It’s been awhile, but a new beta version of Simple Lightbox is ready to be unleashed upon our awesome group of brave testers. Your testing helps to make SLB better with each update.

The beta is quite stable, but one person (me) can only do so much testing. Now it’s time to let it loose for all of you to install and test.

Version 1.6.2 is primarily a maintenance release.  Not a lot has changed (except for a 95% rebuild of the JS code), so with your help it hopefully it won’t be long before 1.6.2 is ready for an official release.

What you get

For being a brave lad and installing the beta version on your site, you get the latest version with all the new features before anyone else. You also get a chance to provide feedback before the final version is released. Awesome, I know.

Oh yeah, and if you find a bug, the fix is named after you. Fame and fortune will surely soon follow.

Note: As always, all previous stable versions of Simple Lightbox are available via WordPress’ official plugin page if you need to downgrade to a previous version for any reason.

Release Notes:

Beta 2

• Optimize: Improved PHP 5 compatibility

Beta 1

• Update: Rebuild JS code
• Fix: Some elements can overlap lightbox
• Optimize: Improved utility code

The post SLB 1.6.2 Beta appeared first on Archetyped.

The Good

Right from the start, the Primal Origins are great for skating because the outsole, while minimal, protect your feet from the ground rushing by as well as from the rough grip tape on the board.  Also, the shoes are light and don’t feel the slightest bit clunky like some skating shoes can be.

In addition, the thin and flexible nature of the Primal Origins adds something that makes skating with them an entirely new experience– ground feel.  The contours of the deck are clearly felt and you can even feel the texture of the asphalt during the brief moments when pushing off the ground.  Even cooler is that you can curl your toes over the edge of the board for better grip when carving left or right.

It’s the best of both worlds; the connectedness of skating barefoot on an old fishtail board and the protection necessary for doing tricks on a modern board.

Why not the best?

There’s no question that the Primal Origins feel great while skating, but the problem is that if you do any amount of tricks, they will not look good for very long at all.

I made a small hole in my shoe after a couple of ollies:

Hole from ollies

To be fair, all shoes suffer from this problem to some extent.  Though some skate shoes may reinforce the high-abrasion areas with additional padding or stronger material, pretty much all shoes will require a dose of Shoe Goo sooner or later due to the inherent roughness of the grip tape on the deck.

What would be great though is if Stem created a shoe specifically for skating with reinforced material in specific areas of the vamp/upper to stave off the need for Shoe Goo for as long as possible.  The larger stitching style used on the Primal Origins may also need to be modified as the grip tape would likely make short work of the exposed thread.

Large stiching may need to go

I love what Stem Footwear has done with their take on casual shoes, so I’m very interested to see what they could do for a skate shoe.

How about you? Would you be interested in a Stem shoe made specifically for skateboarding?

The post Stem Primal Origins: Best Skateboard Shoe Ever! (almost) appeared first on Archetyped.

The shoes are slowly unraveling and I’m afraid I’ll be left with nothing but strips of fabric before too long.

I’ll save the explanation by using a few pictures of the problem.

Left Shoe

Right Shoe

The threads are coming undone at the front of the shoe and appears to be centered at the seam on the forefoot that I previously pointed out as being rather conspicuous.

The left shoe started unraveling first and I initially thought it was just an isolated issue.  Soon after though, the right shoe started unraveling as well.  The fact that the threads started coming undone at precisely the same place on both shoes indicates that this issue may have something to do with the construction of the shoe.  However, as I mentioned in that post, I know nothing about shoe making, so the aforementioned seam may be have nothing at all to do with the threads unraveling.

I’ve reached out to Stem for some assistance regarding this issue and will report back when I hear from them.

The post Stem Primal Origins: Unraveling appeared first on Archetyped.

Details

• Distance: 4.85mi
• Time: 50:51
• Average Speed: 5.73mi/hr
• Socks: No

It was a beautiful, bright night.  The nearly-full moon illuminated the streets in a cool glow as I ran as far west as the local streets would allow.

It was a great run.  Some brief observations

Awesome, Compadre! (The Good)

• Comfort– the Primal Origins were quite comfortable on my feet
• Lightweight– I felt light on my feet as I ran
• Stability/Traction– I trusted the traction of the Primal Origin’s soles as I ran on and over the obstacles in my path
• Ground feel– I’m getting more used to the ground feel of the Primal Origins and it is quite adequate (with the exception noted below)
• Permeability– I never could tell if it was because the Vibram KSO soles were so thin or for some other reason, but moisture seemed to seep in from below if I so much as stepped on wet ground.  Though only a minor inconvenience (and even occasionally refreshing), the Primal Origins did not let any moisture in through the soles as I ran through some puddles and wet grass this evening.

