It’s not that often that I develop unhealthy obsessions. No, actually, that is a lie. However, the fact that I scarcely ever watch any television nowadays (and seem to gladly proclaim it) is… a fact. Now watch me eat my words.

Thank you, Jim! I can no longer (cannot, I say!) miss one episode of Ninja Warrior. The Japanese narrator is priceless. Makoto Nagano = love. And it blows Takeshi’s Castle out of the water, regardless of the opinion of my two sisters, who clearly have yet to see the light.

I’m, liKe, SoOo000 t0tallY g33k1ng out here!!!!1111

As excited as I was about the release of WordPress 2.5, I had every intention of not upgrading the system on any of my sites until either a) the WordPress development team released their first bug and vulnerability patch (which, let’s face it, we all know will be released sooner or later), or b) people began reporting of their experiences using the new and improved(?) system. Of course, as Lady Fortune and I are evidently not on speaking terms, neither one happened. I guess if you want it done right, you gotta do it yourself.

As my test platform I decided to use the largest website I have, i.e. Milla Fan, where WordPress 2.5 is now in effect. I realize it isn’t well-advised to use an active website as your (crash) test dummy for something new, but I figured I would have to upgrade some time, so I might as well do it now and save myself from a later headache. Here are the observations of a first-time user.

Looking at the Dashboard, aside from the obvious visual improvement, the first thing I notice is that there’s a lot of unused space. Aside from the enormous white space between the content table and the right-hand scrollbar which could’ve been effectively taken advantage of, there is also a rather wasteful gap under the comment links in the “Recent Comments” box, which really takes up more space than it needs to, the same which goes for the “Incoming Links” box next to it. Although I’m generally all for spaciousness, even on my 1440×900 screen it does feel like a waste of space to have the box sizes fixed in this way; I realize the original idea was probably to achieve a sense of neatness to the Dashboard, but you really won’t be able to appreciate the thought until you scroll down and see more of the Dashboard contents, which kind of defeats the purpose. Personally, I think this could’ve been avoided by minimizing the “Right Now” box, which right now (no pun intended) takes up more space than it needs to.

Other than that, I’m quite liking the new Dashboard. It’ll take some getting used to, but once you get over the initial shock you soon realize much of what was the old Dashboard is still more or less in place. Setting aside the aforementioned space-issue, the “Right Now” box is in itself a nice addition to the Dashboard, because it allows you to quickly proceed to the most commonly used features of the system.

Moving on, another step backwards I find is that the familiar and consistently organized navigation of 2.3 and earlier versions has been scattered all over the top half of the screen. Now this, my friends, if anything, will take some getting used to, because plain common sense just doesn’t seem to cut it here. Why the “Dashboard” link has been separated from the other, main function links is beyond me, the same which goes for the “Settings”, “Plugins” et al. links now having a corner of their own. Because there really is no evident logic to the new navigational setup, it is a matter of learning the links and their respective places by heart, which is sure to push someone’s buttons, albeit not mine - I adjust easily.

It’s time to write a post, peeps. For starters, I have to say I’m a little disappointed they still haven’t added a visual editor disabler button anywhere on the Write page; it takes quite a stretch of imagination to come to the conclusion that the small “Visual Editor” tickbox is located in your user settings. Earlier, the visual editor was one of the few big reasons why I was hesitant to convert an entire site to WordPress, and it took me weeks of hair-pulling and a tip from a good friend (Maria, you are a goddess) to disable that abhorred thing which, in a permanent, Microsoft-esque fit of arrogance thought it knew HTML better than I. I realize the intention has been to allow each to choose their own, preferred way of posting and editing news on a multi-user WordPress managed newsblog, which is a sensible idea, but surely this approach allows a setting of this kind to be added to the Write as well as the User Settings-page without the settings change having a universal effect on the system?

Overall, however, the Write page is quite neat and clean cut, and I’m quite happy with the new media upload options (though uploading does not function too smoothly here on my journal). However, since the page has a two-column setup I once again have to return to my original point about unused space, which there really is a lot of in the second column, where e.g. the “Tags” and “Category” options could’ve been placed — as it is now I tend to forget assigning my post a category altogether. The earlier feature of draft post titles appearing above the post field is also now gone, much to my dismay, and has been replaced with a small “View Drafts” link under the title “Related” in the right-hand column, which once again requires either intense searching, memorizing or a very vivid imagination to find. Some will also surely find the positioning of the “Preview”, “Save” and “Publish” buttons rather confusing (I know I have - you don’t know how many times I’ve pressed “Save” or “Preview” instead of “Publish” and vice versa), though kudos to the dev team for adding a convenient “Edit Post” link to the Write page once you’ve posted your newly-written update. The permalink edit field under the post title is also an improvement to the earlier “Post Slug” method.

In terms of the Plugins, User- and other general settings I haven’t come across any major, non-facelift related modifications, at least not ones that have caught my attention. The Plugins-section does have a very nifty new feature which allows you to automatically upgrade outdated plugins — except I’ve yet to actually successfully use it.

Although I have in this post focused mostly on the disadvantages of 2.5, do not let the tone of my rather lengthy analysis lead you astray - WordPress 2.5, overall, is quite neat. A little patience is in order here - after all, the revamped system was only just released and even with the best of help, bugs and flaws will be overlooked. Just ask the Windows dev team, they ought to know. I would further like to point out that these observations are quite subjective, and very possibly reflect my needs rather than those of the general public. My advice is to upgrade whether you like the new system or not; the older your version becomes, the more scantily will people be willing to provide product support. Unsurprisingly, the good people at MS are once again a prime example of this.

