I received five messages about various plugins of mine today. I don't think I've gotten so many in one day before. Hopefully, I've resolved everyone's issues.

There is a new plugin online for y'all. It's called "Countdown", and it lets you maintain a list of events like the ones you see in my sidebar under "Dates To Remember". You basically drop the plugin and a dates.txt file into your plugin directory, enable the plugin, add the output code to your WordPress template (read the readme.txt), update the dates file through the WP admin, and *poof*. You've got birthdays and holidays and all.

One nice thing that it does that you won't expect is that it will let you specify a date that recurs, like a birthday, or a date that is a one-time event, like this year's office Christmas party. Even nicer is that you can specify dates like "2nd monday september" and it'll figure it out every year.

The included dates.txt file has settings in it already for Memorial Day, Thanksgiving, and Daylight Savings. You should add your own.

Download it from the usual place.

Comments

Comment by ThePete on .
ThePete
Hi, a good number of your WP hacks look pretty cool. I tried using Adhesive, Countdown, EZStatic and MicroWiki and could only get Countdown to work. I'm using WP 1.2 and would loooove to get that MicroWiki to work. Any chance you could do some docs to better explain how to install EZStatic and MicroWiki? Thanks regardless for your great work!
Comment by Robert on .
Robert
Exhibit is a wonderful plugin, my thanks:~) I have two points to raise… 1) Exhibit seems to leave fewer error lines (in my server log) if I don’t use images from the root of the specified images area. If they are used from a deeper subdirectory the errors line slow down. I can live with subdirectories but would like to fix the error lines. 2) The (system) messages log keeps kicking out these lines… Dec 10 10:53:47 systa httpd: PHP Warning: Invalid argument supplied for foreach() in /home/e-smith/files/ibays/gl/html/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/exhibitimg/exhibit10i.php on line 310 …and they always cite that one line. I even get them if I edit a thread that doesn’t even have a picture ’exhibited’. Is there something I might be able to do to resolve whatever issue is at fault at my site?
Comment by Owen on .
Owen
Well... 1) It works. :) 2) It's smaller. 3) The checkbox appears where it's supposed to more often. 4) The "Last 15 Posts" list in the admin includes sticky posts at the top, shown as "Sticky:Post_Title". 5) I put the sticky date text into a variable and moved it to the top so people can find it. 6) It uses built-in post queries instead of custom ones and magical post-jiggering to implement the stickiness. 7) There is detailed and hopefully useful documentation now in my wiki, which is pointed to by a readme.txt in the archive. For whatever reason, people just didn't look at the code (where the installation insructions are), and then assumed that I hadn't written installation instructions, and then assumed that they'd never figure out how to install it, so I'd get all kinds of mail. Anyway, no more of that. One new feature is that you can set it to not display sticky posts on the home page, but only on category pages. For most people that get excited about this feature it's probably not what they think, but it's a step in that direction.
Comment by ThePete on .
ThePete
Thanks for the new docs, Owen! Actually, I did check the files themselves for the instructions, but I found them a bit lacking. I'm far from Mr. PHP, so I need more than "put file A here and activate it here" to make sense of what a plugin is even for--like EzStatic, which I only installed because I wanted to use MicroWiki, I need a bit more than I found--not your fault, I'm just a n00b. Either way, thanks for all of your hard work--even if I can't get all of your plugins to work, obviously there are plenty of people who can, so that's awesome enough for me.
Comment by Owen on .
Owen
Well I hope that the new docs help get things working. I'm really not as bitter as I appear in some of the instructions (the EzStatic ones in particular), I just get very frustrated when people do the simplest thing they can possibly imagine to get one of my plugins to work and then go on at length about how it's no good, never worked, and can't possibly work, and then ask me to tell them where they can find something that does work, rather than trying to figure it out a little and asking learning questions (as opposed to the "Will you ever make this work right?" that I normally get). The nerve! Obviously these plugins work somewhere, because I use them all here. I've tested them on freash WordPress installations. If something is not working, it's likely due to a change that they made, so it's particularly frustrating when someone says "I don't know PHP", yet they know enough to break WordPress for what should be a drop-in install. Ranting complete. For now.