Bummer, Dude! (The Bad)

• Chafing– I experienced some minor– though consistent– running on the outside of both of my big toes against the Primal Origins’ toe box.  I don’t think I’ll develop any blisters from this chaffing, but they do feel a bit rug burned as I write this.
• Ground feel– I was reminded how great running through grass feels in the Vibram KSOs (closest thing to being barefoot) during my recent run, so the difference in ground feel between the KSOs and the Primal Origins was especially evident while running in the grass tonight.

All in all, a very enjoyable run and the Stem Primal Origins contributed quite a bit to that enjoyment.

The post Stem Primal Origins: Run for the border appeared first on Archetyped.

Details

• Distance: 2.75mi
• Time: 26:55
• Average Speed: 6.15mi/hr
• Socks: No

Observations

Starting Out

Initially, I had the pretty much the same opinions about the Primal Origins as I did on my first day with them:

• Ground feel is not as “transparent” as the Vibram KSOs
• My toes feel confined when in a standard shoe form-factor (as they always have)
• I’m not totally in love with the level of flexibility the Primal Origins offer

On the 2nd Mile

After a bit of warm up though, the Stem Primal Origins came into their own.  I noticed how incredibly light they felt.  Traction over wet ground was good (whereas the Vibram KSOs turn into a personal slip and slide at the slightest hint of water on the ground) and I’m looking forward to trying them out on more demanding terrain.

Toe confinement was not an issue after I warmed up a bit.  As with most things, it was no longer a problem once I stopped paying attention to it.  Even when I did take a moment to observe my comfort, I found that while running, toe confinement was a non-issue because I am constantly adjusting the splay of my toes as I run.

Ground feel is not as good as the Vibram KSOs, but to be clear, it’s still quite good.  The most important thing while running is that I can feel the ground enough to make moment-by-moment adjustments to my weight distribution and gait based on the feedback from my feet.  The Stem Primal Origins provided good feedback on this short run.  I’m looking forward to trying them on a longer run.

Here’s the thing

Stem is marketing the Primal Origins as casual shoes as opposed to running shoes.  In that respect, they are quite nice.  Even still, I think they are a good shoe for running and though I may prefer the Vibram KSOs for regular running, I would not hesitate to grab the Primal Origins for a run.

Breakdown (Short Run)

• No hot spots
• No shifting/chaffing
• Very lightweight
• Good flexibility
• Good ground feedback

The post Stem Primal Origins: First Run appeared first on Archetyped.

This evening after washing off the dried paint and grime, we went out for a bit.  Upon putting on the Stem Primal Origins, I immediately noticed a difference compared the normal shoes I had worn all day.

It was like night and day!

Instead of being confined in a structured shape, I was enveloped in light and airy fabric.

After a full day of clomping around in normal shoes, putting on the Primal Origins were incredibly comfortable.  I felt even more relaxed after putting them on!

I initially compared the Stem Primal Origins to my only other pair of shoes, the Vibram KSO.  While the Primal Origins may be less flexible and have less ground feel than the KSO, the Stem Primal Origins are far and away better than normal shoes.

If you’re coming from normal shoes, the Primal Origins would be a great transition to more minimal footwear.

The post Stem Primal Origins: A Respite from Normal Shoes appeared first on Archetyped.

Regular Expressions

I love regular expressions.

It’s as simple as that really.  You can create a very complex text search using a relatively simple regular expression.  Anything from validating email addresses and phone numbers, to parsing the links in a document can be easily accomplished with regular expressions.

There is, of course, a downside to this convenience– Performance.

In exchange for simplifying the task of matching a complex bit of text, regular expressions are slower than simple string operations.  How much slower greatly depends on the complexity of the search pattern and the size of the text being searched.

One of SLB’s new features currently in development is the option to group gallery links in a separate slideshow from the rest of the links in a post.  To do this, SLB separates and processes the gallery links separately from the rest of a post’s links.  This is a relatively simple task for regular expressions, but since several posts each containing several galleries may be processed in a single request, I wanted to see just how much of a performance hit there was when using regular expressions as opposed to using a string-based approach.

