Schauplatz

New version of Wordpress, feed address updated

Abgelegt unter Internals / Interna, Worte des Tages | Trackback

Moved Schauplatz to New Database

I’ve done it at last! For some time now I had problems with the new link and category system in Wordpress, for instance, I could not use the link and blogroll service any longer. Now I moved this blog to a new database and a new directory on the server. Luckily, all went well. I’m so relieved that I don’t have to carry around the old bad habits of the database any longer. Since yesterday, Schauplatz runs on the most recent version of Wordpress, 2.51 (and I quite like it, too).

Feedburner Service Discontinued

I took the opportunity, too, to delete my feeds from the Feedburner service. I’ve always been glad to use it but I stopped because of two reasons:

1. Feedburner has been acquired by Google a few months ago, and this giant already knows too much about me. One shouldn’t trust them with too much.
2. My bilingual posts are presented by Feedburner as a double feed, that is it looks like this: german german text bla bla /german english english text bla blaenglish‘. The post thus becomes twice as long. If it contains photos as well, it becomes a bit tedious because the feed results in an unnecessary amount of traffic.

Feedburner is so good as to offer a 30 days redirect to the original feed adresse. Ideally, you shouldn’t notice anything if you’ve subscribed to the Schaupatz feed. If there should be anything wrong, though, please get in touch, I will fix it as soon as possible.

Why the feed is now shown in excerpts only, I’m not sure, I’ll try to find out. With other feeds I’m subscribed to, I don’t like it if I can’t read them completely in my feed reader.

Keen Eye Probably Merged with Schauplatz

Sooner or later, I will give up my English blog Keen Eye, though. It’s too much for me to manage two different blogs in my spare time. I will try to cater for my English-speaking visitors on Schauplatz itself, even it’s a bit of a compromise. I find it okay to translate the most important articles to make Schauplatz more or less bilingual. Or maybe Keen Eye will just use the English language feed of Schauplatz, how about that?

Should you need any more of my blog in English, oh my English-speaking visitors, please get in touch. I know it can be difficult if you can’t even read the menu or the forms properly.

Signs of Remembrance

Abgelegt unter Schauen, Schlendern, Sinnieren | Trackback

It really exists: a memorial for those 2000 jews from Wurttemberg and Stuttgart who, between 1941 and 1945, were deported from the railway station Stuttgart North to several concentration camps (Riga, Auschwitz, Theresienstadt). When did someone first think to ask after them? In 2004. When was the memorial opened: 2006.

On a photo walk around the Stuttgart ‘Wagenhallen’, I recently discovered this hidden, quiet, memorable place.

The original train buffers, with showcases behind

Visitor looking at the names of the deportees.
She is refleted in the showcase showing the names of those who were murdered.

The names of the deported.
The showcase reflects one of the original buffers.

What moved me most were the long rows of people with identical surnames. Everyone knows that whole families were wiped out. If you see the names of real people in front of you, though, the insanity of those murders becomes particularly depressing.

You will find more information about this place of late remembrance and more photographs of its layout in the Wikipedia and on the homepage of the memorial.

Autumn …, sorry: Spring in Ludwigsburg

Abgelegt unter Schauen, Schlendern | Trackback

Seen while cycling to work through the fog. The spider has finished its work for the day.

This image poses questions: Does the spider start from the outside or from the centre? Sure, she has to start where she can fix her web. And what is the relationship between hard, brutal, excluding barbed wire (some peopel even collect this stuff, and in Texas there’s a Devil’s Rope Museum) and soft but strong, brutal, insect-catching cobweb? Does the beauty of the water beads and the natural structure somehow redeem our somber thoughts?

Or should we just wonder in silence?

Bin noch da! Andere nicht, und: Adobe Photoshop Express

Abgelegt unter Internals / Interna, Schauen, Schlendern | Trackback

Sometimes, life simply doesn’t allow one to look after one’s blog. Then there’s a break. Cause for this has been, partly, “post 404” at fotografr.de, the last one, for 8mt has shut down his blog. This news still has me locked in a kind of shock … As far as one gathers, he spends his time polishing up the image of an unknown company in Dubai. Sounds exciting, but it leaves us photography bloggers somewhat lonely here, since we used to like 8mt’s photography, his wonderful writing (even if it grew more and more esoteric these last weeks) and his nature studies and travel reports very much. sniff, sniff …!

More than a fun pastime: Adobe Photoshop Express beta

If you want to pass your time whilst waiting for new Schauplatz posts, you may check out the new Adobe Photoshop Express beta. The online image-editing software has turned out a bit different than I had expected: rather than a Photoshop-like application slightly downgraded for online use, it is now a quick and not really dirty, very intuitive image processing tool. Of course one shouldn’t expect a full-scale graphics application with layers or other sophisticated processing tools. Still, a first short test left me positively impressed: the pages come in the new quasi-standard dark, Lightroom-like design, show a clean look, and it’t easy to get good results by using the intuitive image-processing tools. I particularly like the little row of previews above the photo being edited, which, similar to the Lightroom editing presets, give mouse-over previews of different settings.

Screenshot of Adobe Photoshop Express (klick to enlarge)

You can try your hand at the test images (saving not possible of course) or open a free account and upload up to 2 GB worth of images, process them and share them with others. Photoshop Express is not only a web-based picture-editing tool for graphics dummies and quick, mobile photo processing but also a photo hosting site with community elements. It doesn’t have anything to to with Photoshop, the desktop application, but still: not bad, Adobe!

Beware: Adobe grabs your image copyrights!

Unfortunately, the Adobe Terms of Service contain a passage whereby you grant Adobe worldwide practically all copyright and usage rights, the right to sell and make revenue of your images, etc (see paragraph 8). This usage seems to be granted to an extent which would never be legal in Germany (maybe in other countries neither). Meanwhile, Adobe seems to have announced to review the passage in question and correct any misunderstandings.

Schauplatz thinks, this (the service, not the photo hosting rights issue) is worth

Im Lichtrausch

Abgelegt unter Schauen | Trackback

For Jürgen (he knows what I mean) and for Markus who wants to see more photographs. These images are sort of a side-effect of a beautiful February morning. And you might almost see them as pet pictures (click to enlarge).