I am seeking opinions on this particular look for SUFA. I really have it narrowed down to using the site format and look that I was using for the last two years or using this look for the blog. So let me know what you think of this look. I will leave it up for a bit. If I keep this look, I will miss the “waking America up one 3:00am phone call at a time” thing at the top but it has been two years since that was a tag line for a campaign, so perhaps it is time for it to go, lol.
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USWeapon
gmanfortruth
Jon Smith
Life of Illusion
Black Flag®
d13thecolonel
commonman55
I rather like the new look. It seems a little more polished to me. The lack of borders on cascading comments could make things slightly harder to follow, but not significantly. And I would populate the left sidebar a little with some more stuff…Not sure what yet.
Jon,
Agreed with populating the left sidebar. I am waiting to do that though. When you change the “theme” as I have done here you have to start from scratch on sidebars so I don’t want to do too much with the sidebars until I have made a concrete decision on the overall look.
Make sense
I like the look as well. It seems more calming, which would do our ladies some good
Anyone know how to put a picture in the little pisture box on the right of our names, I’m bored of looking so bland.
G… To do that you have to create a wordpress account. I intend to send you an invitation in the next couple of days. I will include detailed instructions on how to set it up so that you will be able to write articles as well as personalize your account so that you have a picture there!
Thanks USW. I like the changes you are making, refreshing, and sometimes change is good.
Hey G!
I was playing around one day and clicked on someones pic..I think it was Flag’s flag and it took me to the wordpress page which showed how to get your own gravatar.
I like the new look as well.
The top is fine-hate the light green-miss the lines. And where are the home page and comment page buttons- or maybe that part just isn’t finished
Oh, I liked there being a flag before
To go back to the home page you just have to click the name of the blog. As for the comment page button, I am unsure what you mean. What is it that you were able to do before that you cannot now. Perhaps I can fix it.
Over on the left side you had two links you could click -one of them said comments and it would take you to a comment page for SUFA-it took you to a page that gave you a list of the most recent comments.
was it something like what is on the left up there now or different than that?
I see your recent comment addition-but that isn’t what was up there before-it was just one button and you went to a page with a whole page full of the most recent posts.
OK I think I know what you are looking for. Let me see if I can find a way to do it in this new format.
You might keep both-I like both of them.
Can you widen the margins so the reply’s don’t get so elongated so quickly. I noticed the reply’s are shorter on both the right and left side than the comments. I can’t see any need to lose the space on the right side.
I noticed that too. But it may be one of the things that I cannot change. I don’t see an option to widen this space for comments short of eliminating one of the sidebars, either left or right. I will play around though and see.
I will see what I am able to do with the light green.
Pink-I’ll take the green
I’m sure it will grow on me.
Reminds me of what a Code Pink site would look like.
That was too much. Had to find a way to go gray. Cannot have code pink affiliation
I like the gray much better
The new look has a much less brainwashing look for sure. All those links to conservative causes was a bit much.
I like it. I find it less distracting.
Hi!
My name is Anita. You’re not from around here are you?
Bahahaha!
I just thought I’d go sluming….fancy meeting YOU here!
I live in the slums…I don’t do fancy very well..doesnt fit my vocabulary!
Living in the slums, eh? Sounds like you’ve got Hope-N-Change, lol. As for that vocabulary, don’t give me that, I’ve seen how you describe certain inviduals, LOL…
I like this look and hope you keep it. Easier on the eyes – not as “busy” as the older one.
Also my page loaded much faster, always a plus.
It’s Sunday, 8:30, gray background. I agree it’s easier on the eyes and page was much faster to load.
Very nice!
I’ll be a hater…I’m with V.. I dont like the lime. Everything is bright! Needs a dark color somewhere..
oh now I look dumb
As soon as I posted my comment another color got added..I like the tan or peach addition
What’s with the teeny tiny smiley next to democratic platform site?
Is that like trying to find a bunny on the cover of playboy?
and no wisecracks about playboy?
No you don’t look dumb. I changed the color BECAUSE you said something.
I like it USW…
Hope you are feeling better!
Best Regards,
RS
Thanks RS! Good to see you here checking in. I am starting to feel better. I intend to be back writing this week also.
I like the black shadow fade-in thing on the bottom edge of the banner at the top.
I think SUFA would look nice done in a couple shades of a light sandy beige tone. Light, but not too light.
Part of the reason a regulation chess board is the colors it is, is because it’s easy on the eyes. Perhaps this concept could be incorporated into SUFA. It might make it easier when reading through 400 replies/comments.
Is there a way to make a text tool-bar part of SUFA? It’d be nice to be able to write in bold and italics instead of having to use CAPITAL letters.
Oh, and keep the numbered comments. It’s easier to find your place.
