Accidental Discoveries
Part of the ISP swap, detailed earlier, moving towards T-Mobile? I’m getting to a point where I want less material, “less computational overhead,” less complexity, on the backend of the websites.
Fewer moving parts.
Towards that goal, I played around with getting one site, just (more or less), a weblog, in its truest sense, currently KramerW.com, getting that set up as a simple culmination of all the online stuff I’ve done over the years. I have exactly one reader who likes the content of the daily blog delivered in an e-mail, otherwise? Online, RSS, tapping in from some social feed someplace? Sure, that’s everyone else. One is e-mail only.
So that meant trying and tossing several solutions for turning a post into an e-mail. That does happens, organically, on some of the sites, I had extra moving pieces, and after a while, some of that software takes up too much computational overhead.
Processing time, server usage, disk calls, contained in a number of different terms, the end-result is extra horsepower wasted on routines that are not necessary, or, in some cases, invaded privacy.
Less is more
Over the years, I settled on Mail Chimp as reliable, cost-efficient, and weirdly good. When I signed up, I think it was up to 2K addresses were free. I don’t know, been a long time, and I still use the service. A selling point, for me, was that the entire mailing list was exportable, which means, totally transparent, completely portable, should I ever change providers. Over the years, I’ve looked, but this one works, and the price is right for me (free).
Can’t add a second list, just for that one e-mail address, but I did discover that an RSS feed could trigger an e-mail, so I set that up. I didn’t answer the original question, I managed to streamline my own workflow, and leave it in a steady state of preparedness for whatever the future might hold.
The mailing list.
While it’s not exactly a bare-bones interface, I found the MailChimp backend — remember — I’m on the free version — somewhat unwieldy. In other words? I didn’t get the correct settings the first time. See if works next week. I think it will, and we’re back to an answer to an unasked question.
Accidental Discoveries
While I currently depend on WordPress as an essential motor, powering the various sites, the add-on JetPack — from what I gleaned — takes up an inordinate amount of software resources, and, the benefits for a simple blog? The benefits might not outweigh the overhead.
Also consider the onerous “computational” overhead required to run a host of plug-ins, add-ons, and other useless window-trappings.
I want less, not more.
Less is More
This is a simple example of toiling away at one problem, and while the solution didn’t work to solve the original problem — simplify e-mail delivery for the one site — it did offer a better solution — fewer moving parts — for the other. As noted, it didn’t work as I expected on the first try, but I think I got it now. We’ll see?
- An amusing sidebar item, the URL KramerW.com has roots in Arizona, at the University, that was my AOL “handle,” and later, back in old Austin, and from thence? I’ve used that as an experimental URL — it’s been a tumble-log, a very short-lived hand-rolled WordPress theme, assorted other pointers, as well, can’t think of them all. Stems from that single room student efficiency just off University in “the good old days.” That’s a handle with some miles.
