LiveJournal

[katieupsidedown]

So, after nearly a decade at this site, LJ finally does something that makes me actually rage. No popcorn and laughing as the masses storm to news posts complaining, this time I'm actually worried.

A while back I was invited to help out with BETA testing new LJ services (I got this invite via lj_releases).

They have just announced BETA testing of a new friendslist.

LJ is planning on redoing everyone's friendslists in the style of the new comment page and update page. They want to copy tumblr and make your friendslist into a dashboard-like system page (infinite scrolling and all). It's also been renamed to "feed" (this I don't mind too much, though). In fact the whole dashboard idea with infinite scrolling wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the fact that everyone will be locked to one specific layout. The system style comment pages are bad enough, but now I'll have to strain my eyes reading my flist? That defeats the purpose of this entire site. The font, use of whitespace, oversized boxes and UI elements ... all contribute to making the page difficult to read, on a site where all you do is read. Aaaah. Even just the possibility of adjusting the font (style and size) would make this suggestion easier to swallow, but it's still not something I'd want for my journal. It would not improve my LJ experience in any way (in fact it would most likely make my daily LJ activities more time consuming).

Now, I wasn't able to make the BETA page display my own friendslist, so I apologise to the random users who are featured in the screenshot, but to give everyone an idea, the below image shows you what your friendslist probably will look like in a couple of months.


(Click for big)


I never switched over from Dystopia, so that adds to the weirdness. You're going to have to picture this with the standard LiveJournal drop down navigation + no blue sidebar to the left. Click the screenshots for bigger versions.

Top of page with links to journal, archive, profile


Example of text heavy post as displayed on friendslist


New buttons to the right replace the navigation strip. One tab for filters


One tab for Archive/Calendar, you can filter your feed to display posts from one specific date. These buttons follow along as you scroll down the page (infinite scrolling).



All friendslists will look the same.

Snippet from the locked post at lj_releases:

The friends page has been redesigned as a system page for all users, and is now available for Beta testers. There is a link at the top of your friends page allowing you to switch between the new and old versions, and will later go into public beta testing. You can switch back and forth between both versions throughout beta testing.

PUBLIC POST AT lj_releases ABOUT THE NEW FRIENDSLIST: http://lj-releases.livejournal.com/79480.html.

You can also see the proposed changes for yourself by enabling the BETA on your own journal (instructions from ruljautonews):

It's trivially easy to test beta features.
1) Go to lj_ru_beta and request to join.
2) Wait to get confirmation that you've been accepted into the community (this could take a few hours.)
3) Go to this page and choose Go To under Beta.
4) That's it, you're now testing the beta release. All site-scheme pages should now display a big "BETA BETA BETA BETA BETA BETA" in yellow letters across the top.
5) You could make comments in the lj_ru_beta post, but if you do please keep this in mind: the majority of commenters there don't speak English and if they do it's not their primary language. Machine translation of Russian is lousy. "My hovercraft is full of eels" lousy. While you can engage in basic dialogue and get a feel for what the other person is saying, don't get too hung up on anyone's phrasing.

You can easily switch back to the old version.

Make sure you let LJ know what you think of these proposed changes, I can't be the only one who thinks this is a horrible idea.

ETA: It's nice to see that I'm not the only one worried about the proposed changes, but please direct your feedback through the proper channels. This is a private journal, I have no affiliation with LJ. Please also be respectful when addressing the LJ staff. They are just doing their jobs. Thanks!

ETA2: Russian news post about the BETA test: http://lj-ru-beta.livejournal.com/7013.html

ETA3: Added more screenshots.

ETA4: Additional info at ruljautonews: http://ruljautonews.livejournal.com/27964.html

ETA5: An update on the new site scheme.

ETA6: Public beta has now been announced. Official announcement.

