Blog

AustinMania! is now a blog, too, and you can post, too

The previous post describes my investigation into Ruby on Rails, as a framework I could use to rapidly build out the AustinMania! community portal. Alas, I was once again stymied by my web host, and for now, I cannot run RoR applications on this web site. This may change with further study, but luckily, I do not need to wait for that to significantly enhance the interactiveness of the site.

As I was pondering my next move, which included considering if I should switch web hosts, a sudden realization struck me – I already had all I needed to implement the beginnings of a user-generated community – a WordPress blog! All I had to do was to make a new, separate database, re-install WordPress with a new blog name, and presto, a new blog was created on the site! The main difference in functionality vs my regular blog is that when a new user registers, they are by default granted “contributor” level access, which means they can create new posts themselves (subject to approval by me before they are published). I also opened up commenting privileges so anyone can comment, and they appear right away without moderation. I can always go back and remove inappropriate comments if I need to, and since the initial goal is to encourage use, this should be ok for now.

I made a few changes to the sidebar from the one this blog is running to better fit the community aspect of AustinMania!, such as listing all the authors and removing the blogroll. Also, I tweaked the entire user registration and login process to “hide” the fact AustinMania! is really a blog, it’s supposed to look like just a community website. I added helpful instructions to the e-mail that sends the initial password, and to some of the registration pages, and removed certain pages or sections from the admin console to simplify it for people who have never blogged before. For example, the dashboard seemed fairly superfluous, so it’s gone. I will probably continue to tweak the admin pages over time so they better fit the theme of AustinMania!

The best part of this is that it is up and running, anyone can contribute, and I can continue to tweak it and add features. I still intend to bring to life my “grand vision” of what AustinMania! can be, but at this point I am not sure if it will evolve from this WordPress platform, or if I will build an entirely new RoR application. Perhaps in the end it will be a hybrid. Whatever the case, I am glad I was able to implement something that works today, and I didn’t let the bigger ideas get in the way of progress. I hate it when that happens, don’t you?