Random thoughts on art, technology, stuff, and occasionally Real Estate: March 2009

 Did you ever download a theme you really wanted to use for your business, but you found the theme's footer contained a link to, say, a site promoting "Triple XXX Rated Adult Toys".  And when you went to edit the link out of the footer, all you could see was a string of encoded characters?

Searching the web, you will find many sites, including the WordPress Forums,  talking about Base64 decoders.

There is a simpler way.  Your ~internet browser~ can decode the string; otherwise you wouldn't be able to read it as you visit the website.

Here's how:

1.  Upload and activate the theme.  Remember that for a few minutes, as you do this little procedure, your site will be live with the spammy link, unless you are using the Theme Test Drive plugin.

2.  Click Appearance - Editor

3.  Click on Footer.php.  See it?  There's the string of encoded characters that we need to convert to ordinary HTML so we can edit them.

4. Up at the top of the WordPress Dashboard, click Visit Site; you will be viewing your WordPress site with the theme installed.

5. Once your site is up on your screen, in your browser's menu bar click View -> Source.  (It Firefox, it is View -> Page Source)

6.  A second window (or tab) will open displaying the HTML code for the page.  Scroll down until you see some thing <!-- Begin Footer --> or  <div id="footer">

7.  Copy everything in that Footer section ... all the way up to the </body> tab and paste it into a text editor.  Notepad will do just fine. (A word processor, such as Word, will farkle it up.)

8.  Now edit the footer section as needed.  Yes, you will need to know just enough HTML to recognize link code <a href=> and to write out your own link.  But that is not too difficult, trust me on that.

9.  Go back to the WordPress Dashboard.  Click Appearance -> Editor, and click  Footer.php to open it.

10.  Delete the entire contents of Footer.php (all the encoded stuff), and paste in the new footer code you just edited.  Click update.  Click Visit Site to check the final product.

One important point:  I always leave links to the original creator of a theme.  It's work.  The person deserves credit for his or her work.  If the theme's creator has links to special causes, I leave those, too. (Chris Pearson's NeoClassical Theme contains a link to Open Education, for example, although Chris does NOT encode any of his theme files.)

I just want to get rid of any links that might seem inappropriate for a business site, and I usually also want to add a credit for myself.  Hey, if I hacked the theme beyond recognition, that's work, too!

Yesterday, while chatting with Maureen McCabe here I learned a couple things about finding member data on Active Rain.

Did you know you could browse through top members by the year, month and day they joined?

Check this out:  http://activerain.com/roster/2006

Or you can look up how many members joined on any given day?

http://activerain.com/action/agents/new_users/2006/6/29 

What I'd love to do and haven't hit on the formula yet, is see the list of all blogs posted on any given day.

I tried

http://activerain.com/blogs/2006/7/21   and

http://activerain.com/blogsview/2006/7/21 and

http://activerain.com/new_blogs/2006/7/21  

But none of those work.  Anyone know the answer to the puzzle?

 Oh, and here's the very first day that anyone ever joined Active Rain:

http://activerain.com/roster/2006/5/25

Day Zero, if you will. :-)

Yes, I really do have other things to do, but this is my relaxation therapy.  :-)

P.S.  JORGEN HAHN if you are reading this, a "search by date posted" search tool would be a cool little thingy to add.  Nobody else might care about it, but it would still be cool.  :-)

Recently, when researching the background of a local bank-owned property, I found that the most recent title transfer was from Citi Group to Lsf6 Mercury Reo Invs LLC, 2711 Haskell Ave., Dallas, Tx 75204.

Googling "Lsf6 Mercury REO" and other variations of the company name yields many hits indiciating quite a range of activity in trading and liquidating property.  But nothing that appears to be a corporate-type web site saying "Hi, we're the Mercury REO company and this our mission statement".

Unless Lsf6 Mercury Reo Invs LLC is related to Mercury Alliance, LLC  ??

Does anyone know if those companies are related?  Does anyone have some inside information on Lsf6 Mercury Reo Invs LLC?  I'm curious to know more about them.