Both approaches do the same thing:

1. Find a gallery in the post’s content
2. Save gallery links and replace with a placeholder in the post’s content
3. Repeat steps #1 & #2 until all galleries have been found
4. Process remaining links in post
5. Reinsert processed gallery links back into post

Here is the code for each approach

String-based

$content = $c_temp;
$w = $this->group_get_wrapper();
$groups = array();
$g_idx = 0;
$g_end_idx = 0;
//Iterate through galleries
while ( ($g_start_idx = strpos($content, $w->open, $g_end_idx)) && $g_start_idx !== false
		&& ($g_end_idx = strpos($content, $w->close, $g_start_idx)) && $g_end_idx != false ) {
	$g_start_idx += strlen($w->open);
	//Extract gallery content & save for processing
	$g_len = $g_end_idx - $g_start_idx;
	$groups[$g_idx] = substr($content, $g_start_idx, $g_len);
	//Replace content with placeholder
	$g_ph = sprintf($g_ph_f, $g_idx);
	$content = substr_replace($content, $g_ph, $g_start_idx, $g_len);
	//Increment gallery count
	$g_idx++;
	//Update end index
	$g_end_idx = $g_start_idx + strlen($w->open);
}

Regex-based

$rgx = "|" . preg_quote($w->open) . "(.+?)" . preg_quote($w->close) . "|is";
$content = $c_temp;
$w = $this->group_get_wrapper();
$groups = array();
$g_idx = 0;
$matches = array();
$o = 0;
while ( preg_match($rgx, $content, $matches, PREG_OFFSET_CAPTURE, $o) ) {
	//Extract gallery content
	$groups[$g_idx] = $matches[1][0];
	//Replace content
	$g_ph = $w->open . sprintf($g_ph_f, $g_idx) . $w->close;
	$content = substr_replace($content, $g_ph, $matches[0][1], strlen($matches[0][0]));
	//Update offsets
	$o = $matches[0][1] + strlen($w->open);
	$g_idx++;
}

Results

Each implementation was run in a loop (to normalize the execution times) on a post with 2 galleries and a few normal image links.

Iterations: 10,000
String-based: 0.108232975006
Regex-based: 0.957661867142
String-based faster than Regex-based by 8.85x (785%)

I was expecting the string-based approach to be faster, but I was still surprised by how wide of a gap there was between the two approaches.  Robustness and ease of maintaining the code must also be accounted for when deciding on an implementation, but in this case, the performance difference was too much to ignore.  Fortunately, the string-based approach is not that unwieldy, so moving forward with the string-based approach was a simple decision.

Retrieving Media Properties

Another new feature currently in development is enhanced skin functionality, which provides access to all of an image’s properties (URL, dimensions, title, description, etc.).  The previous release of SLB (v1.5.6) enabled image descriptions to be displayed in the lightbox, but now that skins would have access to all properties, it was important that the implementation of this functionality was as efficient and speedy as possible.

Until now, SLB fetched certain data on a per-link basis.  This effectively means that there is a database query for every single link being processed.  I will be the first to say that even though retrieving a single variable (using $wpdb->get_var()) from the DB is quite fast, it is not as efficient as retrieving multiple records from the DB in a single query.

As an example, here is the code for the different approaches used to retrieve the attachment ID of the internal image links in a request (an archive page with 10 posts):

Per-link

$pids = array();
foreach ( $links as $link ) {
	$pid_temp = $wpdb->get_var($wpdb->prepare("SELECT post_id FROM $wpdb->postmeta WHERE `meta_key` = %s AND `meta_value` = %s LIMIT 1", '_wp_attached_file', basename($link)));
	if ( is_numeric($pid_temp) )
		$pids_p[$link] = intval($pid_temp);
}

Bulk Query

$pids = array();
$l_names = array();
foreach ( $links as $link ) {
	$l_names[] = basename($link);
}
$l_names = strtolower("('" . implode("','", $l_names) . "')");
$q = $wpdb->prepare("SELECT post_id, meta_value FROM $wpdb->postmeta WHERE `meta_key` = %s AND LOWER(`meta_value`) IN $l_names", '_wp_attached_file');
$pids_temp = $wpdb->get_results($q);
foreach ( $pids_temp as $pd ) {
	if ( is_numeric($pd->post_id) )
		$pids[$pd->meta_value] = intval($pd->post_id);
}

Results

As in the previous example, both implementations were run in a loop to normalize results, but also to provide some insight into how a larger request with thousands of links might be affected by the approach.

