here it is

Aug. 10‘10


We’ve all had those days. You bang your head on your desk trying to figure why something doesn’t work on a web site. It should be easy. It’s staring at you right in the face, but you just can’t wrap your head around it. You start to doubt yourself. Why does this have to be so difficult?

Just before you’re ready to completely lose your stuff on your computer, you have a moment of clarity, and it all comes together. It works! High fives all around!

I had a moment like that today while trying to fix a WordPress bug for one of the great clients of Mindspace. For some reason, the client couldn’t upload photos through the upload utility on WordPress. Well, let me amend that, they’d upload, but wouldn’t upload. The photo could be edited, but once saved, it wouldn’t show up. I fished around Google and the WordPress forums (more on the WP forums in a minute) and found no definite solution. I changed file permissions. I created folders. I did everything.

Side note on the WP Forums: Is it just me or are the regular contributors on that thing the most unhelpful and rude bunch? I know I’m suppose to search the forums, and I do, but sometimes the answer I need isn’t there. Don’t make me feel like the village’s largest idiot because I committed the cardinal sin of asking the same the question that wasn’t originally answered in the first place.

One thing I noticed in the directories was that sub-directories weren’t being created. I googled “wordpress not creating upload directories” and found that I needed to set the media directory to “wp-content/uploads” instead of the full server path that was already in there. I saved and tried uploading an image, and it worked!

After emailing the client to let her know that it was, in fact, working, I received the following response: “I love you so much!!!!!”

It’s days like this that make it great to be a Mindspacer.

So, in review, if you’re having problems uploading images on WordPress, try the following:

  1. Change the permissions of your wp-content directory “755″
  2. Go to Settings » Media and change the Store Uploads settings to the default of “wp-content/uploads” (leave off the trailing slash)
  3. Test an upload and rejoice when it works
  4. If it doesn’t work, good luck on the WP forums

[Image Credit: Sybren A. Stüvel/Flickr]

Aug. 5‘10

Almost all companies today, regardless of size, face unique technical problems and challenges that they are unable to solve internally. Sometimes this causes wasted time or resources, and sometimes it hinders the ability to effectively communicate. That being said, here are some time savers and problem solvers we’ve come up with lately.

Google Maps is an extremely powerful application, assuming you know how to harness its power like we do. Recently, Mindspace incorporated Google Maps into a website to show automotive shops that matched a user’s search criteria. We also customized the map to automatically update exact location and ZIP code while centering and scaling itself to the search results.

Many companies today have Twitter and Facebook accounts. Mindspace has incorporated and automated Twitter and Facebook posts and feeds in many ways, thus saving time and keeping the content pipeline full. And if you need a custom Facebook presence, our design department will ensure your branding is presented well within the social media giant.

Often, clients find themselves using a SaaS (Software as a Service) like Vertical Response, Salesforce or the like. However, truly taking advantage of those types of products requires expertise typically outside of the skillset of the average company. As an example, Salesforce is the go-to CRM for many businesses, and its mature API allows for companies to use the data in many ways. From the creation of web-to-lead landing pages that feed into automatic campaign creation, single sign on (SSO), lead nurturing and much more, Mindspace is quite familiar with SaaS’s offerings and can help you better take advantage of its power while allowing your team to continue using them as they used to.

Disparate databases are becoming more common as technology ages and companies merge. There typically is no simple solution, since the problems involved with trying to use multiple sources for data will become exponentially complex over time, demand more and more attention, yet all the while becoming less and less effective. Mindspace has seen and solved a myriad of data problems, and we’re experts in solving both complex conundrums and political problems in a minimal amount of time.

The members of our Mindspace Interactive team haves some real world experience. This means our team members have worked in jobs in the past where they were responsible for adding value, not merely being a cost center. And in doing so, wethey’ve have amassed quite a bit of experience solving unique problems.

Almost all companies today, regardless of size, face unique technical problems with a combination ofand challenges that they are unable to solve internally. Sometimes this meanscauses wasted time or resources, and sometimes it hinders the sometimes the inability to effectively communicate. That being said, Hhere are some time savers and problem solvers we have created come up with lately.

Google maps Maps is an extremely powerful application, assuming you know how to harness its power like we do. Recently, Mindspace incorporated Google Mapsit into a website to showshowing automotive shops that matched a user’s search criteria. We also customized the map to , automatically updatinge exact location and ZIP code updates, whileautomatically centering and scaling itself to the search results..

Many companies today have Twitter and FacebBook accounts they use. Mindspace has incorporated and automated Twitter and FaceBook Facebook posts and feeds in many ways, of course taking the 145 character count into account, thus saving time and much time in keeping the content pipeline full. And if you need a custom FaceBook Facebook presence, our design department will ensure your branding is presented well within the social media giant.

Often, clients find themselves using a SaaAAS (Software as a Service) like Vertical Response, SalesfForce or the like. However, truly taking advantage of those types of products requires expertise typically outside of the skillset of the average company. With all the advantages these providers offer, there also is a downside. As an example, SalesFforce is the go-to CRM for many businesses, and its mature API allows for companies to use the data in many ways Mindspace has taken advantage of for our clients. From the creation of web-to-lead landing pages that feeding into automatic campaign creation, single sign on (SSO), lead nurturing and much more, Mindspace is quite familiar with SaaAAS’s offerings and can help you better take advantage of theirits power while, yet allow allowing your team to continue using them as they are used to.

Disparate databases are becoming more common as technology ages, and companies merge. There typically is no simple solution, since as the problems ininvolved with trying to use multiple sources for data will become exponentionally complex over time, and will demand more and more attention, yet all the while becominge less and less effective. Mindspace has seen and solved a myriad of data problems, and we’ree consider ourselves experts in solving both complex conundrums and political solving these usually very complex and sometimes political problems in a very single minded effective way, in a minimal amount of time.

Jul. 29‘10

IE Voodoo Doll

On the Mindspace web team, we strive to make all the web sites we create cross-browser compatible. Sometimes problems pop up that perplex us, make us scratch our heads, and wonder why this hasn’t been fixed yet. Most of the time, these problems revolve around Microsoft’s Internet Explorer.

I submit for you review, today’s Internet Explorer nuisance: We were testing the admin of a web site where the URL was “client_admin.mindspace.net” (the URL has been changed to protect the innocent). When tested in every browser, we could log-in and navigate through the site with little problems. When tested on versions 6-8 of Internet Explorer, we could log-in but could not navigate through it without receiving a “You are not authorized to use this. Go away.” error.

We scoured the code to find out to it was in an issue with the PHP session. A quick search on “ie php session problem” pulled up this link. Simply put, IE doesn’t like seeing an underscore in a URL. A quick change and a restart of Apache later and it was working in our old frenemy.

Perplexed? Yes.

Heading scratching? Definitely.

Fixed yet? Absolutely not. Hopefully it’ll be fixed in Internet Explorer 9.

[Image Credit: Chisa/Flickr]