Comment by ThePete on .
ThePete
I understand--and don't blame you for feeling the way you do. I did figure out what was wrong--I have WP installed in a subdirectory but keep the index in my root. When I tell EzStatic to look for a directory (index.php?static=directory) it looks in the subdirectory WP is in. I tried digging through your script to see if I could fix it, but no luck. Unless you know off the top of your head how I can fix this, don't worry about it. I'll figure something out. Thanks again!
Comment by ThePete on .
ThePete
Damn! I tried DLing it from the same link but in a different browser (Firefox instead of Camino) and got the proper files. D'oh! (I guess) Anyway, so things seem to be working fine now. I'm not sure my MicroWiki install is seeing that I'm logged in but, I'll mess with it and make it work. Thanks again, Owen!! I really appreciate the plugins!!
Comment by ThePete on .
ThePete
Cool--well, I'm happy to help but try to get it right on my own 1st. Everything's up and running--the only problems I am having now are 1) I can't resize the content so that the sidebar doesn't cover it and 2) I can't seem to log in. I've tried 2 different browsers and cleared caches and so on. Feel free to check it out and tell me what you think. (Feel free to post to my tag board if you don't want to keep piling on the comments to this site.) Thanks again for your help.
Comment by John on .
John
Owen, Seems that 2.1 solved ALL my problems, and makes me VERY happy. Thanks for the quick fix!!! FYI - I'm getting this error from your verification page. It's probably due to the fact that my reverse dns isn't properly registered. I'm using a free DNS server from afraid.org to register my static IP. They can't register the reverse because it's owned by comcast. Fatal error: Call to undefined function: checkdnsrr() in C:\Program Files\Ensim\Sitedata\asymptomatic\Inetpub\wwwroot\wp-content\spam-karma\captcha_confirm_form.php on line 246 John
Comment by Owen on .
Owen
Great! I'm glad Adhesive is working for you. The checkdnsrr() thing is a problem in Spam Karma. It might be fixed in a newer version, but I got tired of upgrading every time Dr.Dave makes a change (like, every half hour), so I probably don't have it if it does exist. I made a small fix and things look ok from here.
Comment by ThePete on .
ThePete
Just wanted to pass on something I figured out about the MicroWiki script. It tends to not work quite as advertised on some browsers if your WP index.php file is outside of your WP directory. Basically, in some browsers (most that I tried) the MW script can't tell that you're logged in, even if you are. It's a weird glitch within WP that they say will be fixed in 1.3. (I'm not daring enough to give the beta a try just yet.) However, I found a fairly straightforward solution. You simply leave a copy of your WP index.php in your WP directory with this in the index.php's head: < ?php /* Don't remove this line. */ require('./wp-blog-header.php'); ?> Then, to access the wiki, you don't go to where your main WP index.php file is--you go to the one in your WP directory, like this: http://blahblah.com/wpress/index.php?static=wiki At least, that's working for me. Please feel free to contact me if anyone has questions I may be able to help with. And thanks again to Owen for making the plugin in the first place!! Now if I can just figure out how to include the latest additions to the wiki on my main page.
Comment by Owen on .
Owen
Wow, ThePete, I'm sorry I've been unresponsive, but I'm glad you've seemed to sort out the problem you were having. I'll see what I can do with the MicroWiki docs to address the issue, but at first glance, I think this is the prescribed method for using WordPress from a subdirectory. Anyhow, MicroWiki is missing a "delete" feature, which kind of sucks, doesn't it? Maybe I'll add that next. :)
Comment by ThePete on .
ThePete
I hate to keep posting, but I feel like I need to ask you to post the code you use to include your "from the wiki" section on your site. I've tried many different methods for getting the RSS to show up, but it just doesn't do it. I'm not sure if it's something I'm doing wrong or what. I'd appreciate anything you can pass on and apologize if I'm being rude by posting so much. I did do my best to find a solution on my own with no luck. Thanks, Owen!
Comment by Owen on .