Iterations: 10,000
Per Link: 48.4570000172
Bulk Query: 8.63826394081
Bulk Query faster than Per Link by 5.61x (461%)

Retrieving post data in as few queries as possible is clearly faster. As with regular expressions in the previous example, this test was more of a confirmation of my assumptions, but it also provided valuable data regarding the extent to which performance can be affected based on the approach.

Making the necessary changes to allow all links in a request to be processed took some doing, but the end result was much more modular (thus, more flexible) code, so it was well worth the time and effort.

It’s Worth it

I honestly did not want to do all of this benchmarking because it would delay Simple Lightbox’s next release.  However, seeing the potential performance that can be gained (or lost) based on a feature’s implementation reminded me that testing and comparing is an important part of developing fast and efficient plugins.  The result for everyone is that the next version of SLB will be faster than its precursor, despite having more features!

The post SLB: Benchmarking Performance Optimizations appeared first on Archetyped.

Here we go!  A new beta version of Simple Lightbox is ready to be unleashed upon our awesome group of brave testers. Your testing helps to make SLB better with each update.

The beta is quite stable, but one person (me) can only do so much testing. Now it’s time to let it loose for all of you to install and test.

Version 1.6 is mainly focused on adding new features that will make SLB more customizable and even simpler to use.

Here are some examples of things that need testing and feedback:

• Widgets — Image links in widgets should be displayed in the lightbox when the option is enabled
  
• Bug Fixes -- Are the bug fixes mentioned below working as described?
  
• Gallery grouping — When enabled (via the admin settings), groups should be displayed in their own slideshow

What you get

For being a brave lad and installing the beta version on your site, you get the latest version with all the new features before anyone else. You also get a chance to provide feedback before the final version is released. Awesome, I know.

Oh yeah, and if you find a bug, the fix is named after you. Fame and fortune will surely soon follow.

Note: As always, all previous stable versions of Simple Lightbox are available via WordPress’ official plugin page if you need to downgrade to a previous version for any reason.

Release Notes:

Beta 7

• Fix: Boolean case-sensitivity (78 Truths)
• Add: Upgrade notice functionality
• Optimize: Improved compatibility with URI case-sensitivity
• Optimize: Activation processing
• Optimize: Image grouping

Beta 6

• Fix: Options availability for certain themes

Beta 5

• Add: Option to process links in Widgets
• Add: WordPress 3.3 support
• Optimize: Image metadata loading performance
• Fix: YouTube embed using iFrame overlaps lightbox (Elena in Hiding)
• Fix: Inconsistent loading of image metadata

Beta 4

• Optimize: File loading

Beta 3

• Fix: Issue when scanning links without valid URLs (McCloskey Iteration)
• Optimize: Improved safeguards against interference by bugs in other plugins
• Optimize: Link processing performance
• Optimize: Lightbox styling isolated from site styles

Beta 2

• Add: Localization support
• Optimize: Improved link processing performance
• Optimize: Improved image metadata support
• Optimize: Improved support for HTTP/HTTPS requests
• Fix: Links not fully processed when group is set manually

Beta 1

• Add: Option to group gallery links separately (supports WordPress & NextGen galleries)
• Fix: Image activation is case-sensitive (Sensitive Tanya)
• Fix: Visible lightbox overlay edges when image larger than browser window (Chibi Overlay)

The post SLB 1.6 Beta appeared first on Archetyped.

The time has arrived for a new beta version of Simple Lightbox to be unleashed upon our awesome group of brave testers.  Your testing helps to make SLB better with each update.

The beta is quite stable, but one person (me) can only do so much testing.  Now it’s time to let it loose for all of you to install and test.

Version  1.5.6 is all about tightening things up in SLB.  Some nice new features will make an appearance in this version, but the focus will mainly be on improving compatibility and making sure SLB runs clean and fast.

Here are some examples of things that need testing and feedback:

• W3 Total Cache — SLB should now be compatible with the output buffering that W3TC does
  
• Captions — Captions for gallery items and individually inserted images have been tweaked to be clearer for users.
• Descriptions — Text added to the description field when inserting an image should be displayed in either of the default templates
• NextGEN — Titles and descriptions of NextGEN gallery items should be displayed in the lightbox
• Templates — CSS rebuilt, anything amiss?

