The DU Journals are Finally Here!

[Skinner]

WHAT ARE DU JOURNALS?

Have you ever wanted to blog, but can't find the time? Are you intimidated by the idea of setting up and maintaining a blog? Are you looking for a way to attract visitors to your blog? Now you can maintain a blog while you post on the DU discussion forums! Introducing DU Journals -- a totally new and original idea that blends the best features of a discussion forum and a blog.

Use your DU Journal to highlight your best posts from the Democratic Underground discussion forums. Many DUers already have an impressive body of work published here on our website -- now you can easily publish all of it to your own individual Journal. Instead of just letting your hard work get lost forever in the flood of posts on the message board, you can now build an audience of people who come to your journal specifically to read your posts.

HOW TO ACTIVATE AND MAINTAIN YOUR JOURNAL

1. ACTIVATE YOUR JOURNAL

Every DU member can have a DU Journal. But you cannot use your journal until you activate it. Here's how:

1. Make sure you are logged in to Democratic Underground.

2. Click this link to activate your journal: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=activate

For most members, that activation link should be all you need to set up your DU Journal. After your journal is created, you will get a direct link to go to your journal and start configuring it. If there are any problems, the activation routine should prompt you with the necessary information to fix the problem. If you are unable to fix the problem, please feel free to ask questions in this thread.

2. CONFIGURE YOUR JOURNAL

Go to your Journal, and click the little link in the top-right corner of the page which says "Journal Control Panel." This will take you to the Journal Control Panel. You can also access the Journal Control Panel by clicking the "Options" icon at the top of most DU pages. In your Journal Control Panel, you can change the title of your journal, change the format, select from a few different skins (more coming soon), and select special "modules" for the right-hand column of your Journal.

3. ADD POSTS TO YOUR JOURNAL

To add one of your posts to your Journal, first find that post on the Democratic Underground discussion forum. There will be a little black link in the bottom-left corner of the post that says "Add to my Journal." You can add any of your own posts to your Journal. Even if you posted it months or years ago, you can add it to your Journal.

4. FINDING YOUR JOURNAL OR SOMEONE ELSE'S JOURNAL

After a Journal has been created, you can easily visit it at any time. There are a few ways to do so:

1. To visit your own Journal, just click the "Journals" icon at the top of any page, and then click the link in the center of the page that says "Go To My Journal."

2. Visit any member's Journal by clicking the small "Journal" icon next to their username on any post.

3. You can tell if a member's Journal has been updated in the last 24 hours by looking for the button on any of their posts. If you mouse over the button and wait a second, the time of the last update will appear. Click the button to go directly to that member's Journal.

4. You can visit any journal by simply typing the URL of the Journal into your web browser. The URL of any member's Journal is easy to remember. Just use this format:

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/username

That format will work for any username. We also have an optional alternate format for usernames with spaces. Just use a + sign instead of a space, like so:

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/username+with+spaces

LET US KNOW WHAT YOU THINK!

If you have any problems, questions, or comments about the new Journals feature, please post them in this thread. Our Journals FAQ is not available yet, but it will be coming soon.

Skinner, EarlG, Elad
Democratic Underground Administrators

[Drum]

1. Hooray!

Thanks for setting this up!

[mtnester]

2. Can you pin this to the top for everyone?

thanks!

[Skinner]

13. We'll pin it later today.

For now, we want to let it float a little so people can see it.

[mtnester]

15. Thanks! n/t

[Nutmegger]

3. This is great! Thanks so much Skinner!

:woohoo:

[VolcanoJen]

4. Very cool, and very exciting!

:D :D

[mainegreen]

5. That must have been a pain in the arse to implement.

Nothing like adjusting the framework, eh?

Neat stuff.

[stop the bleeding]

6. thank you - I have been trying to figure them out for about

20 minutes - this is fun!

[Radio_Lady]

195. Oh, I like the orange and blue color combination. UCLA colors.

But I expected yours to be red and white -- y'know -- blood is red and gauze is white -- stop the bleeding???

[meegbear]

7. Nice! Thank you Skinner!!

Kiss! Kiss!

[EFerrari]

8. Wow. What an amazing feature.

Thanks, Skinner and all. I've been holding blogging software FOR A YEAR without time or skill to use it.

:toast:

[HamdenRice]

9. This is a great idea -- now I have a really contentious question

I have been looking forward a lot to this, and had taken half-hearted steps to start a blog, but this seems so much better, given DU's built in community audience.

If you can distinguish me from the rest of DU, you may recognize that I have been posting a lot more recently to the 9/11 forum. I'm generally not interested in more unlikely scenarios like pods, holograms, weather control, "no plane at the Pentagon," etc, but focus on connections between intelligence services and flows of capital before and after 9/11.

