CHANGELOG: Myrick Multimedia 2.0.8.6

Ah yes, here we are to another update for another week.

Following the 2.0.8.5 update and getting some content updates done, I began work a couple of weeks back on a Monday night to consolidate the design work for the next three sites I had planned for the transition into one grouping for most of the work I needed to complete in an effort to make life easier with some of the designs that are repeated over several sites, but are utilized as individual blocks on each site with specific purposes.

I’m definitely enjoying the gradient box design the more I look at it as I’ve gone along with the changes to the design over the past week. So far, no issues have been raised over the transition – even though it is going slower than I’d prefer. Sadly, someone has to write the news just like someone has to make the doughnuts.

The only problem I’ve encountered so far? Google Ads will randomly insert themselves into the design, making it difficult to figure out where to put things without it breaking when ads randomly place themselves in places that squeezes the design space. into unreadable mess. This only seems to be a problem for the FRONT PAGES for Polk, Paulding and TNW.

How exactly do I solve that problem? I turn off automatic ads for Google Adsense, of course. But then? I make no advertising money from Google without spending a SIGNIFICANT AMOUNT OF TIME designing AROUND the ad placements. This is not exactly a solvable issue, because Google has been a real pain in the butt this summer over old adsense placements getting mixed around on pages that don’t have permission to host them yet (Haralson Today and Myrick Multimedia for Events and Classifieds placements.)

This leaves the remaining bugs and design updates for Today Sports Wire, and figuring out what went wrong with the promised pick’ems system and why the system isn’t updating all of the scoreboards either based on display conditions.

MY HOPE is that all the technical issues will be wrapped up this coming week, when I get a chance to slow down a little since the Polk County Fair will be concluding on Sunday, and I’ll be posting the crazy amount of photos I usually get in the process.

This is the 2.0.8.6 list of items that received design updates for each site:

Haralson Today

• Harl New Top created to match the Today News Wire top – Featured item, weather from TNW, Latest Headlines (Local News) and the login box combined with the Gradient Design.
• Created new Free Content box with an ad.
• Events Box updated to the new gradient design
• Classifieds Box updated to the new gradient design
• Police/Arrests/Courts Box (solid black keeping with current theme)
• Bremen Buchanan and Tallapoosa transitioned to the gradient box design, Waco went a solid single item.
• Business lost its rounded edges and drop shadow.
• Entertainment box updated to the new gradient box design
• Health box updated to the new gradient box design
• Technology updated to the gradient box design
• TSW Box updated to match the TNW design language – white space kept.
• Press Release box updated to remove drop shadow and rounded corners, remains white space.
• Created the Other Counties box – combines the Polk and Paulding network boxes from Today News Wire, excludes Haralson.
• Financial box updated to match the Today News Wire design.
• State SE box updated to match the Today News Wire design.
• National Box updated to match the Today News Wire design.
• Class Random and Events Random lost their rounded corners.
• Education box temporarily removed.

Paulding Today

• Front Top redesigned to match TNW design
• Dallas and Hiram boxes got the new gradient box design
• Removed the Weather/old Login boxes
• Education lost its rounded edges and drop shadow, remains in same place.
• Events and Classifieds front boxes added, matching gradient box design
• Business lost its rounded edges and drop shadow
• Press Release box updated to remove drop shadow and rounded corners, remains white space.
• Created the Other Counties box – combines the Polk and Haralson network boxes from Today News Wire, excludes Paulding.
• Financial box updated to match the Today News Wire design.
• State SE box updated to match the Today News Wire design.
• National Box updated to match the Today News Wire design.
• World Box updated to match Gradient Box Style, remained solid black background
• Class and Events Random lost their rounded corners, drop shadow.
• TSW Box updated to match TNW designs.