"SAA SQUARED"
A JURIED EXHIBITION OF SMALL WORKS IN FIBER

"Elements 1" - Jamie Fingal

Reception:   MARCH 14, 2009 from 7-10 pm
 
Jurors: Connie Rohman, curator and fiber artist; Kathy Gallegos, Director of Avenue 50 Studio

Honorary Juror and fiber artist Gloria Molina, LA County Supervisor will present the Juror's Choice Award

Nalia Aladdin Sanders, Madeline Bajracharya, Patt Blair,  Roberta Chalfy Miller, Phaedra Cheydleur, Joanell Connolly, Maureen M. Cox, Ann Darling, Raoul De La Sota, Jessica Drummond, Jamie Fingal, Dellis Frank, Georgia Freedman-Harvey, Gwen Freeman, Cicely Gilman, Sally Gould Wright, Cidne Hart, Marka Harwell-Bentley, Heather Hoggan, Ruby Horansky, Harumi Iida, Rebecca Janes, Gwen Jones, Georgianne Kandler, Jeanette Kelly, Smadar Knobler, Phillippa Lack, Linda Laird, Carol Larson, Susan Lasch Krevitt, Mary Ellen Latino, Sandra E. Lauterbach, Mavis Leahy, Ann Loveless, Pam Lowe, Regina Marzlin, Kathleen McCabe, Linda Miller, Uwimana Moore, Alison Muir, Diane Nunez, Mirjam Pet-Jacobs, Pamela Price Kiebaum, Janett Rice, Ann Ridge, Mary Beth Schwartzenberger, Cynthia St. Charles, Meredith Strauss, Deborah Thomas, Karen Valderrama, E. Vereycken, Binah Waite-Williams, Carol Ann Waugh, Deborah Weir

Where: Avenue 50 Studio, Inc., 131 N. Avenue 50, Highland Park, CA 90042

When: Saturday, March 14, 2009 from 7:00 pm - 10:00 pm

Gallery hours: Tuesday through Thursday 10 am - 12 noon, Saturday and Sunday 10 am - 4 pm

Duration: March 14 through April 5, 2009-02-21
 
For further information, please call 323-258-1435 or visit www.avenue50studio.com

The Second Saturday of every month is Gallery Night in Northeast Los Angeles.  Featured this month:

Madam X · Fine Worldly Goods ·

Artist's Opening Saturday, March 14 2009, 7 to 10 pm
Open by appointment until April 4

Future Studio Gallery
5558 N. Figueroa Street
Los Angeles 90042

When times are tough, we need art more than ever to lift our spirits. And if our spirits can be lifted for cheap--so much the better!  Start or expand your art collection, at prices starting at one dollar!

Renowned (and rarely shown) Madam X elevates the spirit of consumerism with PRICELESS VALUES & out-of-this-world SAVINGS on "Fine Worldly Goods" of all kinds. Madam X's wonderful little books, magazines, and newspapers (Madam X's GaZeT) bring you the timeless stories of our era. Love, beauty, truth, and oneness are among the rare essences highlighted in Madam X's publications. Simple and easy to read, they are fully illustrated, handmade, and FUN!! FINE WORLDLY GOODS at super-affordable prices--NOW ONLY!! Other magical ephemera (such as buttons and flags) will also be available. Original paintings, video, and other works of art will also be shown.

About Madam X:
In the year 0000, Madam X journeyed into the Eternal Sphere, exploring, observing, and absorbing the Eternal Culture. She returned to the dimensions of Time in the year 1980, thus proving the unity of all opposites, and the spherosity of All Time. She is the founder of the Human Being Society, whose message is "live the oneness."

About Future Studio Gallery:
A participating gallery in Northeast Los Angeles's Second Saturday Gallery Night, the gallery shows a variety of art, much of it from Northeast LA-based artists. The gallery is also home to the roadside attraction (aka the Statue of Liberty of LA)--Chicken Boy.

About Gallery Night:
Second Saturday Gallery Night is a self-guided tour of the galleries, non-profits and artist run project spaces located in Northeast Los Angeles (NELA). NELA has a tradition in the arts that dates back to the early 1900s when the USC College of Fine Arts was located in Highland Park and characters like Charles Lummis and Antonio Corsi were living in the area. The tradition continues, as NELA is fast becoming one of L.A.'s most exciting destinations to view contemporary art. For more information and to download a map please visit http://NELAart.org .

But wait, there's more . . .
March 14 is also PI DAY, a celebration of the mathematical constant pi. In honor of this, we will be serving pie (while supplies last!).

