Simon 2.0: My New Window to the World

Welcome to the new site and home of all things Simon. Why the new site? A bunch of reasons, really. First, the old site was a bit of a relic.

Simon 1.0 was actually a composite of two different ones: a main site and a Wordpress one--a high-tech Band-Aid,. There was simply so easy way for me to easily integrate the two sites. Updating the register.com site with my blog entries from the WordPress one required a decent amount of work.

Second, from an aesthetic standpoint, my old site just didn't have the look and feel that I wanted. The templates from register.com only took me so far and—trust me—I tried many things like rss-include and wix over the past year to spruce it up. Since my next book is about newer technologies, I suppose that I ought to use some of them as main my window to the world, to quote a song from Canadian icon Geddy Lee.

Third, WordPress’s CMS freaking rocks and, at the risk of disparaging my previous hosting company, there’s really no comparison between the two. The number and types of WordPress plug-ins just blow my mind. To be sure, this site will be easier for me to maintain and more aesthetically pleasing than Simon 1.0. As a result, there are two major benefits:

• Readers will find the site more user-friendly.
• I can more easily add (hopefully interesting) content.

So, What's New?

New features include the ability to easily subscribe to comments and a much more integrated search capability, largely stemming from the fact that all content now resides within the same domain. My only frustration so far (after only a few days of noodling with the site) is why I waited so long to move to the WP platform.

Major props to Shiri Design Studio for its absolutely fantastic job. Rarely have I worked with a vendor so diligent, honest, budget-conscious, and knowledgeable. I only hope that I provide the same level of service for my own clients.

As Morpheus said in The Matrix, "Welcome to the real world."

Thanks for checking out the new site. Feel free to contact me if you have any thoughts or find an issue.