Hoo boy. Where to start...

Okay. So, as I've said several times before, I am a web design student. That's part of why I put dcNET together–so that I might improve my web design skills. Working with straight XHTML and CSS is great and all, but that's not the sort of website I'd be selling to clients. In the interest of teaching myself how to deal with content management systems and server-side scripting and all that, I'm experimenting with one of those CMSes for this website. I'd actually prefer learning to work with Python over a PHP system like this, but eh, my server is what it is and it's good to know.

That probably means absolutely nothing to most of you! But long nerd story short, that's why there's been a drastic overhaul and the URLs to the pages have changed and all that. I'm still adjusting things, making a nicer-looking layout and working out a few little oddities in the CMS's code, but it's more or less all presentable and functional. And that's not all–there's actually new content! Unfortunately it still isn't the Battle Factory, EV training and reffing pages I've been promising, but I'm going to try and finish the EV training page this weekend and I'm going to finish that damn Battle Factory research if it kills me.

No, instead I've added two other pages/sections and updated another. The fanart gallery now has thumbnails, folders and a Lightbox-style thing so that it looks nicer; there are also some new pictures (may I draw attention to the new Sceptile and Tyranitar in particular?). Unfortunately there's still some cleaning up to do–namely, I have absolutely no idea why it scatters the thumbnails all over the place when there are a lot of them, as in the Pokémon gallery, so I've got to look into that–but overall it's pretty cool.

Next, I've added a sort of... puzzle game thing. It's something I came up with years and years ago, and hopefully it's a lot more interesting and hair-tearing than it was when I was ten. It's under "The Pokémon Swap Meet" in the menu, so check it out. Hopefully it's difficult enough, heh.

Then I copied the contents of my Japanese Platinum Version blog over to the site, just in case that's easier for anyone than going through the original blog. And to kill space. It also kills space. But yeeeeah, if you missed it the first time around then go check it out, it's almost entertaining.

Speaking of game blogs, I was stupid enough to pre-order HeartGold in Japanese and will be doing it all over again. It should hopefully arrive in the middle of a decent-length break from school, so with any luck I'll be able to get farther faster this time. That'll probably end up on the site eventually, too.

So, uh, I think that's it for now. If anything's broken (aside from the invalid XHTML on the calculator and gallery pages, which is not my fault and I'm working to fix it), contact me and let me know about it. Peace out, yo.

...but at least I do have a new page! While procrastinating late last night I found Instacalc, which may or may not be old news to most of you but is still one of the most amazing little toys I've ever found on the internet. And I hate math. It's fun to play with, and after spending some time fiddling with it I decided, for the hell of it, to whip up damage and energy calculators based on my ASB reffing scales. It's another one of those things that probably isn't very necessary right now, but it will probably come in handy if a project I'm helping ever gets off the ground. The calculators should be simple enough to use, so if you're a ref-in-training looking to get approved (or if you're just curious and want to see my reffing scale in variable and equation form) then here you go.

You'll notice that the calculator page is under a new section up there *points*. I'm going to be changing how the menu and some of the site pages are structured. This will be gradual as not everything that will be changed is ready to be changed, and I'd also like to keep the top-level menu as uncluttered as possible for you technological dinosaurs that still have tiny screen resolutions, but hopefully in the end it will be more intuitive and convenient. I may change my mind about where some things in the menu go so don't be surprised if the links move around a lot over the next fortnight or so, but I will not be changing the URLs of the pages themselves so you don't have to worry about that.

I swear to god I have not forgotten the Battle Factory, EV training and ASB reffing pages; I just haven't worked on them recently. But they WILL be up within the next few weeks or else I'll... er... have to keep working on them until they are finished.

Oh, and before I forget: shameless plug for the Kutho RPG. We have Pokémon, wanton destruction and ninjas. Really. So join now.

EDIT: Whoopsie, the energy calculator was wrong. After a series of unfortunate events involving a mistake in my math, several typos and more repetitive copy/paste than I care to think about, I have corrected it and everything should be okay now. I highly doubt that anyone who cares has seen it yet anyway, but on the off chance that you did see it and bookmarked the link to the offsite energy calculator then you'll have to update it to the new one. (To prevent this sort of thing from happening in the future, make sure you bookmark my page instead of the individual links.) There's one extra row in the calculator now but it's another "no touchie or you'll get mathfail" row so it doesn't affect the instructions. Sorry about that.

