Dear Spambot

It is always exciting to get comments on one's blog. It is validation of one as a person whom others view nearly as interesting as one views oneself. In that light, your many comments on my blog today are certainly flattering.

However, might I suggest that you consider therapy for your obvious personality disorder. In just a few minutes you have referred to yourself as Arthur Hakes, Todd Johnson, Stephanie Parker, Jonathan Hood, Sheri Alba, and David Drayton. For me personally, the easy way in which you flow in and out of male and female persona is inspiring, but that's can't be easy on your loved ones.

Thank you also for your very flattering note, which you attached to various, apparently random posts on my blog (your varied interests in The Brothers Grimm, NFOEC, Tom Wolfe, and Cormac McCarthy are intriguing to say the least!). However, and I only mean this as constructive criticism, your posts showed very little variety and your mastery of English does not appear to improve via repetition. Perhaps you were merely trying to ensure that I saw your flowery prose by posting in multiple locations?

My name is Spammer Spambot I was browsing internet and found your blog. The author did a great job. I will subscribe to your RSS feeds. Thank you for your contribution. I am a web designer myself. And here some examples of the websites that I designed for payday loans canadian payday loans company. 

In the future, there is no need to post multiple times. I am personally informed whenever anyone comments on any post on my blog. It happens so rarely that I have my computer set up to ring a bell and play a medley from Bachman Turner Overdrive each time it occurs. One comment will suffice.

Unfortunately, I am forced to remove your comments from the website at this time due to obscure local laws about character spacing., If you would like to re-submit your comments, please leave a home phone number and credit card authorization, and I will get back to you at my earliest convenience.

Best regards,
Your Humble Blogger

The Wilkinsons Message Board is active again

The Wilkinsons on the Web section of Wilkinsons.Com had, for a long time, a few dynamic pages where people could contribute links, information, and genealogical leads. That was several years and many ISPs ago, and those scripts stopped working at one point along the way. At that point, the site switched to a bulletin board system that was susequently hacked to pieces in a most disturbing way. For the last few years, there was no feedback system in place.

As of today, a new bulletin board system is in place, thanks to phpBB. It was relatively simple to set up and is supposedly more secure than the last version. Hopefully it will fulfill all of the site's users' needs. Please try it out, make a few posts, exercise the system, and let us know what you think.

Welcome to bananstew.wilkinsons.com

Thanks to Blogger dropping support for ftp, I've spent more time than I'd have liked over the last two weeks moving to a custom domain (http://bananastew.wilkinsons.com). I won't bore my reader(s) with the details of name server problems and tech support issues that kept me awake worrying for minutes each night. It's done now.

Since the big move was already underway, I decided to migrate over to the "new" template at the same time. It's pretty close (see http://www.wilkinsons.com/Bananna/ for a look at the old one), but there are some glitches.

Most notably, if you look at this blog with Internet Explorer, it dies. I don't know why. I don't especially care, but suppose I should. Any suggestions are appreciated. Meanwhile, if you're using IE, just let the page crash and read without the fancy scripts. You life will be a bit less rich, but still satisfying.

(From 34,000 feet over Arizona.)

No, I didn't send you a solicitation for \/|/\{R/\

This has been happening to me a lot this week. One of the consequences of having the same email address and website for over 12 years.

It's not me. I promise. Please don't hurt my family.

Slouching towards Facebook

One of my Wilkinson correspondents (from the Wilkinsons on the Web site) sent me an invitation to join Facebook. I've avoided it until now, but I decided to take the leap and am now officially an icky old married guy on Facebook.

Befriend me if you happen by.

FTTX News Template

Upon request, I have posted the template used in my Blogger Beta blog (see details here). I haven't worked on it in a while, but perhaps it will be of use to others.

Click here for the FTTX News template.

• administration
• Blogger

Wilkinsons on the Web bulletin board

Finally, after over a year lying fallow, the Wilkinsons on the Web portion of this domain has been updated. The most important addition is a bulletin board to take the place of the non-working guestbook scripts for Genealogy, Announcements, and Contacts.

• The new Wilkinson Genealogy Requests and Comments board is now here.
• The new Wilkinson-Related Announcements board is now here.
• The new Wilkinson Comments and Missing Links board is now here.

Please enjoy the fancy new features.

• Wilkinson
• administration

Deconstructing Blogger Beta HTML Template Editing

I've been trying out Blogger Beta with a test blog at http://fttxnews.blogspot.com. Today, Blogger turned on the ability to edit the raw templates. It's a new and wonderful world of strange tags and interesting operators.

For my own benefit, and perhaps the benifit of a few others, here's a deconstruction of my new Beta template.

[Update 09/01 around 2:30pm] This page has been (1) slashdotted and (2) innundated with comments that it is too hard to read. I have posted a large font version at http://www.wilkinsons.com/Bananna/BetaCodeLargeType.htm for those who are having trouble reading this. You'll have to return here to post, though. Also, please link to this post directly, not to the large font version. That one might be moving around a bit.

