After a long hiatus for the first half of 2024, I'm finally getting back to working on my websites. When I logged into Neocities this morning, my site's index page said the last update had been way back in May. Although even that must have been a very minor edit since the last entry in the site's actual update log is from the end of February. So, yeah, it's been a LONG time since I've worked on this place.
Getting back into coding again after such a long break is proving more frustrating than I would have expected. Probably because I was relatively new to the world of coding and websites just a year ago when I joined Neocities. Some of the stuff came back to me as soon as I started working in the beautifully ugly Neocities editor. But, sadly, a lot of it didn't. It feels discouraging to have to run to W3Schools for info I should still be able to do in my sleep. Still, I'm trying to patient with myself as I learn my way around.
So, now that I'm back, what are the plans for the site? I think the long break has actually helped me approach things with a fresh perspective. Before, I was feeling stuck and unsure how to move forward. Now I have a million ideas and plans for where to take things. Over the next couple months, I'm going to be restructuring a bit around the site -- moving sections, adding new sections, grouping pages into sub-groups, etc. After that, I'd like to get the Librarian fansite off of here and into its own domain. And I'm going to start migrating some of my fan-comics and fanvids over here as well to join the fanfic archive part of the site.
I learned a couple new skills while working today and thought I'd share.
First, I finally learned how to create dropdown menus so I can add chapter selections to my fanfic pages. Tbh, this was more challenging than I thought it would be. I first tried shopping around for a way to do it with pure html and css, but the best I could manage was a dropdown that opens when you hover over it. Call me picky, but I badly wanted a menu that would open when you click on it. After a ridiculous amount of wasted time searching around the internet for any solution to the problem, I was forced to admit defeat and add some javascript. I don't have any actual issues with the existence of javascript, or its use on the indie web, but I hate how it looks on my page and I never remember how to write out the functions. Basically, my ND brain frequently dictates how I code my site and it decided javascript is out.
Weird brain chemistry aside, I did finally figure out how to make the dropdown menu and gave it a test on one of my fanfic pages. Works great! I'd like to practice around a bit more with it to get the design looking more sleek, but I'm happy for now. Here's the tutorial I ended up using in case anyone would like to try it for themselves. I adjusted the width of the button and then set the dropdown contents to "width:100%;" so the menu would match the button's size. I also styled the button to imitate the look of different fanfic archives I use.
Second, someone on the MelonLand forum recommended this site as a fun addition to the indie web. It has a list of "slash pages" that you can add to your site. I already have several of these pages on my site, just not under those names. And, while I love the idea of having more commonly used urls among the indie web community (sort of like developing a cultural shorthand) I'm way too lazy to go through and update all of the page names and links throughout the site. Still, I thought I'd share in case anyone else wants to explore it.
That's all for now. I'm happy to be back and look forward to finally getting this site more operational.
Background Image by Valentin Salja