What the Hell is up with Radio and CSS? I just redesigned the template for The Hellenophile, and when I test a file with dummy text in my browser, it looks just like I intended. When I upstream it to a test category with Radio, it gets mangled. I'm not trying to do anything fancy--just a header and three columns with a color scheme reminiscent of a Greek vase., but Radio just won't properly render the damn thing. If your are morbidly curious, the wreckage can be viewed here. Only the right most sidebar is close to what it's supposed to be, but even there the link styling is screwed up. If even IE 4 can render my mock up correctly, why the hell can't Radio do it properly?
Weblogs are about personal expression, so why the Hell can't I just get mine to look unique? With thousands of new blogs everyday, shouldn't creating a personalized look be straight forward, even if it isn't easy? This need is especially acute with Radio because there are so few templates available. Most of the themes are very well designed, but the most attractive are useless for subject-specific weblogs (imagine using Transmitter or Space for a blog about Greece), and the reminder are just too generic--fine maybe for The Agora or a person journal, but not for a blog that wants to telegraph it's topic visually. The Hellenophile will never be a big blog, or the first place someone goes for news about Greece, but dammit, I want it to look like I want it to look.
I like Radio more than some Salon bloggers--I think the capabilities of the software are impressive, and if I had the time, I'd love to explore it. But it is impossible to ignore the fact that there has been almost no work done on the software in the past year (I know it updates in the background, but I get RSS feeds of changes to the root, and from the Userland product news website). I sympathize with the staff at Userland; I know they are a tiny company supporting two major programs. I understand why they choose to keep developing Manila--it is sold for much more money, and it is sold to more demanding users, but I'm using the other program, and its just not working for me.
But with interesting developments in the weblog software category--WordPress, pMachine, Textpattern, Typepad--I'm running out of patience with a program that hasn't shown noticeable improvement in nearly a year, and that won't let me create a simple three-column theme in CSS. Radio has two great advantages: it is inexpensive (when you add in hosting costs) and simple (no complex installation, no need to line up a host), but these are pointless if your blog isn't what you want it to be.
2:04:56 PM 
|
|
