NOTICE

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

NOTICE

Starting tomorrow, April 8, 2019, OL will be down for a couple of days or so.

Nothing to worry about.

Backroom issue.

Sorry for the inconvenience.

Michael

[Ellen Stuttle]

Why did William give a trophy reaction to the announcement that OL would be "down for a couple of days or so"???  Weird.

Ellen

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

All resolved.

I will leave this thread up for a day or two for OL members who might not have seen it and were worried when the site was offline. Then to avoid any future confusion, I will delete it.

Once again, sorry for the inconvenience.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

btw - There is something quirky about the URL right now.

If you go to these links, you get a message that the forum is unavailable.

Quote

www.objectivistliving.com
http://www.objectivistliving.com

 

However, if you go here, you load the site:

www.objectivistliving.com/forums/

and 

http://www.objectivistliving.com/forums/

 

Also, note that there is a little "s" in the http in the following--and both work.

https://www.objectivistliving.com

and 

https://www.objectivistliving.com/forums/

There's even more (those three little www suckers), but that's most of it.

It's a mess, I know, but there it is. Eventually this will all get cleared up.

The rule is if you type in OL's URL and it doesn't work (or if you use a bookmark and it doesn't work), vary the URL a bit like above. Then you should be able to get in.

Please advise anyone you may know who complains about not being able to access the site.

Thanks.

Michael

 

EDIT: Because of this issue, I am going to leave this thread up.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

8 hours ago, Ellen Stuttle said:

Why did William give a trophy reaction to the announcement that OL would be "down for a couple of days or so"???  Weird.

Ellen

Ellen,

I'm glad to see you got through. You actually got through before I did.

 

btw - The name of the trophy icon is called "Thanks," so maybe William was thinking of that. I prefer the more nefarious interpretation, but, to be fair...

 

Michael

[Ellen Stuttle]

1 hour ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Ellen,

I'm glad to see you got through. You actually got through before I did.

 

btw - The name of the trophy icon is called "Thanks," so maybe William was thinking of that. I prefer the more nefarious interpretation, but, to be fair...

 

Michael

 

But...???

Why would William be giving thanks for OL being down?  OL's being down means he'd be deprived of doing his data dumps, etc.

I don't get it, but I suppose there's some behind-the-scenes story you meant by "backroom issue."  (What I initially interpreted you to mean by that was a software maintenance issue.)

Ellen

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

6 hours ago, Ellen Stuttle said:

(What I initially interpreted you to mean by that was a software maintenance issue.)

Ellen,

It was.

I only meant, in a spirit of giving the benefit of the doubt, that he was thanking me for letting people know.

6 hours ago, Ellen Stuttle said:

... I suppose there's some behind-the-scenes story you meant by "backroom issue."

Well, there are a few (there are always a few  ), but nothing re William since he sent that stuff to Kat.

Apropos, he was a lot more fun back when he was in the role of court jester (in the sense of keeping people honest in a humorous manner). Over time, he's allowed his archetype to morph into something more akin to Stephen King's Pennywise.

Michael

[william.scherk]

20 hours ago, Ellen Stuttle said:

Why did William give a trophy reaction to the announcement that OL would be "down for a couple of days or so"???  Weird.

"Thanks for the headsup." 

18 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

btw - There is something quirky about the URL right now.

If you go to these links, you get a message that the forum is unavailable.

Quote

www.objectivistliving.com
http://www.objectivistliving.com

The HTTPS leading the URLs means "HyperText Transfer Protocol Secure." The OL web site  server software 'translates' any plain HTTP requests into HTTPS requests before serving page code to our browsers.  The 'secure' URLs are a sign that any and all communication between server and browser are encrypted through a Secure Socket Layer, so nobody can sniff or sample the web traffic for nefarious purposes. All plain HTTP links to OL seem to be resolving instantly at my end at the moment, using Chrome, Firefox and Opera. 

The 'secure' state of server-browser communications is signified by a lock icon in the address bar, here from Opera:

From the link:  

Quote

What is HTTP?

HTTP stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol, and is an application layer protocol. In simpler terms, it is the protocol over which information is sent from a user’s web browser to the website they are visiting. The data that is being communicated between the browser and the website is sent over in plain text, meaning that if someone intercepted the connection between the two, they would easily be able to see the information you were both viewing and sending on the website. This is especially dangerous when users are filling out sensitive information, like a credit card number at checkout on Amazon, or entering location information on Facebook.