My question is, given the stringent enforcement of segregating 9/11 postings to that forum, will it be permissible to discuss the 9/11 truth movement in one's journal? I am not interested in creating a journal solely or even mostly about 9/11, but given my interests, it would definitely come up from time to time.

Your thoughts would be appreciated.

[EarlG]

12. The rules for the Journals are identical

to the rules for the message board, because everything in your Journal has to be posted to the message board first. So if it's okay for the board, it's okay for your Journal. You can add posts to your Journal from anywhere on the message board, including the 9/11 forum.

[HamdenRice]

18. Thanks! That helps a lot!

I think in the 9/11 forum, there is a feeling that people who rely on evidence and media reports want to somehow separate out from pure speculation. Having a journal will be an immense tool in creating a coherent body of writing that is separate from the concrete-core, no-plane, pod, hologram posts!

[Why Syzygy]

133. yeah but

there isn't anything there! When I click your journal link I get like next page, previous page, but no page. Is that a bug?

10. thanks - nice addition n/t

[sui generis]

11. I am just going to have to check in to Prima Donnas Anonymous

now. Or is it Drama Queens Anonymous.

:evilgrin:

Oh, I'll just do a little one . . .


*****
seriously though, another great dimension of DU - Thanks Skinner! :hi:

[mzmolly]

14. This is going to be great!

Thanks Skinner.

:hi:

[muchacho]

16. sweet

you're too kind!

[THUNDER HANDS]

17. I can't find the 'add to your journal' link

waaah!

[EarlG]

19. It should be on the bottom left of your own posts

Next to where the Alert link is. The "Add to your Journal" link will only appear on your own posts.

[Beetwasher]

26. It's Not There In My Older Archived Posts

I have numerous old bookmarked posts that I would like to add. The little red arrow is there, but there's nothing next to it that says "Alert" or "Add to my journal".

[Skinner]

28. That was a glitch. Try it now.

It should be fixed.

[Beetwasher]

34. Awesome!

:thumbsup:

[HamdenRice]

20. Great skins! Just checked them out nt

[GuvWurld]

21. Great idea...gonna try it out (eom)

[Beetwasher]

22. I'm Not Able to Add Posts From My Bookmarks To My Journal

There's no option in the lower left hand corner to do so. Is there a cut off date? Some of the posts are old.

[mzmolly]

24. Neither am I?

:shrug:

[Skinner]

29. There was a small glitch. Try it now.

You should be able to do it now.

[hunter]

23. I love it, but I find the loud orange "journal updated" icon distracting

But otherwise it's great!

[EarlG]

27. That should shake out in time

Right now everyone is creating a Journal. When the rush dies down a bit, the icon won't appear quite as frequently :)

[hunter]

30. Thanks.

:thumbsup:

[Call Me Wesley]

25. Great addition. Thanks for the great work you all do!

However, I seem to have broken it already. I sent Elad an email. I apologize ... :cry: Oh, and on edit: No hurries!

On second edit, that's the error message. My feeling is it's because I turned the 'Show Greatest' to 'No.'

Query failed: SELECT * FROM dcforum WHERE status = 'on' AND () ORDER BY forum_order ASC, name ASC

[Skinner]

32. Elad is working on that right now.

Hopefully it will be fixed soon.

[Call Me Wesley]

33. Thank you and sorry! (nt)

[LeftCoast]

31. The DU Journals are a very cool addition!

I am sure people will really enjoy them. I look forward to seeing all the creative uses people put them to! :thumbsup:

A :toast: to the Admins for the coolest new DU addition in a long time!

[nickgutierrez]

35. An idea:

Is there some way you can incorporate DU's Friends List into this?

For example, a list similar to the Most Viewed/Last Updated/Newest that shows the people that are on your buddy list, along with the date of their last entry?

[Skinner]

37. We are planning to do something like this.

In fact, we have dozens of great ideas for the journals. But it might take a while for us to program all of it.

[Why Syzygy]

171. My question is why?

Wasn't this already a bitchen enough environment. Why are ya'll complicating matters? Are you seeking something I don't see? Honest question. Thanks.

[Radio_Lady]

191. Hi votesomemore --

You have no journal pages showing, although you must have turned it ON at some point, because the icon shows up.

If you don't want to journal, you don't have to.

This allows us to create a page for ourselves, out of our own posts, and be able to direct others to it. It expands the universe of people who now have a entree to the Democratic Underground, and to the things that we individually want to say.

I've already had my first experience with it and for me, it's great. It will save me faxing paper or sending disks and tapes of my reviews to movie publicists.

I'm delighted. Your mileage may vary -- but again, I'd suggest you go to the control page and turn your journal OFF so it doesn't show the icon next to your name.

In peace,

Radio_Lady in Oregon

[VolcanoJen]

36. Just finished setting up my journal!

That was simple, and fun... amazing how customizable you guys have made it.

Much easier than setting up my blog, that's for sure!

