Get your heart rate going

One of the abilities that I have added to UUpdates Is the ability to rate sites that are being aggregated. Previously the site only had the ability to filter/ignore posts from certain sites.  Someone suggested that it might be useful not to entirely block certain sites, but rather it would be good to have a way to designate certain sites so that they could view updates from only their favorites, most sites or if they wanted to review all the posts on the site depending on how much time they had to peruse the site.

By default when you log onto the site you will see an indicator saying that you are viewing sites you have rated 3 stars or higher:

You will also find (again, you must be logged in) the ability to rate each site as each post from a site is displayed, or in the list of sites.  Just hover over the hearts and click to indicate your level of interest in that site.  In this example I have rated the Interdependent Web as 5 hearts:

Other sites you might not be as interested in.  So those sites you can rate 1 or 2 hearts and they will not appear by default when you visit the site.  You can always check back on sites and change their ratings.

In a hurry and only want to see the content you really love?  Just click the filter to only show the sites rated as 4 or 5 stars.  Log in on your phone, tablet or any device and all your selections come with you.

Hopefully this wil prove to be a quick and easy way to be more selective about the content you follow.

New site is live

The new version of UUpdates UU RSS aggregator is live, and as far as I can tell any legacy functionality is still working.  For example the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of St. Petersburg is using UUpdates to generate a list of UU Quotes.  If you notice any issues with the site please do let me know.  I am taking a look at what it would take to make the site a little better on Internet Explorer 8, but aside from that I am not noticing any major issues.  If you do notice anything wacky going on please do let me know!

Mobile site

I have set up a mobile site at http://m.uupdates.net/.  I had already set up a css for small screens, but it was not working on my new phone.  If anyone with a mobile phone could let me know how the new mobile site looks I would appreciate it.

Better mobile version on the horizon.

Down for maintenance

Minor issue with the new host (mostly my own fault) will cause some downtime tonight should be starting at 9:00 PM Eastern Time. I am getting to know the new hosting offering. I went with http://myhosting.com/ because they had a pretty good deal on VPS plans. So far, not so bad., a lot to like but customer service seems difficult to get a hold of. If you are going the VPS route with them be prepared to fend for yourself. On the plus side you have lots of power, on the down side you can use that power to shoot yourself in the foot. Kinda like I did. What the company lack in service is made up in the offering. The CPU, RAM, etc. for the price is way better than any other VPS (with a decent track record) I could find. Downtime is expected to be anywhere from an hour to two (hopefully not much more).

Hosting Migration

UUpdates is migrating to a new host. Unless you are a big fan of the Wiki (and judging by the usage no one was) you probably won't even notice the change. Or hopefully you won't. If anything seems odd or there are hiccups in the process please let me know.

Feedback

Occasionally when UUpdates has had issues the feedback pages have also had issues. So, I am just opening up this post for any feedback in case the email or other feedback mechanisms are broken.

Hosting Company Recommendations?

Anyone have suggestions for a good hosting company? My current hosting company has annoyed me for the last time. It is more than time to move on. Requirements include:

• Would be nice if they were a "green" host. Run on wind power or some such.
• Need at least 2-3 GB of bandwidth per month. Thousands of visitors and all the fetching traffic add up.
• PHP/MySQL are absolute musts fewer the limitations on number of databases, etc. the better
• Ability to host multiple domains
• Cron support (or some scheduled task) is a must
• SSH is a must
• Ability to acces at least port 80 outbound from the server
• 24x7 chat with Tech Support (for cases like now when they mess things up)
  

Anyone know anything about http://www.sustainablewebsites.com? In my quick searches they looked good.

Thanks

UUpdates small screen rendering

If you have checked out UUpdates in the past on a mobile phone like the iPhone, then you might want to check it out again. I won't go into the technical details (unless asked), but suffice it to say it should look much better now that I have been able to look at it myself.

I recently got a G1 Google phone and I have to say I am very impressed with the idea of cloud computing. Within minutes of signing in on the phone I had access to all my Google apps (like Gmail) and associated contacts. I imported the phone numbers that previously only existed on my phone's SIM card and now I have them in an easily editable format online. With other mobile devices the Palm Handheld there was always the big worry of making sure it got synched so you wouldn't lose your data. I trust the data integrity on Google's servers more than I do a portable handeld device.

Anyway, if there are any comments on the updated layout. For example if it broke something, or doesn't look better please let me know.

Disappointed with Gmail

In general I have really been enjoying Gmail, but recently something has happened which really annoys me. Gmail has tagged some e-mails sent from UUpdates as spam. And, of course, they were not. I think a quick search has revealed the messages and now i am working my way through them. If you sent something along feel free to resend, but hopefully i will be responding shortly. If you do not see a response shortly please do send me a note again.

I don't see an option in Gmail to run a filter that says "if the message matches this criteria then under no circumstances put it in the spam filter". Anyone know how this can be done?