With an existing blog going strong it may come as a surprise to some that I’m starting a new one. Thing is, there are a lot of people who read my other blog who have little to no interest in my occasional comments on web development work, and I have a hankering to write about that a little more. So I decide to start another blog here, to sit alongside the rest of my work site.
A few weeks ago I started work on writing my own blogging software. It wasn’t a decision I made lightly, and it’s not a tool that will be finished soon, but I had become tired of the limited options inherent in most PHP blogging systems. If I wanted to swap out the authentication system to link in with an existing site’s user database, or to add in a new module so that comments were actually threads from a discussion board, it required a gargantuan effort changing the code base. So what I’m working on is a component-based system that will be based around as-small-as-possible a core, with a clear API for switching out any component.
For now, however, it seemed like a good idea to try out some more of the current options, even if it does mean I’ll have to mop-up problems from the variety of permalink formats. Hopefully mod_rewrite will save me there. Right now I’m using serendipity, which feels a little simpler to get going than wordpress, and apparently has better comment moderation options. Neither of those programs seems ready to compete with MoveableType for templating systems or for ease of setting up things like automatic trackback notifications to syndication sites. But it’ll do for now.
Next up: redesigning to get this site better integrated with the rest of jystewart.net.
UPDATE: One of the installed but deactivated plugins allows for XML-RPC ping entry announcements.