Latest update: 9/5/2006

This post is very, very long, so I've hidden it behind a cloak of invisibility (may not work on all browsers). Click here to reveal the gory details.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?> <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> <html xmlns='http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml' xmlns:b='http://www.google.com/2005/gml/b' xmlns:data='http://www.google.com/2005/gml/data' xmlns:expr='http://www.google.com/2005/gml/expr'> <head>	The usual html header stuff.
<title><data:blog.pageTitle/></title>	Here's something interesting. New code for the blog title within the standard <title> tags. <data:blog.pageTitle/> inserts the name of the Blog from your template settings.
<b:include data='blog' name='all-head-content'/>	And here's a line that appears to enter any blog template head information. I don't know that there is any right now. Maybe it's a placeholder.
<b:skin><![CDATA[ /* * Blogger Template Style * * Sand Dollar * by Jason Sutter * Updated by Blogger Team */	The <b:skin> tag encloses the template. There's a </b:skin> at the bottom of the template part of the header. I'm not sure what the <![CDATA[ is doing. Perhaps enclosing the skin data? According to an anonymous commenter: On <![CDATA[: That's simply making it so that they don't have to replace every instance of < with the &lt; entity, since there are <Variable> XML-style declarations within the block. CDATA just tells XML not to parse the data within the block until it reaches the closing ]]>, when it resumes normal XML processing. You can <![CDATA[]]> anywhere outside a tag in an XML document. Note that the template has been "Updated by Blogger Team".
/* Variable definitions ==================== <Variable name="textcolor" description="Text Color" type="color" default="#000" value="#000"> <Variable name="bgcolor" description="Page Background Color" type="color" default="#f6f6f6" value="#d2dbff"> <Variable name="pagetitlecolor" description="Blog Title Color" type="color" default="#F5DEB3" value="#cccccc"> <Variable name="pagetitlebgcolor" description="Blog Title Background Color" type="color" default="#DE7008" value="#006699"> <Variable name="descriptionColor" description="Blog Description Color" type="color" default="#9E5205" / value="#e6e6e6"> <Variable name="descbgcolor" description="Description Background Color" type="color" default="#F5E39e" value="#9eb0f5"> <Variable name="titlecolor" description="Post Title Color" type="color" default="#9E5205" value="#006699"> <Variable name="datecolor" description="Date Header Color" type="color" default="#777777" value="#993300"> <Variable name="footercolor" description="Post Footer Color" type="color" default="#444444" value="#444444"> <Variable name="linkcolor" description="Link Color" type="color" default="#DE7008" value="#DE7008"> <Variable name="footerlinkcolor" description="Post Footer Link Color" type="color" default="#968a0a" value="#3a9900"> <Variable name="visitedlinkcolor" description="Visited Link Color" type="color" default="#DE7008" value="#DE7008"> <Variable name="sidebarcolor" description="Sidebar Title Color" type="color" default="#B8A80D" value="#993300"> <Variable name="sidebarlinkcolor" description="Sidebar Link Color" type="color" default="#999999" value="#009949"> <Variable name="bordercolor" description="Border Color" type="color" default="#e0ad12" value="#006699"> <Variable name="bodyfont" description="Text Font" type="font" default="normal normal 100% 'Trebuchet MS',Trebuchet,Verdana,Sans-Serif" value="normal normal 99% 'Trebuchet MS',Trebuchet,Verdana,Sans-Serif"> <Variable name="headerfont" description="Sidebar Title Font" type="font" default="normal bold 150% Verdana,Sans-serif" value="italic bold 121% Verdana,Sans-serif"> <Variable name="dateHeaderFont" description="Date Header Font" type="font" default="normal bold 105% 'Trebuchet MS',Trebuchet,Verdana,Sans-serif" value="normal bold 86% 'Trebuchet MS',Trebuchet,Verdana,Sans-serif"> <Variable name="pagetitlefont" description="Blog Title Font" type="font" default="normal bold 300% Verdana,Sans-Serif" value="normal bold 270% Verdana,Sans-Serif"> <Variable name="titlefont" description="Post Title Font" type="font" default="normal bold 160% Verdana,Sans-Serif" value="normal bold 117% Verdana,Sans-Serif"> */	Some of the layout styles are defined here as "variables". Note that they are commented out (/* */), which I assume means that they are only used by Blogger Layouts, not in the actual html coding. Essentially, this is a place to store all of those font and color choices you can make in the Layouts. Some of the template choices don't seem to have all of these options. I picked one with a lot of flexibility, and I get to set a lot of color and font options. Color of post text Page background color Title text color Title background color Heading description btextcolor Heading description background color Post title text color Post date header text color Post footer text color Post links text color Post footer links text color Post visited links text color Sidebar title text color Sidebar links text color The color of any borders The font of all of the text in the body The font of all of the text in the sidebar The font of the date headers The font of the blog title The font of post titles That's a lot of flexibility.
body { margin:0px; padding:0px; background:$bgcolor; color:$textcolor; font-size: small; } #outer-wrapper { font:$bodyfont; } a { color:$linkcolor; } ... Lots o' deletions ... /** Tweaks for layout editor preview */ body#layout #outer-wrapper { margin-top: 0; } body#layout #main, body#layout #sidebar { margin-top: 10px; padding-top: 0; }	I deleted a lot of the styles here, as there's nothing all that special about them. However, it is interesting to see the "variables" defined above showing up here in the styles. For example, the body wrapper is defined with a background of "$bgcolor" and a text color of "$textcolor", both of which are defined above. Then, at the bottom are some "Tweaks for layout editor preview." Setting some padding and margins, but I couldn't tell you why or what for.
]]></b:skin> </head>	Here's the closer for the <![CDATA[, <b:skin>, and <head>.
<body> <div id='outer-wrapper'><div id='wrap2'>	Now we start the body, the stuff that actually shows up in a browser. The wrappers are standard stuff that appears in the old templates (and many other styled web pages).
