Year: 2007

Everything Else, ,

Imieniny widget – alpha 0.4

I’ve released the latest version, alpha 0.4, available from my downloads page.

I cleaned up the code a bit more and corrected an issue I had where the option values set in the Presentation – Sidebar widgets tab were reset upon re-opening. The php code was not complete and the options were lost on reloads.

I’m thinking that it is pretty stable now and I’d love your feedback on this version.

Does it work for you?
Does it make sense?
Are the options sufficient?

Thanks.

Poland - Polish - Polonia

Happy Pułaski Day

Kazimierz Pułaski, soldier, politician, freedom fighter, and father of American cavalry.

Kazimierz Pulaski

Pułaski Day will be observed in Illinois on March 5th this year.

Hymn of the Moravian Nuns of Bethlehem

When the dying flame of day
Through the chancel shot its ray,
Far the glimmering tapers shed
Faint light on the cowled head;
And the censer burning swung,
Where nere before the altar, hung
The crimson banner, that with prayer
Had been consecrated there.
And the nun’s sweet hymn was heard while,
Sung low, in the dim, mysterious aisle.

“Take thy banner, May it wave
Proudly oer the good and brave;
Wnen the battle’s distant wail
Breaks the Sabbath of our vale,
When the clarion’s music thrills
To the hearts of these lone hills,
When the spear in conflict shakes,
And the strong lance shivering breaks.

“Take thy banner! and, beneath
The battle-cloud’s encircling wreath,
Guard it, till our homes are free!
Guard it! God will prosper thee!
In the dark and trying hour,
In the breaking forth of power,
In the rush of steeds and men,
His right hand will shield thee then.

“Take thy banner! But when night
Closes round the ghastly flight, If the vanquished warrior
bow, Spare him! as thou wouldst be
spared! By our prayers and many tears, By the
mercy that endears, Spare him! he our love hath
shared! Spare him! as thou wouldst be spared

“Take thy banner! and if e’er
Thou shouldst press the soldier’s bier,
And the muffled drum should beat
To the tread of mournfulfeet,
Then this crimson flag shall be
Martial cloak and shroud for thee.”

The warrior took that banner proud,
And it was his martial cloak and shroud!

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem entitled “Hymn of the Moravian Nuns of Bethlehem” was inspired by the fact that General Pułaski’s Legion is said to have marched into battle with a silk banner embroidered by Moravians in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.

Current Events, Perspective, Political

John McCain got it right – the first time

John McCain, who I supported when he ran against George Bush, stated that American lives have been wasted in Iraq. He’s right, absolutely, dead, right.

Unfortunately, any gravitas he had back in-the-day is gone, and I no longer support him. He’s become a washed out shadow of what he was.

On the David Letterman show he said:

“[Americans] are very frustrated, and they have every right to be. We’ve wasted a lot of our most precious treasure, which is American lives, over there.”

…and, for a brief moment, the former John McCain was back.

I my estimation wasting is the burning and destruction of something precious for no purpose, or for a purpose of little value. We have wasted our nations youth and treasure on the adventures of a President and administration who are at best misguided, at worst deranged, and in actuality criminal.

Of course Mr. McCain has subsequently backpedaled because saying ‘wasted‘ is a sin (see: McCain says he misspoke in saying U.S. lives ‘wasted’ from CNN). Mr. Obama said the same thing and had his head handed to him as well.

We have to tout their sacrifice. That’s the only proper word. Sacrifice we feel so strongly about that we cut VA funding and place our permanently injured and handicapped sacrificial lambs in places like Walter Reed. To wit from Fox News: Top Army General Relieved of Command at Walter Reed Army Medical Center

WASHINGTON —” A top Army commander was relieved of his command at Walter Reed Army Medical Center on Thursday after senior officials said they lost trust and confidence in his leadership abilities to address injured soldier care at military medical facilities.

Army Maj. Gen. George W. Weightman leaves his post as two-star general of the North Atlantic Regional Medical Command and Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

In a brief announcement, the Army said service leaders had “lost trust and confidence” in Weightman’s leadership abilities “to address needed solutions for soldier outpatient care” at Walter Reed.

The change comes on the same day that an independent panel reviewing allegations of poor quality-of-life conditions at two military medical facilities treating soldiers injured in Iraq and Afghanistan plans to meet for the first time…

They are coming back severely handicapped, insane, or sick. We aren’t seeing it that much because those folks are all housed out of the public eye. When they do appear on the street, and they will be out, on the street, we’ll echo the words of Mrs. McGrath:

All foreign wars I do proclaim
Between Don John and the King of Spain
And by herrins I’ll make them rue the time
That they swept the legs from a child of mine.

The ending lyrics from Mrs. McGrath most recently performed by Bruce Springsteen in We Shall Overcome – The Seeger Sessions.

God help us.

Saints and Martyrs, ,

Updates to the Imieniny widget

I’ve updated the Imieniny widget as follows:

  • Added support for setting time offsets in the administrative interface.
  • Added support for re-naming the widget title in the administrative interface.
  • Cleaned up the code

Special thanks for the guidance from Kaf Oseo at guff szub. See WP plugin: My Widget – example WordPress widget.

The current version is alpha 0.3. The download is available from my Downloads page.

Everything Else, ,

Imieniny WordPress widget plug-in

As I mentioned in Blog updates, I had added a PHP script to my blog to list the current saints’ name day. I took that script and created a Word Press widget out of it.

As recommended by Automattic, I took their Google widget script, which is very well documented, and worked from there, adding Adam Brucki’s Imieniny PHP script to it.

I had already taken the script and updated it for UTF-8 compliance and tweaked the output.

I’ve now added a section to the script to adjust for server time differences. My server in on UTC so I had to adjust the time by -5 hours.

I am releasing the widget as an alpha 0.1 version. It works for me ‘as expected’ but there are no guarantees… It is being released as-is. If it breaks your stuff, delete the plug-in and move on.

Here are some of the things I’d like to do with it:

  • Allow the end user to adjust the title
  • Allow the end use to adjust the time differential
  • Clean-up the code

For the most current download version please see my downloads page.

To install:

  1. Unpack
  2. FTP the imieniny.php file to your plug-ins directory
  3. Activate the plug-in
  4. Drag the Imieniny widget to the preferred locale on your sidebar (your theme must have widget support and Automattic’s Widgets must be installed.