Blog Done (14th August 2008)

Today is the last time my rather weak VB6 build scripts should need to run.

Difficulties

With the change in URL level for the entries, I had to transform all relative href values. Internal links in /blog/ should now be absolute.

Spidering through the blog and then generating pages which span different areas was tricky. In the end, I settled on pre-spidering the blog to load each entry’s path into an array, nested 3 levels deep:

  1. Year numbers. Currently from 2004 to 2008 at the moment.
  2. Month numbers. Currently from 1 to 12 in 2004 to 2007, with 1 to 8 in 2008.
  3. Paths to entries.

The path to the blog is stored in a constant as the script is just for my use.

Script Steps

  1. Spider blog into nested array, counting total number of entries.
  2. Start the archive of entries.
  3. Start the archive of months.
  4. For each year:
    1. Write heading and list of months to archive of months.
    2. Write <div> and heading to archive of entries.
    3. Start this yearly index.
    4. Write list of months to this yearly index.
    5. For each month:
      1. Write subheading and list of entries to archive of entries.
      2. Write heading and list of entries to yearly index.
      3. Start monthly index.
      4. Write list of months to monthly index.
      5. Sort entries into reverse chronological order.
      6. For each entry:
        1. Write linked heading followed by date in parenthesese to monthly archive.
        2. Write entry text to monthly archive.
      7. End monthly index.
    6. End yearly index.
    7. Write </div> to end section in archive of entries.
  5. End archive of months.
  6. End archive of entries.
  7. Start blog homepage.
  8. Write most recent linked heading followed by date in parenthesese to blog homepage.
  9. Write most recent entry text to blog homepage.
  10. End blog homepage.

Timeline

2nd December 2006 Blog Rebuild
23rd March 2007 Blog Headings
28th August 2007 Blog Sidebar
22nd May 2008 Extinction of Stone Age Blog IA
23rd June 2008 New Blog for 2003
29th April 2008 Complete Archive now built by an update.php script checking files and folders.
17th May 2008 Completed blog about Sight City 2008 Notes & Experiences.
23th May 2008 One page create per entry for all of 2003.
27th May 2008 Page per entry for 2004 and 2005.
Markup of blog indices.
Automation of yearly blog indices.
Indices for 2003, 2004 and 2005.
29th May 2008 Yearly index ordered from oldest to newest.
Yearly index has horizontal list of months across top.
Yearly index has subheading per month.
Yearly index has list of blog entries with date as <li value>.
Page per entry for 2006.
30th May 2008 Blog sidebar starts with a list of all years.
Blog sidebar lists recent 5 months instead of 13.
Page per entry for 2007.
7th June 2008 Page per entry for entire /blog/ area.
24th June 2008 Went live with new IA for 2003 section of Blog.
Link checking all online blog indices.
25th June 2008 Went live with new IA for 2004 section of Blog.
27th June 2008 Created the Blog Organisation, Navigation and Information Architecture topic in Site Critiques of Accessify Forum.
29th June 2008 For bettor or worse, I’ve gone live with all the new IA.
Created 2 RedirectMatch rules which cover most changes.
14th August 2008 Raised subheading levels in entries as they were still at the level for monthly indices.
Reduction of subheading levels when entries get built into indices written, tested and run successfully.
Uploaded entire blog folder.