<!-- skip links for text browsers --> <span id='skiplinks' style='display:none;'> <a href='#main'>skip to main </a> | <a href='#sidebar'>skip to sidebar</a> </span>	It's nice that the folks at Blogger are worried about text browsers, but how many text browsers are still out there and do I really care if they read my blog? Text browsers are valuable and necessary tools for the internet and Blogger are Mensa-level geniuses to include this code snippet in their template. (Please stop the harassment now.)
<div id='header-wrapper'> <b:section class='header' id='header' maxwidgets='1' showaddelement='no'> <b:widget id='Header1' locked='true' title='FTTX News (Header)' type='Header'> <b:includable id='main'> <div class='titlewrapper'>	Here's the first expanded widget - the header widget, encased in a standard set of <div> tags. The <b:> tags are new, and appear to be a way to indicate information to Blogger (see more below). This one includes the ID entered in the layout (Header1) and the title (FTTX News) plus some Blogger-specific information about it being locked and of the type "Header". Items listed as "includable" are called later with "include". That's a very nice idea, and one that took me a while to figure out. Includable items that I found defined were: Main = The title and description, then later the main blog content, then later the sidebar content. And this one never gets called with a "include" statement. Some confusion here will hopefully be sorted out later. Comments = The detailed comments postQuickEdit = The icon and code for quick editing from the main page backlinkDeleteIcon = exactly what it says feedLinksBody backlink feedlinks nextprev commentDeleteIcon post flat menu interval toggle posts Interestingly, I can't find a way to move the "Header" layout widget to anywhere else on the layout page. For example, I wanted to put the header over the main content, but not over the sidebar. No dice. Moving it in the template results in a "invalid template" error.
<h1 class='title'> <b:if cond='data:blog.url == data:blog.homepageUrl'> <data:title/> <b:else/> <a expr:href='data:blog.homepageUrl'><data:title/></a> </b:if> </h1> </div>	Very interesting. An embedded "if-then" statement in the template. Another advantage of the <b:> tags. The "data:" construct appears to be the new way to reference what used to be Blogger tags. There are no definitions available yet from Blogger, but I'm guessing the definition of these data objects blog.url = the currnet URL for the blog page blog.homepageUrl = the URL of the homepage of the blog In this case, if the current URL equals the homepageURL (i.e., you're on the main page), then the title doesn't have an embedded link. If you're on another page (e.g. an archive page), then the title becomes a link back to the main page. Pretty slick.
<div class='descriptionwrapper'> <p class='description'><span><data:description/></span></p> </div> </b:includable> </b:widget> </b:section> </div>	And here's where the Blog description get printed out, safely within its own wrapper. Here's another data field description: The blog description (duh!) The wrapper, of course, uses the variable and styles above as defined in the Layout editor by calling the "descriptionwrapper" class defined in the header.
<div id='content-wrapper'>	This is a big division, with all of the content including the main and sidebar. Other than that, nothing special.
<div id='main-wrapper'>	And the wrapper for the main content (not sidebar). Again, nothing special or new.
<b:section class='main' id='main' showaddelement='no'>	This however, is Blogger specific. It defines the main section that shows up in the Layout editor. It also says that it's not possible to add any elements to this section, something that you can experience for yourself in the Layout editor. The main section is for posts only. Personally, I don't use the main part for anything other than posts, so maybe this limitation isn't too bad.
<b:widget id='Blog1' locked='true' title='Blog Posts' type='Blog'>	Another widget expanded - the posts. If you note in the Layout editor, this widget has some components that you can add (they show up below). This line appears to indicate the start of the individual page content, but it's not entirely clear what all is going on here. It looks like this one line puts in all of your post content, including the footer, labels, etc.. That's a lot of work in such a small number of characters. It remains to be seen if that will be a problem.
<b:includable id='comments' var='post'> <div id='comments'> <a name='comments'/> <h4> <b:if cond='data:post.numComments == 1'> 1 Comment: <b:else/> <data:post.numComments/> Comments: </b:if> </h4>	The first includable sub-widget is the comments. This widget only prints when you go to a specific entry and are looking at the comments - it's not on the main page of the blog. That's the magic of the include/includable constuct. Again, a nice if-then statement so that if there is only one comment, the blog prints "1 Comment". If there are more than one comments, it prints "# Comments" where # is the number of comments. Another data object here: post.numComments = the number of comments on a specific post
<dl id='comments-block'> <b:loop values='data:post.comments' var='comment'>	Here are the comments themselves. And another nice construct in the <b> tag - a loop. This one appears to loop through the post comments.
<dt class='comment-author' expr:id='"comment-" + data:comment.id'> <a expr:name='"comment-" + data:comment.id'/>	I'm not personally familiar with <dl>, <dt>, and <dd>, but I'm guessing that those are standard html tags. dl and dt are used for making lists of terms and their definitions (as pointed out by a rather superior slashdot commenter). Here's another interesting Blogger code construct, "expr:". "Expr:" appears to be a way to generate content for other use, something that used to be done with Blogger tags. In this case, "expr:name='"comment-" + data:comment.id" generates the name field in the <dt> tag (and later in an <a> tag) that is equal to the text "comment-[really obscure number representing this specific comment]".
