WordPress 2.5 goes gold

The new iteration of the platform that powers this weblog and a handful of others was pronounced good to go today by Automattic’s Matt Mullenweg at WordCamp Dallas. I wonder how many WP users just dropped whatever they were doing - doing chores around the house, perhaps, or interacting with family and friends - and rushed to WordPress.org (given a shiny new interface in conjunction with the new edition announcement) to snag the new hotness? This being Saturday, though, a lot of those folks may not yet have heard.

Add WordPress.org: It looks good. Much better than before, and I assume that the usability pros at Happy Cog were behind the redesign. (Wrong! It was Matt Thomas who did the redesign. Thanks to Matt Mullenweg in comments for the correction.) The new look extends throughout the site, even to the forums. The Codex remains a unregenerate holdout, but not for long, I hope.

Must admit that I like the new look for WP.org better than the new look for WP 2.5. Shhh! Don’t tell anybody! But we’ve talked about that one aspect of the new edition before and won’t belabor it today.

I’ve been using development versions of 2.5 in my test install for a while now and have been keeping up with revision news via wp-testers, so this upgrade is just one more install for me. I’m pretty well prepared for changes necessitated by the new edition and, well, am feeling fairly smug about it. More interesting to me is the brief glimpse of the interactions between contributors afforded by the testers mailing list. It’s like an Amish barn-raising, but without the noonday meal.

To those folks: deserved congrats for pushing 2.5 across the finish line. Celebrate, but not for too long: I hear version 2.6 is due in just four months.

Oh - when will I upgrade? Soon enough. I know that some folks have been running their production blogs on release candidate versions of 2.5 for a while now, and more power to them, but I prefer to take my time. Besides, I’m busy this weekend.

Update: Since writing the above I’ve upgraded my test install and was sufficiently satisfied to upgrade another blog as well. This latter upgrade was done in order to make use of 2.5’s beefed-up mass editing feature. It’s proving helpful, but it would be even more useful if it was capable of displaying all posts within given parameters instead of just fifteen. Makes for a slower deletion process than I’d like. There may be some way to diddle the code to get WP to display more selected entries; I’ll look into that. Still, it ought to be part of the feature.

Speaking of slow: it takes over a minute for 2.5 to delete those fifteen entries. Better than doing it one at a time, of course, but…

Hey! Delete time is now down to thirty-five seconds. Much better.

Update: This blog - yes, the one you’re soaking in - now upgraded to 2.5 without a hiccup. Woo-hoo! Will talk about it in greater detail in a separate post.

Un-x-cited over X Files

Color me unenthused over the pending movie revival of The X Files. I was a lukewarm fan of the show, and was utterly underwhelmed by the first film spinoff, The X-Files: Fight the Future. It’s much too early to start recycling Nineties concepts, isn’t it? Didn’t we just get rid of DINK, techno, and Seinfeld?

Yes, I did watch the program some. Yes, Gillian Anderson was very easy to look at. And yes, the “monster of the week” concept - straight outta Kolchak: The Night Stalker - was a lot of fun. These fine attributes were undermined, however, by the yawn-inducing, tinfoil-hatted conspiracy “story arc” that excited legions of nerds but put me to sleep. I can’t even think the words “Smoking Man” or “Lone Gunmen” without wanting to take a nap.

As for the first film - ehh. I seem to remember Mulder being shot in the head, but he shook that off easily enough. Scully got stung by a bee and almost died. Lots of white Antarctic background. Kang and Kodos flying away. And, uh, Rollin Hand but not - strangely enough - Cinnamon Carter. Did I miss anything?

I’m told the TV series went on for a couple of years after the film came out. Odd that I don’t remember.

And now it’s all coming back. Well, it’ll be fun for somebody.

Barry Who?

ESPN: Let the name of Bonds be stricken from every pylon and obelisk of AT&T Park!

It’s hard to let go of a house

New York Times: Seller’s remorse: “We could not get that house out of our blood.”

Unstoppable Robot Ninja. ‘Nuff said.

Unstoppable Robot Ninja: No reason, ‘ceptin’ that it’s gorgeous. And it has a name even cooler than Waveflux.

