As if waiting for the warmer weather over the past couple of days, the tree behind our house has suddenly exploded into life. Where there was nothing just a day or two ago its branches are now covered in bright, fresh leaf buds. Despite everything that has been happening for the past year, nature carries on, nature prevails and continues her cycle, and that's something to take to heart.
This system is designed to be used chronologically, each day's posts flowing down the page in the order they were written so that you read the day from top to bottom just like a page in a book. That's also why the Daily RSS feed is recommended over the Live feed. Blogging, however, is traditionally reverse-chronological with the latest post showing first so you always have the latest item in view as soon as you visit the site.
This key difference (along with posts not having their own page) is what would likely put people off using something like this.
As I went to bed last night I started mulling it over and decided to add 'Post Order' to the admin page. While the blog structure (each day to a page) won't change the post order on any given day can be specified according to preference. When post order is changed the post direction indicator (top right) also changes to point in the direction of post flow.
It's early in the implementation and I haven't looked at how it will affect everything so whether it actually makes the final cut is currently undecided. Still, it's a nice idea – it's always good to provide options.
@colinwalker what platform are you using for this? It's impressive.
Colin Walker replied:
Thanks. It's my own custom built system called (b)log-In (I know awful name.) It's a PHP/MySQL setup based on the custom layer I built on top of WordPress but is completely standalone.
Unless I drastically rework things it looks as though post order may be a one time selection – ideally set in the initial setup. Changing it with existing posts breaks some direct linking to items and comments. 🤔
I think I've actually sorted the issues with post order and it was a lot easier than I was expecting. The issues were with the way I was selecting nested page elements with JavaScript – I was previously selecting items from an array but, obviously, this array was being reversed with the posts. A rethink made me realise there was a better way.
@colinwalker I really like the way things are structured on your blog. Almost like a digital journal.
Colin Walker replied:
Thanks. That's exactly how it's meant – each day unfolds and I always refer to it as being in sections rather than posts. It's very much "stream of consciousness" type stuff that just follows on from what's above. Each day is a blank slate waiting to be filled.
@manton any idea why the first post in this conversation (and I've seen it before) might reappear an hour later than it was posted? It has not been updated and existing replies in the conversation reflect the original post time. Thanks.
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2021/03/31#p7
The first pass on the admin page is complete. I've separated changing the password into a separate section so that I can trigger a prompt to check you really mean to.
I may even run the blog as reverse-chron for a day or two just to check everything works okay.
