Lunar Days etc. update

Finally, I started implementing something I have planned many years ago: an extended description of the lunar days from different sources. I decided to concentrate on the two main sources for now but will add more whenever I find some additional information. This work will take some time, and time is the scarcest resource for me these days, so it will continue for a while. But you will be able to see the progress if you check the status of About the Lunar Days article.

However, this is not the only thing I am doing at the moment on Lunarium. I feel uncomfortable that the explanation of planetary hours and days that existed on the old site is missing now and I have started adding it again, gradually, updating and reviewing it bit by bit.

There is a constant lack of time however, with most of the work done over weekends and the rest of it done on the evenings after the whole day of work. I have also just signed a contract and started writing a book on some aspects of iPhone development. I am also doing a research into some aspects of the Traditional Astrology applied to the problems of the modern life... And I have a full time job that allows me to pay my bills.

So please be patient.

Google Goo...

I was so happy when I thought that Google AppEngine team fixed their time zone implementation overnight - but I was wrong. Quite soon, time zones went awry again. Then returned back to normal, then got broken again. The truth is that this is an intermittent problem. I have recorded it in the AppEngine bug tracker and let's hope it will be really fixed one day.

But this is only one of the problems with which I am struggling at the moment, instead of filling Lunarium with interesting and useful content. Another major problem is that three Google Gadgets that I have created a few years ago stopped working. I have spent just too many evenings trying to find out what went wrong. Everything seemed to be right as before the migration of Lunarium to the new platform I made sure that the feeds used by the gadgets keep working.

Yesterday I have discovered that the problem was in the fact that the main URL of the site was changed from lunarium.co.uk to www.lunarium.co.uk. This change was forced by Google, and since the gadgets were registered with the first version of URL, another department of Google, named iGoogle, decided that the gadgets should not work anymore. Thank you, all the different Googles!

I was able to resubmit the gadgets with the new URL but they are now considered as completely new gadgets. Now, how do i tell all those 5000+ users of Lunar Informer who think that the gadget is broken that it is available and works, and under the same name, but is simply hidden somewhere in the bowels of Google.

I was able to find a special procedure which will hopefully allow me to join these two identical gadgets into one, but after I jump through a number of hoops, and after a week or so of waiting.

At the moment, if you are interested in my gadgets, the easiest way to get them is to install from this page: http://www.lunarium.co.uk/software/gadgets.jsp

Sorry for my irritated tone in this posting, there are a couple more Google-related problems that I will have to struggle with in the coming days instead of doing something much more sensible. Google is a powerful platform but these days I am fed up with its bugs, idiosyncrasies and developer-unfriendly interface.

Time Zones Work Fine - Bravo Google Guys!

It looks like Google team has fixed the problem with the time zones overnight. If you couldn't get correct time - please check again, it should work now. Phew... What a relief!

Problems with time zones

Unfortunately, I have just discovered a problem that prevents Lunarium from working properly for many locations right now. This problem is not mine or yours, it is a problem of the platform on which Lunarium is running - Google AppEngine. The guys haven't implemented most of the world's time zones yet.

I have reported the problem to the AppEngine's news group, let's see if anything will happen soon...

Lunar Calendar Details and Broken Gadgets

Now I am having more constructive feedback, there are less and less emails saying that I have ruined my site by replacing a dark background with a light one...

The most important complaint is that Lunar Calendar now doesn't provide all the textual information that was provided by the old one. This is true, of course, but the information is coming and significantly more rich than it was before. My approach has two levels:

1. Right in the calendar, each bit of information will have a 'tooltip' - a brief textual explanation of what it is and what it means that appears when you hover your mouse over that bit of information. The information displayed in such tooltips is exactly same that was available in the old calendar.

Right now, I have implemented tooltips for the lunar days in the universal calendar. I believe this is a much more convenient solution than the old one. In the old calendar, you had to click on a link, say, for the same lunar day, and the link would bring you to the link of lunar days. Then you would have to navigate back to see another bit of information in the same or another day.

With the new calendar, you don't need to leave it, all the information will appear under your cursor as soon as you hover it on an event that is of interest to you.

2. The second level of information will be represented by articles devoted specifically to each element of the calendar: an article on lunar days, an article on phases and so on. In these articles, I will make available all the information that I have on the subject.

The second important complaint is that Google gadgets, of which I have three (Lunar Informer, Moon Sign Now and Planetary Hours), do not work anymore. That's really bad because I have put a lot of effort into making sure they continue to work. The problem is that in the years that passed since I have created those gadgets, Google Gadget API has changed significantly, and I have forgotten even those things that I did know about this API. So I will have to relearn everything from scratch and possibly rebuild my gadgets before they will work again. The only thing I can promise is that I will do that by all means.

A Rough Transition

The New Lunarium has replaced the old site. I have already received a number of emails asking to bring back the old site as people prefer the old design. Well, design is a very personal thing and although the old colour scheme wasn't too bad, it couldn't be used for a truly extensive resource - like what Lunarium is going to become in close future.

Many complaints are very fair though as I wasn't able to complete many important details before launching the new site. Also, a few things that were supposed to work, like Lunar Informer gadget, got broken despite of my best efforts.

Of the important details that are missing the two that I am going to fix in the first place are:

1. In the universal lunar calendar, clicking on various symbols will display an appropriate information, like what this or that lunar day means etc.

2. On the planetary hours page, the current hour will be highlighted and the time format will be the one that the user has selected in the Settings.

I am going to work daily fixing various problems and adding more information to the pages - but let me get some rest first. It was really a challenge for me to get the core of the site ready and working, and I am somewhat exhausted at the moment. This is something I was planning and doing for years, and it is designed to work without any major maintenance for many years ahead.

If there is something you are terribly missing, please let me know. Bug reports will be highly appreciated. But please understand that there is no return to the old site: it would die anyway on the 1st of January 2010. This is why I am in such a haste with rolling out the new version.

If you want the New Lunarium to be better in one or another respect - please help me to make it better with your feedback. Thank you!

Only a Few Days Before Going Public

The New Lunarium is not completed yet but the core functionality is ready and I am receiving quite a few emails asking when lunar calendar for the next 2010 year will become available.

So I decided that on the 20th of October, soon after the Moon will enter Sagittarius, I will make New Lunarium public (which means I will redirect the lunarium.co.uk domain to the new online content). Many pages will be left empty, but those are pages with textual content and the text will be added to them gradually after the new site launch.

There will be already the first lesson in the Free Astro School.

In the overall, New Lunarium will be much bigger than the old site and I will keep adding content to it and grow it ever after the 20th October launch.