“Who ya gonna call?” “CODEBUSTERS”
No.
But the metaphor of Ghostbusters crossing the streams was inversely appropriate to a little bit of code action over the holidays (of which the actual action was nil).
But this was fun.
This nice tweet from John Johnston (who spawned the idea) reminded me of a WordPress plugin I had made
The WP Posted Today plugin is meant to offer a short code you can put on a site and it will list all previous posts on the current calendar day (this of course is useful if you actually still blog regularly) (cough) (cough).
Just for grins I checked the page where I use my own plugin. Yikes. Red Alert. It displayed all the ones for December 29 in years past, but the part where it should list how many there were was blank.
I dug into my own code… and found myself a bit lost. Crossed. I was not even sure where I got the sprintf functions (John’s original code?) that were aimed to be compatible if anyone every wanted a language translation (maybe, or it’s just that thing when people code things differently).
Taking the path of least resistance, I took out the code where I think the problem was occurring and did it a more simple, but brute force way.
And it worked.
So I updated the version on GitHub and felt at peace with the world. In the off chance someone stumbled into my little corner of code, they would find something that works (or should work).
And then (here comes a stream crossing) Michael Hanscom @djwudi — someone I don’t think I’ve ever communicated with — tweets that he had seen pretty much the same bug and offered a fix.
In looking at his post I saw the fix he made, and said– that’s better than mine! So I decided today to roll back my changes in place of Michael’s solution (but also keeping a modification I had made to remove extraneous calls when not needed for singular versus multiple results).
I noted the extra change he made in hos own version
Plus, I’ve made one other tweak to the plugin, so that it adds a link to the end of the excerpt to better handle “microblog” style entries that don’t have titles, so I still get to feel good about that part, as well. 🙂 My coding skills may be underdeveloped and rusty from lack of regular use, but they’re not entirely atrophied!
In this case, these microblog type entries (see Michael’s demo page) lack titles, so yes, a link is needed at the end of the post excerpt.
Yet I could see that regular posts (like on my site) did not need the extra link, and also, not everyone might want the arrow Michael likes.
I solved this cleverly by creating an additional shortcode parameter more which defaults to a blank string. In the shortcode function, we convert any attributes passed to variables with
extract(shortcode_atts( array( "month" => '', "day" => '', 'excerpt' => 1, 'more' => '' ), $atts ));
So on my site, where I just used the shortcode There are 18 posts previously published on September 1st
- 2025
- Funeral For a MacbookPro Friend We are gathered here to mourn the loss of Alan’s trusty 2013 Retina 13″ MacBookPro, a trusty, reliable, though keyboard battered workhouse that was there for every web page, blog post, flickr photo edited and uploaded, and more for over 11 years. The family requests no cards or flowers. Music is not provided by Elton […]
- 2021
- 1/623 Hi. There has not been too much nostalgia posting here lately (well actually not much at all, so there). Maybe last June? But who cares if I feel like dipping into my tech past, it’s there. It’s part of my journey. And it’s my blog, my domain. Farther back, maybe a year ago, I recanted […]
- 2017
- The Indispensable Digital Research Tool I can Say, Without Lying, Saves Time I sometimes tell people that when technology evangelists espouse that their tool saves you time, that it’s a red flag warning / code talk for “I am lying”. But here, I share my one, career tested exception; it’s old technology that many people have abandoned. I will wade carefully through the acronym jargon, but it’s […]
- 2013
- Reporting on the First Week of Headless ds106 Checking all of the meters, spinning a few dials… ah there we are, signal. It has been a week since we launched the Headless ds106 course and on seeing the posts that have come in, the burst in twitter activity, I am pretty happy about the level of activity. More than that, it is very […]
- First Week Headless of Daily Creates The point of ds106 Daily Creates is something that should not take much work, so really it is more than enough to just do them and get them posted somewhere. It is helpful, and suggested for people in Headless ds106 who have some experience, to try sharing some of the behind the scenes notes of […]
- 2012
- The Question Should be: Why Are You *Not* Blogging I don’t becaue I have an outdoor brain — http://cogdogblog.com/2005/09/30/ (wow that was a blog heavy day). It has been a long time since I nodded when reading (maybe it was listening to) the IT Conversations podcast where Jon Udell spoke about his notion of narrating the work we do (I was also listening because […]