ETA7 (really?): RUSSIAN NEWS POSTS CONFIRM PAGINATION AND ABILITY TO CUSTOMIZE FONT AND BACKGROUND IN THE FUTURE, ruljautonews HAS MORE: http://ruljautonews.livejournal.com/28207.html

Comments

[soloecal.livejournal.com]

DYLAN THE DOG, DYLAN THE CAT, DYLAN THE WIKIPEDIA NONSENSE BABY, AND NOW DYLAN THE RAT? DYLAN? I DON'T KNOW HOW I FEEL ABOUT IT.

[katieupsidedown.livejournal.com]

WELL IF YOU HAVE AN OBJECTION YOU MUST COME UP WITH SOMETHING BETTER.

I DID SUGGEST GRETA. XD RESPONSE WAS NOT POSITIVE ENOUGH TO STICK.

[soloecal.livejournal.com]

GENEVIEVE. PEAR. GRETA IS AWESOME AND THEN MY GUITAR AND I CAN VISIT AND TAKE PICTURES OF HER WITH IT. VICTORIA.

...BILLVY.

[joannabanana23.livejournal.com]

Ok, that is SOOOO cute but rodents skeeve me out SOOOO bad. I wish they didn't. I'd love to get one.

As for names, Dylan is actually pretty cute. I was thinking of getting a puppy a while back and some of the names I was thinking of are Molly, Bella, and Abby. I think I like names with double letters. I also like flower names like Rose, Petunia, Posey, Jasmine (my cat's name), Lily, Daisy and so on.

Congrats on your little furball!

[katieupsidedown.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I can handle pretty much anything, though I'm still kind of nervous around birds. Is that weird? Tarantulas, snakes, and rats are all cool, but parakeets make me uncomfortable lol

[super-bitch06.livejournal.com]

Awww what a cutie!! You should consider getting her a cage mate; rats are highly social and thrive better with a ratty friend to play with =]

I'm so freaking jealous of you. I wish I could have one!

[katieupsidedown.livejournal.com]

I went in to work planning to get 2, but Karina said that if I did that they'd fight. :/ Plus, I'd need a larger cage and all the like guinea pig cages and such had too much space between the bars for a baby. They would squeeze out in no time.

[drunkoffthestars]

Actually, two girls together are usually okay. It's the boys who fight, though there are people who do that. I don't know enough about them to know how to get them to not fight.

[quiet000001.livejournal.com]

I had all boys (up to 6 at a time at one point) and I never had significant problem with fighting.

I mean, yes, they go through a period where they squabble (when they're 'teenagers' and all hormonal) and they also play fight, but none of them were every seriously injured (I think I saw one or two little scratches) and they sorted it out fine.

(And at least in the UK, if you have a male who is TOO hormonal, you can get him temporarily chemically castrated so he settles down. Generally one injection is enough to get him out of the 'terrible teens'.)

So I'd definitely get two. You can keep them in a smaller baby cage together without any problem, and once they get too big for it, you can replace it. (I know it sucks, but really rats should have lots of room to run around anyway. They like to have litter, food, and sleeping areas.)

[quiet000001.livejournal.com]

I should add that I also introduced new males to an existing cage of males while I had rats (I got them in pairs of two at various times, so there'd be an older pair and a baby pair being introduced) and the trick is to do the following:

1. Introduce them all in a neutral environment. Most rat folks like the bathtub because it's very easy to clean (so it doesn't smell like anyone's territory) and also it tends to be a New and Unique place, so often the rats kind of band together in the face of 'where the fuck are we? is there a bath coming?' instead of looking for trouble.

2. Put a tiny bit of vanilla on each rat (on the back/base of the neck) to make them all smell more like they belong together.

3. Clean the cage REALLY REALLY REALLY well before putting them all back in it, and replace all bedding/toys that might smell like the original rats. (You can put them back once they're all settled in together.) (Actually, you don't need to worry about this so much if you're introducing babies. And once when I was introducing rats I had a set up so they had free range of the room plus access to the cage, so I just let everyone out in the room together with the cage accessible, and didn't mess with them, and eventually everyone ended up in the cage anyway. Score! :) )

[cetacea.livejournal.com]

This! I just introduced a baby female to two adult females, and I did all of these things. It worked really well and there was only a little bit of squabbling. Now they are all happy as clams.

