Archive
Windows Live Spaces url forwarding still working
- It is a long time ago that I migrated my blog from Windows Live Spaces to WordPress.
- It appeared to me recently that the URL forwarding from the original web pages to WordPress which was part of the migration package that Microsoft offered, had stopped working – regrettably, since I still have old documents pointing to the original pages, and the cryptic URL naming scheme seems to make it difficult to find out where the original ULR pointed to.
- However, it seems that only some forwarding stopped working. If I reformat URL format 1 (which redirects to the WordPress homepage) to format 2, the forward still works:
Beep – beep – boop?! Cannot get classic mode to stick for editing my existing WordPress.com pages
Looks like I can get classic mode to stick by clicking on “classic mode” in the upper right of edit mode, for creating new posts.
Looks like I cannot for editing existing posts – what gives?
Best advice seems currently to edit through the “dashboard” – unacceptable to me, I often need to revise/refine posts when I browse them.
UPDATE: Well, the test-“Edit” to refine after publishing this post gave me the classic mode of editing – does it remember something? Currently, the behavior seems more like hit or miss…
UPDATE2: The edit for an old post still gets me “Beep – beep – boop” edit mode. Is it possible that the choice of “classic mode” affects only new posts after choosing?!
Update3: OK, looks like my choice of the old-style editor is being remembered now. Not sure that I did something to achieve that.
How to work around flat flush-left nested lists in Windows Live Writer
- Windows Live Writer (2012), in WYSIWYG mode under the “edit” tab, conveniently interprets “tab” keys, when issued within an <ol>/<ul>, as, i.e. converts them into nested lists.
- However, Windows Live Writer does not horizontally indent the nested lists. Rather the lists appear “flat” flush left –(restart in ) only numbering and vertical indentation, like so:
- The underlying source code feature is that <li> get immediately closed, before the nested <ol> gets even opened, as you can see here:
- You can force the indented view by wrapping the <li></li> around the nested <ol></ol?, like so:
- The resulting look with horizontal indentation:
- Unfortunately, to make matters worse, certain work with lists in the “edit” mode make them revert back to the default “flat”view. So you often have to redo your work under the source code tab.
Change onedrive to skydrive to embed your MS-Office online files in WordPress
- A while ago, Microsoft was successfully sued by Sky to change the name of SkyDrive. Recently MS did that, but it looks like somebody has not gotten the memo yet, again:
- Originally suggested embed code from SkyDrive: https://onedrive.live.com/embed?cid=0025C841818181C2&resid=25C841818181C2%21666&authkey=ANeXAUnGHDfEqTQ&em=2
- Fail on WordPress.com:
- Change to:
- Sort of works on WordPress.com (but width and hieght parameters are being ignored):
Call it “blog”, “CMS” or whatever, as long as your WordPress site visitor stats show that it helped people
I have been asked by a colleague about the “hits” in the upper right on my website. They are the number of visits I had(not counting myself, at least not when I am logged in – like many “bloggers”, I am likely my own best audience! 
).
My website could be called “a blog”, since it is based on WordPress, which started as a platform for blogging (but now – being so easy and flexible, and free (though not to host)- is behind every 5th website on the planet!).
WordPress is also the platform for the faculty blogs in CLAS-pages: If you are member of CLAS and not represented up there, I hope you know that you can request getting a CLAS-page here.
“Blog stats” is a hard-coded label that I cannot change. If I could, I’d prefer to call it “Content Management System stats” (that’s probably why they do not allow for changes ).
As opposed to just “web-logging” what is going on in my daily work life, I try to organize in this CMS the little things that I discover, hoping for reuse:
- by other people. That’s at least my justification for blathering, and I am sticking to it. (1125 posts? Really? Plus plus 1? Oh well… ).
- by myself. For the CMS and blogging habit (summarizing into a somewhat presentable, comprehensible form, and tagging for findability) makes me often search for answers that I have forgotten on my blog rather than on my computer (and that is despite me loving OneNote).
In my WordPress site (hosted on wordpress.com), I can see site visitor statistics like in the picture below: Includes search terms which led to clicks on one of my posts, countries of origin, outgoing links clicked etc.
I don’t do SEO or anything similar advanced on this website, nor do I use the statistics to cater to my audience (I am sure it is almost entirely transient). For me, it is just fun how I can glean from these statistics that I could help people find answers to their language, learning (and too often: computer infrastructure) questions and some of my work can be reused.
Heck, I decided to “blog” this email response, since it might answer the questions of a few more of colleagues than the person that emailed me.
Design options for the departmental WordPress-based website using Widgets and Pages
- For layout design:
- Go to http://[yo r site’s URL here]/wp-admin, e.g. http://lrc.unc.edu/wp-admin, and log in (you need site admin privileges , like I have for the LRC site).
- In the left-hand menu, click on “appearance”/ “widgets”
- You should see this:
- to design your right sidebar, follow the instructions on top of the widget list (i.e. drag and drop, then unfold the widget in question by clicking on the down arrow to the right
to edit the appearance of the site.
- Go to http://[yo r site’s URL here]/wp-admin, e.g. http://lrc.unc.edu/wp-admin, and log in (you need site admin privileges , like I have for the LRC site).
- “Pages”(in the left hand menu)
- are an afterthought in wordpress which was originally based on dated posts (for a diary-like web logs), but can be useful for not time-sensitive , stable areas/sections of your site.
- You can include a bulleted or numbered list which you periodically update manually (click “edit” on the page)
- or, for frequently changing information (like lists of students), you can use a system that may have more initial learning curve, but in the long run makes updating easier
- embed an online spreadsheet from Google Apps or SkyDrive
- or embed an RSS feed like in the above example (if you have an RSS. provider).
How to workaround SkyDrive embed codes not working WordPress.com
- Problem: I cannot seem to get the new embed code that SkyDrive offers now to work on wordpress.com.
- Cause: No idea. Guess somebody did not get the memo? Hope it is not me.
- Workaround:
- Old skydrive embed code still works in wordpress (E.g. https://thomasplagwitz.com/tag/lists+resources/), but is a completely different syntax than what skydrive offers for embedding now (insert office code into [] to try it out):
- office width="750" height="1300" src="http://r.office.microsoft.com/r/rlidExcelEmbed?su=10634757809471938&Fi=SD25C841818181C2!126&kip=1&AllowTyping=True&Item=Table2&wdHideGridlines=True&wdDownloadButton=True"
- However, you can still convert the current embed into the old one:
- by inserting the new parameter values into the old ones:
- "cid" becomes "su" and
- "resid" becomes "Fi" .
- This example successfully embeds into a WordPress.com code now. (insert office code into [] to try it out):
- office width="750" height="1300" src="http://r.office.microsoft.com/r/rlidExcelEmbed?su=4FA3329905D7E1CE&Fi=4FA3329905D7E1CE%2162359&kip=1&AllowTyping=True&Item=Table2&wdHideGridlines=True&wdDownloadButton=True"
- No we seem to have been here before, so we shall see how long this workaround lasts.
Questions? Read the About. Or just ask me a quick
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+CAT2+...CATn"
Other ways to find help
If you cannot find it here, look there: 5,500 Language-Learning Links and Programs for learning or teaching 150 languages
Shortcuts:Our Lists, Our Maps, LRC Staff Moodle Site,LRC Project Moodle Site, 49erexpress, UNCC Moodle, Student Recordings: s:claslcslrcsanakostudent
Learning usage samples: Sanako oral exam, Kaltura webcam presentation, Dictation with speech recognition, Sanako written exam, Chinese and Japanese interactive stroke-order practice
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