The Shift to HTTPS

While HTTPS is essentially the same concept as HTTP, the “S” harbors one big difference between the two: security. HTTPS stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure, and instead of acting as its own application layer protocol, it uses separate protocols called SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) and TLS (Transport Layer Security).

HTTP and even HTTPS are not concerned with how information gets from point A to point B; however, the secure sockets layer that HTTPS uses ensures that the information travels through a safe tunnel to its destination, without concerning itself with the actual data that it is sending. The SSL also encrypts the information that is being sent, which means that the true meaning of the data (credit card numbers, personal information, etc.) is very difficult to be cracked by anyone trying to see the information. Nowadays, the majority of web browsers support HTTPS for more secure Internet browsing.

 

Edited April 10, 2019 by william.scherk
Added notes about Secure Sockel Layer and HTTPS

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

1 hour ago, william.scherk said:

All plain HTTP links to OL seem to be resolving instantly at my end at the moment, using Chrome, Firefox and Opera. 

William,

Yesterday on my end, they were not. Today they are (Chrome and Brave).

I like your explanation of https for the reader. I don't muck around in these things with IPB because they do all that on their end and I imagine the delay was due to their proprietary encryption.

But I actually pay for this service on another website (the upcoming blog). I'm thinking of moving that site to a hosting company that uses Cloudflare since it's free for Wordpress sites.

Michael

[william.scherk]

2 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

I like your explanation of https for the reader. I don't muck around in these things with IPB because they do all that on their end and I imagine the delay was due to their proprietary encryption.

I've been resurrecting my abilities to code lately, rigging up a "Fan Page" for a little-known Youtube fanatic, Magick Kool-Aid.^** In trying to come up to speed with developments in the Twitter Developer's API, I discovered that Twitter demands HTTPS security for its embed codes -- so I had my server-side account become SSL-compliant. 

When you use a 'Tweet this page' from a major site, Twitter allows that site to embed images, titles, description and even an audio or video player within the resulting tweet. Eg, 

-- if you ever wanted insight or help in getting this to happen in your new blog, Michael, feel free to ask. It looks like Wordpress has established Twitter Developer API plug-ins available that will allow Twitter embed codes in each blog item as appropriate -- so that a "Tweet this entry"  may show any image/description/sound file/video file within that discrete entry.

______________________

** -- the 'Fan Page' is crammed with bits of interactive items that are available to other fans of the fanatic during live Youtube broadcasts -- with a number of "Tweet this" and "Follow this account" and even a couple of 'pre-populated' Twitter buttons. 

Zzzzzzzzzz

Edited April 10, 2019 by william.scherk
Added Mark Hubbard tweet about the imaging of a black hole

[william.scherk]

On 4/10/2019 at 8:03 AM, william.scherk said:

The HTTPS leading the URLs means "HyperText Transfer Protocol Secure." The OL web site  server software 'translates' any plain HTTP requests into HTTPS requests before serving page code to our browsers.  The 'secure' URLs are a sign that any and all communication between server and browser are encrypted through a Secure Socket Layer, so nobody can sniff or sample the web traffic for nefarious purposes.

This note tells you how to embed an image from a Google Drive account. Usually Google Drive serves up all your cloud files in any web browser, which is great, but what if you don't want to share a link to the page holding your image?   Easy.  

First, acquaint yourself with the actual shareable URL at Google Drive; it will look something like this:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ZzvxKnaPZ5omiICcR-2tHqvkIHxJMq3-/view?usp=sharing

Second, copy the smasmodic random identifier in the middle, bolded above, to your clipboard.

Third, take this URL snippet and copy it: https://drive.google.com/uc?id=

3.2 -- append the long spasm of character to the snippet. Eg, 
https://drive.google.com/uc?id=1ZzvxKnaPZ5omiICcR-2tHqvkIHxJMq3-

That's your image URL to paste into the edit box.  In most browsers, that's it, the picture will pop into the text-box as with a more conventional image URL ending in .png, .jpg, .gif, and so on.

4. If that doesn't work in your brower, click the "Other Media" drop-down selector in the lower right of your edit box.  Choose "Insert image from URL" and then paste in the Google Drive URL you assembled.

Eg, 

My new, wonderful upgrade of screen-recorder powerhouse ShareX stripped out all my old configuration files, so I am climbing Mount Frustration in order to make uploads 'stick' via its built-in File Transfer facility. So far, just wear and tear on the molars, so I thought to squeeze out a positive discovery. Grind, grit, chew.