Mind the Gap

As with all upgrades, there’s usually a gap between installation and optimization. Wordherders is now running MT 3.12, but we are all still working out some kinks, especially as we try to get our old 2.61 templates in line with the new features. So, please be patient.

A few things I’ve noticed already:
1. Still some issues w/ commenting. If you leave a comment on a herd blog and it doesn’t show up right away, likely it has been sent to moderation. Herders – you can moderate your comments in the new “comments” section under “Post” (in the left toolbar). I believe you can change your preferences depending on how you want comments to work in the Weblog Config section.

Neil Turner has a nice breakdown of the changes in MT 3.* in his review. This screenshot lists the options for configuring your comments.

2. Blacklist no longer has a DESPAM button, which I find slightly inconvenient (especially since I like to despam several blogs at once). Hopefully that’ll change soon, so I don’t have to go through blogs one by one.

You can, however, use blacklist as you delete comments in the “Comments” section. The link is all the way at the bottom, so it may be easy to miss. Herders – as always, please be careful what you add to the global blacklist. Also keep in mind that the new Blacklist automatically updates via RSS feed (at least, I think it does).

3. In order to get the new features working right (such as commenting), it appears that several new templates need to be included (and I haven’t figured out the right combination/secret handshake yet).

4. They dramatically changed the layout of the CSS and template, which makes things a bit tough. Lots of tweaking to come, I think.

5. I can’t see trackbacks (on the Wordherders main blog, which is the only place I’ve tweaked templates so far)

6. [Update] Somehow, a spammer is getting through on one post in Wordherders. This is particularly odd because I have set Wordherders.net to Typekey only for the time being. Very weird.