Thank you SO MUCH for this fantastic addition to DU, Admin!!

[orleans]

41. for those of us who have never done this before...how do you even

post something? i can't figure that out. can you help a fool who has never posted a bloggie or journal before?

(what do you do to write something? what do you click? where is it? can you help jen?

[VolcanoJen]

51. orleans, here's my preliminary "how-to"!!

You can't write something new to your journal, you can only add posts you've already posted on DU first. At least, that's the way I see it working.

After you write and post something (either an original topic or a reply) to DU that you want to add to your journal, go back to the post, and click on "Add to My Journal" at the bottom of your post. That's all you have to do. You can go back and edit/write an introduction to the post that will only appear in your journal, as well.

The DU Journal is like a collection of your "Greatest Hits." The stuff you wrote for DU that you want to compile in one easy-to-find-and-read spot for everyone.

It's the coolest thing!

If you want to personalize your journal more, there are modules that let you add your profile, links to your favorite blogs, your favorite forums, your favorite DU Journals... you can even choose your own design to make your blog reflect your style. Admin has set up several pre-made skins, or, from the looks of it, you can make your own, if you're good at that kind of thing.

I think it's amazing, and long overdue. Go play around with it and you'll get the hang of it quickly!!

[Catchawave]

68. Thanks VolcanoJen, you helped me too :) n/t

[Beaverhausen]

89. thanks for the tips!

[orleans]

93. thanks jen. n/t

[Why Syzygy]

134. um well

you just posted. So I guess you have a clue. I don't get the journal thing either, but I know how to post here, as you do too.

[mattclearing]

38. This is awesome!!!

Thanks so much for this. DU continues to amaze with its features.

[The Witch]

39. These are great! I'm thrilled. One problem:

With the "short blurb" option, all the formatting (inc. line breaks) is gone from the main journal page. (formatting does appear in the full entry).

Alternatively, consider adding a "Title + Intro Text" option so the intro can explain the title further without having badly formatted first-few-word chunks.

Thanks!

[Skinner]

42. The short blurb option is supposed to work that way.

It looked funny when the blurbs were not all uniform.

I don't understand the "Title + Intro Text" option. Could you explain a little more?

[The Witch]

49. Well, you can add/edit intro text (separate from short blurb)

for example, go to mine and there is the title, then intro text, then the entry.

[Skinner]

52. So, what you're suggesting is

that you want an option that is somewhere between "Short Blurb" and "Title Only" which permits you to include an intro, but does not include a blurb. I think I understand.

[The Witch]

53. Picky, ain't I? ^___^

Thank you for your amazing work on DU, Skinner, you're a gem! :yourock:

[Gregorian]

40. Wow. Thanks for this incredible opportunity.

Now if I just had something to say.

[WilliamPitt]

43. Never mind

Found it.

[EarlG]

45. The link appears on the bottom left

of your posts, next to the Alert link. Bear in mind that it only appears on your own posts, you won't see it on other people's posts.

If you want to fill up your Journal quickly, just do a search for your own username using the DU search function. You can add any of your posts from the past to your Journal.

[WilliamPitt]

46. Yeah, found it

I was looking on the Journal page, because I am, in fact, a moron.

Thanks.

[VolcanoJen]

63. Your other bottom right?

On my screen, the "Add to my Journal" link appears on the bottom left of the post, just to the right of "Alert."

This is the coolest new DU toy ever.

[EarlG]

64. Arf

Yes... my other bottom right :D

[Minnesota Libra]

44. This will be great!! I got as far as setting everything up BUT........

.....I haven't figured out yet what to do in order to actually start writing. This will be absolutely great though!!:applause:

So do I need to post an article in the DU forums FIRST before it will appear in the Journal, or what??

Guess I don't really have much to say that will be very interesting except I'd like to find out if anyone else is going through the same political reevaluation as I am. Guess I'm also a tad afraid of getting flamed during this reevaluation process too.:hide:

OK, I wait your answer/s

[Skinner]

48. Yes, you need to post on the DU discussion forums first.

Then you can add it to your journal.

[Minnesota Libra]

54. OK, now I got it.....thanks nt

[SoCalDem]

66. Will the journal accept comments?

The threads that link back to the journal are long dead...and should people want to comment, how do they do that??

[Skinner]

72. It will only accept comments if the thread is still active.

If the thread is locked or archived, then people can't respond to it.

[Radio_Lady]

192. Good idea.

[hang a left]

47. I am never going to have a journal :(

I say stupid shit.

[Catchawave]

70. LOL....a lot of us do too :)

I'm looking at it as a opportunity to expand my DU thread-starters and looking absolutely brilliant one day :hi: Heh.

Yeah, even my Lounge triumphs :silly:

[pecwae]

130. Well, I created one

but it may be years before I have anything to add to it.

