Joped.com

Over the past few months, I have been researching how different websites are implementing OpenID.  The major conclusion that I have come to is that many site operators don’t understand OpenID.  One of the main selling points to OpenID is not having to register with every damn website you come across.

What really drives me nuts is finding a site that accepts OpenID, I then authenticate with my OpenID provider, only to be bounced to a registration form.  What the hell ?  My OpenID profile isn’t empty, it contains some basic information about me.  Zip code, timezone, Firstname, Lastname and email address.  Why would you go and ask me for the same information again ?  This information has already been passed back to you with the OpenID protocol!  At very least, can you please pre-populate this information ?

When you return to an OpenID site and change your timezone in your OpenID profile, why doesn’t the site you are logging into update your information with the new data sent back from your OpenID provider ?!  I know this can be a tricky thing to do, I am working on it for Linkped.  I had this support at one point, but had to remove it when I refactored the OpenID login code. My first run with OpenID was a very lame way to support it. Don’t worry, support for updates will be returning very soon.

Many websites hide their OpenID login screens and for the life of me I can’t figure out why!  Hell, I use it as a selling point on Linkped.  With 83% of the user base using OpenID who can blame me   The OpenID logo is a slick design that fits into almost any website.  Don’t make me hunt for your OpenID login screen, put the logo right on your registration form to let your vistors know they can sign up even faster by using OpenID.

OpenID is a great thing, and I am happy to see it getting adopted everywhere.  I know that one day spammers will become a problem and site operators will revert to using a captcha after login, but I am ok with that.  However, unless more developers stop to think about how difficult and ass half backwards their OpenID implementation is, OpenID isn’t going anywhere.

If you are developing a site that uses OpenID, take some time out of your day and go use some sites that have OpenID.  See how bad and annoying some of the implementations are, learn from their mistakes.

This trailer was leaked at some point yesterday.  The quality is really terrible but gives you an idea.  Supposedly, this will be featured tonight on Entertainment Tonight. I won’t be watching it because I honestly can’t stomach that show. Hopefully, they will post the HD version soon.

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.

Very minor change, moved /content/ to /joke/ for better SEO.  I think I screwed up a few moves back when I changed this and my traffic took a nose dive.

There is also a few minor bug fixes included

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.

Fairly random and not that exciting, decided to do some sky diving in WoW.  Just flew up as high as I can and jumped off.  Yes, my graphics are turned down since I am boxing.