the Village Knittiot

As some of you know, Mr. Knittiot and I recently switched our domains to a new hosting service. Since the introduction of the uber-shitty Network Solutions into our lives, things have been a complete nightmare.

Our first clue that things were not going to go well was the discovery that they LIED TO US about all the reasons we decided to switch over to their *@%#! service in the first place. Then, when Mr. Knittiot called them and said, “Um, I have an email from you guys that states I would get the following services/features/options, but it doesn’t appear to be that way at all.” They said, basically, “We didn’t say that.” And he said, “Yes you did.” They said, “No we didn’t.” And he said, “Would you like to see the email?” And they said, “No. We didn’t say those things.”

One of those things they failed to deliver on was a pointer from my old URL to my new domain’s URL. This was particularly disheartening to me, since everyone who formerly read, bookmarked, or linked to my blog found only a lonely error message when trying to connect to The Village. Okay, so I lost some readers. Those among you with enough tech savy or who’s email address I had, I tried to let know. Then I discovered my RSS feeds stopped working, and that I no longer received email notification when I had a new comment. Also, sometimes, in the middle of the day, the site would just go down.

These problems (and more) resulted in long conversations with customer service where they told us things like, “The problem is your email service provider.” Okay. Rounds of no-it-isn’t-yes-it-is would ensue. They would reluctantly open trouble tickets for the treatment of such problems and then Mr. Knittiot would get an email from them saying the ticket had been closed and the problem was resolved, when clearly the problem had not been resolved. In short. They are fuckers. So, we are taking our business elsewhere.

Once again, this means a little upheaval. Some potential downtime. And ultimately the ability to breathe a deep sigh of relief. This time, we did a little more homework. And by we, I mean Mr. Knittiot. This place is the real deal. They get excellent reviews all around. And most importantly, they aren’t liars. So that’s good then.

Anyway, I wanted to let you know what was going on. You know, just in case you end up in some other dimension because you happened to visit my blog at exactly the right moment in the space-time continuum where alternate universes collide and all that. Most likely though, you’ll just encounter an error message, but not to worry — we’ll be right back.

If you do end up in an alternate universe — either I’m really sorry or you’re very welcome.

Technology is something I like, but usually only when it is working well, and usually only when I don’t have to think about it too much. When I do have to think about it, I want it to be marveling at some new wonder of this digital world we live in. I certainly don’t want it to be because I have a problem. Nevertheless, I have reconciled myself to the fact that problems will arise, and deal with them I must. So…

As it turns out, getting your own personal domain is not all smooth sailing. And the previously promised automatic redirection isn’t so much automatic or redirecting. As a matter of fact, at the moment it is nothing more than an error message (as you may have discovered). I don’t know if this will change or not, but I suspect it won’t. We are working through some poopiness with the new domain hosting, so please bear with us. I will send out an email to those blogs I know link to the Village with updated URL info. And for those of you with bookmarks that haven’t been able to find me, my sincerest apologies and I’m glad you managed to find us despite the mess!

Welcome to our new home!

Yes, the Village Knittiot now officially has it’s very own home on the web. PJ’s Attic has been kind enough to give us a little virtual corner to crawl around in these past several months. But … our fiber stash got a little too large so we decided it was time to look for a place of our own. So, what do you think? Roomy, no? And look at all this light!

Of course, this means our address has changed, so for those of you with bookmarks, please feel free to update them with the new one — www.villageknittiot.com — although, the old one will continue to redirect you here.

Random Rogueishness

Neck detail completed, and shoulders seemed together, I am well on my way into the hood. I couldn’t resist trying it on to see how it was fitting…

As far as computers go I think that I am pretty much like your average person. I like things to work. I don’t want to feel like I need a PhD in physics to use something. And despite having *some* idea about what is going on with my computer, I am still pretty much in the dark about how it works, what to do if something goes wrong, etc. I tend to let Mr. Knittiot get things to a working order, and then I try to keep everything as it is so long as I can do what I need to do. In other words, I do not muck. Not a lot anyway.

Once I get used to The Way Things Are or learn about something that seems interesting, I tend to think about it for a very long time, maybe even mention it 5 or 6 times, then casually illicit the help of my household TechnoGod (I, of course, do not immediately avail myself of that help, as there is still change/adjustment time needed). I feel extremely fortunate in this way, because I know not everyone has a household TechnoGod, especially not one like Mr. Knittiot who is a little bit like a cross between the Computer Whisperer and a Technical Savant.