[Radio_Lady]

193. Different strokes for different folks! Maybe you like to read only!

This makes it easier for those of us who have TOO MUCH TO SAY! Goodness, I didn't know I have posted over 4,000 times. No wonder my sex life has suffered.

[crispini]

50. Totally FUN!

:woohoo::woohoo::woohoo::woohoo::woohoo::woohoo::woohoo:

[Catchawave]

73. Hi Crispi ! Just had to tell you....

yours was the first journal I clicked on the journal page to see "what they look like". It was easy from there :loveya:

PS: I did a 3 month search on myself, and just posted my favorites so far, ya'know, the ones that make me look "smart" :rofl: and a few :loveya:

[crispini]

74. Hee.

I did the same thing. Yours looks awesome btw! :thumbsup:

[Radio_Lady]

194. Crispini, your journal is fantastic! I am now motivated, out of jealousy,

to emulate you.

Learning at age 66 is GREAT fun!

See you around the DU!

Radio_Lady in Oregon

[Catchawave]

55. Absolutely Fabulous !

Have never been able to figure out my blogspot account, so this certainly scratches that itch...Thanks Team DU :hi:

[Up2Late]

56. Hey that's cool! Thanks guy's

I already tried activating mine, and it worked great. Good instructions too.

[Patsy Stone]

57. Rock ON, gentlemen!

Thanks! :yourock:

[crispini]

58. Observations I have made ...

It pays to post in slower-moving forums because a lot of my stuff that I have put in my journal is still open and could theoretically be responded to. Conversely, I've been reading a couple of other people's journals and have been DYING to respond to their thread which is long since locked. I suppose this effect will fall off in time.

Can't believe you can add both your threads you start AND your posts. That is totally freaking cool. This is going to be SO MUCH FUN!

Wish that you could add people's favorite journals to a list of your bookmarks somewhere, so you could get to people's journals you like just by clicking. Yes, you can type, but it IS hard to remember people's usernames sometimes...... HEY. Could this finally be a use for the "Buddy List" ??!! :think:

[Skinner]

62. There are a couple options

You can add your favorite journals to the blogroll module on your Journal. Then all you have to do is visit your journal, and you can click on the links on your blogroll.

Another option is to add your favorite members to your DU buddy list. At your suggestion, I asked Elad to add the journal links there.

[katinmn]

59. Thanks! I am really enjoying playing with this. It's very easy.

I plan to send the journal link to some friends and relatives who don't spend as much time online as I do. Maybe they will get hooked on DU, too. :evilgrin:

[ms liberty]

60. Wow! I'm excited!

Although it may be a little while before I get started on one, I'm looking forward to having a journal. But I'm MORE excited that I'll be able to read other DU'er's journals - we've got some ultra-talented members, and when everyone gets their bits posted together in one place, it's gonna be HUGH!!!

Thanks Skinner! Thanks EarlG! Thanks Elad! You guys ROCK!

[TechBear_Seattle]

61. Excellent resource! n/t

[SoCalDem]

65. Thanks.. This looks great.. I can "empty" my bookmarks

:)

[brainshrub]

67. This will enable DU to leap-frog over Kos.

Don't get me wrong, I love Kos. But now, for the first time they have a competitor.

Comprehensive thread system + Educated Liberal membership

Match made in heaven.

Great job guys. Congratulations.

[OnyxCollie]

77. Pronounciation question

I've heard Daily Kos mentioned a couple times on NPR and they pronounced it "Koz". I always figured it was pronounced "Chaos". Made sense to me...

[Trevelyan]

127. Pronounced Coze because the name was from Markos nickname Kos but I

started out pronouncing it like Caw-zh as in Kos-sack so still think of it that way.

JOURNALS ARE A GREAT IDEA!!!

:party: :toast: :bounce: :party: :party: :toast:

Fun!!! Whoopee!!

[brainshrub]

69. My journal does not work. :(

I get this error:

An error was encountered:

That journal is turned off.

[Skinner]

71. I think the problem is that you turned it off.

Go to your journal now. There should be a link that you can click to turn it back on.

[brainshrub]

76. Thanks, I don't know how I did that.

My first journal post:

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/brainshrub/1

[Lone_Star_Dem]

75. It's even better than I had hoped it would be

Good work guys! :toast:

[OnyxCollie]

78. Is there any way to locate old posts

that I haven't bookmarked? There's a lot of things I wish I could read again. This looks cool. Thank you.

[EarlG]

81. Just use the Search function

Click the icon at the top of the page. Search on your username (make sure to search the archives).

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

79. Journalized! Hooray!

This is so totally cool! Thank you DU!

Peace and Love and Light To All!

[mdmc]

94. peace and low stress ommm

:kick:

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

117. Thank you mdmc! Peace and low stress to you as well mdmc! :)

Ommmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm ;)

[Ian David]

80. Absolutely brilliant! THANK YOU!

I'm willing to admit that I often fall in love with my own writing and my own message posts, but I still get a certain amount of non-self-masturbatory enjoyment out of the posts of others here on DU.

