Well, some of you may have noticed: something has changed here. Namely, I've switched my weblog from my own software - PyDS - to WordPress. Why? Well, there are many reasons. Not even the worst of them is: because I can. But the more technical ones are a bit more complicated:
It starts with the database. PyDS uses a rather peculiar database, namely Metakit. Metakit is nice when you have small and compact data, but not so nice when it grows. Eventually it starts to behave strangely. Under certain circumstances it shreds the data. With my nearly 4000 articles, I'm still far from that point, but you don't have to push your luck and wait until the last minute, right?
Then there's the concept of PyDS rendering all articles as static content. That's also quite great, because the files are of course delivered much faster than if they came from a database. Unfortunately, with nearly 4000 posts, you have to wait quite a while for everything to be generated if you make a layout change. For that reason I already have a cronjob that regenerates everything every night. But somehow that's still pretty weird, so away with it.
Besides, I'll eventually want to switch back to my own software - but to do that I'd have to migrate the data anyway. Now I no longer have it in that somewhat wobbly Metakit, but in MySQL. Yes, I know, MySQL sucks dead hamsters through clogged straws. I say that myself all the time. Anyway, it's still significantly better than Metakit. And my new software is currently still just a pipe dream. I don't even know if I'll really want to write it...
Additionally, WordPress has a number of nice features and PyDS has become a bit baroque in its internal structure over time - for example, PyDS can't handle hierarchical categories and the categories of Blogmarks and Weblog overlap. Now everything is in one common pot and that's that.
Otherwise, I've had WordPress in use for quite a while already and was very satisfied with version 1.2 - although it was still very sparse in terms of features. Version 1.5 is now quite impressive. Ok, it's still a pure beta, but it's already good enough for normal use. I've noticed a few small bugs so far, nothing serious or critical.
Let's see what happens. I should have redirected everything possible from the old stuff to the new stuff. So RSS feeds should continue to work and links to old posts should also be properly redirected. If anyone notices anything that doesn't work but should, or has any other comments: you know where to find the comment function here.
Aside from that, PyDS has been in existence for almost 2 years now. So it's time something changed - PyDS itself will of course continue to be developed. And is of course still available, nothing changes there. I still have it in use on various other sites. It's just this weblog monster here that has simply outgrown the system.