Polk Today

• Front Top Redesigned to match TNW
• Free Box added
• Class Front added
• Events Front added
• Aragon, Cedartown and Rockmart boxes redesigned for new gradient box layout
• Obituaries redesigned, loses rounded corners and drop shadow
• Police box fixed color errors
• Removed Weather, login, Cedartown Bulldogs, Rockmart Yellow Jackets boxes.
• Education, Pets and an ad were combined.
• Press Release box updated to remove drop shadow and rounded corners, remains white space.
• Created the Other Counties box – combines the Paulding and Haralson network boxes from Today News Wire, excludes Polk.
• Financial box updated to match the Today News Wire design.
• State SE box updated to match the Today News Wire design.
• National Box updated to match the Today News Wire design.
• World updated to gradient box design style (utilized to create a world version for Haralson that was missing.) – kept black to previous design, sits in between National and State/SE on Front
• Class Random and Events Random lost their rounded corners, drop shadow.

Front design updates are basically completed, but one thing needs to be updated for each site’s front: what to do about current weather? Could it be incorporated into the free content boxes?

Myrick Multimedia Classifieds

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Bug report

Top header area for Polk Today, Paulding Today, Haralson Today and Today Sports Wire needed fixing for the correct login link based on the site, not on the Myrick Multimedia login. I was able to correct the issue quickly.

Headings for Polk, Paulding and Haralson Today remain skewed left on some desktop versions of the site, depending on scaling. I’ll be doing some brief fixes on that as well for the 2.0.8.7 update.

Block spacing has been a mixed bag with the Today Network theme, but has to be updated by site individually. Expect that to be fixed in 2.0.8.7

A persistent bug with click tracking hasn’t been solved with an update. Not sure why? Investigating with Advanced Ads software creator. I reached out, did an update to the software with a specific addon to 3.0.7, but that didn’t seem to fix the click-tracking issue. This could be a setup problem, or potentially something didn’t get added into the code for mobile/desktop server ad placements that allowing impression tracking, but not click tracking.

I *do* know that clicks are working since I do get traffic from them internally. How much? That is the question.

Roadmap

This coming week during the overnight hours, I’ll be finishing up the work to update the TSW front page, and begin working on pages for each team and sport.

This means I’ll be spending a night or two on scoreboards and the pick’ems contest as well.

After that is finished, I look to make some changes to the following:

A) The Membership Account Area needs a bit of a revamp, with the hopes of making it easier for folks who login to their main account on Myrick Multimedia to find the useful portions of the site for individuals who subscribe easier to access. I expect the current version to be replaced in part or in full with the upcoming 2.0.8.7 release with the revamp of the TSW front. The 2.0.9 range of updates will likely be specific to bug updates, and should be on a fixed weekly basis through October.

Myrick Multimedia Events

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B) Three additional network areas: games.myrickmultimedia.com, realestate.myrickmultimedia.com and jobs.myrickmultimedia.com will be spinning up in the coming days, with some additional details to work out before we call the release 2.1.0; expect details to come on those realestate.myrickmultimedia.com and jobs.myrickmultimedia.com in specific before we hit the fully updated point release. The Real Estate and Jobs subsites will be accessible for reading postings, but adding items will require additional subscription access outside of the Monthly+ subscriptions

C) I plan to figure out in the coming days additional opportunities for those who want to access Myrick Multimedia content for a short time to join, pay for short time, and keep their accounts available for when they wish to purchase a short-term plan again. This will likely come AFTER the official 2.1 “stable” update, and I will seek to include site access for individual sites on a short term basis, or single-site access without the events, classifieds or video access available to Monthly+ subscribers. I can’t guarantee that will be possible. (I’ll be beta testing this possibility with the Real Estate and Jobs site access.)

D) Communications: It would be great to be able for subscribers – and potential advertising clients or news tips – to have a way to communicate directly and immediately without having to rely on Facebook messenger. I looked into options previously, but didn’t find anything that I thought would work well, or didn’t require additional cost. I’ll probably throw this problem at ChatGPT in the coming days, but I will not be using AI coding to create the platform, as I prefer to avoid potential avenues for the site to be accessed with illicit intent, and I fear that ChatGPT in this particular area could introduce vectors unintentionally (or intentionally? – More to come on KtE on that commentary bit.)

That does it for the 2.0.8.6 update round. Enjoy the new design layouts, and more will be coming soon on that front!