I think it might be a good idea if we could directly reference other people's posts in our own journals.

Of course, I could always just clutter-up the message threads by replying to someone and saying, "Hey, that's great. I'm replying to your message so I can link to this in my journal. Meanwhile, here are some pictures of kittens."

[EarlG]

82. Don't forget this is just the first rollout

Now that these are finally done and out there, we can start working on enhancements. So your idea about referencing other people's posts could certainly happen.

[Ian David]

122. Also, another suggestion but it might be kind of "niche" re: RSS Feed

AvantGo has been kind enough to roll-out a free RSS Reader for the PalmPilot / PocketPC crowd.

Some RSS feeds are more PalmPilot-Friendly than others.

For example, it is nearly impossible to read the DU RSS Feed through AvantGo.

Some feeds that work fairly well on AvantGo:

http://www.buyblue.org/rss.xml
http://www.motherjones.com/mojoblog/index.rdf
http://massresistancewatch.blogspot.com/atom.xml
http://feeds.dailykos.com/dailykos/index.xml

If the RSS feed didn't truncate the messages, then there would be no need to click on the "Full Article" link.

That would be enough to make the DU RSS feeds "good enough." Just stop truncating the messages.

Right now, AvantGo gives me an error when I do that. "Bad Request. Your browser sent a request that this server could not understand. The number of request header fields exceeds this servers limit. Apache/1.3.34 server at journals.democraticunderground.com Port 80"

Even when it's not broken, clicking on "Full Article" gives me pretty much unreadable stuff on most blogs, including DU.

As more and more people start relying more upon portable data devices like The Blackberry and web-enabled cellular phones, this issue will become more important.

The journals are awesome! Keep up the good work, Skinner!

[Sullivan4Congress]

83. Great Idea

Thanks

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

84. Thank you thank you thank you

This is the neatest thing since-Sliced Bread!!!!!!

[WoodrowFan]

85. one wish

I just wish I could post directly to my journal without posting it in another forum first..

[Adelante]

154. I thought that, too

But I changed my mind. My thinking now is that if we all write posts in the Discussion area we feel are worthy of being highlighted on our Journals, then the level of discussion and the quality of the writing on DU overall will become something truly to be proud of. I don't know if this is what the admin have in mind, for sure, but I sort of remember something about this being an aim this year. I think it's a good way to go about it.

[Gemini Cat]

86. Thanks!

This will be good.
:applause:

[Dead_Parrot]

87. how about a "journal" group?

Just an idle suggestion - since we can't (yet) add non-post entries, could you look at adding a "journal entries" forum? It would be off everyone's radar as far as the normal groups are concerned, but would allow posts (and discussions thereof) for people's thoughts for the journals...

Of course, we could all use the lounge instead - no-one would notice... ;)

[Skinner]

91. We might do that.

We're considering it.

[realisticphish]

98. definate second to that

unless it is eventually changed so that we can post directly to journals, i would like that group

[libnnc]

88. Skinner, you are a god!!!

This journal idea is THE STUFF!! Thank you so much for all you do. What a fantastic online community we have and this journal feature will only bring us closer. :grouphug:

[liveoaktx]

90. Very nice and very easy

I'll make sure to put the video links in this journal

[WHAT]

92. This is great, I follow what other people have to say...

for one reason or another...I like the way they argue (even if I don't agree), I like their idiosyncratic quirkiness, their breadth of knowledge, grasp of a subject, writing style, sense of irony, passion of idea, etc, etc.

Sometimes I apprehend a style, thought, conviction of a particular poster and want to read more by them.

As more of a reader than a poster, I really like this feature. Hopefully, more of my favorites will be opening their journal here so I won't have to check all the time to see if they're in the discussion.

Thanks!

[Wrinkle_In_Time]

95. Holy Jeez! The forums are awash in red icons!

This is a great feature. I'm sure it will be a great channel that lies between the forum posts and the DU headliners. I look forward to finding a few journals to follow. In the meantime, the forums look like this:









:rofl:

I believe this is called The Turnpike Effect -- The availability and unforeseen utility of a resource leads to greater use than was predicted. Availability shapes demand.

Hmmm... maybe I should create a journal about this. :+

[PatrioticLeftie]

96. Sounds spiffy

I'll try it out.

Just out of curiosity. Does that place have any features like this? Does it still look like the same shade of cow vomit it did before?

[intheflow]

97. Thank you, thank you, thank you! I have a couple questions, though.

I'm so happy I don't have to search through the 5 million threads I've bookmarked to refer people back to earlier posts I'm building on.

Here's a :loveya: :loveya: :loveya: -- one each for Skinner, EarlG, and Elad!

