Category Archives: Web Stuff

Broken Links

Philosophical Meanderings, Too Posted on by

My Broken Links Checker is finally notifying me of what I’ve known since I merged the two web sites. Every single link is broken. I want to assure you, I’m getting them fixed as quickly as I can. In the meantime, don’t be surprised if you encounter missing images or links that don’t work (the link checker disables them until I fix them, so you should be safe from that anyway).

I’m also going to turn off the “Revive Old Post” feature until I can get this fixed. No sense having people trying to check links that aren’t there. I’ve also been having some trouble with permalinks. My blog back end is struggling. I’m chipping away to get broken links fixed and other anomalies squared away.

Liebster Award

Philosophical Meanderings, Too Posted on by

I’ve been nominated for the Liebster Award by Juneta Key, writer of Fantasy, Paranormal, Urban Sci-Fi Cyber-Steampunk & Mystery, Romance, and Life Inspired Stories.Liebster Award

 

Thank you, Juneta, for thinking enough of my blog to recommend it. Here are the rules:Rules

 

Here are my eleven questions to answer:

1. Who is your favorite author? James Michener

2. If you had 3 wishes what would they be?

  1. Health for me and my loved ones
  2. Everyone would at least have enough
  3. The ability to communicate effectively

3. If you were given a free round trip ticket to anywhere, where would you go? I’d set up a writing retreat via Amtrak sleeping car on the longest route I could configure in the United States.

4.  Would you rather live near the ocean, forest, mountains or the fourth option;)? I love the ocean, forest, and mountains, but I’d choose to live right where I am — smack dab in the middle of rolling Texas.

5. What is your favorite genre of music? Classic rock.

6. Plane, Train, Boat, Car or other for vacation travel? Train

7. Where is your favorite place to escape from the daily grind to? I’m retired. I’ve escaped the daily grind, so the answer is home.

8. What is your best memory?  (You probably have several, but pick one) My earliest memory is of riding in the wagon across a gravel parking lot behind my mom, who did not drive. I was not more than two. Mom says I’d say, “Bumpy ride, Mommy.  Bumpy ride.”

9. Do you have a hobbit? if not, what would you like to do for a hobby? ROFL @ SELF  okay this error was too good to correct—go ahead tell me who is your favorite hobbit? I have no idea what a hobbit is. (Well, all right. It’s a small, troll-like fictional being, but I am completely unfamiliar with the details, because I’ve steadfastly avoided reading the book for 40-plus years.)

10.  What is the most memorable book you have read, or movie if not a big reader? The Throwaway Children I checked it out of the library when I was around 13, and it was ghastly. I found it as a used book on Amazon several years ago and bought it, but I haven’t had the guts to read it again. It was a non-fiction book about the things adults have done to abuse children, and it was something I probably shouldn’t have been reading at that age.

11. Would you travel around the world in 80 days if you could? Nope.

11 Random Facts About Me:

  1.  I’m still amazed I was able to retire from working for someone else before I turned 48.  I never saw that coming (not when I was 20, anyway!).
  2. I’m going to attempt to have two total knee replacement surgeries before September, 2015.
  3. My husband is an incredibly talented musician, an exacting craftsman, and, since he’ll be 78 this year, I’m embarrassed I can’t keep up with him. (See #2 above.)
  4. Until Millie died in 2012, I had always had a dog.
  5. My husband and I love long Amtrak trips.
  6. I’m not a fan of holidays (except for paid time off work) or ceremonies.
  7. I once wanted to be a zoo veterinarian.
  8. I toyed with becoming a marine biologist.
  9. Now I’m an amateur feline behaviorist.
  10. I’ve always wanted to be a writer but didn’t think I was “experienced” enough. When I became “experienced” enough, I realized I had needed to be practicing writing all that time.  Catching up.
  11. I’m a Native Iowan and a Naturalized Texan.

My Nominees (Note sure of the number of followers, but each has something to say, and I’d love to see more people find them):

  1. Wendy at Shining the Light (She hasn’t been posting much, and I miss her thoughts, but I know she’s been busily writing good fiction.)
  2. Paige at Tales From the Laundry Room
  3. Patty at My Edible Landscaping Journal
  4. Valerie at Valerie Comer
  5. Stephen at 51313 Harbor Street
  6. Erin at Erin Hartshorn
  7. Bonnie at Cowgirl in New England
  8. Margaret at Tales to Tide You Over
  9. Zette at Joyously Prolific
  10. Elizabeth at Dreaming in the Daylight
  11. Thea at Expected Aberrations

My Questions for My Nominees:

Use the questions above, but, unless you actually have a hobbit (if so, tell us all about it!), for question nine, please tell us about your favorite hobby.