Owen
I cheated: $wikipage = $wpdb->get_row("SELECT mw_wiki.*, CHAR_LENGTH(mw_wiki.body) as sz FROM mw_wiki LEFT JOIN mw_wiki AS s2 ON mw_wiki.keyword = s2.keyword AND mw_wiki.postdate < s2.postdate WHERE s2.id IS NULL ORDER BY mw_wiki.postdate DESC LIMIT 1"); echo "<a href="http://www.asymptomatic.net/_wiki/{$wikipage->keyword}">". ((($wikipage->title)=='')?$wikipage->keyword:$wikipage->title)."</a>";
Comment by Georg Bauer on .
Georg Bauer
There is a little bug in adhesive with regard to the the_date function: it allways removes the date, even on single pages. As I understand it on single pages (when only the sticky post is shown) the date should be shown. I added a && (!is_single()) condition to the check in the adhesive_the_date filter and now it works fine.
Comment by zogre on .
zogre
Hi i've been trying to setup Exhibit but i'm getting an error on the exhibit_full.php page. Fatal error: Call to undefined function: numeric_index() in /web/htdocs/www.stereotipic.it/home/wp-content/plugins/exhibitimg/exhibit10p.php on line 650 Everything else looks like it's working properly: create thumbs, inserting them into posts, previews etc. Folders and files should have the correct permissions but i didn't configure the chmod option in the exhibit config: could it be a problem? I'm putting back up the post so you can have a look if it helps. the post i'm talking about thanx in advance
Comment by Alejandro on .
Alejandro
Hi there, thies might be a stupid question, but I have just came to the "WorldPress" world ;) and I've tried your countdown plugin and I live it (exhibit is one of the best plugins thou). Anyway, I'm not good at programming so here is my question: I see the "dates to remember (gray, don't like it and it's dificoult to read) and the dates in the same color! How can I change that? Well, I hope you can help me :) Nice work. Saludos Alejandro
Comment by Owen on .
Owen
zogre- Sorry for the delay. The lines in exhibit10p.php that use numeric_index() should be calling exhibit_numeric_index() instead. If you make the change, it should work. fukami- I don't know what you mean. Only the very next occurrance of a repeating event appears in the list. So if it should happen more than once within the list range you've specified, you'll only see the first instance. Is this a bug? I don't know - you tell me. Alejandro- All of the date styling is handled via CSS. You should be able to set the style of the LI/UL tag that contains your date list so that the elements that are hard to read (likely they are dates in the past, with a special class) become easier to read. On my site the classname is ".importantdates", but yours may be different. By default, the LI tags for dates in the past are styles with the class ".pastevent".
Comment by owen on .
owen
Yeah, ok... This one is not so obvious, but I'm sure it will make sense when I explain it. All of your sidebar's LI elements that appear in black (the color you want) are links. So your links are styled as black, but the default color for LI elements that aren't links is gray. What you need to do is add something like this to your stylesheet: #menu ul ul li {color:black} That seems to fix it. Good luck!
Comment by owen on .
owen
Ok, I'll answer this one, but I'm not fielding any more CSS questions. You'll have to find a CSS reference and figure things out for yourself. There are plenty of good books available, and there are a number of well-maintained resources online to reference as well. You might even be able to find links to this kind of info at the WordPress codex. Each of the sections in the sidebar has an id parameter it. You can use the id to specify the color of the subject of individual items in the sidebar. For example: #categories {color:lime;} If you want to change all of them at once, you need the tag type for the menu titles and the container that they're in: #menu li {color:lime;} Note that with CSS, if some other rule provides more specifiers than you do, it will override your settings. So if you want to add a new rule that changes the color of items in the menu, you need something like: #menu ul li li a {color:pink;} -- OSA: Approved WordPress User Level: 10 Post commenting expired for this post 43 days ago. Final filter result: 10 --
Comment by Bill Sherlock on .
Bill Sherlock
Don't know if you read the support forums at Wordpress and the last post there regarding Exhibit is dated last June, so I thought I'd try you here. I'm running WP 1.5 beta 1. The thumbnailing process works, which seems to be the bugaboo for most, so I'm kind of at a loss as to what's going on. The problem is when I click on the image to add it to the post nothing happens. I know this is not much to go on but any hints would be appreciated. Thanks, Bill
Comment by Jason on .
