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.

Anonymous, not exactly

I have not tried to stay anonymous, certain things would give away my identity, but I certainly have tried to keep a low profile.  I declined an offer to be interviewed by Peter Bowden of UU Planet because I know how I get tongue tied in front of a camera.

On of my favorite hymns says:

“If you cannot sing like angels, if you cannot speak before thousands, you can give from deep within you. You can change the world with your love.”

Yep, I am not the kind of person who can speak before thousands.  But fortunately there are other ways to contribute.  That is why I set up UUpdates.net. it is my labor of love.

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!

Teaser #2 for new site.

OK, final teaser before going live with the new site.  I will continue blogging about new features and soliciting feedback, but I will do more of that when the site is live and folks can check it out.  But for the teaser shot there are 2 things to show here.  First the much improved tag cloud, and second the much improved look on a mobile device.

The new site is ready to roll, but before I turn it loose I need to ensure that I don't break anything for folks using the utilities or distributing updates via javascript/rss.  This should not take too long, and I really don't want to break anything in migration.

In terms of Unitarian universalist blogs I really like this cloud: Religion, Theology, Social Justice, Love Spirituality... good stuff.

New UUpdates Logo

It has been a while since I have made any substantial changes to UUpdates.  But after a few job changes, a career change, major surgery, moving cities, etc. etc. I finally got the time and was able to set to work on fixing some of the deficiencies with the current site.  It is not quite ready to go live, but things are definitely in the home stretch as I put it through the paces to make sure it is ready to go live.  Hopefully more will be coming soon, but in the meantime I have created a new chalice for the new site.  I have also submitted this to the UUA, for anyone who would like to reuse this for spreading the word about Unitarian Universalism please feel free. 

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.

Standing on the Side of Love

I have made a change to one of the sites that is being tracked by UUpdates. I was tracking the main feed for the "Standing On The Side Of Love" site (http://www.standingonthesideoflove.org/feed/) but it appears that some of the items from the feed link to blank pages. So, I have updated the site to track http://www.standingonthesideoflove.org/category/blog/feed/ instead. Unfortunately it looks like there is no way to follow the "In the News" feed and automatically link through to the desired content. If you are interested in following that then you will need to follow the updates here:
http://www.standingonthesideoflove.org/news/

UUpdates site maintenance

The hosting company providing services for UUpdates migrated the system to a new server. Ever since then I was looking for a new hosting company. I did find one, but things did not work out well. So, I am making my way through any issues that I find with the site currently to fix it post migration.

It looks like finding a new host might be difficult. The site has enough activity that the basic hosting plans will suspend the account for too much activity. The dedicated hosting plans are bit expensive (and that is what the sales reps push me towards).

So, I am going to be rewriting sections of the code to optimize the data collection. As blogs become less active it will scale down the frequency with which updates are checked on that blog. I am hoping to be able to make these changes without interruption, but you may notice some odd behavior over the next few weeks.

If you notice any issues with the site, or odd behavior, please let me know.

Since this posted a while ago

Due to some server issues, migration, etc. etc. I got a tad behind on adding entries to UUpdates. One blog seems to be updated fairly regularly, and the particular post of interest is no longer current I thought I would link to it here. Check out this post on growing religion through social media.

Minor Interruptions

There may be minor interruptions as UUpdates is migrated to a new server. The hosting company that I am currently using (I will be asking for recommendations for a new host in a later post) was bought out and the servers got migrated despite my selecting the "I will do this manually option".

Hopefully things will be straightened out shortly.

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.

UUpdates stalled

So, my company is bought and it's the big move weekend. This means disconnecting all the servers trucking them to another city, setting everything up and spending a lot of time fixing anything that's broke. Long weekend with 14+ hour days at work.

None of this had anything to do with why UUpdates wasn't available, that I could have planned for, but wouldn't you know it the hosting provider chooses to perform and upgrade that knocks it offline the same weekend I am super busy. Nice timing.

The provider is having bigger issues, they say they will hopefully resolve things soon.

Server Upgrade

The ISP let me know that my site, and most of it's settings had been migrated. I have managed to mostly get things running, but you may notice some odd behavior. If you do please let me know, like strange characters, sites not updating, etc. I have been working through a list of errors I have noticed.

Site Redesign

A three column format seemed inappropriate when most folks simply are there to click through to the latest updates. All the menu options (and a bunch more) are still there. If you notice any "buggy" behavior with the new software let me know. I'll highlight individual features in new blog posts.

Enhancements

I am almost ready to release the new UUpdates. Two changes have been made to the current site and will carry over into the new one:

First is a set of optimizations to the database. I did some things to make results faster, and some of you may have noticed the total page count was lowered. By looking at the web traffic I noticed that people are far more interested in the latest information than they are in digging in deep, at least not routinely. So, I lowered the number of "feed items" stored to 10 items per site. Some sites had up to 30 items of monthly updates, which were unlikely to ever get read. The filter is just that -- not an extensive search -- as it is limited to pulling from only the excerpt and the title, so it's best used to track hot topics which are likely to appear in the title or first part of the post like filtering on "Second Life" which is getting a lot of press. But the more limited number of posts means searching back is less productive.

