Joped.com

Release notes for Linkped 2.16

• Introducing new shorter URL  and new algorithm for generated links. All links generated will now use lkp.cc instead of linkped.com.  Old links will direct to the new location, so don’t worry they won’t break.
• SSL for login, registering and change password has been restored.
• Fixed issues with the view count on links not always updating properly.

Alpha testing of the new send link feature has been going well, but its still not quite ready for beta.  Although the interface is pretty much the same, all of the backend code was completely rewritten.  Presently, there is no ETA on when this will be available.

Linkped 2.15.5 has been released:

• New buddy list and email address list out of beta and released to general public, thanks beta testers!  I am going to be working on colors for the graphs, I know they are a bit hard to read right now.
• New redirect frame, similar to the old one but cleaned up the CSS and images.  You might notice that the up and down arrows match the new ones in “My sent links”.
• The top frame shows the number of views a link has, this is just the first phase of a big feature in development. (secret for now)
• When you view a link, it will that remove your alerts. (Thanks PJ for the suggestion)
• The “Show per page” location has been moved above the pagination, and only appears when you hover over.  Helps keep the interface clean.
• Moved the RSS icon

Known issue

• Favorites are only showing up for page 1

For the past month I have been cleaning out the remaining protype code thats haunting the code base.  I have already re-written about 85% of the code base.  There are a few small user facing changes:

• Paginated inbox
• New pagination
• Different javascript framework
• CSS sprites for faster page loads
• User settings
• Fixed error checking on send link

The new sent links is coming along very well.  This next round of beta tests will invite much more of the user base into it.  I don’t want to include too many new users, since the new features could could confuse them when they change.  Of course, beta testing is totally optional.

I have also created a twitter for Linkped.  I will announce new releases and issues on the feed.

I released a new version of Linkped late last night, which finally contains the new inbox.  I went through a very heavy testing period before this was ready for public use.  Thanks to the beta testers who helped me a lot with tracking down some odd bugs.

The biggest change is removing the hide button.  This button honestly made things confusing and didn’t work very well.  Its one of the oldest sections of the code base and needed a rewrite badly.

However, its now even easier to find what you have missed in the new inbox. There are filters for All, New and Viewed.  (Sorting is in development)

There are a number of UI improvements that I will be introducing over time, however there are more critical section that need a rewrite first.  My sent links and send link are coming down the pipe soon, but they are also going to require an intensive beta test.

Enjoy!

This update contains an AJAX hide link for the alert system.  There are a few minor bug fixes as well, mostly related to the display of dates from months ago.  There are a few more minor features I am working on for the alert system before I move on to the next polish up, which will be annouced later on.

I pushed this update last night and noticed a bug this morning that was preventing it from working correctly under SSL, this was fixed this morning.

I have been testing this system internally for a while now and its finally ready for release.  This simple system will keep track of links that are sent to you, or when your friend views a link.  There is now a new screen that shows alert events which is now the home screen when you login, think of it as your dashboard.

Presently, the system can only keep track of links sent to you, links you receive and special system notices.  I have plans for supporting ratings and comments in the near future as well an RSS feed.

This update contains a major update on the OpenID backend.  There was a number of issues with the old system that are finally resolved.  The big difference is the way user accounts are handled.  Previously, an OpenID was associated to an email address.  This is a serious problem since many OpenID providers don’t return email information, even if you specify its required.

However, that will make things much better long term.  If you have a bunch of email addresses you can add them all on to your profile.  Even better then that, is that you can specify the primary email where you want your links sent to.  Your friend only needs to know 1 of the email addresses on your list.  I have some things planned for this that will be reveled later on.

There is still a ton I need to do on the user account system, this is a major step towards the end goal.

There are a number of other minor improvement as well.  For example, the support page was a wreak previously.  I took a few minutes and throw together something that is a big improvement.  Although its not what I want, its a huge improvement over the previous version.

Update: After some data scrubbing I noticed that due to a long standing bug the total number of users on Linkped was inacurate.  This was due to the way I handled OpenID accounts that didn’t send an email address in the response.  I admit it was a very lame way to handle it but I was pressed for time.  The real total of users on Linkped is now 555

I just pushed up a minor release of Linkped.  Its a mostly rewrite of the backend that handles the buddy list.  Much of the code is in a kinda crappy state.  This is why I am doing a major overhaul of it.  User facing, there are no changes only a few minor bug fixes.

I have not enabled SSL on the site yet, few more small tests I need to perform before I set it live.  Next overhaul is going to be with user accounts, there is a few things its doing currently that is holding me back on feature development, more on that later.

Most of the code on Linkped is pretty much in a prototype state.  Many of the tables are fairly unoptimized and are hard to work with right now.

So, I started a complete rewrite a last week.  However, a few days into the project I realized I am trying to do way too much at once.  The code requires a major overhaul and with my very busy schedule it could take a few months to get it to a respectable level.  I have now taken a step back and archived my work to start over in smaller chunks.  Although I “lost” a good week of coding, the code will be usable when I reach those areas.

I should start pushing some updates to the site in the next week or so, no new features will be introduced though.  Much of the work will be backend, but will fix a few quirks on the site.  For example, the buddy list system is slightly clunky.  Sometimes it doesn’t display the proper labels for users and defaults to their email address.  Its a rather annoying inconsistency.  This is going to be the first thing I tackle followed by user account system.

After I finish a few minor changes to Jokeped (Mostly SEO shit), I am going into a full development cycle on Linkped.  I totally rewrote Jokeped reducing the code base a ton and really optimizing the crap out of it.  It now has ultra high use of memcache to the point it can run without a database being present.  Keep in mind, it normally does have a database driving it.  The only time the database won’t be present is if the site was getting slammed or the server was having trouble.