BL… I will see if I can get the numbers added back in on this theme. As for the text tool-bar, that is something that I have wanted to add for a long time. It appears that the only way to do so is for me to change formats altogether and do a self hosted wordpress.ORG site rather than a wordpress.com. That would require me to purchase server space somewhere. I haven’t looked into how expensive that is to do.
Wep,
I’m not sure it’s worth paying for,…
…BUT, if it’s an already available option, or a really cheap option – go for it. It WOULD add to SUFA. It’d be cool to have personalized text color and font too.
…just brainstormin’, throwing up ideas.
To all my resident IT buffs
I have considered moving over to wordpress.org, where the server space is something that you provide but where I would have SOOOOO many more options, such as the text editing BL mentioned above. I think I would be able to keep the same url for the most part.
My questions are many. Is this hard to do? How much “programming” language would I have to understand to do something like that? Are things like getting server space to host the blog really expensive?
Server cost:
You can get a server for as little as 2-3 dollars a month, but I prefer to go ahead and spend 7-8 to get the next level up. It tends to get you better support and server speed. You do not need a dedicated server or anything like that. I can give you a list of recommended vendors. You will have the fewest issues on a linux server, since they all have php and cgi support, and most offer several MySQL databases, which are the basis for a wordpress site.
WordPress software is free, as you probably know. Setup and install is VERY simple, you do not need any special knowledge, there are very clear and simple instructions. Transferring your current database from wordpress.com to your own wordpress.org site is a little more complex, but there are good instructions out there for that as well.
As for manipulating the site, the key is to get a good template, of which there are tens of thousands, some free and some not. Manipulating that template significantly is where some code knowledge is helpful. the bulk of what you need to know has to do with CSS (cascading style sheets), you will not have to mess with the PHP code or the database commands or anything. CSS is not too hard to understand, but there are LOTS of answers out there if you want to know something specific. You can search on almost anything you want to do with google and a simple “how do I do x in wordpress?” And myself and some of the other IT buffs might be able to help also.
There are some things that wordpress.com does for you that you will have to set up on your own, some easier than others. Also, you may have a drop in random traffic because you will be outside of the “wordpress community”. I chose to do my own wordpress site rather than a wordpress.com blog so that I had full control, I tend to recommend/prefer that, but it is more work than what you do now. I will help any way I can either way you go.
Top picks, look at:
http://www.bluehost.com/
and
http://www.hostmonster.com/
for hosting. Both support wordpress, have easy interface with CPanel, and have unlimited bandwidth and storage space for $8 or less per month.
I’m gonna make one more suggestion-then I’m gonna hush-Why don’t you try the gray in the middle and the white background on the sides-the gray is much easier on the eyes. I’m gone-hope everyone has a good saturday night.
Forget that, I was looking at the home page but do have a good night.
Can’t have changes without some humor!
Holes!
These holes are not only amazing, but some are really terrifying!
The sheer scale of these holes reminds you of just how tiny we are.
Kimberley Big Hole – South Africa
Apparently the largest ever hand-dug excavation in the world, this
1097 meter deep mine yielded
over 3 tons of diamonds before being closed.
Glory Hole – Monticello Dam, California
A glory hole is used when a dam is at full capacity and water needs
to be drained from the reservoir. It is the largest spillway of this
type in the world and consumes 14,400 cubic feet of water every
second.
Great Blue Hole , Belize
This incredible geographical phenomenon known as a blue hole is
situated 60 miles off the mainland of Belize . There are numerous
blue holes around the world, but none as stunning as this one.
Sinkhole in Guatemala
These photos are of a sinkhole that occurred in Guatemala . The
hole swallowed 2 dozen homes and killed at least 3 people.
SHIT HOLE, Washington D.C.
This hole swallows trillions and
trillions of U.S. Dollars annually!
The money that falls into this hole
is never heard from again!
It is reported to be filled with
at least 535 ‘ass holes’.
Ok, with the colorand format not a real user, just someone who comes by to read the latest and review the information, some of it is astounding!
USW,
You may want to look at Sharepoint Services that is Hosted. I found some for 8.95 a month, unlimited users and 500 mb space.
You can do a search on Sharepoint Hosting to find info.
You could possibly get around the 500 mb space limit by archiving old articles to a different server that you own and use Sharepoint “linking” functionality to get the the archived info.
Best Regards,
RS
Thanks RS. I will look into that sometime today to check it out.
RS, this is probably the first major disagreement I have had with you. I HATE SharePoint.
At least it was over some techy crap and not something important like philosophy. 
Okay, USW, here is my opinion for what it is worth;
I like it. It gives more of an opportunity to respond to selective posts without having to take the time to scroll through all the other posts and responses.
Hope you keep it this way.
I also like the new look a feel. I’m a regular reader…occasional commenter.