 

Wednesday Wanderings: Sorry. New URL Coming

Philosophical Meanderings, Too Posted on by

Maybe. I’m going to apologize right up front.  I think I’m going to be changing the URL on the blog again. I thought I had it set up right, but now, I think I’m going to wind up moving it to the root domain.

Or not. But probably. If the blog disappears, just look for it at jeanschara.com (instead of jeanschara.com/randr). You have at least a week before you have to worry about it, maybe more. I have to check a few things out, make backups, all that fun behind the scenes stuff.

Or maybe I’ll find another way. If so, I’ll let you know that, too.

Tech Stuff: WordPress Security

Philosophical Meanderings, Too Posted on by

If you have a blog, what, if anything, do you do to ensure it doesn’t get hijacked by nefarious web characters? Well, mostly I’ve trusted WordPress to publish solid software and used a strong password.

Then earlier this month, I was wandering around on the FTP site of my site and noticed some files that looked suspicious on several of my blogs.  I grew concerned. One one of my private blogs, I installed a WordPress security plug in called WordFence. It only found a generic problem — one file differed from the original WordPress installation file, but it had been modified by my hosting service. Each of the sites that had the strange files were sites I’d used the lazy way to install (and have sort of regretted ever since), meaning I let the hosting providers script service install the sites. There’s nothing wrong with this, but every once in a while, I have to log in to the service from my cPanel and tell it which version I’ve already updated the site to from my end.

Even though my installs were mostly clean, I like the idea of WordFence keeping an eye on things. In fact, the day after I installed it on my primary site, I looked at the login attempt statistics and saw that someone in Italy had been repeatedly trying to login to my site using the Admin username.

Now, you’ve probably heard the advice to never use Administrator or Admin as your administrator username.  Um. Yeah.  I have too, and until I saw those hits, I’d not done anything about it. When I saw that, I made the change right away. And I am using the WordFence plug in to block anyone who tries to login that way in the future.

What does WordFence do? The free version does quite a lot. It will scan your site and compare the WordPress and theme files against known good ones in the WordFence repository for signs of tampering. If WordFence detects differences, it will let you know.  You can compare the original reference file with the version on your site and tell it to ignore or make it match.  If you have the paid version, you can schedule these scans. In the free version, you must run the scan manually (click a button to start the scan).

You can look at live traffic on your site. You can block IPs. You can activate a caching option to speed up your site. Premium members can activate two-factor authentication via their cell phones.

Generally speaking, so the individual or very small business owner using WordPress, the free version of WordFence should be fine, but the premium features may be worthwhile to you, depending upon your traffic or level of comfort with risk.

You may or may not decide you need additional security help for your site, but, please, if you’re using Admin or Administrator for the username on your admin account, fix that but quick.

@JeanSchara

Philosophical Meanderings, Too Posted on by

I’ve taken the plunge and created a Twitter account in my real name. This account will focus on readers and writers and people who are interested in that aspect of me. My @PolarBear60 account is all over the map — reflecting my personal interests and will remain active. I’ll be … Continue reading →

Blog Host Downtime

Philosophical Meanderings, Too Posted on by

My internet host has built a new datacenter and will be moving the server my top domain is on tomorrow night.  Here’s an excerpt of the notice they provided: The Bluehost System Administrators will physically move your server (containing the hosting account: mercuryranch.org) into the new data center between 9 … Continue reading →

WordPress 3.1

Philosophical Meanderings, Too Posted on by

I upgraded to WordPress 3.1 when my dashboard said it was ready.  I’d seen a few people oohing and ahhing about it on Twitter, but I hadn’t noticed anything particularly different.  Until today.  I clicked onto the main page, and noticed the toolbar similar to the one on the WordPress.com … Continue reading →

Blog Editing and Revision

Philosophical Meanderings, Too Posted on by

After seeing all the dead links in the blog over the last couple of days, I began to wonder if it might be worthwhile to look back on early blog entries and do some pruning.  Do any of you ever do that? Park of me thinks it’s probably a time … Continue reading →

Broken Links

Philosophical Meanderings, Too Posted on by

I read about a Word Press Plug-In that finds broken links in your site.  Since I moved Rantings and Ravings from one URL to another a year or so ago, I knew I had to have broken links, so I installed the plug in and put it to work. It … Continue reading →