Simple Location 4.3.0 Released

Simple Location 4.3.0 has been released. This continues on the work released last week in 4.2.2.

Measurements in Simple Location have been stored in scientific units(celsius, meters, etc) since 2019, with an option to display in imperial on the frontend. With 4.2.2, the admin will now show in imperial units if you set the setting. This can be overridden on any page by adding the ?sloc_units=metric or ?sloc_units=imperial to the end of the URL.

4.3.0 introduces Meteostat and Visual Crossing as weather providers. Visual Crossing is the first provider that not only offers 1000 queries per day, but pay per use at a fraction of a cent after that. All of the other providers offering a free tier require a monthly fee after that point that well exceeds justification for the amount of posts even the most dedicated poster makes.

Meteostat is a historic only provider. It offers not only an API(key required), but the ability to download all data on a specific weather station(which requires no key). A future version of the plugin could download and cache the weather stations you use the most. For now, only the list of stations is bundled with the plugin, which it uses to determine the closest station.

The National Weather Service, the Met Office(UK), and the Custom Station plugin also cycle through lists of stations to find the closest one.

Expect more enhancements in the weather station category, with so many different ways to get weather stations data.

4.3.0 introduces historic weather support, for providers who offer this without a premium account. This includes Dark Sky(if you still have an API key), Meteostat(which only offers historic data), and Visual Crossing. If someone is paying for premium service on OpenWeatherMap and wants to talk me into adding this, send me a note.

The Fallback Weather provider feature introduced in 4.2.0, which allows for a secondary provider, will be checked if the primary provider does not offer historic weather.

Please remember, somewhere on your site, to provide attribution to the services you use. I’m off to backfill weather on my old posts.

Replied to https://diggingthedigital.com/15584-2/ by Frank Meeuwsen (diggingthedigital.com)

https://boffosocko.com/2020/12/25/automating-syndication-of-reply-contexts-in-twitter-cards-using-ogp-metacrap-and-plugins-in-wordpress/ (boffosocko.com)
I think I understand what you’re working towards Chris and it’s very interesting. One of the problems I have with the current Post Kinds plugin…

But Frank, it already does this. If there is no mf2, it tries JSON-LD and OGP.

Refbacks for WordPress Version 2.0 Released

The Refbacks plugin is now updated after nearly two years. The plugin doesn’t need much attention, it always worked it’s based on the Webmentions plugin, and we’d done some work over there that I brought over, including a new retrieval class, improved type support, etc.

The way I implemented Refbacks is essentially this. When someone visits a page on my website, and it has a referer string, it forks into the background a process to retrieve that page, verify it does link, and creates a refback comment. Semantic Linkbacks parses microformats and enhances that comment. It excludes links on the same site, as these are handled already by webmention or even pingback.

One of the things I’ve used this for in the past is to show mentions of my site on the Indieweb wiki.

Book Signing, 1997
Last month, Herb Solow passed away at the age of 89. Solow was well known as the executive in charge of production of the original Star Trek. I recently found this picture of the time I met him and Bob Justman in Boston in 1997 when they were doing a signing of their book, Inside Star Trek.
WordPress allows for custom archive templates. For the longest time, I’ve wanted to change the archive for my photo posts to show them in a photo grid. So, I’ve now done that at /kind/photo. You have to click the photo to see the full context, but I like the presentation of all photos I’ve posted. This does not include photos in other types of posts, but it’s probably the most visual item I’ve put out in a while. I hope it causes me to post more photos.

Remembering Six Flags Atlantis

As part of my continual nostalgia series, today I’m continuing my Florida memories by remembering Six Flags Atlantis, below brochure is from my own collection.

Six Flags Atlantis was a water park that existed in the 1980s, and ultimately was demolished after damage from Hurricane Andrew in 1992.

Where the park once sat is a series of retail shopping establishments.

Coming up on the 25th is the IndieWebCamp Create Day. This is an online event where people will work on projects while sharing in a common Zoom room, so they can collaborate with others, or just bounce ideas and feel togetherness. People are invited to demo to others what they worked on.  If you have no other plans that day, why not join us for a little while, or  a long while.

On the Wearing of Masks

Since shortly after I returned in March, I’ve been mostly isolating myself. I haven’t gone to my place of business since early April(working remotely). I hopped from my apartment to hiding at my family’s home in upstate New York, and now I’m hiding out at my parent’s apartment.

During all this, I have not left the house without wearing a mask, fitted over my nose and mouth. I find masks uncomfortable to wear. Even in cases where I pulled it down outside, when no one but my immediate family was around, if anyone else approached, I pulled it back up.

From others, however, I’ve seen a casual attitude toward the wearing of masks and the downplaying of this. Forcing people to wear a mask during a pandemic is an acceptable infringement on their personal liberties. Society in general is a shared consensus to agree on limitations of personal freedom. If you want absolute freedom, to do anything and everything, we call that anarchy.

I tend to take a centrist point of view to most things. So, let’s accept that some people do not want to wear masks and do not believe in it, and others do.

If you fall into the maskless category, and you encounter someone who is choosing to wear a mask, you can:

  • Approach them or otherwise infringe on their six foot bubble as if nothing was happening.
  • Give them the six feet of distance their mask indicates they want from you
  • If you carry one, pull your mask up till you are out of their presence.

Out of these three categories, the only one I object to is the first. So, you don’t believe in wearing a mask….respect those who do. This is what we call courtesy and decency. It applies regardless of belief. You can’t claim ignorance of social distancing as a thing in the current environment.

I personally believe that wearing a mask protects both parties. It isn’t a 100% solution, but what is?

So, if I want to avoid people who won’t respect my beliefs, I could either constantly be vigilant any time I leave my safe zone, which I am…or, as some of those people would suggest, if I don’t like it, I can just lock myself up till this is over.

I’m looking forward to the time where my face can be seen freely in public. However, until then…kindly put on a mask(over the nose and mouth) any time you are within six feet of me, or make an effort to give me space.