On the Ongoing Projects

Some updates on two ongoing projects.

1. The Website Redesign.

Over the past forty-eight hours, I’ve been thinking about formatting the site for mobile browsers and how to achieve what I want.

Yes, there are WordPress plug-ins to do this. But I like the idea of making something of my own.

Conceptually, I understand what I want to do. I’m not sure yet how to code it, and that’s something I’ll look into over the next few days.

I still have the typography of the site as a whole to deal with as well. Again, it’s a case of knowing what I want to do, and even having some of the code blocked out. It’s just a question of sitting down and writing the necessary CSS.

I’ll explain exactly what I want to do.

What I’m building is a magazine-styled website. Yes, it’s a blog, but it doesn’t look like a blog, and it doesn’t behave like a blog.

The front page is structured like, say, the New York Times‘ front page. That page will be in sans-serif fonts.

When you go to read an article, the presentation, obviously, will be different. A serif font. A larger point size in the first paragraph (for more of that magazine look). And instead of the blank line between paragraphs, successive paragraphs will be indented, just like you see in a book.

I know how to achieve all of this. I even have some of the code written. I just have to plug it in.

2. The Merlin Outline.

The Merlin outline, which I last mentioned nearly a month ago, is nearly sorted, and then it will be good to go for NaNoWriMo.

One insight, which opened up some interesting possibilities was this. I’d originally thought about how to change the characters from Merlin characters to more authentically Arthurian characters. Uther would become Arthur, Arthur would become someone else (Gawain or Bors or Tristan), that sort of thing. I saw some value in Arthur remaining Arthur, though, even though this story takes place later in Arthur’s reign. An unexpected dramatic possibility revealed itself in doing that.

All that remains, insofar as the outline is concerned, is to type up the notes I’ve made on the train the last two weeks. As of right now, I’ll knock that out on Saturday and things will be set for next week.

Published by Allyn

A writer, editor, journalist, sometimes coder, occasional historian, and all-around scholar, Allyn Gibson is the writer for Diamond Comic Distributors' monthly PREVIEWS catalog, used by comic book shops and throughout the comics industry, and the editor for its monthly order forms. In his over ten years in the industry, Allyn has interviewed comics creators and pop culture celebrities, covered conventions, analyzed industry revenue trends, and written copy for comics, toys, and other pop culture merchandise. Allyn is also known for his short fiction (including the Star Trek story "Make-Believe,"the Doctor Who short story "The Spindle of Necessity," and the ReDeus story "The Ginger Kid"). Allyn has been blogging regularly with WordPress since 2004.

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