On edit:

I have a couple questions.

First, I have a post back from the days when I was jinuu, before the name change amnesty. It give me an error when I try to post that thread to my journal. Is there any hope for posting my old thread?

Also, can I post a thread from one of the groups? Right now only members can access those posts, but there are a few I'd like to add to my journal for the public to view, if possible.

Also, the text on my photo posts runs right off the side of my screen, as if there were no auto text wrap code. :shrug:

Thanks again!!

[mdmc]

99. how do you remove a thread from your journal ?

[Skinner]

100. Click the link that says "Remove from Journal"

It's at the end of the post.

[mdmc]

101. is there an easier way?

lol... thanks! :)

[xultar]

121. You could use a sharpie on your screen!

:rofl:

[mdmc]

124. some folks shouldn't have blogs, me thinks

:)

[FredStembottom]

102. It's rare when something comes along that fits my bad work habits!

But this sure does!

Naval-gazing was never so fun!

[FredStembottom]

103. OK...I've loaded mine up with "stuff". Is there a way to......

re-order the entries???
I can't find one.:crazy:

[Elad]

105. No, the order is determined by the time of the post

in reverse chronological order. It can't be changed.

[omega minimo]

104. Is entry order of old posts final-- or any sorting as we backtrack & add?

Did that make sense in the short version?

This is an inspired idea. Congratulations and thank you all.

Forgive me if it's too obvious but....... what would be the best way to go back and add posts so they are in consecutive order? Just do it or are there any tricks?

Thanks again

[Elad]

106. It's by the time the post was posted on the discussion board

When you add it to your journal does not affect the order.

[omega minimo]

109. BRILLIANT!!!

:yourock: :rofl:

Wishing continuing success to DU............. oh yeah-- and Dems, too!

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

107. Thank you, this is great and easy, even for an amateur like me :)

DU, Skinner, EarlG, Elad

It's cliche and been said many times before, but bears repeating...:yourock:

MKJ

[Redstone]

108. Bought some extra server storage space, did you? Well, good.

It shows that you guys who run DU are really commited to the (frequently-misused) concept of "building a community" online.

I salute you for this and all of your efforts in making DU the wonderful place that it is.

Redstone

[bigtree]

110. completely spoiled

ya done real good here.

History will thank you.

I wonder, is this an original? It will be when our bunch gets their spaces going.

To pull everything into one spot. What a blast.

I'm afraid to start messing with it, I may never emerge again.

[Rude Horner]

111. How do you people...

create the most incredible website in the world? Absolutely an amazing addition to the site, and hats off to all of your hard work. This is going to be SO much fun to play with and take DU to another level. It was fantastic before. Now....well,...:toast:

It's funny....year after year, freerepublic looks the same, and DU just keeps getting better and better. Not that that's any surprise. :)

[ClusterFreak]

112. Hats off to you!!

What an excellent idea!!

Thanks, Skinner!!

[Hissyspit]

113. Great fun! n/t

[Tahkcalb]

114. A great addition to the system. Thx.

n/t

[wiley]

145. Blackhat?

[Tahkcalb]

168. Yes?

:hi:

[mogster]

115. Great!

Very good sw again, folks! :yourock:

[johnaries]

116. AWESOME! Killer idea! THANK YOU!

Yet another reason DU is my favorite website!
:yourock:

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

118. Who did the coding for this?

And are they available for hire? :evilgrin:

[Skinner]

119. Elad did the coding.

:thumbsup:

[xultar]

120. then ELAD IS GOD!

[Dead_Parrot]

136. Seconded...

...but we already knew this, surely?

[intheflow]

123. I'm having some problems with my journal.

I've posted a lot of my photo threads, and the text runs off the screen, as if the text wrap parameters are out of whack. I don't have that problem if I use the "short blurb" formatting option, but then the photos aren't up, which is sort of the point of my posting them in my journal. Is there anything I can do to rectify this problem?

I also want to post a thread fro when I was jinuu, before the 2004 name change amnesty. The post comes up in the archives as "jinuu," but says "intheflow" posted it when you open the thread. When I try to post it in my journal, I get an error message that says

<img src="/images/Query failed: SELECT skin, logo FROM journal_index WHERE username = 'intheflow'

Here's the post in question: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=2588489

Have I any hope of getting this posted in my journal?

Thanks, Guys! This is a great gift to our community!

[Elad]

125. That happens because the pictures in your posts

are too wide for the journal column. If you want to post them without disfiguring your journal, you need to open them in photoshop (or another photo editor) and make them a more reasonable size.

Unfortunately no, you won't be able to add posts from your previous name to your journal right now. I'm unsure if we'll change this or not.