<b:if cond='data:comment.authorUrl'> <a expr:href='data:comment.authorUrl' rel='nofollow'><data:comment.author/></a> <b:else/> <data:comment.author/> </b:if> said... </dt>	Again with the nice "if-then" constuct. This one makes the comment author into a link if they have a profile URL. Otherwise, it just prints their name. Note that the "nofollow" is automatically included so that blog spammers get no love from the Googlebot.
<dd class='comment-body'> <b:if cond='data:comment.isDeleted'> <span class='deleted-comment'><data:comment.body/></span> <b:else/> <p><data:comment.body/></p> </b:if> </dd>	Here's the text of the comment(s), and another "if-then". If the comment has been deleted, then encase the comment in a span of class "deleted-comment". In my stylesheet, that's italics and gray. I imagine this is for temporary deletions or confirmations of deletions. Surely the deleted comments don't just hang around.
<dd class='comment-footer'> <span class='comment-timestamp'> <a expr:href='"#comment-" + data:comment.id' title='comment permalink'> <data:comment.timestamp/> </a> <b:include data='comment' name='commentDeleteIcon'/> </span>	And here's the comment footer. The "expr:" operator is used to generate a permanent link to this comment and assign it to the timestamp. Another <b:> tag is used to tell Blogger to put up the delete icon if the reader is the author (or so I imagine).
</dd> </b:loop> </dl>	Here endeth the comments coding. Some data objects in this section are: post.comments = some way to know if a comment exists (used in the loop statement) comment.id = the long and obscure integer assigned to a comment by Blogger comment.authorUrl = the URL of the commenter's profile comment.author = the name (or nickname) of the commerter comment.isDeleted = is the comment deleted (duh!) comment.body = the text of the comment comment.timestamp = what do you think?
<p class='comment-footer'> <a expr:href='data:post.addCommentUrl' expr:onclick='data:post.addCommentOnclick'>Post a Comment</a> </p>	This prints a little "Post a comment" link at the bottom of the individual post pages. Notice how flexible the "expr" operator is here. It generates a link within a <a> tag poining to a URL and defining a click action. Nice. More data objects: post.addCommentURL = the URL where someone can enter a comment on a specific post post.addCommentOnclick = the "onclick" action for entering a comment on a specific post
<div id='backlinks-container'> <b:include data='post' name='backlinks'/> </div>	Here's where the backlinks counter gets generated. Pretty simple - nothing like the comments.
</div> </b:includable>	And that's the end of the includable sub-widget for comments.
<b:includable id='postQuickEdit' var='post'> <b:if cond='data:post.editUrl'> <span expr:class='"item-control " + data:post.adminClass'> <a expr:href='data:post.editUrl' title='Edit Post'> <span class='quick-edit-icon'> </span> </a> </span> </b:if> </b:includable>	This little includable sub-widget adds the "Quick Edit" icon to a post if the reader is the author. If there is a post editing URL, then generate a span containing the quick edit icon. New data objects here are: post.adminClass = not really sure what this tells Blogger, but it's used in a span definition post.editUrl = the URL to edit a specific post
<b:includable id='main' var='top'>	Another incluable "main". The includable "main" is going to need some more defining by folks smarter than I am.
<!-- posts --> <div id='blog-posts'> <b:loop values='data:posts' var='post'> <b:if cond='data:post.dateHeader'> <h2 class='date-header'><data:post.dateHeader/></h2> </b:if> <b:include data='post' name='post'/> <b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == "item"'> <b:if cond='data:post.allowComments'> <b:include data='post' name='comments'/> </b:if> </b:if> </b:loop> </div>	This is the post section, where the actual posts on the main page are printed out. Or so I believe. There's a loop that goes through the posts, and if-then that prints out the date header it exists, and an if-then that prints out the comments section if comments are allowed. New data objects are: post.dateHeader = the date header, apparently only attached to the last post on a specific day blog.pageType = not really sure, but it's probably a way to determine if you're on the main page or an item page post.allowComments = pretty obvious, isn't it? The line" <b:include data='post' name='post'/>" apparently instructs Blogger to print out the post text. So I suppose there is some flexibility here for hacking. I'm guessing that the "<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == "item"'>" if-then statement is used to include the comment constucts from above if this in an individual item page.
<!-- navigation --> <b:include name='nextprev'/>	This calls the incluable code for next and previous links. Oddly, that incluable hasn't been defined above. So I suppose the order of the includable/include can be flexible.
<!-- feed links --> <b:include name='feedLinks'/> </b:includable>	This one call the incluable code for feed links. The includable close is for the "main" includable - or at least this particular "main" includable.
<b:includable id='backlinkDeleteIcon' var='backlink'> <span expr:class='"item-control " + data:backlink.adminClass'> <a expr:href='data:backlink.deleteUrl' title='Delete Backlink'> <span class='delete-comment-icon'> </span> </a> </span> </b:includable>	Here the incluable for the back link delete icon is defined. And yet another data object backlink.deleteUrl The data object appears to be nicely object-oriented with the "backlink" object having sub-objects like "deleteURL".
<b:includable id='feedLinksBody' var='links'> <div class='feed-links'> Subscribe to: <b:loop values='data:links' var='f'> <a class='feed-link' expr:href='data:f.url' expr:type='data:f.mimeType' target='_blank'><data:f.name/> (<data:f.feedType/>)</a> </b:loop> </div> </b:includable>	Here is the code snippet for the feed links body includable. This one loops through all of the called links types (var='links') and prints out a hyperlinked pointer to the link URLs. The hyperlink (<a href ...>) includes a URL and type, both of which are constucted on the fly with expr: operators. The target is set to '_blank' so that the links open in a new window. Always a nice touch.