If you build a Mu Community, and opt for open sign-ups, you will soon encounter spam sign-ups.  Usually, the newly created spam blog will be a first name followed by a short series of numbers.  My first was "janelle4751" if I remember correctly.   And the email domain will be something like "buyviagra.com".

The problem is, spammers have built robots to search the web for the standard text on the sign-up form.  As soon as the robot encounters the standard text, it executes a little program to complete the form.

The Good Guys have come up with a variety of techniques to defeat the spam robots.  If you are interested in that discussion, you can read more  here,  here and here and here.

Since my Mu Communities are all very, very small, and niche oriented, I've replaced the standard Mu sign-up.php page with a Google Doc fill-in form, and then I create the user accounts and blogs manually from the backend.

(My other reason for doing this was, as you may remember, that for me, at least, on a GoDaddy server, the standard sign-up.php behaved wonky in Internet Explorer...  worked just fine in Firefox.... temperamental in IE.)

If I was receiving hundreds of legitimate signups every day, manually setting up each new user would be a headache.   But that's not the case, and it is not what I want anyway.  :-)

I am documenting the procedure of manually setting up a new user here, just in case I happen to forget how to do before the next new member comes along.

Sign in as admin.

At the Dashboard, click Site Admin. Then click Create a New Blog.

At the Blog Admin screen, scroll to the bottom, and complete the Add Blog section, using the information provided by the new user in the Google Doc form.

The new user will then receive an activation email.  The new user will need to click on the login click, and sign in with their new Username and Password

After signing in, they will be directed to the Dashboard screen for their new blog.  The Dashboard will only display blogs connected to that particular Username.

After signing in for the first time, the new user will then receive a second, confirmation email.

Notes for the record:

1.  Yes, WordPress Multiple User still uses the previous user interface design.  So, no, I am not in an old, obsolete version of WordPress.

2.  Carlton is my dog.

Note to self:

To set the opacity of a div in a stylesheet, do this:

#wrapper {
       width: 950px;
       margin: 0 auto;
       background: url("images/wrapper.jpg") repeat-y;
       text-align: left;
 filter:progid:DXImageTransform.Microsoft.Alpha(opacity=88);
        -moz-opacity:0.88;

The Microsoft Alpha Filter: DXImageTransform.Microsoft.Alpha being the secret ingredient.

And don't forget to ID the div in the HTML file, like this:

    <div id="wrapper">

There are plenty of statistics, reports and graphs dealing with the current real estate market in Los Angeles.  However, sometimes studying one individual case can present a clearer picture than all the combined data.

This bank-owned home is currently available for sale. It is approximately 950 square feet; a 2 bedroom, 1 bath  Spanish style in the Mount Angelus area of Highland Park. 

It is currently offered for sale at $270,000.

It sold in 1998 for $120,000

It was listed for sale in February of 2006 for $485,000. and sold in April of 2006 for $485,000.

Notices of Default were filed in February 2007, December 2007.

The Notice of Sale was filed in February 2008.

The Trustee Sale took place in March 2008.

The property is currently bank owned and listed for sale at $270,000.

This article is not intended as an advertisement of any property listed by another brokerage firm.  It is intended as a report of current real estate market conditions.  However, if you are interested in purchasing a property in today's market, we have a staff of highly qualified agents ready to assist you.

Yes, I support Marriage Equality.

(I also love Jack Black, and the wonderfully funny, upbeat attitude of this little musical production.)

With the introduction of the new CSM designation (Certified Social Media Marketer) and the proliferation of many other designations in recent years from ALHS (Accredited Luxury Home Specialist) to CPS (Certified Short Sale Professional) and everything inbetween.....

I got to wondering ....  What what is the process of getting a seminar/training/course program accepted by NAR, and who is making the money off of it?

I am guessing here, I have absolutely no idea how this works ....  But I am thinking most of these courses are dreamed up not by NAR staffers, but by people in the industry anywhere and everywhere.  Then the creator of the course goes through some process of having the course accepted and credited by NAR? 

The course is then marketed to NAR members.  Members pay to take the course, then continue paying annual membership fees to maintain the designation.  I wonder how the money thing works.  The course creator and NAR split the income?

Anyone know if that is actually how it works?

Some of us Active Rain Old Timers really ought to get together and create a new designation.  Let's say CARS (Certified Active Rain Specialist).   Seriously.  I think there is some money to be made there.  :-)