msiegel

26 Feb 2012, 11:24pm

accounts cleanup

i'm suspending new account creation for a little while.

i'll be cleaning up leftover unused accounts, and a bit of frivolous new junk as well

25 Feb 2012, 7:22pm

categorian

server restart

sorry for the hiccup; we were offline for about 10 minutes

12 Feb 2012, 10:32pm

categorian

mutual friends

on your friends page, mutual friends are now shown with a heart

happy valentine's day :)

i'm everybody's friend here, even if you don't see a heart :)

7 Feb 2012, 10:57pm

categorian

while everyone is busy exploring pinterest, i'll be here working under the hood :)

29 Jan 2012, 7:54pm

categorian

image and youtube thumbnails

in the library, at the bottoms of some category pages, is an experimental section with clickable thumbnails :)

you'll only see them if you have UNSAFE Stagger enabled on your Setup page

28 Jan 2012, 11:24pm

categorian

image thumbnail generator part 3 of 4 is working

i should be getting to the library tomorrow :)

25 Jan 2012, 11:32pm

categorian

image thumbnail generator part 1 of 4 is looking good :)

it may seem odd to do this as part of the porn filtering project, but to me it's an important part of keeping the whole system in balance

24 Jan 2012, 10:44pm

categorian

the site status checker completed. about 7% of sites gave an error; not bad :)

now i'm working on image thumbnail generator

22 Jan 2012, 6:31pm

categorian

i wrote a site status checker program this afternoon.

it's now going through the database and checking each of the 225461 sites to see if they're accessible, or if they're 404 (not found) etc.

this program, and a half-dozen more parts, are all along the way to the next version of porn filtering. the parts have other important roles to play as well :)

edit: cool... 30713 down, 194748 to go :D

19 Jan 2012, 10:52pm

categorian

fix for photoblog

if Photoblog stopped working when you upgraded Firefox, please get a new Photoblog bookmark from your Setup page :)

19 Jan 2012, 10:50pm

categorian

STOP INTERNET CENSORSHIP

i have added an optional banner for Jan 18th protest of the "PROTECT IP Act".

if you want to use it on your blog, paste this line at the end of your Style:

#cateventbanner { display: block; }

please add your voice to help defeat SOPA and PIPA -- laws that could lead to unlimited government censorship of any website!

even non-U.S. citizens can help

13 Jan 2012, 9:22pm

categorian feature-request

feature request

Stagger through a selected topic

former SU'ers remember how this worked :D

13 Jan 2012, 9:20pm

categorian feature-request

bug (bumped)

Photoblog doesn't work when the page's title has an apostrophe

is this still true? i think the latest Photoblog bookmark might have fixed it :)

13 Jan 2012, 1:54pm

categorian

back to porn filtering

now that photoblog seems stable, next i'll be resuming work on filtering out porn (for those who need to :)

11 Jan 2012, 5:55pm

categorian

firefox 9 breaks old photoblog bookmark

the latest photoblog bookmark works! please see above :)

11 Jan 2012, 4:45pm

categorian

Categorian :: Add-ons for Firefox

toolbar for firefox

looking for the toolbar? download it here

10 Jan 2012, 1:18pm

categorian

SUCats Forums

Fresh new new Forums are now online for fans of Blogspot, Categorian, Posterous, StumbleUpon, Tumblr, Wordpress, and more.

SUCats is made and run by some of our very own members :)

Check it out: SUCats

29 Dec 2011, 9:26pm

categorian

first queue upgrade completed

on the Queue page, you'll now see:
- a link to a new "diverted messages" page
- a "divert" link under each message

these allow you to block all messages from specific people, but still be able to go see what they wrote you :)

you can later decide to "allow all" messages from a person, and their messages will go back into your Queue page

29 Dec 2011, 9:22pm

categorian

contacts removed

the Friends page no longer has a Contacts section

it has been replaced by the new Diverted Messages page :)

27 Dec 2011, 9:40am

categorian

changes to visitors list

"Anonymous" visitors are no longer listed. they are ignored, just like random visitors from the internet :)

you are no longer listed as a visitor to your own blog. this often happened when visitors sent you messages

18 Dec 2011, 12:46pm

categorian

lowering posts per page

i plan to lower the maximum number of posts per page... to about 150.

so the blog with 30000 posts will have at least 200 pages :)

17 Dec 2011, 11:02pm

categorian

incoming rss feeds are now turned off

the rss checkbox is also removed from the Setup page

this does not affect the importer, or any imported posts :)