[intheflow]

126. With more coffee, I figured out the text spacing problem.

:donut: :think:

And no biggie on the former identity thing. I wasn't jinuu for that long, anyway. :hi:

[Jose Diablo]

128. Saaay, these Journals are the best thing since

sliced bread. Maybe I should start donating to DU again. These journals are gonna eat a lot of memory I think.

[MH1]

129. Very nice! Thanks!

I love it. I absolutely love it.

:bounce: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce:

:yourock:

My only comment/suggestion is - and I'm sure you're planning on it - is to add some comprehensive instructions to the help section. Your post helps with the basics but I still had to figure some things out by trial and error. For example, I didn't get the "short blurb" thing until reading some of the comments below. (That would make a good FAQ pointer btw).

Very well done.

:toast:

[radio4progressives]

131. Question on Uploading Photos - (Learning Curve Still)

First let me say this is a fantastic idea and thank you for putting this together..

i'm still working on how to upload links on the side columns and uploading photos/images in the body of a post..

copy and paste doesn't work, nor does the usual uploading function or it operates differently than I'm accustomed.

any help/guidance you can provide in this regard most appreciated.

[Skinner]

142. You can't upload pictures.

You can only remote-link photos that are elsewhere on the internet.

[radio4progressives]

159. I finally figured it out...

[JudyM]

183. This is good to know - I tried to upload book cover pix. Is Journal FAQ

in the works?

PS it's really easy to use - thanks for the suggestion!

:hi:

[Why Syzygy]

132. Well that sounds like a lot of work

and brain power. But I seem to be missing something? Like why do we want to do this?
Is it like a private archive?

[Why Syzygy]

135. where is the skin thing? n/t

[Jersey Devil]

137. A really embarrassingly dumb question, but I have to ask

Why can't I get my journal post to appear anywhere but in the right hand margin? I've tried everything but can't get it to appear as text in the main part of the journal screen.

[Skinner]

139. Do this:

To add one of your posts to your Journal, first find that post on the Democratic Underground discussion forum. There will be a little black link in the bottom-left corner of the post that says "Add to my Journal." You can add any of your own posts to your Journal. Even if you posted it months or years ago, you can add it to your Journal.

[Catherine Vincent]

138. Dumb questions...

Would you like every DU member to start a journal? If that were to happen, would it take up bandwidth from DU?

[Skinner]

140. Not a dumb question.

Everyone who wants a journal should set one up. The Journals are on a different server, so they shouldn't have much impact on website performance.

[thinkingwoman]

141. What a fun and innovative idea!!

Good on ya Skinner, EarlG and Elad!

Thanks again for all you do to make DU amazing!

:toast:




edited to correct typo. :eyes:

[Dyedinthewoolliberal]

143. Hi Skinner!

My problem is I can't find any of my old posts except form the last 48 hours. Is there a way for me to find what I've written and select for the journal?
Thanks,
John (DITWL)

[Skinner]

144. You can do a search on your username.

Just click the "Search" icon and then click "Use advanced search form (includes archives)"

[earth mom]

146. A suggestion:

Is there a way to turn the red button into another color like blue? (Which btw, is the "dem" color.)

I'm asking because well, I guess I'm getting old, but I find the red button to be jarring and it hurts my eyes.

Thanks in Advance! :hi:

[Skinner]

147. We want to keep the red button for a while.

I'm not sure if we'll keep it forever. But for now we want something attention-getting. Since the journals are new, we don't want people to forget about them.

After a while, when the novelty wears off, I suspect we will see fewer red buttons on the discussion forums.

[Adelante]

149. This is a wonderful thing to do, Skinner

Congratulations :)

[earth mom]

151. Thanks for the reply. : ) eom

[GOPFighter]

148. I'm trying to use html tags to spruce up my journal name

HTML tags didn't work when I used < >, but did when I used < >. But it chokes when I use too many html tags (font size, color, etc.). Are we limited in the number of characters we can use in the journal name? I'm sure a lot of people are going to want to personalize their journal name.

[realFedUp]

150. 2 questions: photos, typing directly into journal....

Can we add photos from our computer directly
into journals? If not, can someone advise how
to do that via another site?
And can we type directly into our journals
without posting on a thread?

thanks guys, this is a fun addition.

[Skinner]

152. Answers.

You cannot add photos directly from your computer. You need to upload the image to the internet, and then you can post a link to it.

You cannot type directly into your journals. Instead, you need to post on the discussion forum first, and then add the post to your journal.

[realFedUp]

153. ok, thanks. nt

[Tuttle]

155. no link for "Add to my Journal."

and no ALERT either?

Tut-tut

[Tuttle]

156. oops now I see...

said the blind man.

Use the Add... and Alert from HERE!? Ok!

Tut-tut

[SoCalDem]

157. Is the orange "update journal" button moving?

I click it when I mean to click "original".. Could it move to just above the name of the person?? :)

[Skinner]

158. We may try out some other locations.

But it's likely to stay in that spot for at least a couple weeks.