- More GIFing with Photos: loop a portal into the impossible ds106 is ramping up, and Michael Branson Smith is going deeper in thought with the idea of the animated GIF: I’m a big lover of the animated GIF having created dozens as bits of reflection on cinematic moments, film posters and comic book covers. These animations are all fabulous homages to stories I love. But […]
- 2011
- Mom’s Last Postcard We carried the box out of the car and set it gently on those straps, suspended over the hole. I shall never ever forget that lonely creaky sounds those straps make when released, when Mom went into the ground. I spoke about how I was worried when I told mom in March that I had […]
- Road Stats: Week 10 It’s been a busy 2 weeks, and I completely lapsed on last week’s notes. I doubt anyone noticed. I managed to cross almost all the way the super landmass known as “Ontario”, and might have made the eastern border were it not for the sad call that cam with bad news about my Mom. cc […]
- 2010
- A Dear Chrome Letter cc licensed flickr photo shared by Johnny Grim Dear Chrome Browser, Despite our early leaps for joy I am sorry, but to quote BB King, The Thrill is Gone. Despite your spryness in startup and the slickness of the location/search bar, this relationship is just not working out. You have more than lost your shine. […]
- 2009
- What Did You Do When Gmail Went Down? cc licensed flickr photo shared by cogdogblog So Gmail went belly up today for a bit. There was a fart in the cloud computer. Did you reload inbox every 30 seconds? I bet that helped. Did you tweet about it? I did- pulled out a Don McClean: I can’t remember if I cried Reading tweets […]
- 2007
- Belated (B)log Day Is anywhere in the world is it August 31? I have come up for air a day later.. Let’s see if I can come up with my five unusual, unheralded blogs. First is this tiny one originating from Monkton… just kidding. The Generator Blog collects all those sites that allow you to generate an image […]
- Gender Bending Bacn Gender Bending in the Bacn posted 1 Sep ’07, 10.50am MDT PST on flickr Just got some fresh bacn in my inbox- seems like Quechup has some issues with gender Share this barking on social media
- 2006
- I Like This Schedule flickr foto I Like This Scheduleavailable on flickr For this 12 day vacation, I’ve not needed to check the Palm Pilot much– I like its monotony. I’ve been working on some new recipes…. Share this barking on social media
- Yup, Gisela Needs Web Design flickr foto Gisela Storeavailable on flickr Small out of the way town south of Payson. This was the General Store and bar, closed for 3 years. I was poking around the net looking for anything about Gisela, Arizona, a town of minimal map dot size. For as many years I have driven north on the […]
- 2005
- My Plate Is Full flickr foto june-bbq 018available on my flickr It’s already past the time when our building empties out and I’m still pounding the keys here. With the start-up of the fall semester, many programs/projects needing support, a poaching and leak of our office staff, all is leading to things just piling up on the plate. I […]
- Not Hired flickr foto New Jobavailable on my flickr I am now delivering packages at campus here! I am disamyed not to have gotten a chance for the courier position at Wintec… a colleague notified me: I’m afraid we have decided to outsource the courier position to another country. Thanks you for your application, we’ll keep it […]
- Pour Some RawSugar On Your Bookmarks Just when we thought the net was full to the brim with social bookmark tools, comes another new kid on the block: RawSugar: RawSugar enables you to save and tag all your favorite web pages and then later find the one need in seconds. Why is this so important? Think of how many times you […]
On Michael’s site he might use There are 18 posts previously published on September 1st
- 2025
- Funeral For a MacbookPro Friend We are gathered here to mourn the loss of Alan’s trusty 2013 Retina 13″ MacBookPro, a trusty, reliable, though keyboard battered workhouse that was there for every web page, blog post, flickr photo edited and uploaded, and more for over 11 years. The family requests no cards or flowers. Music is not provided by Elton […] ➡
- 2021
- 1/623 Hi. There has not been too much nostalgia posting here lately (well actually not much at all, so there). Maybe last June? But who cares if I feel like dipping into my tech past, it’s there. It’s part of my journey. And it’s my blog, my domain. Farther back, maybe a year ago, I recanted […] ➡
- 2017
- 2013
- Reporting on the First Week of Headless ds106 Checking all of the meters, spinning a few dials… ah there we are, signal. It has been a week since we launched the Headless ds106 course and on seeing the posts that have come in, the burst in twitter activity, I am pretty happy about the level of activity. More than that, it is very […] ➡
- First Week Headless of Daily Creates The point of ds106 Daily Creates is something that should not take much work, so really it is more than enough to just do them and get them posted somewhere. It is helpful, and suggested for people in Headless ds106 who have some experience, to try sharing some of the behind the scenes notes of […] ➡