The second enhancement is really to offset the first. When it comes to searching I can't compete with a service like Google, so why bother trying? Thanks to Paul Wilczynski I don't have to compete, I can use Google. If a filter on UUpdates fails to find any results, the user will be directed to a page that contains the search results for the same term on Google Search of UU Blogs. Try an obscure reference like "equus" and UUpdates will return no results (at least it didn't when I tried it, Harry Potter's (Daniel Radcliffe) photos could change that). But UUBlogSearch.com will return results.

New Chalice coming soon

Like Ms. Kitty I am thrilled to be mentioned in the latest UU World. more specifically UUpdates.net and not my blog. After the UU Blog Awards I got a bit of a bug to work on a redesign and finally kicking out some new functionality. It's not there yet, but in anticipation I wanted to share one thing I have finally settled on, a new logo/chalice.

The chalice idea is basically an inversion of an RSS button, with with orange radiating out instead of white. Unlike the new UUA chalice I wanted to keep the chalice off center, as the old Universalists did the off center with symbolic purpose. It's the same idea as the current chalice, but I like the new chalice a whole lot more. It looks less "Atari 2600".

Giving credit where credit is due the actual chalice above was done by Scott Abbotts I merely changed the "circles" around it.

I am sort of bummed I didn't finish the work before the publicity. The new release is coming.

2006 Top Sites

Happy New year everybody. Year end seems like a good time to put together another "top X" list. So, this time I decided to pull the top 50. And here they are:

1. The ChaliceBlog


2. PeaceBang


3. Boy in the Bands: Scott Wells on the practice of Christian faith


4. Philocrites


5. A Minister's Musings


6. Yet Another Unitarian Universalist


7. A Spiritual Walk Together


8. The Happy Feminist


9. Making Chutney


10. PeaceBang's Beauty Tips For Ministers


11. The Journey


12. Media Nation


13. it's all one thing


14. CUUMBAYA


15. Shadow of Diogenes


16. Authentic Threads


17. Errant Frogs


18. The Wild Hunt


19. ministrare


20. RadicalHapa is Joseph Santos-Lyons


21. Live from UU PLANET


22. Sisyphus


23. Jess's Journal


24. Paul Wilczynski's Observations


25. Sexuality and Religion: What's the Connection?


26. Never Say Never To Your Traveling Self


27. Elizabeth's Little Blog


28. Ms. Kitty's Saloon and Road Show


29. iMinister


30. BiddiesInMyBrain


31. Trivium


32. debitage


33. Unitarian Panentheist


34. Returning . . .


35. Red State Rebels


36. Spirituality and Sunflowers


37. Reignite


38. Unity


39. BiddiesInMyBrain


40. Finding My UU Soul


41. the Socinian


42. Renewed Hope


43. Reflections


44. Root and Source


45. the yes church


46. UU Carnival


47. The UU Enforcer


48. The Ranting Rev


49. Birthing Journey


50. FUUSE

Some blog name changes and other factors might have moved the standings around a bit, for example if your blog name changed from "Arbitrary Name" to "arbitraryname.com" then the links over to your blog would have been split between 2 "different blogs". Also, this is a total over the year. if your blog is new then it is unlikely to reach the top.

How many people clicked through? Well for the folks at the top spots I sent over 2,000 "Unique Views" (as defined by Google Analytics) to each of those sites. For the sites at the low end it's a few hundred, and somewhere in between for everyone else.

Again, happy new year, and start thinking of those Blog Award nominations!

The Top 30

Ok, so no promises that this will be a regular feature, but people seemed to enjoy it last time. Here is the top 30 places people visited from UUpdates for the past 30 days.

1. The ChaliceBlog


2. PeaceBang


3. The Happy Feminist


4. PeaceBang's Beauty Tips For Ministers


5. arbitrarymarks.com


6. Yet Another Unitarian Universalist


7. Boy in the bands


8. Lo-Fi Tribe


9. Making Chutney


10. Elizabeth's Little Blog


11. CUUMBAYA


12. Sexuality and Religion: What's the Connection?


13. Media Nation


14. Philocrites


15. Jess's Journal


16. Ms. Kitty's Saloon and Road Show


17. Finding My UU Soul


18. The Wild Hunt


19. The Journey


20. Sisyphus


21. debitage


22. Shadow of Diogenes


23. ministrare


24. Spirituality and Sunflowers


25. iMinister


26. Returning . . .


27. thelivelytradition


28. RadicalHapa is Joseph Santos-Lyons


29. Paul Wilczynski's Observations


30. Red State Rebels

Blog Removal

Typically I don't mention it when I remove a blog from UUpdates. Generally it's an unceremonious removal of a blog that has gone defunct. But I thought I would mention this one because it means the removal of a UU Blog Award winner. So, a fond farewell and best wishes to Lo-Fi Tribe's Shawn Anthony.