I am appealing to the good and common sense of the producers of the upcoming two silver screen renditions of J.R.R. Tolkien’s masterpiece, The Hobbit, (for God’s sake!) not to hire Guillermo Del Toro as the director of either film. Well, I would appeal to them if they actually gave a toss about my opinion. Which, by the way, they don’t. You’d think they would — but they don’t.

Guillermo Del Toro cannot be allowed to direct the upcoming The Hobbit films. No, seriously, he can’t. Unfortunately, according to IMDb, this seems to be the reality. If there ever was a time for a “Bring Back Peter J” petition, it’s now. Actually, since it seems rather unlikely Jackson will be returning to direct another film in the Lord of the Rings area of things, it might be more worthwhile to start a “Say No to Del Toro” petition. This, of course, as long as the potential replacement isn’t one of the following: Kurt Wimmer, Uwe Boll, Sam Raimi (whom I hear was attached to the project at some point, much to my horror and dismay) — and, as much as I love the Star Wars film franchise, George Lucas. Sorry George, the new films just didn’t cut it.

Let’s get serious for a moment here, though. There are a lot of things one can say of Jackson’s Lord of the Rings films, but I doubt anyone who’s read the books with serious thought can deny the astonishing accuracy with which the production team translated the atmosphere of this classic tale on screen. The Fellowship of the Ring, my favorite of the three books as well as the films, is one of the most beautiful, touching and exciting films I’ve come across of late, and I think much of the achievement in the film lies in Jackson’s genius direction and Howard Shore’s equally exceptional score. (I could go on and state how this coming from someone who is disappointed by 88% of most modern-day films is saying a lot, but that would be corny of me.)

It is a fair argument to say that, in the case of the Lord of the Rings-films, one shouldn’t raise one part of the production above the other - the films were an extraordinarily successful team effort, and as they say, there’s no ‘I’ in team. That said, I am discussing Jackson’s contribution to the film trilogy here rather than that of the entire crew, with my my argument being that Jackson is an irreplaceable part of the film franchise. Irreplaceable I say! Guillermo Del Toro, on the other hand, is an irreplaceable part of — well, no film franchise, really, or (dare I say it) film, for that matter.

Yes, yes, I know of Pan’s Labyrinth, I’m sure it’s as great as they say it is and I’m sure Del Toro didn’t just “luck out” with that film (and no, contrary to habit I am not being sarcastic here, so please wait until I make a snide remark about Harry Potter before throwing pie at me), but honestly, though. Hellboy? Blade II (which I am ashamed to admit I own on DVD)? Hellboy II?!? New Line Cinema, you can’t be serious! I never thought I’d say this, but if this really is the shape of things to come, I might have to turn my back on future Lord of the Rings-related film productions.

Perhaps you think I’m being overly dramatic, but the Peter Jackson-directed films are very, very dear to me, and not least because they introduced me to the literary works of the exceptionally gifted J.R.R. Tolkien. I will not have my Lord of the Rings experience ruined by a second-rate prequel that will with 84% certainty miss the mark. Not to mention two prequels.

I don’t even know if the films would be called ‘prequels’. They would be prequels, though. Right? I mean, the Star Wars prequels were ‘prequels’, right? Ah, I give up.

I intended to blog about the Oscars. I really did. And then a month passed.

It’s alright, though, because the WordPress team recently put up a sneak peek of the upcoming v. 2.5, which looks like a version I could marry. Well, to the extent that you can marry software. Which is… not so much, actually.

At any rate, for an audio-visual person like myself, the updated look is a tremendous improvement from the current blue admin theme, which is nice, but a touch bland for my liking. The orange-light blue combo is positively yummy. I’d lick the screen, but that might be weird.

The new write screen only displays the information that you’ll use most often. It displays the most common fields in a way that makes posting incredibly easy. Additional options are hidden away until you need them. The new Write screen anticipates the natural flow of the way you write, and is smart enough to remember the way you left it so that your preferred writing environment is always quickly available.

Personally, this has a bit of a fishy, Microsoft smell to it. In my experience, any software that tries to think on my behalf has me pulling my hair out in a fit of frustration after the first three minutes. (I say Microsoft, because any MS program has me pulling my hair out within the first 15 minutes for the very aforementioned reason. An hour later, and I’ll have to start plucking my eyebrows. Heck, even my mother - a hell-bent Windows-supporter, mind you - has resorted to surprisingly colorful language when using MS Word for, well, anything other than to do-notes.) On the other hand, they are sounding pretty smart about what they have planned, so I will - with a little hesitation, mind you - give them the benefit of the doubt (which is more than I can say for any new MS release).

My other hesitation regarding the new release concerns to what extent they will change the way WordPress presents and manages content. Back in the day, when the all-new Coppermine Photo Gallery 1.4 was released I thought I might have to seriously consider webdesign suicide as all my cpg 1.3 gallery layouts were essentially nuked to death in 1.4. On the other hand, back in the day, I could barely design at all, so maybe them layouts being knackered up by 1.4 was an improvement rather than a loss. I’d nevertheless rather not have it happen another time.

I’m still pretty geek-excited. I’m itching to install the 2.5 RC1, but I’ve never been very good at backing up my databases, and won’t start now.

Update: The good people at WordPress have now released RC2 alongside a screencast, which looks quite promising in my opinion. I am particularly loving the multi-upload feature; uploding 100 files one by one has been a real drag at many of my other websites.

Oh, and for the record, Katherine Heigl, Helen Mirren and Jennifer Garner were the best dressed at the Oscars = indisputable fact. And Jennifer Hudson needs to seriously stop parading her boobs to every event. We’ve seen them, thank you, and we know they’re big.