- 2012
- The Question Should be: Why Are You *Not* Blogging I don’t becaue I have an outdoor brain — http://cogdogblog.com/2005/09/30/ (wow that was a blog heavy day). It has been a long time since I nodded when reading (maybe it was listening to) the IT Conversations podcast where Jon Udell spoke about his notion of narrating the work we do (I was also listening because […] ➡
- More GIFing with Photos: loop a portal into the impossible ds106 is ramping up, and Michael Branson Smith is going deeper in thought with the idea of the animated GIF: I’m a big lover of the animated GIF having created dozens as bits of reflection on cinematic moments, film posters and comic book covers. These animations are all fabulous homages to stories I love. But […] ➡
- 2011
- Mom’s Last Postcard We carried the box out of the car and set it gently on those straps, suspended over the hole. I shall never ever forget that lonely creaky sounds those straps make when released, when Mom went into the ground. I spoke about how I was worried when I told mom in March that I had […] ➡
- Road Stats: Week 10 It’s been a busy 2 weeks, and I completely lapsed on last week’s notes. I doubt anyone noticed. I managed to cross almost all the way the super landmass known as “Ontario”, and might have made the eastern border were it not for the sad call that cam with bad news about my Mom. cc […] ➡
- 2010
- A Dear Chrome Letter cc licensed flickr photo shared by Johnny Grim Dear Chrome Browser, Despite our early leaps for joy I am sorry, but to quote BB King, The Thrill is Gone. Despite your spryness in startup and the slickness of the location/search bar, this relationship is just not working out. You have more than lost your shine. […] ➡
- 2009
- What Did You Do When Gmail Went Down? cc licensed flickr photo shared by cogdogblog So Gmail went belly up today for a bit. There was a fart in the cloud computer. Did you reload inbox every 30 seconds? I bet that helped. Did you tweet about it? I did- pulled out a Don McClean: I can’t remember if I cried Reading tweets […] ➡
- 2007
- Belated (B)log Day Is anywhere in the world is it August 31? I have come up for air a day later.. Let’s see if I can come up with my five unusual, unheralded blogs. First is this tiny one originating from Monkton… just kidding. The Generator Blog collects all those sites that allow you to generate an image […] ➡
- Gender Bending Bacn Gender Bending in the Bacn posted 1 Sep ’07, 10.50am MDT PST on flickr Just got some fresh bacn in my inbox- seems like Quechup has some issues with gender Share this barking on social media ➡
- 2006
- I Like This Schedule flickr foto I Like This Scheduleavailable on flickr For this 12 day vacation, I’ve not needed to check the Palm Pilot much– I like its monotony. I’ve been working on some new recipes…. Share this barking on social media ➡
- Yup, Gisela Needs Web Design flickr foto Gisela Storeavailable on flickr Small out of the way town south of Payson. This was the General Store and bar, closed for 3 years. I was poking around the net looking for anything about Gisela, Arizona, a town of minimal map dot size. For as many years I have driven north on the […] ➡
- 2005
- My Plate Is Full flickr foto june-bbq 018available on my flickr It’s already past the time when our building empties out and I’m still pounding the keys here. With the start-up of the fall semester, many programs/projects needing support, a poaching and leak of our office staff, all is leading to things just piling up on the plate. I […] ➡
- Not Hired flickr foto New Jobavailable on my flickr I am now delivering packages at campus here! I am disamyed not to have gotten a chance for the courier position at Wintec… a colleague notified me: I’m afraid we have decided to outsource the courier position to another country. Thanks you for your application, we’ll keep it […] ➡
- Pour Some RawSugar On Your Bookmarks Just when we thought the net was full to the brim with social bookmark tools, comes another new kid on the block: RawSugar: RawSugar enables you to save and tag all your favorite web pages and then later find the one need in seconds. Why is this so important? Think of how many times you […] ➡
// output post and link
$output .= '
' . get_the_title() . '';
// display excerpt if we want it
if ( $excerpt ) $output .= ' ' . get_the_excerpt();
// for microblog output where there might not be titles so add a link at end
// h/t https://www.michaelhanscom.com/eclecticism/2020/01/02/rss-feed-weirdness-and-php-debugging/
$output .= ' ' . $more . '';
So how is that for the odds of streams crossing on the same obscure bit of code? That’s the old fashioned kind of net serendipity that still happens.
Thanks Michael! Check out his 20 year old blog, he’s an “Enthusiastically Ambiverted Hopepunk” quite the tag line.
Featured Image: Edit of the Ghostbusters Cross Streams scene found in the Ghostbusters Fandom Wiki site which states “Community content is available under CC-BY-SA unless otherwise noted.” I replaced part of the background with a screenshot of the WP Posted Today PHP code.
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