[quiet000001.livejournal.com]

I forgot another thing you can do to minimize the risk of fighting is to also take some bedding from each rat (while they're still living apart) and put it in with the other rat so they get used to the smell.

(I mean, not something really stinky and gross that you'd otherwise throw out- something they've napped on for a bit is fine.)

[super-bitch06.livejournal.com]

The other folks said pretty much exactly what I was going to say =]

Ideally, you'd want litter mates, but that's not always a feasible option. In which case, you'd want to give them separate cages at first until they both know and trust you, then introduce them in neutral territory for increasing periods of supervised play time until they start to coexist peacefully.

But of course, having to buy a new cage would probably put you above what you had originally intended to spend. Myself, I've always been a fan of converted bookshelf cages. This is a very over the top kind of example, but it shows you what I mean: The Grotto (http://www.dapper.com.au/grotto.htm). Leaves lots of room for customization, and gives you lot of levels and nooks and crannies to keep them occupied and entertained.

Dylan may end up being just fine by herself. She'll sleep all through the days, so just keep an eye on her in the evenings, make sure she seems happy and willing to socialize with you. And give her some toys to play with/chew on so she doesn't get bored. She may do just fine on her own =]

[svimmelhet.livejournal.com]

Oh rats!! I love them they are so cute. I can't wait to see pics of her.

[cat-mcdougall.livejournal.com]

I... have no girl names. However, pretty names:

Aruna (http://www.behindthename.com/name/aruna)
Tawny
Adva (http://www.behindthename.com/name/adva)
Anima (http://www.behindthename.com/name/anima-1)
Bia (http://www.behindthename.com/name/bia)
Itxaso (http://www.behindthename.com/name/itxaso)
Aditi (http://www.behindthename.com/name/aditi)

... I like strange names *slinks back to obscurity*

[kat-lair.livejournal.com]

oh cool! I'm glad you got a pet after all. Congrats to a new rat-mummy!

[yenesi.livejournal.com]

sjkdf sjkdfh skld *_* SO CUTE!

[dracasealm.livejournal.com]

Well, I guess anything not on THIS (http://www.geocities.com/redwallhq/foes.html) list is safe ;-)

[katieupsidedown.livejournal.com]

Actually when I had mice their names were all Martin, Mariel, Matteo, May, etc ;)

[dracasealm.livejournal.com]

Those are great names for mice :-)

[yamapea.livejournal.com]

OH MY GOD SO PLEASED CAN'T WAIT FOR PICS. *_____*

[justakid.livejournal.com]

Baby rats are so cute. Then they mature and get ratty...and fat. All of mine and my brothers' wound up getting tumors.

[cetacea.livejournal.com]

Sorry to butt in, but I just have to say I love my mature ratty rats! And they don't get very fat if you let them out to exercise often enough. At least mine aren't fat, and I mostly attribute that to the fact that I let them run around a lot.

[quiet000001.livejournal.com]

I think it depends a bit on the rat, also- I had brothers where one was ALWAYS skinny, and the other one was always a bit plumper, and they both got a lot of free range time and a healthy diet- it's just the skinny one was always go-go-go and the fatter one's idea of a good time was finding a new place to settle in and sleep. :)

But yes, babies are cute, but so are mature rats. I loved it when my boys got to be cuddly. :) (Even the one on the go would seek you out when he was finally ready for a nap.)

[cetacea.livejournal.com]

I AM SO EXCITED FOR YOU.*flails* Rats are so amazing.

[alanna-zero.livejournal.com]

A raaaat, how cute!! You should name it Cedric *is random* Just kidding ;)

[alanna-zero.livejournal.com]

Okay I am totally stupid and read that as in you got a boy rat and actually wanted a girl...sorry xD Then you probably shouldn't name it Cedric...lol.