Yep, it's a video game sales ad... touting Amazon.com's limited time offer...

In case you haven’t noticed the sidebar ad for it on some of the other DevPal/Javamancy sites, you may have spotted it here, on Javamancy itself.

It’s a text ad for Amazon.com’s limited-time offer on video games (well, it actually includes PC and Mac games, as well).

We’re experimenting with some of our real estate, and why not allow you, our gentle readers, an opportunity to maximize your gaming potential and thrills at the same time?

… And here ’tis, the seventeenth announced update to Javamancy the Weblog, Javamancy mini, and all of the other Web applications running at javamancy.com (that most of you don’t have to interact with, or even worry about!).

The majority of the update is, of course, the WordPress 2.8.4 release, which finally cleared our QA testing and CM automata a mere couple of hours past midnight. Rather than “sit on it” for a few more hours while new design and media elements were streaming through the CI cycle to join the completed WP 2.8.4 component on the staging areas for the multiple destinations, we decided to allow Update XVII to proceed alone with WP 2.8.4 and our code patches.

Thanks for hangin’ in there with us, folks!

Reporting Problems

If you notice any oddities, style related or otherwise, please let us know.

N.B.

Other related Javamancy posts (in reverse chronological order):

• WordPress 2.8.4 Fixes a Security Vulnerability
• Javamancy Updated XVI
• WordPress 2.8.3 Now Available
• Javamancy Updated XV
• WordPress 2.8.2 Fixes a Security Vulnerability

Related Javamancy mini items (in reverse chronological order):

• WordPress MU 2.8.4a is now available! I…
• In addition to WordPress 2.8.4 being rel…

Housekeeping

Some of you have been asking about when the “HTTP Mass Downloader” suite of products will be available to the public…

The question really should be: Will the “HTTP Mass Downloader” suite of products be available to the public?

At this time, although a few of you have been heavily involved in the testing of the various products in the “suite”, there will not be a public release– at least, not for the foreseeable future. And, gee whiz, people! Who keeps coughing up these funky names for my software?!? Let’s stick with their original names, okay? After all, it’s only a few different components: 0, 1, 10, 11, 100, 101, 110, 111, and 1000. How hard can it be to remember?

I was so worried that I was not going to be able to rush out of the house and stand in all sorts of lines to buy… whatever it is that’s being sold. Like electronics, food, games, food, clothing, food, house improvement products, food, and food…

But there was a massive flood of E-mails from well-meaning folks, as well as profit-driven (and extremely desperate) retailers, claiming that there are plenty of online Black Friday deals that there’s no need to leave the house.

And, of course, there are pure-online plays, like the online Apple Store, who have traditionally offered some moderate discounts on various products on Black Friday. So there are certainly plenty of options for the savvy shopper.

DevPal Helping People Worldwide

Launching later will be DevPal’s somewhat quirky blog for online and brick-and-mortar limited-time offers. We’ve detailed several limited-time offers on Javamancy before, and we’ll keeping doing them. But we’ll be using the as-yet-unnamed offers blog to provide more details and act as a stronger focus point for such items.

Initially, I was thinking “later” meant later today, but realistically speaking, it’s “later” like in a few days. Too much turkey… argh!

More Reading

• Black Friday, the shopping “holiday” (Wikipedia entry)

This month, we’ll be rolling out a few new features across Javamancy, as well as a few new surprises.

Keep checking back in to see if you can spot ‘em!

(To kick things off, check out the Javamancy comment system…)

“Steve, what are you doing with all those themes? Isn’t one enough?”

Well, sometimes yes, and sometimes no.

I’ve seen some pretty innovative (and sometimes merely pretty) blog themes floating around out there, and I was thinking that it really makes sense to “open up” some of the internal UI testing that Javamancy and other visualization aspects of the more-established DevPal sites to you, the viewing public.

But rather than just bombard with stuff, I was contemplating popping up (at odd intervals) an occasional theme that is currently under review. Then, if you have any constructive comments you’d like to contribute, you could place them with this post or via the usual private method.

Note: Keep in mind that some of the blog themes that are being tested are not native to the WordPress format, so some features may function awkwardly. In fact, even some of the native WordPress themes are quite bug-ridden, too! :-O

The Setup

A few days ago, I mentioned the notion of gradually introducing OPLs, so as to not overly shock you, Gentle Reader. Context linking is something that may be intriguing enough to try out, so let’s give it a shot here.

The Premise

Unlike the old-fashioned product links (e.g., the Classic Amazon Product Links), the JavaScript code snippet that is injected into the pages should communicate with the central server with content changes and relay hopefully appropriate product links matching identified product-related keywords found in the content.

Easy enough, right?

The Action

So, there’s a bit of lag time for the context linking function to get revved up, and then incremental content shifts should trigger “quicker” updates.

So we wait…

The Setup

As I relax at the Alexandria Starbucks enjoying my coffee, lightly bantering with the baristas about various oddities of life, my thoughts sometimes slip over to the online aspects of this blog and wonder how to better relay all sorts of items that I’ve encountered or utilized in my journeys.

Hmm… Well, how about resurrecting online product linking?

The Premise

So, there are a lot of ways to manage OPLs, but perhaps the most convenient way (and requiring the least amount of inventory space) would be to leverage an existing product catalog and merely provide you, Gentle and Fun-Loving Reader, with the links to the products you’re interested in.

The Action

The next step is to begin testing various page layouts and OPLs to see which may be most appropriate for DevPal.

Fun times are a’coming!

N.B.

More on Starbucks (reverse order):

• Mr. Heringer, I Presume
• Follow-Up to Starbucks iTunes Song of the Day
• Starbucks iTunes Pick of the Week
• Starbucks Card