Release Notes:

Beta 6

• Optimize: Improved support for small images in default template
• Add: Initial support for NextGEN galleries

Beta 5

• Add: HTML support in image descriptions
• Optimize: Support for non-English text in UI settings
• Fix: User-defined UI text not used (Ivan gets Even (cooler))

Beta 4

• Fix: Options reset after update (KRazy Donna)
• Optimize: Improved IE compatibility
• Optimize: Improved data handling

Beta 3

• Update: Important: System Requirements aligned with WP 3.2.1
• Add: Display image description in lightbox
• Add: Option to enable/disable image description in settings
• Optimize: Additional CSS cleanup
• Optimize: Template loading performance

Beta 2

• Add: Support for W3 Total Cache plugin
• Optimize: Template CSS Cleanup
• Optimize: Caption support for galleries

Beta 1

• Update: Options code cleanup (Juga Sweep)

What you get

For being a brave lad and installing the beta version on your site, you get the latest version with all the new features before anyone else. You also get a chance to provide feedback before the final version is released. Awesome, I know.

Oh yeah, and if you find a bug, the fix is named after you. Fame and fortune will surely soon follow.

What I need (How to report an issue)

Pretty simple. I need you to install the plugin and make sure everything is working.

If you have an bug/issue to report, please provide the following:

• URL of page exhibiting bug (I can’t do much if I can’t test it myself)
• WordPress version (3.2.1 etc.) — Note: SLB only supports the latest version of WordPress
• Other plugins installed
• Browser(s) with issue (Firefox, Chrome, etc.)

Note: All previous stable versions of Simple Lightbox are available via WordPress’ official plugin page if you need to downgrade to a previous version for any reason.

The post SLB 1.5.6 Beta appeared first on Archetyped.

Adjustments

Thankfully, last week’s adjustments seem to have done the trick– the frames stay on well during various activities and are quite comfortable.  I am now used to the way the adjusted arms feel and nothing seems out of place.

I can wear these frames all day and feel no discomfort.  This is quite impressive considering plastic frames are generally heavier than metal frames (which my last frames were).  However, the thin arms of metal frames that I’ve had in the past had a tendency to dig into my ear, so they did get a bit uncomfortable after a full day of use.  This does not happen with the Ray-Ban RB5076′s.  It may simply be due to the fact that the plastic arms of this frame are thicker and so cannot really “cut” into my ear.

Lens Problems

Ever since I got these glasses, I’ve felt like I couldn’t quite see as sharply as I had hoped.  I got a new prescription in February and the contacts I got using the prescription seem to be quite a bit sharper.

As time has passed, I find myself becoming less and less confident of my vision when wearing these glasses.  I currently don’t feel comfortable driving long distances (especially at night) while wearing them.

Clearly, this is not how I should be feeling about new glasses.

Since I cannot easily compare the clarity of my contacts with my glasses, I sometimes wonder if I’m just imagining that things seem less sharp than I expect them to be.  However, the kicker was last night when I tilted my glasses slightly downward so that I was looking through the lenses at a slightly different angle and position.  All of a sudden, everything was in sharp focus.

Now, I’m well aware the tilting the glasses can and will change how one can see through the lenses (this was a trick I would use as a kid when my prescription was getting too weak), but the difference in this case is that the world that I saw when I tilted the glasses was what I expected.  Things were sharp where they were supposed to be.  I could read things that I expected to be able to read at a distance such as street signs and storefront displays.

So today I went to Costco (where I got the lenses made) to have them look at the lenses and let me know whether something might be wrong with the lenses.  Thankfully, this did not take long as it only required them to put each lens under a machine to get some readings, which confirmed that the glasses matched the prescription I provided.

The optical technician also pointed out that an previous pair of glasses that I had ordered at Costco (several years ago) where actually stronger than my current prescription, so I may need to make an appointment with my optometrist to see if there was some mistake with this new prescription (though it is strange than my contacts using this new prescription seem just fine).  According to Costco’s records, the difference in prescription is quite large, so this may be the cause.  Looking at the prescription of the last pair of glasses I bought (online in 2008), the old prescription is indeed stronger than my new prescription.

So I guess the next step is to call up my optometrist and talk to them about possibly getting my prescription adjusted.

Thankfully, Costco says that they will replace the lenses at no charge if an adjustment is necessary.  That’s awesome.

The post Ray-Ban RB5076 Field Notes (Day 17) appeared first on Archetyped.