14 Dec 2011, 11:42pm

categorian

quickReply added

after checking your Queue, there's a new option to reply to the message using this smaller, quicker method

14 Dec 2011, 8:30pm

categorian

tiny icons

if you spot tiny icons in the library, it's an experiment :)

i want to see if i can tolerate icons in the listings, or if they give me a headache like su v3

it's definitely better when each item fits entirely on one line :)

12 Dec 2011, 10:23pm

categorian feature-request

feature request

Send to groups

ability to save groups, and send something to an entire group

12 Dec 2011, 11:01am

categorian

QuickSend improved

the checkboxes should be working now :)

11 Dec 2011, 1:51pm

categorian

additional Blog it bookmark

a new, optional "Blog it" bookmark opens your blog in a new window/tab for convenience

go to the Setup page to pick it up :)

11 Dec 2011, 12:04pm

categorian

bump improved

"bump" bumps to the top
↑ bumps up one
↓ bumps down one

11 Dec 2011, 11:49am

categorian

phasing out su rss

i'm planning on removing the su rss feeds

they're confusing people, and su will probably remove them soon anyway

this does not affect the importer, or any imported posts :)

5 Dec 2011, 5:58pm

categorian feature-request

feature request

custom favicons

it would be nice be able to add custom site icons, at least per blog

5 Dec 2011, 2:26pm

categorian

server configuration tweaked

this should help prevent "502" errors :)

27 Nov 2011, 9:41pm

categorian

usernames a-z reserved

i'm reserving the one-letter usernames a-z in for internal use (infrastructure services that live on subdomains :)

24 Nov 2011, 10:37pm

categorian

extra posts below page number!

do you have unwanted stuff under your blog's page number / arrows? have trouble seeing the arrows because of those extra posts?

go to your Setup page and UN-check the "show extra RSS Feed" checkbox.

that ought to help :)

24 Nov 2011, 9:13pm

categorian

session timeout increased

your account should stay logged in much longer while you're not active.

you can still log out at any time, of course :)

24 Nov 2011, 7:04pm

categorian

experimental SSL support added

the certificate is for categorian.com only.

this feature is *not* ready for general use :)

also, hi to WeAreGeek :D

24 Nov 2011, 6:37pm

categorian

privacy policy added

it's on the front page, and it reads:

"I hate spam. I don't share your private information with 3rd parties."

simple is best :)

24 Nov 2011, 3:18pm

categorian

importer upgraded

the latest version has better filtering of invalid characters.

it should be much less likely to give "illegal character code" errors now :)

17 Nov 2011, 12:11pm

categorian

"within five minutes" removed

the Recently Active page no longer has a section for members active within the last 5 minutes.

that section didn't work well as a "Online" indicator. it needlessly invaded privacy without providing options or controls. i'm rethinking the design.

you can still check who was online within the last hour :)

17 Nov 2011, 8:49am

categorian

this note was just sent in:

Quite a few bloggers use ImageShack as a host for their images and backgrounds. ImageShack has since February this year blocked many countries as you can read some here: http://www.ghacks.net/2011/03/07/your-country-can-only-view-this-image-by-logging-into-imageshack/

Due to this many blogs look like this:

for the benefit of our international users (which is essentially everybody :), it might be a good idea to move background images to another image hosting site.

15 Nov 2011, 11:03pm

categorian

return from editing

after editing a post, you now return to the page the post came from

many happy returns! :)

15 Nov 2011, 1:12pm

categorian feature-request

feature request

option for Stagger to show content from friends more often

13 Nov 2011, 9:22pm

categorian

UNSAFE Stagger option

Stagger now filters out NSFW material (such as porn) by default.

this first version is very strict!

it will become less conservative, over the coming months :)

so, there's a new option on the Setup page called "more-exciting, UNSAFE Stagger". notice the warning! :)

how does it work, and why is it so conservative?

this first version refers to a relatively short "whitelist" of domains, ones which are practically guaranteed not to present anything too racy or objectionable. any sites not on the list are ignored from Staggering.

the "whitelisted" domains are some of the most popular in the database, so there are thousands of pages of safe material to Stagger through.

on the positive side, clicking Stagger should now be completely safe by default. on the negative side, it can be somewhat boring, and there aren't many visuals!

more heuristics (rules of thumb) and the use of tags will be added as time goes on, and these will provide more subtle control over what's included in your Staggering :)

10 Nov 2011, 1:01pm

categorian

"local" tags

if you want to have your own "local" tags that DON'T go into the Library.... then just write them with a * at the beginning

for example, if you're posting things about a marathon you're running, you could tag them with:

*marathon

easy! and those tags won't go into the Library :)

7 Nov 2011, 9:18pm

categorian

installed the latest version of redis server :D

the plan is to mirror all the user records from mysql to redis so i can add to the schema without adding to the schema, so to speak.

need this for more easily adding a nsfw preference, but it has a number of other uses as well :)

4 Nov 2011, 7:27pm

categorian

feature requests are just people's requests for new features

i consider them all, and whether/how they fit into the design :)

4 Nov 2011, 6:00pm

categorian feature-request

feature request

jump to page number, or jump by sets of (10 or so) pages

4 Nov 2011, 5:44pm

categorian feature-request

feature request

Recently Active link on Friends page looks too much like a heading

4 Nov 2011, 5:40pm

categorian feature-request

feature anti-request

don't add competitive features: anything that can have numbers on it, like how many followers or page views, which disrupt harmony and impose pressures

3 Nov 2011, 7:03pm

categorian

categorizing is cool

if you tag something Flowers instead of just Photography, then people looking for Flowers can find it! :D

3 Nov 2011, 6:21pm

categorian feature-request

feature request

be able to add code to the html head section, that applies to every page

3 Nov 2011, 6:14pm

categorian feature-request

feature anti-request

don't add a 'like' function! it clutters things up

3 Nov 2011, 5:36pm

categorian feature-request

feature request

improve conversation display (message threading) in Queue

note to self: order by date, but then pull up by thread; similar to Recently Active page

3 Nov 2011, 4:41pm

categorian feature-request

feature request

questions and answers forum

3 Nov 2011, 3:08pm

categorian feature-request

feature request

when using stagger, see who added the page or has it in their blog

3 Nov 2011, 2:41pm

categorian feature-request

feature request

option for commenting on a post (something like a comments thread or giving the post a "like" in the thread)

3 Nov 2011, 12:21pm

categorian feature-request

feature request

option for private blogs that are shared only with selected members

3 Nov 2011, 12:00pm

categorian feature-request

feature request

don't stagger accidentally into porn

edit: mission accomplished! to a first approximation :)

3 Nov 2011, 11:16am

categorian feature-request

feature request

remove the flag when you visit a subscriber, rather than after 15 days

3 Nov 2011, 11:12am

categorian feature-request

feature request

(on tags page) tag text is proportionally sized to represent the approximate number of entries in it, or other method such as a numeral beside tag to show approximate number of entries in that tag

1 Nov 2011, 7:46pm

categorian

friends page online

sorry about that minor outage! :)

the little green flags show people who subscribed within the last 15 days

1 Nov 2011, 5:08pm

categorian

added "my url" link

what url do you send people, to bring them to your blog?

copy the link that says my url -- it's across from your username, on your main blog page :)

1 Nov 2011, 9:57am

categorian

if the way i run this place seems unorthodox... it's true! :)

my time is scarce, so the design and operation are based on simplicity of implementation and minimizing the need for maintenance.

31 Oct 2011, 7:37pm

categorian

categorian facebook group

haha, that didn't take long! :)

orfie started a categorian facebook group that's open to all :D

31 Oct 2011, 7:03pm

categorian

importer upload fixed

if you've been getting a "connection reset" error while uploading your WXR file to the importer, try again -- it should be fixed now :)

thanks to jerzee55sst for the report! :D

30 Oct 2011, 10:59pm

categorian

importer online

i would have liked to test it more, but due to popular demand... :)

there's a link to the importer on the bottom of your Setup page

30 Oct 2011, 9:08pm

categorian

database server upgraded

all site functions are now running from one moderately fast server :)

30 Oct 2011, 10:35am

categorian

Nudes, Porn, Violence, etc

As a courtesy to your fellow users, please tag posts you think might be objectionable (e.g., porn, guns, nude art, etc).

Some people will want to find them, and other people will want to avoid them.

Tagging your posts will help in both cases :)

30 Oct 2011, 9:37am

categorian

we've *got* to have *more* power!

i'll see what i can do with the database server later today :D

this will mean 20-30 minutes of downtime, several hours from now...

29 Oct 2011, 5:41pm

categorian

toolbar auto-login

i'm now allowing WeAreGeek's Categorian toolbar to log in automatically.

this should make it even easier to use, especially the Queue button :)

29 Oct 2011, 3:35pm

categorian

top-of-page links updated

the help link now goes directly to the help page

and the Categorian link now goes to my blog, showing all Categorian posts :)

28 Oct 2011, 11:14pm

categorian

importer in testing

new version of the importer is now being tested.

the first test was successful: a large blog with 20126 posts came in, in about 3 hours.

i may do another server upgrade tomorrow to speed up these large imports.