I don't have any substantial updates right now (although I did add a few more shiny Pokémon to the sparklies page and the two pointless ASB team pages), but I'm just popping in to let my three visitors know that I've been doing some serious article-writing work. No, really! The Battle Factory page I mentioned a few updates ago is coming along pretty nicely, and I've finally figured out how I want to write that ASB reffing page so that it isn't stupid; the EV-training page should hopefully come shortly after that. I only have four days of class left before a decent-sized break, which means that I'll have more time to focus on getting things done around here. Assuming that I manage that time properly, the Factory page should be ready to roll out next week or thereabouts with the reffing and EV training pages soon to follow.

I'm so proud of myself. :O

...and so, another month later...

Actually, I uploaded those two new pictures a while ago, along with an update to the stock arena and sparklies pages and a revamp of the hideous Infernape render I had up there before. God only knows why I didn't post about it sooner, eh. Unfortunately I haven't had time to finish anything major other than that stuff–I'm currently trying to help out several different Pokémon fangames and an RPG forum, and I'm still majorly distracted by school and my own fakemon stuff–but I swear that I'm doing my best to get one of those ASB pages done as well as the EV training page and one last update to the failblog (covering Darkrai and Shaymin, as that's about all that I can do that everyone else in America hasn't already seen for themselves in English) and figure out how I want to redo that blasted artwork page. I've also had a few new layout ideas bouncing around in my head, so I might be able to get something done there.

I'm trying, really I am, but I'm only a goldfish human. Curse my attention span.

No, really, I'm not. I'm sorry I've been gone this long; I didn't intend to be. But a long bout of "too busy to put a lot of work into the site" was followed by "okay I *can* work on the site now but I have no internet access". Admittedly the only thing I had ready to upload right away was two more pictures, but it was something. :/

Anyway, the internet at home is finally back up, but since we're having a problem with the router it's only on the main computer. All of my relevant files are on my laptop, however, and it's too much hassle to try and go back and forth between this computer and the laptop to update stuff. I apologize, but everything's going to have to wait until we have wireless internet again.

But don't despair! (haha yeah right because people actually care about this site) I haven't just been sitting around twiddling my thumbs. Okay, maybe I've wasted a lot of time playing Solitaire and Mahjong on my laptop, but I *have* done some productive stuff in addition to that. In addition to the two pictures I have ready to upload (and, depending on my drawing mood over the next few days/weeks, there might be more of those), I'm going to be finishing up another ASB-related page that should be able to go up with them. I have another one in the works, but all of my notes for that are in Google Docs and are therefore inaccessible without regular internets. Also on deck for when Regular Internets has returned is a game-related page about EV training, and depending on how things go there might be another page about Platinum's Battle Factory. There *may* also be new/updated free images and zodiac images and an update to the art page to make it more like a gallery and less like a jumbled mess, and if my resolve and self-confidence hold up and manage to chase all of the stupid ideas away there might even be a one-shot fanfic and some information about some potential projects I have planned (one of which isn't Pokémon-related, as a heads up, but the site technically isn't entirely about Pokémon anyway, so).

Now that Platinum is out in English I really ought to finish up the Platinum failblog, which I should be able to do in one or two more posts when Regular Internets comes back. My English copy of Platinum and a few other games are eating up some of my Japanese Platinum time, but I do have enough notes for at least one more post when I can get to LJ again, so there shouldn't be that long a wait.

So the two-maybe-more new pictures and the ASB page should be up as soon as my laptop is connected to the internet again. Following that I will do my very best to deliver at least some of the other stuff I mentioned, and maybe more stuff depending on my mood. (Oh, and I'll update the shiny Pokémon and TCoD ASB pages, too, if you're one of those strange people who actually finds those interesting or would like a trade.) Please bear with me just a little longer, and hopefully I'll be able to step up site activity again.

Now, if you will excuse me, I need to finish the ASB page and then go lose myself in more Solitaire and Mahjong. And Platinum, and some Fire Emblem games, but mostly Solitaire and Mahjong. Later.