News
Transition to new CMS on MarkusTegelane website
2024-07-06 18:13:42 UTC+0
Soon MarkusTegelane website will run a new content management system, the same one that's on markusmaal.ee website, which has been written by me from scratch (apart from Markdown decoder, which is a third party library). The change affects all subsites, including MarkusTegelane+ and MarkusTegelane++ (dev) sites, where both are getting a new interface. Content management system has multiple benefits compared to previous Laserlite system, including:
- Labelling system, which helps improve the SEO of the site with additional metadata
- Management of multiple subsites on one admin panel
- Modular design thanks to widgets
- Error reporting system
- Universal design across multiple web apps
However, old themes will not work on the new content management system (specifically laserlight and classic), but I try to keep it possible to allow you to use these themes, altough I probably won't really update those legacy pages anymore.
The transition won't happen immediately, because I need to determine all of the links, which need to be redirected to new URLs, so that old markustegelane.eu links don't throw a 404 after update.
Here are some screenshots of the site with new CMS:
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| Content management with multiple subapps |
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| MarkusTegelane+ devUpdate page |
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| News subpage (MarkusTegelane webapp) |
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| MarkusTegelane+ latest videos page |
Reminder: legacy version of channel database will be closed on 1st April
2024-03-31 19:36:50 UTC+0
Due to security concerns, I am closing the old version of channel database. At 12:00 UTC, it will no longer be possible to use this URL to enter the channel database, instead you are going to see an error message. New version, which you will be able to access in the future, can be found here.
New application - Channel database Lite
2024-02-29 18:33:12 UTC+0
Channel database has always been an important part of my website and now, in 2024, I have rewritten it from scratch in Yii2 framework. I have several reasons for doing this, but one important reason is that the old channel database apps were written in 2020, back when I wasn't as experienced with making PHP applications.
The consequence of this is that the code of channel database is now very unreadable and over the years, there have been a lot of bugs, which I have found in the app. Architectually the problem was that about 90% of the code was on a single file and global variables were used everywhere. The situation was a little bit better on the very first versions, but there a lot of the code was duplicated, which created a situation in which changing something in the main view didn't apply to idea box and gallery.
The situation got worse, when I discovered serious vulnerabilities in legacy non-Bootstrap versions (which is why I made them inaccessible).
Channel database Lite solves these problems through version methods. First, the project now uses MVC (model-view-controller) patter. This makes it easier to find content in the code (e.g. database communications in models, views in views directory, controllers in controllers etc.).
Second, it uses Yii2 framework. This is a PHP framework, which uses more secure defaults, includes useful helper functions and a better debugger, automates various tasks, etc.
Third, it doesn't do anything unnecessary. You can't add or modify records directly within the application, even if you are logged in. Database is managed externally in admin view on markusmaal.ee site.
It still uses Bootstrap 5 styling framework, but now it also uses custom colors, which is something that the old applications didn't do.
Almost all functions are still available, including searching videos, various filters, gallery, idea box, report viewing and downloading, sorting, archived comments and more. The exceptions are CSV export for reports and legacy browser mode. The last one I didn't bother implementing since Bootstrap 5 already doesn't support older browsers, but CSV export was removed, because there are so many implementations of it and converting JSON to desired CSV format isn't that difficult.
Last, you may ask - what happens with the old channel database versions? The last version, which was available before Lite was published, will still be available until 1st April (apart from archived comments). After 1st April, I'll remove that application from my website. Older versions, which didn't use Bootstrap styling framework are already no longer available to the public.
Empty blog post
2023-12-30 20:01:26 UTC+0
This blog post has intentionally been left empty. Please do not read it!
Deleting Twitter/X profile
2023-10-22 14:25:25 UTC+0
Starting from next year, I'm going to delete my account on Twitter/X. This means that starting from January 2024, you will not be able to follow what I do using the social network site. Instead, I recommend you follow me through the following methods:
- markusmaal.ee - my primary website, I try to maintain it as long as possible :)
- YouTube - I exist on YouTube as @MarkusTegelane, @MarkusTegelanePlus, @hashMarkusTegelane, and @PAKTC channels, you can also follow what I do using the community tab (I also have the @MarkusMaal channel, altough there are a few public videos there)
- Odysee - @MarkusTegelane:8 mirror of my YouTube channel, no subtitles, videos are in the original language
- markustegelane-en.blogspot.com - my channel's official blog, the most important info about my channel is posted here, you can also follow through RSS: https://feeds.feedburner.com/markustegelane
- GitHub (development related stuff): https://github.com/MarkusMaal
- markusmc.tk - my Minecraft blog, I post Minecraft related stuff here (only available in Estonian), also RSS available: https://feeds.feedburner.com/kaevandamejameisterdame
- E-mails: [email protected], [email protected]
Downloads on the markusmaal.ee website!
2023-10-08 11:43:54 UTC+0
Starting from today, you can download stuff I've made from the markusmaal.ee website! For this, just click Downloads button, choose a desired category and the downloadable item. From the download page, you'll find the description, screenshots and download links with checksums!
Big changes coming to my YouTube channels
2023-09-18 18:23:31 UTC+0
You may have noticed that I haven't posted any new videos throughout the last couple of months to MarkusTegelane, MarkusTegelane+ and Markus' stuff channels. That is because I haven't had a desire to make any new content to these channels. The motivation has been gone for various reasons, but two more important reasons are lower view counts and the fact that I haven't been satisfied with the quality of the past videos I've posted on my channels.
Due to this, I am planning to make significant changes to all of the three main YouTube chanenls I manage - MarkusTegelane, MarkusTegelane+ and Markus' stuff. After these changes, the quality of the videos should become consistent and thus improve. One change for MarkusTegelane and MarkusTegelane+ may be a large channel name and overall branding change. It's also possible that a huge chunk of the videos, which are currently public, may become unlisted and/or private. I am also planning to delete the entirety of the Markus' stuff channel next year (2024), before this, an announcement in the form a video and community post will be posted.
You may ask - what? why? when?
First, what specific changes I'm going to be making? That part is in the process of being figured out and is classified.
Second, I already answered the "why?" part - because I want to find new motivation for making new content to these channels.
Third, when will I make these changes? The answer is short and concrete - at the latest on January 2024, an earlier time isn't out of the question. For the three main channels, I will NOT POST any new videos before this time, the only exception may be the 10th anniversary video for MarkusTegelane (it's not out of the question that it might become the last MarkusTegelane video ever).
Moving markusmaal.ee to Cloudflare
2023-08-21 14:32:36 UTC+0
For various reasons, I have decided to point the nameservers of markusmaal.ee to Cloudflare. For visitors, this might mean that access to the website might be temporarily unavailable.
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