gina's Blog over my 'include' directory. Hoping that would fix it.

Nope, didn't fix it.

Now, I had to roll up my sleeves and look at the files themselves.

I started by tracking down how exactly Serendipity handles login. I added some debug statements, and found that the SQL it was running was perfectly good. (Mind you I ran that exact SQL against the wrong database, so yeah, let me wipe the egg off my face.)

I decided that I needed to connect to the DB directly, so I commented out the serendipity_db_query function and wrote my own.

Nope, still the same thing. No login love.

Finally, I decide to just hack the login routine, and force the login of my user. Thinking that maybe if can at least login, I can make a new user. Uncomment the forced login, and see if that fixes it.

That worked. I was able to force the login and create a new user.

In doing so I looked at my old user. Hey, the username is wrong.

Apparently while I was dorking around with the userprofile plugin I modified my user record and had reversed the username and my real name that I use on this blog.

That is what made me notice that I was looking at the wrong database. (Wiping even more egg off my face.)

In the end, it was not the un-install, nor was it malicious hackers.

IT WAS USER ERROR.

I am human, I make mistakes (though not often).

At least I now have a slightly better understanding of the inner workings of Serendipity. Which will help when Buddha and I start coding plug-ins.

Laterz