Anyway, since I first started learning about Linux, the Open Source Initiative, and The Free Software Foundation (among others), I have been watching and reading and thinking and feeling a sense of excitement — almost like anticipation. I kept finding my non-technical self doing things like starting conversations about the theoretical superiority of Linux, and deciding that it is important to have a philosophy about technology. And when Mark Morford posted a rant about why it is silly for Americans to spend as much money as they do on PCs when they could run the all powerful and ultra secure Mac, I actually emailed him and told him if he was a real rebel, he would be using Linux — I, of course, being a current Microsoft Windows user (if you could see me right now, you would see the sheepish expression on my face).

I have asked Mr. Knittiot 6 times over the last several months to install Linux on my laptop, which has always been greeted with enthusiasm, but when he woud then say, “Great, let’s set up a time!” I would say, “Sure, okay…” And then change the subject. In my mind Linux meant becoming a Mucker, something I am distinctly not. It meant leaving the familiar safe womb of Windows and venturing into a whole new galaxy. I was scared — even despite the security blanket of said household TechnoGod (maybe I should knit a little deity statue).

Well, Sunday afternoon I took the plunge. Which was really more like Mr. Knittiot coming into the den (where I was happily knitting and watching Buffy) and saying (for the umpteenth time) let’s put Linux on your box. And me finally saying, “Okay, I’m ready.”

There are a lot of words that Mr. Knittiot uttered on Sunday. I thought I was doing pretty good understanding every 7th or 8th one. Even so, the process went pretty well. I learned, though not as much as I should have. And as of Monday afternoon (Mr. Knittiot wanted to spend Monday “Mucking” with the system himself) I am a Mucker. I have been successfully booting into Linux, checking my email, posting to the blog, browsing the web, setting my preferences, and learning about the brave new world that is Suse 9.2. In short, the world has not fallen apart, and there was minimal disruption to the technological flow of my life. I am participating in something that I really admire, and I’m learning how to be a Mucker. Power to the people!

Wow! Things sure look different around here, nes pas?

Since I fired up the Village back in November, I have been hobbling along with some content management software that Mr. Knittiot (my own personal TechnoGod) managed to make function in a blog-like manner.

But, it wasn’t exactly a smooth process. Not because the software wasn’t awesome, but because it was meant to handle so much more than a simple blog. When I wanted to post a new entry, I had to code links and images using my good friend HTML, which often made writing an entry seem like a much larger task than just jotting down a few words and hitting “Publish.” Also, there were the comments, which I didn’t like from the start and thought were less than intuitive. Even so, I had a blog. So all was good…

Then, last week I was reading through someone’s blog when lo and behold, he happened to mention a little piece of open source blogging software called WordPress. I looked into it, and I knew this was the software for me. Mr. Knittiot spent a few days poking at it, and the result is this. Changes can be expected pretty regularly as I muck about with some of the features, turn things off and on, and in general run around my blog like a little kid hopped up on sugar.

This free software is an example of the remarkable tools available to you thanks to the Open Source and Free Software movements. If you don’t know what Open Source means, learn. If you’ve never been to the Free Software Foundation’s website please do. I mean it. Among other things, this is about accesibility to technology for more than just the priviledged few who can afford to pay hundreds and thousands of dollars for technology and its benefits and opportunities. More than that, it is about a thriving creative community. It’s about technology as a concept not just an abstract tool.

I have been using Open Office (which replaced the entire Microsoft Office suite for me, which I couldn’t afford) for about 6 months, I also have Gimp installed (Photoshop substitute), and last week I realized it was silly to be using Microsoft’s web browser when I could be using a secure browser like Firefox instead. So I installed that. It rocks. You may also have noticed before the link on this site to Creative Commons. They are kind of the Open Source answer to copyrights, allowing for gray areas when it comes to your creative works. Recognizing that creativity builds off of a creative community, and that art inspires art, yet understanding that my creations are still my creations, it allows me to specify in what ways anything I create can be used. Today, I am taking the ultimate plunge and installing Linux on my laptop (with help of household TechnoGod, of course — though he assures me that he is only going to stand there while I do it myself, because it is just that easy).

*steps off soap box* Okay, just had to get that out there.

Speaking of Mr. Knittiot, he did manage (we think) to keep all the registered users of the old site, as well as their comments. If, for some reason, you cannot log in to this site (there�s a link down and to your right for that), please request a new password. If you don�t get a new password within ten minutes, please send an email to webmaster [at] pjsattic [dot] com and Mr. K will see what he can do!