<b:includable id='backlinks' var='post'> <b:if cond='data:post.numBacklinks != 0'> <a name='links'/><h4><data:post.backlinksLabel/></h4> <dl id='comments-block'> <b:loop values='data:post.backlinks' var='backlink'> <div class='collapsed-backlink backlink-control'> <dt class='comment-title'> <span class='backlink-toggle-zippy'> </span> <a expr:href='data:backlink.url' rel='nofollow'><data:backlink.title/></a> <b:include data='backlink' name='backlinkDeleteIcon'/> </dt> <dd class='comment-body collapseable'> <data:backlink.snippet/> </dd> <dd class='comment-footer collapseable'> <span class='comment-author'><data:post.authorLabel/> <data:backlink.author/></span> <span class='comment-timestamp'><data:post.timestampLabel/> <data:backlink.timestamp/></span> </dd> </div> </b:loop> </dl> <p class='comment-footer'> <a class='comment-link' expr:href='data:post.createLinkUrl' id='b-backlink' target='_blank'><data:post.createLinkLabel/></a> </p> </b:if> </b:includable>	This is the includable for the backlinks. The first if-then statement checks if there are any backlinks (post.numbacklinks != 0). The != must mean "not equal to", because this section only makes sense if there actually are backlinks. This section prints a label ('links'), followed by a label (defined in the layout options), followed by the backlinks themselves formatted as a definition list. Some data objects in this section are: post.numBacklinks = the number of backlinks on a post post.BacklinksLabel = the label for backlinks defined in the options menus in Blogger post.backlinks = the backlinks themselves backlink.url = the url for the backlink backlink.title = the title of the backlink backlink.snippet = the small snippet of text that shows below a backlink backlink.author = the person who wrote the backlink article backlink.timestamp = what it says post.createLinkUrl = the url used to create a link to this post post.createLinkLabel = the label for the create-a-link link
<b:includable id='feedLinks'> <b:if cond='data:blog.pageType != "item"'> <!-- Blog feed links --> <b:if cond='data:feedLinks'> <div id='blog-feeds'> <b:include data='feedLinks' name='feedLinksBody'/> </div> </b:if> <b:else/> <!--Post feed links --> <div id='post-feeds'> <b:loop values='data:posts' var='post'> <b:if cond='data:post.allowComments'> <b:if cond='data:post.feedLinks'> <b:include data='post.feedLinks' name='feedLinksBody'/> </b:if> </b:if> </b:loop> </div> </b:if> </b:includable>	This is the includable for feed links. The main if-then-else statement checks to see if the current page is an item page or not. Again, "!=" must be "not equal to". If the current page is not an item page, then print the Blog feed links. If the current page is an item page, then print the post feed links. For non-item pages, another if-then checks that there actually are some feed links. If they exist, then the feeds are printed out inside a set of <div> tags by calling the feedLinksBody includable, which I assume is somewhere below. The passed data to the includable is feedLinks, as opposed to post.feedLinks, which is used below on the post-specific links. For the item pages, an if-then checks to see if comments are allowed. Apparently, feeds aren't displayed if comments aren't enabled. I'm not sure why that particular restriction exists. If comments are enabled, then a second if-then checks that feed links exist. If so, then the post-specific links are printed out inside a set of <div> tags by calling the feedLinksBody includable with post.feedLinks as passed data.
<b:includable id='nextprev'> <div id='blog-pager'> <b:if cond='data:newerPageUrl'> <a expr:href='data:newerPageUrl' expr:title='data:newerPageTitle' id='blog-pager-newer-link'><data:newerPageTitle/></a> </b:if> <b:if cond='data:olderPageUrl'> <a expr:href='data:olderPageUrl' expr:title='data:olderPageTitle' id='blog-pager-older-link'><data:olderPageTitle/></a> </b:if> <b:if cond='data:blog.homepageUrl != data:blog.url'> <a class='home-link' expr:href='data:blog.homepageUrl'>Home</a> </b:if> </div> <div class='clear'/> </b:includable>	I'm running low on steam for today, so the rest of these are a bit terse. I'll try to fill them in later. The includable for next and previous post links.
<b:includable id='commentDeleteIcon' var='comment'> <span expr:class='"item-control " + data:comment.adminClass'> <a expr:href='data:comment.deleteUrl' title='Delete Comment'> <span class='delete-comment-icon'> </span> </a> </span> </b:includable>	The includable for the comment delete icon.
<b:includable id='post' var='post'> <div class='post'> <a expr:name='data:post.id'/> <b:if cond='data:post.title'> <h3 class='post-title'> <b:if cond='data:post.url'> <a expr:href='data:post.url'><data:post.title/></a> <b:else/> <data:post.title/> </b:if> </h3> </b:if> <div class='post-header-line-1'/> <div class='post-body'> <p><data:post.body/></p> <div style='clear: both;'/> <!-- clear for photos floats --> </div> <div class='post-footer'> <p class='post-footer-line post-footer-line-1'><span class='post-author'> <b:if cond='data:top.showAuthor'> <data:top.authorLabel/> <data:post.author/> </b:if> </span> <span class='post-timestamp'> <b:if cond='data:top.showTimestamp'> <data:top.timestampLabel/> <b:if cond='data:post.url'> <a class='timestamp-link' expr:href='data:post.url' title='permanent link'><data:post.timestamp/></a> </b:if> </b:if> </span> <span class='post-labels'> <b:if cond='data:post.labels'> <data:postLabelsLabel/> <b:loop values='data:post.labels' var='label'> <a expr:href='data:label.url' rel='tag'><data:label.name/></a><b:if cond='data:label.isLast != "true"'>,</b:if> </b:loop> </b:if> </span> <span class='post-comment-link'> <b:if cond='data:blog.pageType != "item"'> <b:if cond='data:post.allowComments'> <a class='comment-link' expr:href='data:post.addCommentUrl' expr:onclick='data:post.addCommentOnclick'><b:if cond='data:post.numComments == 1'>1 <data:top.commentLabel/><b:else/><data:post.numComments/> <data:top.commentLabelPlural/></b:if></a> </b:if> </b:if> </span> <span class='post-icons'> <!-- email post links --> <b:if cond='data:post.emailPostUrl'> <span class='item-action'> <a expr:href='data:post.emailPostUrl' title='Email Post'> <span class='email-post-icon'> </span> </a> </span> </b:if> <!-- quickedit pencil --> <b:include data='post' name='postQuickEdit'/> </span> </p> <p class='post-footer-line post-footer-line-2'/> <p class='post-footer-line post-footer-line-3'/> </div> </div> </b:includable>	The includable for the post itself. This one is the master and calls many of the little ones above.
