The root cause of the problem

Though there are several different "types" of errors each of you are getting, they are all in fact caused by one underlying problem. Unfortunately, that problem is your web host. Some of you have hosts which are just plain crappy, while others of you have hosts who are so caught up in "securing the servers" that they've removed and/or disabled most of what makes PHP such an awesome language to work with.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm all for security. I know I sure as hell wouldn't want a server on my grid getting hacked. However, some of these hosts are going to the far end of the "extreme" in terms of "lockdown". I won't get into too many geeky details, as it would just bore most of you. So I'll just say this... When it comes to web hosts, the cliche "You get what you pay for" is more true than you could possibly imagine.

What we intend to do

The examples mentioned above don't cover everyone, but those are the primary issues at hand. So, we're working extra hard to implement EVEN MORE pre-checks, pre-pre-checks, and pre-pre-pre-checks to ensure that if ANYTHING is unavailable in your hosting environment, the plugin will simply abandon the idea of using our fancy new sprite generator feature and use the premade sprite that's included with the plugin instead.

Another thing that we've come to realize is that we're failing in part due to the fact that we're trying to make this plugin as "dummy proof" as possible. I'm not calling anyone names, just making reference to the fact that aside from clicking a few checkboxes, radio buttons, or icons... There's not much to "setting up" the plugin.

This however, may be about to change. Unfortunately for the vast majority of you who enjoy the plugin and who it works for just fine, there are others out there who can't get it to work due to lousy server setups and poorly thought out site structures. Therefore, we're debating whether or not to add several text boxes which will allow for a 100% guarantee that the plugin will work on your server setup.

These boxes would be for you manually defining absolute server paths, relative server paths, and other such things which are somewhat hard to "automatically guess" due to the fact that some people love installing wordpress in crazy directories and renaming wp-content to something weird...

Now before any of you who are code savvy say, "but what about using content_url() to grab the wp-content location no matter where it is or what it's named?". Let me first say thanks for mentioning it... However, content_url() only gets the URL of wp-content folder... It doesn't get the absolute path, nor does it get the relative path, which are two things we desperately need for this to work properly.

There are things called "constants" that are defined by WordPress that we could use, but they aren't 100% accurate either as they won't know if the folder has been renamed. At any rate, please be patient and rest assured that we are most definitely busting our butts trying to get this thing back up and running 100% for all of you.

Ok, so this post is gonna cover everything that's happened since the last post and now (which is quite a bit), so get ready. It seems that with my other project nearing it's launch date, it's becoming harder and harder to divvy up my time between both projects equally. This has been pretty clear in the fact that SexyBookmarks hasn't been updated nearly as much as I would have liked to lately.

I know this sucks for you guys, but I'm doing my best. Anyway, I've recently updated the plugin (which I'm sure you guys have already downloaded by now) that fixes quite a few bugs and adds several new features as well. This in itself was no easy task, as it seemed that the SVN didn't like me at the time. It took me several new version releases to get the SVN updated "correctly", and then Norman had to come along behind me and clean up my mess. Don't ask me, I have no clue... I guess it was a SVN conspiracy against me or something... Anyway, it's fixed now and hopefully I won't encounter such conspiracies gain in the near future.

Bugs Fixed/Features Added in v2.5.3.3

1. Added i18n / l10n support

   This has been a long awaited feature addition that took quite a while to accomplish due to the lack of real "instruction" on how to implement it in the WordPress codex. Sorry for the wait!

2. Added Russian translation and several popular Russian bookmarking sites

   Thanks to Yuri Gribov for translating the plugin and offering several suggestions for Russian based bookmarking sites!

3. Added DesignMoo to the list

4. Added bit.ly integration

   The plugin now allows you to enter your bit.ly user ID and API key so that you can track stats on the links you shorten

5. Fixed *most* plugin conflicts due to jQuery incompatibility

   There are still a few conflicts that we've yet to solve, but this update fixed the majority of them.

Known Bugs in v2.5.3.3

1. Conflicts with jQuery sliders and faders

   No matter how hard we try, we can't seem to work out ALL of the plugin/theme conflicts related to jQuery. This latest release fixed the vast majority of them, but there have been a few reports of persistent conflicts that we've yet to find a solution to.

2. Plugin doesn't pull correct post titles when using Shopplugin.net shopping cart plugin

   I'm assuming this one is still broken, but have yet to receive any confirmation of the fact.

