The Coming Soon Plage

Welcome to our little corner of the web, where we've embraced a bit of '90s nostalgia with our hand-crafted approach. Think of us as the 'artisanal' creators of the internet! You might notice some sections saying 'coming soon' or 'under construction' - that's our way of saying we're old-school enough to still be working on it. We're not fans of those fancy magic scripts; everything you see here is a labor of love, either by us or fellow '90s enthusiasts. If an option says it's coming soon, it's like waiting for the next issue of your favorite comic book - it might come out, it might not, but we'll try our best to make it happen when we find the time. Oh, and the only fancy framework we're using is good ol' Bootstrap, because let's face it, I am a geeks, not UI wizards.

Now, a bit about why we made these changes. The old blogging software was starting to feel like a bloated mess, causing its fair share of headaches. To add to the chaos, some folks were taking bits of our private work, even though it was out there on the web. We might be small, but our stuff is precious, so we wanted to create a more private and controlled system.

Also, the website wasn't just mine anymore; it became a joint venture with my wife. So, I wanted the site to reflect that partnership. As I mentioned earlier, I've returned to what initially made me fall in love with web development. No more large databases, no need for complex scripts and systems to do the basics. After a little mishap trying to install a password protection system on the already bloated script (which, predictably, broke everything), I decided to take a step back. I rebuilt the entire website from scratch. There's no CMS or blogging software behind this website. The Burning Man PHP Website Engine is simply a collection of PHP helper scripts created on the spot when I needed them. I'm not using any publicly downloadable scripts; this was crafted with good old PHP and OMG functions. I'll admit, I have a rocky relationship with OOP - it's just not my thing.

So here we are with our new website. The invite system seems to be doing its job, and I can make fixes without risking a domino effect of chaos since it's mostly just text displayed on a screen. It's a return to the basics, and we hope you enjoy the simplicity as much as we do.

Please Note:

It's come to my attention that some people might assume that because they see a readable blog, I must have no trouble reading and writing effortlessly. However, that assumption is mistaken. In fact, this very blog required the assistance of ChatGPT to transform basic information into readable content. I didn't just toss some text into the AI and hope for the best; I painstakingly explained each section to the AI, then had it generate the content. After that, I had to rely on a TTS (text-to-speech) reader. Yes, my reading ability is that challenging — I have to use TTS readers to ensure the text not only reads correctly but sounds right. This is why we offer audio versions of our blogs on the site; since we're already using a reader, we converted the text into audio files

For each section of this modest blog — let's say, 4 or 5 sections — it took me about an hour in total using a basic script that would normally take just a few minutes to create. This is one of those instances where you shouldn't judge a book by its cover. Also, while this text took an hour, the TTS conversion will take another 30 minutes or so. I'll have to save the audio snippets the TTS reader provides (You get what you pay for) and then use software to stitch them together into a single audio file for your listening convenience.