Since we’re working on improvements to the blog, we are adding two functions that will highlight substantive blog postings that are intended to solicit reader response and discussion (the current post excluded). One is the Featured Post — which you will see at the top of the side menu; the other is a “sticky” post function that allows such substantive posts to remain stuck to the top of the scroll until discussions slow to a halt. Both functions are being demo-ed with this post. What took us so long? Seriously.

We hope this facilitates discussion of substantive posts, or at least prevents them from being lost in the scroll of announcements and calls — valuable as the latter are. As an aside, the Discussion forum seems appropriate for what we had intended the Question Board to be, so we will be retiring the QB in the next couple of weeks. Please use the Discussion tab to submit your questions or thoughts that are briefer than a full blog posting might require.

We’d like to pilot a new discussion forum page (you can access it through the Discussion tab on the tab menu). Post your own items or questions there for discussion. Go over and reply to my discussion post topic if you have thoughts about it. If it seems easy and convenient as a way of replacing the current Question Board then we’ll gradually phase out the latter. Your feedback will help us. Cheers.

I’ve added a plugin that allows you to download a PDF version of a post. This may be of use for some purposes, however, the current plugin does not include the comments for a post (which can be very illuminating). Nor does it convert non-Latin characters or accented Latin ones. It is what it is. Also, videos from popular sites such as YouTube or Vimeo are converted to links in the pdf. Please note the header, which indicates the presumptive intellectual property ownership by the author of the particular post. For citation norms governing blogs, see this MLA style summary.

There is a link along the bottom of each post for the purpose. Cheers.