Saturday, May 29, 2021

Technical Difficulties

The old, traditional header size has been borked by Blogger.
 Recently you may have noted that there has been a change to the formatting of this blog. It has to do with the 'template' I use provided by Blogger, the entity that this blog is hosted by, which, by the way, is a Google company now these days. Didn't used to be when I started out here. Anyway....

I received a comment Thursday, and I thought there may be a few of you out there who are wondering the same thing. So, this post will explain it the best that I am able to. The comment first:

"GT, Howdy;
I've noticed that over the past week perhaps 2 or longer the Banner Photo has been reduced
in size. What's with that? Just curious.
"

Well, the answer is a bit complex. From time to time, our digital overlords decide to 'update' our tools, platforms, and devices that they live in. We don't get to choose what happens, many times, and so functionality, user experience, and creative interface gets screwed up- if you think the 'update' is goofy- and you end up having to adapt. 

If there is one thing I've learned in 15+ years of blogging is that you'd better be able to accept changes and adapt. Changes are coming whether or not you want them, like them, or understand why they came. Like when Google brought Blogger under its control. Whoo-Boy! That was a sea change in user experience! They took away a bunch of control and tried to pre-package the formatting so that everything ended up being what 'they thought' was cool- not what the users thought was cool. 

And these little nuances, these little changes reflect that big change when Google took over. One day everything looks like it always did and then- poof! You open up your content editor and some dinky little thing has been tweaked by someone you'll never know so that now you have to do things a completely different way. Oh, and you get no warning. No tutelage on how to navigate the new change, or how it 'benefits' you. Yeah................thanks guys! 

So, that is what happened. I have yet to figure out how to adjust the header so it is like it used to be. Once I do- if I ever do- we'll get back to the way things once were here. Or not.........

Maybe we'll have to adapt and change with the times. You can read into that whatever you'd like.

3 comments:

graveldoc said...

As someone who was required to use an electronic medical record during my career, I feel your pain. Many times changes were made, without my input which often gave the system the "flu" for a week or longer with which we had to deal until they could work the bugs out. The I.T. folks called these changes "upgrades" but, I referred to them as "downgrades". It seems to me, without explanation these changes happen without consideration to how they may effect the user. My little rant...

Guitar Ted said...

@graveldoc - Ironically Mrs. Guitar Ted is a Clinical Infromatist at our local hospital and has to be the liaison between the doctors and the electronic record format the hospital uses. I hear about those 'upgrades' before they happen and she rues the days when they go live because of the fall-out that comes along with them.

So, oddly enough, I also have some empathy for your experiences as well via my wife's telling me of how it works out there at the hospitals she has to go help at.

graveldoc said...

All I can say is, "Bless her heart. I understand what you mean by "fall out". I've known of some fine physicians who have chosen to leave practice over their issues with the EMR which does not help with our healthcare shortage.