Link love hate
I have been amusing myself lately with a little personal project.
It's just one of those trivial things I invent to keep the brain cells lubricated, like Sudoku or crossword puzzles only more interesting.
I had a page on this site for links to other sites. It was reasonably neat in that it not only gave the links but also what they last wrote and when they last wrote it. It was like the Martin Scriblerus yoke I have on the sidebar here only a hell of a lot larger [which is why it had its own page].
A while ago Google who supplied the background information, recently decided to stop that service, and as a result the page went haywire. Fuck you Google says I to myself and I decided to write my own method which didn't use any third party. I decided to adapt the Scriblerus code, but that didn't work for various technical reasons. So I started from scratch.
It's working quite well now, though it is very slow to load, as it has to visit every site on my list of links, but the fact is that it works.
I still have a lot to do on it, as I need to speed it up more than considerably, and I also need to streamline it so that it is more automatic that at present. Also there are quite a few links in the database that are missed out due to a wee bug somewhere. Anything to keep the brain active?
The first thing that struck me when I first ran the prototype was the large number of sites that hadn't posted in six months or more. I deleted them all with one exception – Captain Ranty. There are some things that transgress the boundaries of respect, and deleting the Captain would be one of them.
Coincidentally, Dioclese posted a piece on linking the other day. I gather he's not the greatest fan of "blogrolls" and to be frank, I'm not either. I have one partly out of a little consideration for those who link here [and I still get a lot of visits from Captain Ranty… I hope it's his spirit still alive and kicking] and partly because of the coding exercise. Leastwise if Dioclese can do some drastic pruning then so can I. So my list of links is considerably shorter, and I might as well cut out those who are already on the Scriblerus list – no point in duplication?
And it might speed the page up a bit!
Blog rolls have their use – for the casual browser, they point to other like-minded sites. Or, if you follow the dark side on mine, diametrically opposed views. And why not?
And, yeah, I still get visits from the Captain. Gone, but not forgotten.
I have nothing against links, though too many can be confusing and I tend to ignore them. Some say they drive traffic away, but they have to arrive first before they can be driven off?!! A site without links seems a bit isolated somehow?
So far this month I have had 141 visits from the Captain's site. It just goes to show – eternal life!
I have an even shorter list than you do albeit without the fancy "latest post" thingy. It consists of 4 links and one of 'em is you. Another is your alter-ego that gives tech advice now and then. K8 is the 3rd and Sixty (remember him?) is the 4th only because, like yourself, he's been on there since the beginning. Considering everything, that's enough.
You mean I make up half your list? 😯
I like the idea of the live feed. Apart from showing clearly who isn't around any more, it's an incentive for the likes of yourself to post more often [before you drop off the end].
How could anyone forget Sixty? Apart from himself of course?
Really I'm OK with blogrolls as long as they reflect blogs I really read and recommend. I don't necessarily agree with what they say but as long as I DO actually read them, that's fine. Otherwise what's the point in saying "I don't read this but I recommend that you do!"
I do find it sad when bloggers like Ranty and CF and Captain Haddock drop off their perch tho' as I feel I know them even if we've never actually met.
It's inevitable though, isn't it?