Update! Version 2.0 is here: Translate Widget 2.0

So, I’ve completed my first bona-fide Wordpress Plugin
It’s one of those newfandangled widgets, and it adds little flags to your sidebar, which will take you to a translation of the current blog page. It uses google translate, but removes the frame, so it looks quite nice! Once you’re in one language, you can browse around the blog, and everything stays translated. You can just click on the English flag to get back to the original language. You should see it on my sidebar now, and you can give it a trial run. Then, if satisfied, download it here:
Translate Widget
The zip includes a /flags/ folder, and a translate.php file. Both need to be placed in the /wordpress/wp-content/plugins/widgets/ folder. If you want to change the English language flag from the default American to either the British or Canadian (as I have!) flags, they are included, just rename flag_ca.gif, or flag_uk.gif to flag_en.gif. Now you can just go to the widget’s options.

Donations

If you appreciate my plugins, and feel compelled to spread some love, I would certainly appreciate it. No obligation though, of course.

Comments, tips, or problems are welcome, just leave a comment here, or send me an email (Address is in the sidebar.)

Do enjoy!

Update on June 14, 2006: The plugin now supports Arabic, since Google has added that to their list of supported translations. This brings the total to 9 languages.
To those not familiar with Wordpress Widgets, you need to have the Widgets plugin installed before you can use my widget.

I have a picture of me in the sidebar now, so any random visitors will know what I look like
The photo is actually one of my Senior Pictures, which were taken a few months ago. I was very pleased with how they turned out, and so I finally got around to scanning the best ones, and uploading them. You can see them here:

Thanks goes to Uncle Cal McIntire for the excellent photos!

A lot of the spam comments I get on my blog start off with something like “That’s a very good point”, or “You have a very helpful site”, to try and trick me into letting these pride-building remarks through. However, the truth is shown when you look at their name, which links to great-web-hosting, cheap-linoleum-floors, and the like.

Well, yesterday, I encountered a different technique. A nice fellow named Max left the following comment on a recent post of mine:

Please, work with design colors. I have red eyes from your colors!

Ouch! I was sent reeling into a puddle of self-pity. Ok, not quite, but it did injure my ego a bit!
I can take criticism, however, so I was about to free the comment from it’s moderation queue prison. It was not caught by Akismet, my comment-spam blocker.

As my mouse flew towards the “Approve” button, my eyes caught an important, yet previously overlooked detail. Max’s ‘homepage’, was in fact, a very spammy url.
With my lighting-fast reflexes I changed my cursor’s course, and sent the comment spiralling into the abyss of caught spam.

Foiled again, spammer!

Change!
Change is good.
So, I have made some changes to trevorcreech.com.

Most notably:

1. I have fancy header-text/logo!
2. The sidebar is now on the right.
3. You can now comment on non-blog works, such as my writing!
4. As a consequence of the above, my blog is now at http://trevorcreech.com/blog/ instead of http://blog.trevorcreech.com. Photos are now at http://trevorcreech.com/photos/ as well, instead of http://photos.trevorcreech.com.
5. There’s more stuff in my sidebar.
6. Buttons are pretty.

I will be moving over the rest of my writing soon, and hopefully more stuff.

So, as a last tribute to my first design experiment, here is a screenshot:

From here forth, vive le 2!

Ok, Katie tagged me, so here’s the 7-things quiz, as I will dub it, except that I’m going to make it the 3-things quiz, just because 3 is better than 7, says I.

7 3 things I want to do or see before I die

1. Visit all the continents(maybe not Antarctica).
2. Do something crazy like skydiving or bungee jumping.
3. Get married to an awesome wife and raise a family.
4. Learn to fly.
5. Give my kids the chance to live in another culture.
6. Get a job (high ambition, I know!).
7. Play guitar in a band.

7 3 things I can’t do

1. I can’t play sports (hardly).
2. I can’t play the accordian.
3. I can’t play the guitar with my toes(Hey, some people can!).
4. I can’t think of any more things I can’t do, so I’ll leave it off here. I guess I’m just talented.

7 3 things that attract me to the opposite sex

1. Godliness.
2. Sincerity.
3. Appearance (Note: This is not like a big thing, but I would say it plays into what ‘attracts me to the opposite sex’. Whatever.)
4. Sense of humour.

7 3 books and movies I love

1. The Village.
2. Red, Black, White books.
3. Rift in Time.
4. More serious stuff…anything by Joshua Harris.

7 3 things I say most often

1. *Nose laugh*.
2. That’s hilarious!
3. I don’t know…other people probably know better than I do.

7 3 things you should know about me

1. I’m an apprentice of Jesus Christ.
2. I like to take things apart, and try to put them back together.
3. I’m a geek, I can program and stuff.
4. I love Senegal!
5. I’m like incredibly close to my family.

So, I do hereby tag Stephen, and Darren, since he hasn’t done his yet.