Jason
I'm trying to use your countdown plugin, but when I put the code into the sidebar template, I get the followign error: Fatal error: Call to undefined function: gettime() in /home/.alexi/idcadmin103/indianademclub.org/blog/wp-content/plugins/countdown.php on line 171 Any clue? Is it a server config issue? Am I plain out of luck? THanks a bunch. This plugin looks like just what I need and I really hope I can get it working.
Comment by Jason on .
Jason
gonna be a pain in the ass again. sorry. things seem to be working okay, except all my dates seem to be skipping from february to december. I put something like "4th tue all FOO" and it shows the next event being the 4th tuesday of december. I set option in dates_to_remember to start earlier this month and it gets the february date. but nothing for any month mar-nov shows up using 'all' I'm using alpha 5 of countdown. Should I try an earlier version? thanks for the great plugin and the even better support. doubt there's much I can do to repay, but hey, let me know.
Comment by Silky on .
Silky
Hi!... I just want to ask in setting up / integrating MicroWiki and EzStatic into my blog theme (Obsidian2).. I have no experience in PHP nor StyleSheets coding.. I did not know where else to ask for this, as there is no specific forums (and WordPress Support Forum is very slow).. It does work with only one column, but the problem is how to make one-column page for only those wiki pages? Thanks for any answers...
Comment by sean nordbø on .
sean nordbø
I installed adhesive and ut seems to work, just two smaller problems. 1. When I load the page after I've marked a post as sticky I get a "Done, but error on page" most of the time. And it seems that a "Object is missing". Everything work, just the error message that's a bit annoying. 2. I can't style either Adhesive or Countdown, no matter what i do in my CSS it doesn't work. Probably my lack of knowledge. Would appreciate some help. My site is: www.seansite.net btw.
Comment by Owen on .
Owen
I created a Countdown wiki page that has some ideas about styling Countdown. Your page isn't styling countdown because you don't have any way to address those tags. There are no IDs or classes. Add one and you'll find it much easier to create a style rule that works. I need to see errors to debug them. Sorry, but as you might imagine, there just isn't time for me to speculate what errors might be.
Comment by Darrell Schulte on .
Darrell Schulte
WP 1.5 Version: 1.0 alpha 5 Mar. 28 - Blah event (1 days) Mar. 31 - Blah event again (4 days) Wanted to ditch the "s" when there was one day to go...so, within the countdown_days function I commented out one line and added a few others. I'm not sure if it's exactly right (I'm sure there's possibly a more elegant want to get the same results), but it seems to work. //echo ($until == 0) ? 'Today' : "{$until} days"; if($until == 0) { echo "Today"; } elseif ($until == 1) { echo "{$until} day"; } else { echo "{$until} days"; } results are now: Mar. 28 - Blah event (1 day) Mar. 31 - Blah event again (4 days) Thanks for the plugin. Very nice.
Comment by waymorefunner on .
waymorefunner
Amazing what you can find in comments here. I just ran into the gettime() error today and now it's fixed based on these comments. Plus, I wanted to pass along code similar to Darrell's here that I used to do the same kind of thing with Today/day/days. The only difference is that I also decided to bold everything that was a "today" thing. $date_print = date($date_format, strtotime($date)); echo ($until == 0) ? "$date_print" : $date_print; echo ($until == 0) ? " - {$event} (" : " - {$event} ("; echo ($until == 0) ? "Today" : ""; echo ($until == 1) ? "{$until} day" : ""; echo ($until > 1) ? "{$until} days" : ""; echo ($until == 0) ? ")" : ")"; echo $endswith;
Comment by Darrell Schulte on .
Darrell Schulte
Rick -- What parameters are you sending dates_to_remember? What format are you using for dates.txt? waymorefunner -- nice. Owen (or the masses) -- I tried it once already, but had mixed (read: failed) results, but if anyone has a nice PHP trick to selectively show the countdown for certain days, I'd be interested. Something like: Y 2005-03-28 Blah event N 2005-03-31 Blah event again Y 2005-04-01 Blah event once again Mar. 28 - Blah event (1 day) Mar. 31 - Blah event again Apr. 1 - Blah event once again (5 days) or along these lines anyway...there were some instances were I preferred to not see the remaining days for some, but not for others.