So don't click on any links in any messages allegedly from Universal Hub about your password expiring, because that's not how it works: I'm not sending out messages and the server assures me it hasn't achieved evil sentience.
Update: More RAM installed.
For which I apologize! The server error log keeps showing an error message that basically means the server is running out of memory to do stuff, so tomorrow morning, the Web host will be adding more memory to see if that fixes things (so tomorrow, sometime after 10, if the site's down, it might be to get a memory infusion).
If you're a frequent visitor, you may notice the site's been either wicked slow or down a fair amount over the last week or so. And now all the thumbs-up votes on comments are all gone (although voting still works, so new votes will be tallied).
I've been slowly playing around with upgrading UHub to the next (by like three generations) version of the underlying software. In addition to important stuff like better display on mobile devices (fun fact: Most people now look at UHub on their phones, by like a 2-1 margin over desktop browsers) and ongoing support for security fixes, the new version will allow emojis (who doesn't like emojis?). Read more.
Say hello to Oliver Blake, Universal Hub's new intern, who started today:
Hello all my name is Oliver Blake, I am an aspiring journalist from Boston. I am an incoming freshman at Ithaca College and I will soon be graduating from Fenway High School, located in Mission Hill. Feel free to reach out.
I've changed the way search works. Instead of an actual search box on every page, you now have to click the search icon on the right side of the main toolbar at the top of a page. Read more.
Of course, there's a UHub Mastodon feed. Why do I mention it? Oh, no reason, why do you ask? Read more.
We might as well retire - it's all downhill from here now that a disgruntled citizen has filed a 311 complaint about Universal Hub: Read more.
Please drop me a line (see the Contact link at the bottom of any page) and let me know and I'll get you set up, so you can lock in your name for comments and get e-mail updates on replies in discussions you're interested in.
I've had to turn off the new-user registration system because of a particularly nasty spam attack tonight: Read more.
Update: Mail's working again, so you can mail me to your heart's content once more.
For some reason, if you attempt to contact me or any of the fine universalhub.com addresses, it will bounce back to you. Until it's fixed, if you need to contact me e-mailishly, probably your best bet is to send a direct message on Twitter to @universalhub, or, via Facebook, a message on the Universal Hub page.
Comments on the the Revolutionary War Airports post are working now and I've loaded in the ones that should've appeared. As for why it happened, it's a stupid problem related to so-called "extended ASCII characters" that you can use on Twitter or much of the rest of the Web but which give the current UHub set up conniptions.
I've turned on new templates for the site. For desktop users, the site should work pretty much as before, just some of the colors are different. Mobile users, hopefully, will get a better looking site, one with an actual working Search box. Read more.
I'm slowly finishing revamping the templates that control how the site works (mainly for mobile users, but also to do something about the poor search-box UI). Read more.
I'm slowly making my way towards some UI changes here, and one of the things that has long sucked is the search box. Read more.
This weekend, I'll be tweaking Universal Hub's templates to keep ads off pages for monthly subscribers - not just the ads themselves, but the calls to the UHub ad servers that would otherwise put all sorts of hidden stuff on pages. I've been testing out the code to make this happen, and, so far, it actually works (yes, I'm always amazed when that happens). Read more.
Welcome! Unfortunately, we can't get you refunds on the 2,000-rupee "smart watches" you ordered because you didn't get them here. Take a look around and you'll see this is a site that only posts news about the city of Boston, with a domain name of universalhub.com. The watch site you want is universalshub.com (note the extra S in there). Our name is a play on words involving a nickname for Boston; their name is, well, who knows?
I've started using a new ad-serving company, and one of the options for configuring their system is to enable "GDPR consent," which is related to that European data-privacy regulation that went into effect a couple months ago. So of course, I enabled it, thinking, basically: Why not? That's what started the privacy popups - and the way you couldn't read more about the privacy policy here, because I didn't enter the URL to it. I've turned it off (sorry, Europeans), so apologies for any inconvenience (UHub privacy policy, should you want to read it).
Time was, UHub had a system for letting you get notified when somebody replied to your comments. Then, that just stopped, weeks, maybe months ago (I didn't notice until somebody asked me about it a few days ago, and I realized I'd somehow deleted the software that handled it).
E-mail notification's back on. I've set the default to "off" (don't want to send somebody e-mail they don't want!). There are a couple of ways to get it back on - and to be notified of posts in certain categories: Read more.
Took me way too long, but I've finally managed to get SSL working on the ol' site (the problem, for people who care, will follow). Read more.
Help keep Universal Hub going. If you like what we're up to and want to help out, please consider a (completely non-deductible) contribution.