</b:widget> </b:section> </div>	And we have finally reached the end of the main post widget. Phew!
<div id='sidebar-wrapper'> <b:section class='sidebar' id='sidebar' preferred='yes'> <b:widget id='Image1' locked='false' title='' type='Image'> <b:includable id='main'> <b:if cond='data:title != ""'> <h2><data:title/></h2> </b:if> <div class='widget-content'> <img expr:alt='data:title' expr:height='data:height' expr:id='data:widget.instanceId + "_img"' expr:src='data:sourceUrl' expr:width='data:width'/> <br/> <b:if cond='data:caption != ""'> <span class='caption'><data:caption/></span> </b:if> </div> <b:include name='quickedit'/> </b:includable> </b:widget> <b:widget id='Label1' locked='false' title='Labels' type='Label'> <b:includable id='main'> <b:if cond='data:title'> <h2><data:title/></h2> </b:if> <div class='widget-content'> <ul> <b:loop values='data:labels' var='label'> <li> <b:if cond='data:blog.url == data:label.url'> <data:label.name/> <b:else/> <a expr:href='data:label.url'><data:label.name/></a> </b:if> (<data:label.count/>) </li> </b:loop> </ul> <b:include name='quickedit'/> </div> </b:includable> </b:widget> <b:widget id='HTML1' locked='false' title='' type='HTML'> <b:includable id='main'> <!-- only display title if it's non-empty --> <b:if cond='data:title != ""'> <h2 class='title'><data:title/></h2> </b:if> <div class='widget-content'> <data:content/> </div> <b:include name='quickedit'/> </b:includable> </b:widget> <b:widget id='Feed1' locked='false' title='Latest Comments' type='Feed'> <b:includable id='main'> <input id='displayMode' type='hidden' value='true'/> <input expr:value='data:feedUrl' id='feedUrl' type='hidden'/> <input expr:value='data:numItemsShow' id='numItemsShow' type='hidden'/> <input expr:value='data:showItemDate' id='showItemDate' type='hidden'/> <input expr:value='data:showItemAuthor' id='showItemAuthor' type='hidden'/> <input expr:value='data:locale' id='locale' type='hidden'/> <input expr:value='data:timeZone' id='timeZone' type='hidden'/> <input expr:value='data:feedReaderJsonBaseUrl' id='feedReaderJsonBaseUrl' type='hidden'/> <input expr:value='data:feedWidgetRefreshIntervalSec' id='feedWidgetRefreshIntervalSec' type='hidden'/> <h2><data:title/></h2> <div class='widget-content'> <ul id='feedItemListDisplay'> <b:loop values='data:feedData.items' var='i'> <li> <span class='item-title'> <a expr:href='data:i.alternate.href'> <data:i.title/> </a> </span> <b:if cond='data:showItemDate'> <b:if cond='data:i.str_published != ""'> <span class='item-date'> - <data:i.str_published/> </span> </b:if> </b:if> <b:if cond='data:showItemAuthor'> <b:if cond='data:i.author != ""'> <span class='item-author'> - <data:i.author/> </span> </b:if> </b:if> </li> </b:loop> </ul> <b:include name='quickedit'/> </div> </b:includable> </b:widget> <b:widget id='Text1' locked='false' title='Administrative Notes' type='Text'> <b:includable id='main'> <!-- only display title if it's non-empty --> <b:if cond='data:title != ""'> <h2 class='title'><data:title/></h2> </b:if> <div class='widget-content'> <data:content/> </div> <b:include name='quickedit'/> </b:includable> </b:widget> <b:widget id='TextList1' locked='false' title='Sources' type='TextList'> <b:includable id='main'> <h2><data:title/></h2> <div class='widget-content'> <ul> <div id='link'> <b:loop values='data:items' var='item'> <li><data:item/></li> </b:loop> </div> </ul> <b:include name='quickedit'/> </div> </b:includable> </b:widget> <b:widget id='BlogArchive1' locked='false' title='Blog Archive' type='BlogArchive'> <b:includable id='main'> <b:if cond='data:title'> <h2><data:title/></h2> </b:if> <div class='widget-content'> <div id='ArchiveList'> <b:if cond='data:style == "HIERARCHY"'> <b:include data='data' name='interval'/> </b:if> <b:if cond='data:style == "FLAT"'> <b:include data='data' name='flat'/> </b:if> <b:if cond='data:style == "MENU"'> <b:include data='data' name='menu'/> </b:if> </div> <b:include name='quickedit'/> </div> </b:includable> <b:includable id='flat' var='data'> <ul> <b:loop values='data:data' var='i'> <li class='archivedate'> <a expr:href='data:i.url'><data:i.name/></a> (<data:i.post-count/>) </li> </b:loop> </ul> </b:includable> <b:includable id='menu' var='data'> <select id='ArchiveMenu'> <b:loop values='data:data' var='i'> <option expr:value='data:i.url'><data:i.name/> (<data:i.post-count/>)</option> </b:loop> </select> </b:includable> <b:includable id='interval' var='intervalData'> <b:loop values='data:intervalData' var='i'> <ul> <li expr:class='"archivedate " + data:i.expclass'> <b:include data='i' name='toggle'/> <a class='post-count-link' expr:href='data:i.url'><data:i.name/></a> (<span class='post-count'><data:i.post-count/></span>) <b:if cond='data:i.data'> <b:include data='i.data' name='interval'/> </b:if> <b:if cond='data:i.posts'> <b:include data='i.posts' name='posts'/> </b:if> </li> </ul> </b:loop> </b:includable> <b:includable id='toggle' var='interval'> <b:if cond='data:interval.toggleId'> <b:if cond='data:interval.expclass == "expanded"'> <a class='toggle' expr:href='data:widget.actionUrl + "&action=toggle" + "&dir=close&amp;toggle=" + data:interval.toggleId + "&toggleopen=" + data:toggleopen'> <span class='zippy toggle-open'>? </span> </a> <b:else/> <a class='toggle' expr:href='data:widget.actionUrl + "&action=toggle" + "&dir=open&toggle=" + data:interval.toggleId + "&toggleopen=" + data:toggleopen'> <span class='zippy'>? </span> </a> </b:if> </b:if> </b:includable> <b:includable id='posts' var='posts'> <ul class='posts'> <b:loop values='data:posts' var='i'> <li><a expr:href='data:i.url'><data:i.title/></a></li> </b:loop> </ul> </b:includable> </b:widget> <b:widget id='HTML2' locked='false' title='' type='HTML'> <b:includable id='main'> <!-- only display title if it's non-empty --> <b:if cond='data:title != ""'> <h2 class='title'><data:title/></h2> </b:if> <div class='widget-content'> <data:content/> </div> <b:include name='quickedit'/> </b:includable> </b:widget> </b:section> </div>	All of this code is for the sidebar, and I don't have tome to look through it today. I'll try to get to it later.
<!-- spacer for skins that want sidebar and main to be the same height--> <div class='clear'> </div> </div> <!-- end content-wrapper --> </div></div> <!-- end outer-wrapper --> </body> </html>	And, thus endeth the template. Pretty heady stuff that will take some studying.

