Ok, so WordPress finally and completely won me over today.  They have a wealth of plugins, themes, and a huge community supporting their ecosystem.  Whether you’re running your own web-blog, a photo-blog or even a podcast, there are plugins to support that.  Since it’s free, it’s even a great resource for small and large enterprises alike.  I’m hosting my own instance of WordPress-MU simply to make it easier to maintain the 2 or 3 core blogs of different topics I am interested in, and the soon to be 2 or 3 more “test” blogs I’ll be creating as I attempt various less-common blog types such as photo-blogging and knowledge-blogging (a probably mistaken name for the concept of blogging at least one bit of information that you learned about on any given day).

I knew I’d do it too…  This is actually an edit since I posted the entry and then remembered the big feature that I just learned of that made me think to write this post.  There are instructions on importing your blog from wherever you hosted it last, and the instructions are quite clear.  I have found that this is very compatible with the overall experience of the latest versions that I have seen of WP.  Things are laid out simply, clearly and the user experience seems to make a lot of sense.

Wow…  So for the fourth time in a row I’ve gone to Fry’s, only to be disappointed in the selection of what I’m looking for.  Each time I go I seem to not find what I’m looking for.  It’s not because I just can’t find it, because I ask.  Sometimes I get the “deer-in-the-headlights” look of total clueless-ness.  Sometimes I get somebody that knows what I’m talking about, but gives me the look of “what are you crazy?  We haven’t carried that for a decade…” look along with the standard “sorry, we don’t carry that” answer.

Regardless, it has become clear to me that unless you’re either a total consumer, or a total electronics geek (and even then sometimes it’s questionable), Fry’s is not for you.  Even if you’re a total consumer, you need to do your homework first, because about half of the time, it seems as if the salesperson doesn’t have a clue what you’re asking, or what they’re talking about.

Well, maybe I’ll stop venting.  Maybe it’s just me that needs to catch up and realize that technology that was sold as standard 2 years ago just isn’t being supported anymore…  Maybe I just didn’t stock-pile the right parts.  Whatever, I’m still not going back to Fry’s unless it’s for a clearly “consumer” item and I’ve done my homework as to 1) what the best part is, 2) whether Fry’s carries it, and 3) if the local shop has it in stock.

Frankly, I’m sub-consciously starting to compare them to CompUSA (now out of business, probably for very similar reasons).  That is to say, derision is becoming more and more prevalent in every thought or conversation I have about these guys.  Their support and subject-knowledge have always been questionable though at best, so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.

Well, the installation of Wordpress MU went fairly smoothly, although a problem that I think was with my ISP caused me to have to download it straight to my webserver for the installation.  After that, the setup was insanely easy, although I managed to “Archive” my main site by accident, locking me out until I did a database fix.

Anyway, I have to say that I’m very happy with the interface.  I’m also very happy with the rich set of themes, widgets, and the rich community surrounding the product.  The requirements for hosting your own are very low, unlike some of the others I’ve tried in the past.  We’ll see how actively I can use this now.

Signing off to get some sleep…   I know, I know, it’s still REALLY early for a techie.