I’ve been very busy the last few weeks focussing on refinements and tweaks for this site as a whole with a few additional features supporting the podcasts hosted here as well. A quick summary for those that are interested:
The Server
I’ve migrated the site to a new VPS, now running an up-to-date CentOS 7 x64 server located in San Francisco which should present significantly less loading delay times for readers in North America. The first VPS had become bloated and hard to update and it was time to start fresh. Improvements as a result of the upgrade include:
- Search functionality now working properly
- Faster page load times
- Statamic restructuring and switching to Parsedown also improved the speed of the site
The Podcast Live Stream ShowBot:
- Q&A Table now added
- Client-side reset functionality between episodes for Administrators (okay, so that’s not an end-user feature but it makes my life easier)
- Time stamp of suggestions/questions made, now in a relative format
Podcast-specific Additions:
- Past podcast guests are now listed, including links to the episodes they appeared on
- Integrated Guest/Host/Sponsors throughout the site reducing site overheads when updating
- Look-aheads for future episodes now fully automated
- Tweet links from the schedule now allow anyone to tweet a link with the times and time remaining until the next episode goes live
I will be taking a break from site improvements for a few weeks so I can focus on the content and preparation for Pragmatic but in sneak-peeks I’ve lined up a special guest for the 50th episode, and yes, I will be doing a “Christmas Special” for Episode 51 which is going to be a bit different.