Gord Barentsen

Hello again, So all of you will have noticed the changes I've made to the site as I prepare to push it forward into "live"ness. The most obvious of these changes is the new default site theme, LF_Magnum,[1] which will quite possibly replace the existing themes. LF_Magnum has a lot of eye-catching features and makes very good use of the real estate on a given page to provide easy access to social media buttons. Some of you have mentioned that you really like the idea of a sticky header (the top menu that stays at the top as you scroll down a page), so I kept that in mind when selecting a new default theme. Of course, there is also the marquee, which will contain breaking news about site developments and links to other information. I hope you all like it as much as I do - tweaking this theme has been a very nice creative exercise for me. As always, please post in the Suggestions forum or get in touch with me if you have comments, opinions, or suggestions of any kind. Footnotes ^ If you're wondering about the name, "Magnum" is the original name given it by its developer. I've just kept it because I can't think of anything else right now!

Hello all, Since this site will be "officially" going live in the next while, I wanted to draw your attention to some coding-related issues which affect how the two newer themes (Dashboard, Chameleon) display. In short, you will see the odd part of a webpage which seems to have no background, where the text at times can be very difficult to read against the static background graphics. This apparently has to do with the way certain blocks of code were formatted in Invision's CSS, and I am waiting on this issue to be resolved (it affects many other people out there as well!). So if you want to see everything without these formatting issues, I suggest you use the default LF_Blue theme - there's no background eyecandy, but everything will display fine. Of course, registered Members are still free to use the new themes...everything works fine - it's just the odd display block that's affected. Invision promise to address it as soon as they can; you'll know as soon as I do! Note: as I've said before, while they will display on mobile screens the newer themes are too involved to display correctly on mobile devices - they're more for the desktop/laptop/tablet experience. I recommend using the default LF_Blue theme, which is much easier on your mobile bandwidth anyway.

I'll put one up so you can see what they're all about. There is also the ability to send Sticky Notes to other site members, which I'm currently experimenting with.

That is just...wrong...on so many levels....

Hi everyone, Introducing Sticky Notes - an eye-catching way of making Members aware of new developments on the site, whether it's scheduling notifications for Tutor Clients, downtime for the site, or contests for you to win stuff! I felt this might be a better alternative to the Announcements window at times, which should really stand out a bit more so that people notice it as soon as they splash down on the main page. Sticky Notes are much more noticeable! Sticky Notes will appear pinned to a side or corner of your screen. Once you've read a Sticky Note, just click its X to remove it from your view.

Hey everyone, Just wanted to give a warm welcome to our newest member: @rhlangan, a colleague of mine from the Holism conference who has kindly opted to join our eclectic little circle. rhlangan does work in Jung, Deleuze and Spinoza, and you can find the abstract of his conference paper in the Holism blog abstracts attachment. Welcome again!

I forgot to add: if you like, you can update your current location to let people know where you are. Simply change your location back once you get home. I'm at the University of Essex right now, so I've revised my current location on the Map.

Nope, perfectly legal. I had to sign my dissertation over to the Canadian archives and dissertation repository, but I retain copyright. Besides - anyone can download it for free from Western's repository, so there's no reason why I can't post it here. Stay tuned!

Hi everyone, It's been online for a little while now (as some of you have noticed), but I thought I'd introduce the new Member Map, accessible from the Resources tab in the main menu. Basically, it allows you to show people where you are and provides a geographic distribution of members. Let's make it as global as possible! A couple of brief points: Participation in the Map is entirely optional. Putting your location on the Map can help you connect with other people near you (or who are in places you might want to go someday), but you're under no obligation to do so. Do not provide your full address unless you want it to be made public! You can either give Maps your current location or enter your detailed address information. Enter your home address if you want, but it will be visible to anyone (bot or human) who browses the site. So if you live in Melbourne, simply entering "Melbourne" or a related option from the dynamic menu is fine and will preserve your privacy.

Just a public service announcement to let you all know that my thesis was finally published in Western's thesis depository. So you can all start calling me Doctor Gord.

Yes, I know. Unfortunately there's no simple way around this, due to the way the CSS handles background images. It's always a challenge to get things looking right on both mobile and desktop themes at the same time; I know many, many people use mobiles more and more nowadays, but given the nature of the site I'd suggest using the LF_Blue theme if you can't take how the background images look with other themes (for which I can't blame you!). On the plus side, using LF_Blue will certainly be easier on your bandwidth. In the meantime, I will see if I can develop a mobile-friendly version of the fancy themes with background colours or simple patterns only - something a little more aesthetically pleasing for mobile browsers.