Ballpark Village takes a hit

A year ago, I said:

…(note to cities everywhere: always make ballclub owners build the promised shopping [or dining] district [or building] before constructing the new stadium)…

And this is, pretty much, why:

Centene Corp.’s much touted move to Ballpark Village in downtown St. Louis is dead.

The Clayton-based company released a statement today stating, “Ballpark Village was unable to accommodate Centene’s plans for our world headquarters, which we deeply regret and are disappointed to announce.” [...]

Centene’s decision to pull out of Ballpark Village leaves great uncertainty as to when construction will begin on the $387 million first phase of the project. In addition to the Centene portion of the project, Ballpark Village is supposed to have 324,000 square feet of retail, restaurant and entertainment space; 100,000 square feet of office space; and 1,200 parking spaces.

Hizzoner’s take on this utterly awesome news:

I am very disappointed that Centene and the Ballpark Village Partners could not come to an agreement. Meeting the needs, obligations, legal requirements, and goals of both parties was extremely difficult, complicated, and frustrating. [...]

I still support Ballpark Village. Because of changes in the composition of Ballpark Village proposed by the developer, a new redevelopment agreement will have to be negotiated. The project will only move forward on terms that are fair to the taxpayers.

In an earlier blog post, Mayor Slay laid the blame for Ballpark Village difficulties squarely on Baltimore-based co-developer Cordish.

A story in this morning’s newspaper quotes a Cordish Co. spokesman explaining why there is still a big hole outside Busch Stadium – and may still be a big hole there for the next several months. He attributed the delay to continuing negotiations with Centene Corp., which plans to relocate its headquarters to downtown from Clayton. [...]

But, I don’t believe Centene is to blame for the delay. Cordish has had four months to complete the negotiations and finish the development agreement. Like everyone else, I am growing impatient. I want to see construction start soon.

Meanwhile, Centene offered up its own announcement…

“Ballpark Village was unable to accommodate Centene’s plans for our world headquarters which we deeply regret and are disappointed to announce,” Centene said in a statement. “Since our announcement in September 2007, we have been working closely with representatives of Ballpark Village to finalize details for this project. Despite the best efforts of everyone involved, we could not bring our plans to fruition.”

…and grouchily muttered that it may not even stay in the St. Louis area.

No official word just yet from the St. Louis Cardinals, who stand at the center of a muddy hole downtown where a development may or may not be, someday. No word from Cordish either, for that matter.

Let’s end on a happier note by remembering how giddy everyone was over the prospects for Ballpark Village, long, long ago.

Update: The Cardinals and Cordish issue a joint statement…which saves time, I guess.

The St. Louis Cardinals and The Cordish Company believe that Centene would have been a great addition to Ballpark Village. We are disappointed that the parties could not come to an agreement, despite months of effort and the best intentions of the City, Centene, and the Ballpark Village team. Ultimately, the many complexities of Centene’s proposed project in Ballpark Village proved insurmountable.

We will now work immediately with the City and State to finalize all public approvals and commence construction of Ballpark Village. The Ballpark Village partnership is in the unique position of having its private financing in place, and we are ready, willing, and able to proceed. Our vision has not changed — Ballpark Village will be a world-class mixed-use project that will positively transform the City of St. Louis.

Hard to judge either the complexities or the intentions involved, since (as Kurt Greenbaum of the P-D points out) few details have actually been released by the parties. All we can know for sure is that everyone’s disappointed.

Max Schmeling in proper context

Viva El Birdos: ESPN gets a needed schooling on “Hitler’s Champ.”

You can fool some of the people, some of the time

Political Wire: “A sizeable proportion” of Democrats still haven’t gotten the memo about McCain.

The al-Maliki ultimatum

Roger Zelazny said it in Lord of Light:

It is written that he who gives orders without having the power to enforce them, that man is a fool.

Not sure if Nuri al-Maliki is a sci-fi fan.

A little more certain that the American “advisory role” will need to become a little more than that if Maliki is going to make good on his challenge to the Mahdi Army militias.

Ice chunks seven times the size of Manhattan collapse every day, er, don’t they?

CNN: No such thing as global warming, nope, nope, nope.

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