• Blogger
• administration

Blogger finally wakes up and lumbers forward

Of course, this means that all of the hacks that I spend hours implementing are about to become obsolete....

• administration
• Blogger

How'd You Do That? The Banana Stew Template

Been futzing with the template lately, as loyal reader(s) will have noticed. Beyond all of the pretty yellow colors (if they aren't pretty yellow, you need to fix your monitor), there have been some nifty new widgets added.

It's been a while since I lasted posted the links, and there are a lot of new ones, so here's a brand new list of the Banana Stew Template widgets.

• Drop-down lists in the sidebar (used in the Leftovers list and others)
  
• Random text each time you load the page (used in the random tagline and random review)
  
• Scrolling dynamic lists in the sidebar (used in the Groceries, Banana Roll, and others)
  
• Automatic categories using del.icio.us and greasemoney
  
• Dynamic, clickable category list (the Ingedients list)
  
• Visual effects (like blind up and blind down)

I also recommend the large and growing list of Blogger hacks at the Blogger Hack Wiki.

• administration
• Blogger

Cleaning up the template

Too much stuff on the blog, what with the embedded video and list of 400+ classmate names.

To speed things up a bit, I've taken out the HaloScan trackback scripts and links to the TTLB ecosystem. They took too long to load and took up lots of extra space that was of little practical value.

So going forward, just assume that there are no trackbacks (I think I had one ... once) and that this website is a multicellular microorganism in the TTLB ecosystem (I made it up to flippery fish once - honest - but that was then and this is now).

Filed in: administration

No More Kumquats

Over the holidays, I received a missive from the monolith that automatically generates ... let's call them kumquats ... on this blog and most other websites. It appears that I had inadvertently broken a part of their agreement by drawing attention to the fact that kumquats exist on this site.

How was this attention drawn? With nearly illegible randomly appearing text in the upper right that every once in a while said something to the effect of "Only attractive people click on kumquats." Hard to believe that incited anyone to do any extra clicking, as evinced by the total of 6 (six) clicks for an earnings of $3.17 in the month of December off of the entirety of this blog. (For comparison, this is approximately equivalent to 0.0075 shares of stock in the kumquat distributor.)

In any case, all reference to kumquats has been removed from the site. Please do not feel any pressure to utilize the kumquats. This is not to be viewed as an endorsement of any particular kumquat that may or may not appear on this blog. No kumquats were harmed in the creation of this website. Long live the mighty kumquat.

Filed in: administration creations humor

(re)Boinged

Dang, gotta straighten the place up a bit. Boing-Boing posted another link and I'm expecting new guests to the blog any minute.

Filed in: administration

Destroy all Comment Spammers

I had to completely recover the Wilkinsons Genealogy Requests page this week due to the unwelcome scourge of comment spammers.

That page allows Wilkinson genealogy researchers to post their own requests for information (so that I don't have to), and it's been quite popular for several years. Only occasionally do I run across an inappropriate post, and most are along the lines of "look at me, my name is on the internet". There was a spate of posts last year from someone selling financial products or something, but those were realatively harmless (albeit annoying) and easily purged.

However, when I checked the page earlier this week, only one or two posts were displayed, then nothing. The page just ended. I've run into that problem with other automatic scripts when the page gets too massive, so I figured I'd just break up the page into bit-sized pieces and everything would be ok.

However, when I got into the html code, I discovered that the real problem was that some mouth-breathing, inbred, brain-deficient, foul-smelling, bug-eyed, cretin of a comment spammer (redundant, yes, I know) had copied some html code into their post and broken the page. This low-life, mange-ridden, horse-faced, ignoramous had actually coped the entire code from a web page - including all of the headers - into their post.

Anyway, the page is up and running again. While editing, I took the time to remove a few of the other "Hi Dude" messages and went ahead and broke the page up a little. I hope you all enjoy the new pages.

Wilkinsons Genealogy Requests Page
Wilkinsons Genealogy Requests Archive

Filed in: administration

Plaxon, Plaxoff

I've been getting occasional little messages for the last year or so from colleagues and obscure acquaintances that were mass-generated by the program "Plaxo". It's a deal that's supposed to automatically update your Outlook contacts whenever anyone changes address, phone number, job, favorite color, etc. If someone in your Contacts folder hasn't joined the Plaxo cult, the program sends them an email asking if their information is still current. Interesting concept.