Now, please take note that the above lists were ONLY for v2.5.3.3, and the last version I posted about was v2.5.2.3 which was quite a while ago. The reason for this is because of the streak of bad luck I seemed to run into lately. First, when applying the update for v2.5.3 to the SVN, there was an issue with the CSS due to the fact that we tried to remove all of the !important statements from our stylesheet. However, for some reason unknown to us, when most themes loaded the styles they didn't seem to cascade properly as they should. So we had to add the !important rules back in to fix that.

The next bit of bad luck came when I attempted to update the SVN with v2.5.3.1 which included the fix mentioned above. I have no clue why, but it seemed that the SVN was plotting against me and made it extremely difficult for me to get anything done. First it applied the entire contents of our repository into the tag update, and then wouldn't actually update the tag after I had removed it. This led to me having to release YET ANOTHER tag update JUST to remove the repository from the tag.

Norman then had to add a couple of CSS fixes that I had missed and release another update (v2.5.3.3) to clear everything up and get things back on track. Once all that was done, I then decided to tinker with my server settings at the root level... BAD IDEA.

I wound up breaking the site (which I'm sure most of you already realized) and have spent the last 3 or 4 days trying to fix it. I've finally got most everything restored from backups, but had to recreate quite a few things manually. The contact forms are all new, so hopefully they're going to work properly. Anyway, just an update to let you all know what the heck happened. Let's hope it never happens again, eh?

Yep, that's right... I'm the cause of most of the bugs this time around. Most of them were simply stupid omissions on my part, and others are things that I have no clue what happened.

Rest assured though, ye townsfolke of Sexyville... I've collected thy reports and have thus begun the annihilation of said bugs.

1. Subscribe to comments link printed twice

   Some see two icons, others simply see the link itself is printed in duplicate.

2. When added to Index, menu references site rather than posts

3. Google Bookmarks link garbled

4. Everyone getting an error message about Twittley Default Tags when saving

   Fixed in development version... Help is on the way!

5. Conflicts with jQuery sliders and faders

   There have been several reports that the plugin causes the jQuery slider or fader of a user's theme to quit working if any of the javascript powered options are selected. (auto-center and animate-expand) - We are looking for a solution, but have yet to actually find the real problem so far.

6. Plugin doesn't pull correct post titles when using Shopplugin.net shopping cart plugin

   Still looking into this one, please be patient!

7. Some themes FORCING background colors or borders

   This is also fixed in the development version.

8. Plugin doesn't cooperate with installs which use custom wp-content directory location

   Thanks to Kureng for pointing this one out to me. He's also been kind enough to show me how to fix the issue, and it will be released in an update very soon.

I know you hate bugs, so do I. So keep checking back often for updates regarding bug patches for these bugs!

So here we go again with more bugs to squash... This is just a quick update to let you all know what bugs I know about so far. If you have found other bugs besides these, please use the form provided and submit them to me ASAP so I can start working on them.

1. Blog name showing up on each post

2. Stumbleupon and Yahoo icons not being displayed when using manual mode

3. RSS and Email links not being displayed when using manual mode

4. Bugs with the email link causing content to display weirdly

5. Twitter status message not being encoded properly

Stay tuned for more updates regarding bug reports/fixes as time goes on! I'll also be releasing bug reports individually as they come in from now on. This will help you to stay informed quicker whenever a bug is reported and help to avoid duplicate bug reports. I will also post a temporary fix for each bug as they are reported (if one is available) so that you won't have to wait for the next update to fix the problem.

** Please note that any temporary bug fix will be offered "as is" with no guarantees that it will work for each and every possible scenario. I also will not be offering additional support in regards to implementing the temporary solutions so as to give me more time to implement the permanent solution and release the bug fixes sooner

Take a quick peek below and see if you are suffering from any of these reported bugs. If you are, please do not resubmit the issues as they are already being addressed. For those of you who may be encountering other issues not listed here, please report them by using the Bug Report Form and I'll start looking into them right away.

Known bugs in v1

1. Custom CSS box overlaps icons in options page

2. Pages sometimes disappear when using the plugin (2 reported cases)

3. Menu appears at top of post even when "Below Post" is selected

That's it!

Not too many bugs, and most of them don't affect the majority of you! That's the way I like it, and the way I intend to keep it if I can help it!