Exporting Textile2 Content with WordPress

November 17, 2008 By Aaron Leave a Comment

A friend of mine approached me recently to help him out. He had tons of archives in his WordPress blog that had been created using the Textile2 plugin. Textile is a form of markup that is wiki-like. In other words, it’s not straight HTML. The Textile2 plugin interprets the markup and renders HTML that browsers can understand when the post is actually called.

I created a small plugin for him that, on WordPress export, translates Textiled content into standard HTML format. It depends on the Textile2 plugin, so if you are going to use this, make sure you have that.

<?php
/*
Plugin Name: Textile Friendly Export
Version: 1.0
Plugin URI: http://technosailor.com
Description: Translates Textile 2 Content to HTML on WXR Export
Author: Aaron Brazell
Author URI: http://technosailor.com
Disclaimer: This Plugin comes with no warranty, expressed or implied
*/

function textile2_export( $content )
{
	global $myTextile2;

	if( !class_exists('Textile2_New') )
		return $content;

	return $myTextile2->do_textile( $content );
}
add_filter( 'the_excerpt_export', 'textile2_export' );
add_filter( 'the_content_export', 'textile2_export' );
?>
Filed Under: Code, Movie Reviews, Sports Tagged With: textile, WordPress, wordpress plugin

Indiana Jones

May 23, 2008 By Aaron 2 Comments

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to see Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, the first Indiana Jones move in 19 years. I make no promises about spoilers, but will attempt to avoid giving the story away.

IJ4-WP-48-800.jpg

The opening scene was the hook to get Indiana Jones loves back into the action. Indy is now quite a bit older and the setting is many years later in the heart of the Red Scare. The enemy is no longer Nazi Germany, but the Soviet Union.

Indiana Jones survives a missile range speed acceleration testing track, loads of highly trained Russian Red Army with a strange inability to hit targets with their guns, three drops over Niagara Falls-size waterfalls and the collapse of yet another temple.

The requirement for the suspension of all belief aside, it was a pretty good movie. Definite popcorn flick. 3.5 Stars which isn’t bad for a Lucasfilm comeback.

Easter Eggs include: The Ark of the Covenant, Area 51, Shia LaBeouf nearly putting the Indiana Jones hat on his head, the Death Star drawn on a wall and a few more that I might have missed.

It was classic Indiana Jones. Historical plot woven with supernatural thread. Very enjoyable, but not at all believable.

Filed Under: Movie Reviews Tagged With: indiana jones, indiana jones and the kingdom of the crystal skull, reviews

Untraceable: Light on plot; Heavy on message

January 27, 2008 By Aaron 1 Comment

Last night, my wife and I decided to go check out the new movie Untraceable starring Diane Lane. We both believe we got our money’s worth.

Spoiler to follow.

The plot was a bit weak and worn out. The FBI cybercrime division do their cyber warfare bit on Windows Vista machines, for one, which makes it somewhat laughable. :-) Putting that aside, the plot follows a serial killer through a tired progression of increasingly sensational murders, with an internet twist. The more traffic that visits the site with live streaming of a victim, the quicker the victim dies.

“We are the murder weapon” was the chilling verdict from the FBI in a national press conference that only served to drive traffic harder and faster to the website as viewers and chat room participants engaged gleefully in the torture and subsequent deaths.

The plot continues to an expected climax where the star of the movie, Diane Lane playing Agent Jennifer Marsh, becomes the last of the killer’s victims. Every step of the way, the next twists were predictable, yet still very interesting and gripping.

Though the plot was tired and overdone (something right out of Criminal Minds, actually), the message was clearly aimed at the YouTube generation of young, tech savvy internet users who are comfortable in a world of little human contact. Images on a screen are something to be entertained by, much like the television generation could sit down and watch Rambo or Die Hard and walk away laughing.

Don’t get me wrong. I am the YouTube generation. I watched this video, shortly before leaving for the theatre (which incidentally is hilarious). Guilty as charged.

The point is, the movie does a good job of sending the message. We got the memo. The plots weakness was balanced out by the well executed delivery.

3.5 stars.

Filed Under: Movie Reviews Tagged With: diane lane, Movie Reviews, social media, untraceable, youtube