I've never been able to get the thing to work behind the impenetrable Hitachi firewall, so I've been deleting the messages as an annoyance.

However, I got a few last week and decided to try again to use the tool. As expected, the impenetrable wall of fire denied access, but this time I forgot to remove the tool before I left for home. And when I booted up at home, it managed to get through.

Now I am converted. What a cool little deal. Many dozens of casual one-time acquaintances that I exchanged cards with at some minor trade show showed up in my Outlook Contacts folder complete with full address and title, even if they've exchanged jobs recently. And, wonder of wonders, once it contacted the mother ship one time from home, it found a way to re-connect through the impenetrable death wall at the office.

Very nice tool. Feel free to add my email address you your own Outlook Contacts folder and watch as my business address and phone number download. I will warn my admin to expect a flood of complimentary calls and requests for signed photos.

Filed in: administration

Trackback Testing

I've installed HaloScan's free Trackback code on the blog, and I'd be interested to see if it's working. Anyone want to give it a shot?

I will, of course, be going about pinging the sources that I've plagiarized.

Filed in: administration

Wilkinson Genealogy Database Update

Amazing the things you can get done during long meetings and much longer plane rides.

When the Wilkinsons Genealogical Database was originally built back in the 90s, there were over 30 different contributed databases from other researchers. The database eventually got too big for my primary server and was moved to another server that went out of business a year or two ago. So, I started over with a different format - only the relevant names and ancestors are on-line and the GEDCOMs with the complete detail are available for download.

Rather than immediately put the old information back up, I tried to contact the contributors. Not a one still has a valid email address. So, I'm slowly going through each contribution, cleaning out living references, putting in a pointer to the contributor name, and merging it on-line.

I've completed two so far. About 30 more to go. Head over the main database page to watch how it all comes out.

Filed in: Wilkinson administration

Who are you and where did you come from?

I recently installed Site Meter on all of the pages in the Wilkinsons on the Web group. One of the neato-cool features is that it tells me where people came from to get to those pages. And if you came in from a web search, it tells me what you were searching for.

As expected, I suppose, most people are looking for someone named Wilkinson - probably themselves - in one of the major search engines. However, sometimes some odd results show up. Here's a few from the last couple of days.

Search for "Topless at the University of Oklahoma"
OK, I can understand why that results in the Famous Wilkinsons page. There's Bud Wilkinson (coach at the University of Oklahoma) and there's June Wilkinson (famous topless actress). By why oh why would a person searching that topic click on my link in the results?

Search for "Coat of Arms"
Tons of people are looking for this one. It's probably 50% of the referrers. The search itself isn't too odd, nor is the fact that the Wilkinson Coat of Arms site comes up in the results. What's odd is that anyone is still using HotBot to search.

Search for " which british member of parliament has won an olympic gold medal"
I looked through the results, and I can't tell if any ever have. I know my page didn't help.

Search for ""corduroy was invented in"
Oddly enough, the answer for this one is in the Hal Peterson letter. It was invented in Honley. Read the letter for details.

Search for ""famous criminals of the 70s"
Which goes to show why you should put quotes around your search phrases. On the Famous Wilkinsons page is a reference to a Wilkinson that worked to rehabilitate criminals plus a reference to a fictional Wilkinson on the TV program "That 70s Show". Probably not what the researcher was looking for.

Vanity Searches
Helen Wilkinson, Eva Wilkinson, Nichola Wilkinson, Caroline Wilkinson, Sarah Wilkinson, Robert Wilkinson, Bill Wilkinson, Jessica Wilkinson, Adam Wilkinson, Scott Wilkinson, Glenn Wilkinson, Nelda Wilkinson, Harold Wilkinson, John Wilkinson, Linda Wilkinson, Jason Wilkinson, Norman Wilkinson, Stan Wilkinson, Brad Wilkinson, Michelle Wilkinson, Mark Wilkinson, George Wilkinson, Harry Wilkinson, Delila Wilkinson, Kirk Wilkinson, Christopher Wilkinson, Edwin Wilkinson, Eliza Wilkinson, Jonathon [sic] Wilkinson, Ken Wilkinson, Gary Wilkinson, Louise Wilkinson, Benjamin Wilkinson, Glenn Wilkinson, Johnny Wilkinson, Phil Wilkinson (Australia), Jon Wilkinson, Bob Wilkinson (Cape Town), Randy Wilkinson, Michael Wilkinson, Signe Wilkinson, Bud Wilkinson, Brett Wilkinson, Stacy Christina Wilkinson, Joan Wilkinson, Ed Wilkinson, Karen Wilkinson, Linda Wilkinson (Nebraska), Jason Wilkinson, and more.

Search for "www.wilkinsons.com"
Surprisingly, this one shows up rather often. If you know the place you're going to, why search for it? The only reason I can think of is to find out who else is pointing to wilkinsons.com. And why would anyone other than me care about that? It's a mystery.

Filed in: administration creations

Wilkinson Website Updates

Lounging around, sick with a severe cold, I'm getting more updates completed. I'm now looking through emails that have been neglected for at least a year.

Added today:

Andrew Wilkinson
Wilko's Wargaming Emporium

Gordon Wilkinson (25)
The Wilkinsons of Hyde Park, South Australia. Only 25 names on-line, but lots of other resources for Australian Wilkinsons.

Filed in: Wilkinson administration

Wilkinson Website Updates

Finally getting through the email and updating the Wilkinsons on the Web site with requests for listings. The following sites were added today:

Michael Wilkinson home page
Mark Wilkinson home page
James Wilkinson home page
Wilkinson Services, a Wilkinson-related business apparently consisting of the three brothers listed above.

Their mother (Jeanne Wilkinson) runs Texas Woodcrafts.

Filed in: Wilkinson administration