[wiley]

160. Is there a way to just post to one's journal?

Or delete some of the inane responses to a journal?

[Mechatanketra]

161. Glitch.

If I click on the journal link, I get an error message asking me to check spelling.

If I manually alter it to lower-case "mechatanketra", I can get to the journal page.

However, I'm still not seeing a "add to journal" link on my posts (at least the first one I looked for) ... possibly because of the case problem? :-(

[Skinner]

164. The URL of your journal is not case-sensitive.

You should be able to get there by typing

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/mechatanketra

or

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/Mechatanketra

The "add to journal" link should be on all of your posts on the discussion forum. Find one of them and look in the bottom left corner.

[seafan]

162. delete

[wiley]

163. Okay, the My DU thing is additional Brilliance!

I feel there is not an icon that expresses the extent of my awe, gratitude, respect and support for what you shiny brilliant people have done. Is there an icon for the holy trinity? A new mod non-sectarian version.

Can I now connect my DU control panel to monitor Diebold and other electronic voting machines?

:toast:

[Skinner]

165. That upgrade should be coming sometime next month.

:D

[EFerrari]

166. I just started working with my journal.

And hafta say, it's so intuitive and so EASY to do. Amazing.

The potential uses of this form are staggering -- in a good way.

I especially like being able to manipulate the appearance of the page.

:toast:

[WHAT]

167. Love it! just a little request...

is there anyway to keep the text size the same on the journal as what one has set for their text size. If I click on a journal, I have to increase the text size to match what I am used to and then decrease it when I go back. Just a tiny aggravation.

Thanks for considering this "aggravation"...I think Elad. Thanks again for a wonderful feature.

[Skinner]

169. Unfortunately, I don't think there's an easy way to fix that.

Because we're letting members change the way their journals look, we don't have as much control over them.

[Why Syzygy]

170. I don't look for opportunities to be a nay sayer

But imo in this case things have been complicated for no reason. Is life not becoming more complicated enough? Now there is not even a "my posts" icon on the latest page? I'm gonna go ugh. Keep some things simple. I'm sure you're trying to help but I don't see it here.

[Why Syzygy]

172. Let me be blunt.

I miss the "my posts" on the latest page. That's how I keep up with the action I'm most interested in. Now have to go to "my du" then posts. Let me gently say, I don't like that.

[Skinner]

173. Are you aware...

...that you can see all of your posts on the "My DU" page, without clicking through to the "My Posts" page?

[Why Syzygy]

174. No I didn't... thanks

That is a nice feature.

[muriel_volestrangler]

175. Question about indexing engines eg Google

I think that DU is set up for archived forums, at least, not to be accessed by robot crawlers, eg Google - certainly the DU threads that show up on Google seem random, and just a small amount of the whole of DU. I presume this might be because the load on DU might be huge if all the archives were constantly accessed by the automated systems.

Will this also apply to journals? It's possible that, being the 'cream' of people's posts, they might bring a lot of new people to DU if they are indexed; but the load on DU might not be too much (though perhaps it will be, depending on how the pages are set up). Will the journals also appear on Google's blog search?

[Skinner]

176. Our intention is that Google will index the Journals.

But it may take some tweaking before it does so.

[jonnyt]

177. Cool

Pretty cool.

[cynatnite]

178. Why doesn't my star show up on my journal?

I thought it was the design I picked and tried a couple, but none of them show the star. It does show up with my posts, but just not at my journal. Can I do something to fix this? I like having it.

[Skinner]

180. Do this:

Go to your journal.

Click "Edit Journal"

Look for "Profile Information" and click "Edit Module".

Look for "Donor Status" and click "On".

Click "Save Changes".

[cynatnite]

182. Thank you! n/t

[cynatnite]

179. What about nominating journals?

Maybe something to highlight a really good journal for people to go check out. Perhaps once a week or so you, EarlG and Elad can do something like this.

There are so many it seems and it would be nice if a journal or two got an honorable mention or something.

I'm really tired so blame the idea on that. :)

[Skinner]

181. We're probably going to do something like this eventually.

But we haven't found the time yet.

[jonnyt]

184. Thanks for that

Thanks for that

[jonnyt]

185. awesome

That has sorted me out.

[jonnyt]

186. Great feature

Wow, what an amazing feature.

[DoYouEverWonder]

187. Small request?

When you go into My DU, would it be possible to put links directly to the main forums in the bar across the top, where you have MY POSTS ? Otherwise its two clicks to get to any forum once you go in there.

Thanks.
DYEW

[goodriddance]

188. good to know

alas

[Cleita]

189. How can I edit my journal?

I mean the body of it, or do I have to repost? The original post has archived so I can't add it on the bottom.

[Skinner]

190. You should be able to add archived threads to your journal.

Just find the post and then click the "Add to my Journal" link.