Aquila Online

A minor refresh

// April 30th, 2011 // 1 Comment » // Blog Stuff

As I mentioned in my previous post, the latest WordPress core update did not play nice with the theme on Aquilaonline. Suffice to say, I’ve had to do a minor theme refresh to get the various elements, plug-ins, widgets and other bits of code to work again.

In the process, I’ve had to kill some of my favourite (read: labour of love tinkering) widgets.

One of these used to show album art of the recently scrobbled songs on Last.fm. Took me ages to “perfect” the look and feel of the album covers, together with the placement on the site and corresponding links back to the track and artist info on Last.fm When I think about it, I wonder if anybody was really interested in what I was listening to? I guess the same could be said for people posting their top 5 artists/songs of the week on twitter/facebook or wherever.

Other than showing off to family members or providing some minor spectator value for the casual blog browser, I’m not sure the mere automated posting of recently played tracks actually influenced anyone enough to click and listen/buy/recommend the track/album/artist to others. Does a recommendation about a particular song or artist carry more weight in influencing others to take action?

I think the answer is yes. Personal recommendations and word-of-mouth referrals do carry a lot more weight. Perhaps instead of just automatically posting my recently played tracks, the focus should rather shift to genuine recommendations, research, interesting info that may be relevant to the audience.

Hmm… What do you think? Interested or not?

Hopefully most bits and bobs are up and running. I will however still be tinkering a bit with the theme until everything is satisfactory again.

** Update 10 hours later **
I finally managed to track down the problem.

If you’re using the Irresistible theme from WooThemes, the biggest issue when upgrading your WordPress core is that the idTabs jQuery script also needs to be updated. The old js file basically broke a tonne of my widgets, but after much tinkering (and referencing my regular backups) I got it all to work again.

Along with the fix to my tabs, I also managed to restore and restyle the fmTuner plugin . Now I can bore you a bit longer with my bad taste in music.

Soccer City stadium photos

// May 22nd, 2010 // 3 Comments » // Photos

We recently had an opportunity to go on a tour of the Soccer City stadium in Johannesburg, South Africa. This stadium will be hosting the opening and closing matches of the 2010 FIFA World Cup Football tournament in June-July 2010. It’s an amazing venue.
Click on the image above or here to view the rest of the pictures in the gallery.

Fix our roads please

// April 17th, 2010 // 1 Comment » // Cars & Bikes

We all know that Johannesburg roads are riddled with potholes at the moment. I think it was the Minister who said in a report this week that approximately 70-80% of South African (read, not just JHB) roads are in a really bad state.

Since I’ve had my first (of three) Volvo’s* I’ve been a magnet for tyre problems. This is not to the fault of Volvo mind you, but more the state of the roads in and around JHB. The only reason why I’m bringing up the Volvo thing, is the cost of replacing tyres.

Having a “high performance” vehicle, means “high performance” tyres, which means a big dent in your wallet. But I’m digressing.

Bellairs drive in Northriding must be one of the worst ever roads built by man. There’s no storm water drainage and the road is in a perpetual state of potholedness**. The latter is largely due to the housing developments that have sprung up in that street and area over the last 6 years or so.

Too many complexes went up without adequate planning. The traffic is a nightmare and it could take anywhere between 45 minutes to 2 hours to get to Sandton. Not fun.

The storm water drainage problem is seemingly being attended to at the moment, which is causing its own set of problems. For one, they have closed one lane of the road and created a one way only. Just imagine the chaos when hundreds of drivers suddenly realise that there’s only one way (and that’s down).

You’re being diverted to Hyperion, which in itself is chaos. The road is also in constant repair and the one side includes a low bridge, which floods when there’s a bit of mist in the air. Sediment and all kinds of building material seems to collect at the bottom whirlpool pit that is Hyperion drive.

And this is exactly where I picked up a nail, driving through this muck. Obviously only realising this on Thursday morning, being greeted by a flat tyre.

Lucky for tyrefix (the tyre fix solution) that saved the day. Two cans of that stuff inflated the tyre enough to get to the nearest service station, pumped up the tyre to 220 and drive off to work (by this time more than an hour late).

Perhaps not surprisingly, this stuff did the trick and held the tyre together. This morning (Saturday, 2 days later) I went to Tiger Wheel & Tyre in Fourways to get it checked out properly.

The nail was firmly lodged in the tyre, but mend-able. The muck created by the tyrefix cleaned out and a wheel rotation, balancing and alignment later we’re on the road again.

This tends to be a costly exercise, but very necessary. You don’t want to play with your life. Especially if it’s being held by something generally not bigger than the width of the palm of your hand.

Although accidents do happen, my plea therefore is to the Johannesburg Roads Agency and the Minister of Transport. Fix our roads please. People’s lives are at stake, the economy is at stake and South Africa’s image is at stake.

* Volvo’s tag-line is Volvo for life (there’s a reason for that – you can’t get rid of them once you have one. Don’t get me wrong, they’re great cars, but no resale value)
** Some days I make up words – potholedness is one of them – deal with it

Ankle sprain

// November 11th, 2009 // 4 Comments » // General

It sucks. I sprained my ankle on Monday night. Although the swelling came down significantly this morning, I can’t say it stayed that way for long..

I must admit that the ankle guard is definitely helping me with my general stability, but I don’t think its helping much with the blood circulation. Hence the puffyness 3 days later? I wonder if I’ll have to get to a doctor any time soon ?