27 Oct 2011, 10:44pm

categorian

next up

once i have the importer back online and sufficiently error-resistant, the next things on my list are:

nsfw filter! :)
more speed!! :D

27 Oct 2011, 9:08pm

categorian

beware of porn

there is not yet a NSFW filter, so if you indiscriminately (randomly) click on things, you might run into porn.

actually that's a lot like the internet in general. but still, you have been warned :)

25 Oct 2011, 11:05am

categorian

security upgraded

it's now impossible to put any of your sensitive categorian account bookmarks into a blog post, whether on purpose or accidentally :)

thanks to orfie and lisashaz39 for reporting the strange behavior that led to this upgrade :D

24 Oct 2011, 10:33pm

categorian

ok, i've got a strategy for filtering out illegal character codes in the importer... but seeing as i'm starting to hallucinate, i think i'll be taking the rest of the night to rest :D

maybe i can squeeze something in, before dawn tomorrow morning? well see :)

24 Oct 2011, 1:41pm

categorian su

man, i hope everybody exported from SU in time

edit: there's a rumor going around that you can still use SU's exporter!

24 Oct 2011, 7:49am

categorian

i'll tweak the importer tonight and put it back online :)

24 Oct 2011, 7:22am

categorian

all right! we have *speed* again :D

24 Oct 2011, 12:11am

categorian

the additional server is up... and so am i... way past my bedtime :D
if all goes well, we'll wake up to a stable, faster categorian in the morning :)
good night all...

23 Oct 2011, 7:57pm

categorian

making progress on the additional server. keep your fingers crossed! :D

23 Oct 2011, 1:21pm

categorian

i'm taking the importer offline for at least several hours, to make improvements.
this is to deal with errors that i'm finding *inside* the wxr files.

i'll update this notice later today with more information :)

edit: we seriously need more server power. i'll see what i can do.
edit 2: making progress on the additional server. keep your fingers crossed :)
edit 3: i think we're almost there... :D
edit 4: it worked

i'll tweak the importer tonight (monday night) and put it back online :)

note: there's *no* time limit on importing! :D
just make SURE you get your wxr file from SU's export process, and your blog will be safe :)

21 Oct 2011, 9:33am

categorian

the importer ran out of memory overnight!
sorry guys, that's why you couldn't connect to it :)
i may have to modify it yet again tonight to better handle those really large blogs :D

go ahead and try it again :)

20 Oct 2011, 11:22pm

categorian

latest modifications to the importer are working great -- no more interrupted imports, *nor* UTF-8 errors! :D

20 Oct 2011, 8:34pm

categorian

some people's exported blogs seem to have invalid characters in them... leading to XML syntax errors when importing.

i'm now looking at possible workarounds for that on my end :)

19 Oct 2011, 7:15pm

categorian

ok, i'm off to dinner. hold all my calls! XD
last night's progress on the importer was great, but it still needs a little more work.
i'll be back for corrections in a while... :)

18 Oct 2011, 5:39pm

categorian

now making corrections to importer :)

17 Oct 2011, 11:25pm

categorian

SU Blog Importer BETA

Hi all! Our SU Blog Importer is now in Beta testing, and we're getting great results from it. Once the last kinks are worked out, it will be ready for you to use :)

To prepare, go ahead and export your SU blog, following steps 1-3 of SU's Blog Export Guide, and hold on to the WXR file that is produced.

NOTE: If you already exported your SU blog, *before October 5th*, please EXPORT IT AGAIN. Any WXR file you have may contain errors! SU fixed these errors after the 5th.

Looking forward to seeing your blogs! :D

17 Oct 2011, 12:40pm

categorian

whoops! looks like someone tried to use a wxr that was exported awhile back... before su fixed the ampersand encoding issue :-/

i'll have to warn people about that

17 Oct 2011, 11:31am

categorian

:) had to restart the importer. somebody fed it a file that was *not* a wxr!

16 Oct 2011, 11:07pm

categorian

importer beta testing is going great! :D

16 Oct 2011, 12:15am

categorian

did some additional alpha testing -- looks good! :)
phew, tired... i'll finish setting up the beta test tomorrow am.

15 Oct 2011, 9:24am

categorian

the importer's first beta test will be today :)

Tags → categorian