If things look a bit different today, it’s because I have just switched OST from postnuke to drupal, which I think provides a content management structure much better suited to the demands of this site. Drupal is a simpler system – the forum in particular lacks the considerable sophistication of the old one – but it’s much more flexible and consistent in the way it handles articles and comments, which is the real core of OST. For help in finding your way around, read the rest of this story.
Click RECENT POSTS at the top of the page for an overview of recent activity on the website.
Registered users should be able to log in as normal. If not, try requesting a new password from the User login box. Failing that, I suggest you re-register. You need to be registered in order to submit articles and discussion topics. You do not need to register just to add comments. If you are logged in, you can add links to a bookmark block in the sidebar.
The changeover is not yet complete: not all the content has been transferred; the active and new forum topics lists in the sidebar do not yet reflect actual recent activity; you will find that some of the links in the articles don’t work properly. These and other matters will be corrected over time. Hopefully.
If you have any particular observations or gripes about the new platform or life in general, add a comment to this story.
Finally, many thanks to everyone who’s contributed to OST. I’ve loved the interaction. Keep it up.
Thanks for being our tech-priest
Andrew - After trying a lot of different things to get Christian websites running right, I can really appreciate what you’ve done here. Thanks for making this site so easy to use and so well-organized. I think it’s really well set up to have loads of well-categorized content (hmm, doesn’t sound very postmodern to me, though..).
A categorical mistake?
Justin, it’s interesting that you should say that. I was thinking the other day that maybe I should remove all the categorization and just let stuff accumulate in a shapeless seething mass of thoughts that over time would produce its own organic coherence. How much do we predetermine the conclusions we reach by the categories that we impose (‘hermeneutics’, ‘emerging theology’, ‘ecclesiology’, etc.) - indeed, by the compulsion to categorize at all?
A disorganzied approach might work if it were easier for users to cross-reference within the material on the site. Hyperlinks are great but they’re fiddly to set up. There are ways of automatically generating links to terms, but I think the sort of theological vocabulary we are using is too vague for that to work efficiently. For the same reason searches don’t work terribly well. I suppose this would introduce an element of serendipity into the process that might be quite creative and wonderfully un-modern. Anyway, thanks for your comments. Much appreciated.
the shape of OST
Hello again, Andrew
I received your email, thanks for the introduction to Drupal. I am intrigued to discover from this post that you have made the transition from Postnuke, for reasonse that appear at my first sight (site?) to be well founded. I am encouraged. My early forays into PN suggested I didn’t quite a bit of it and i’m also encouraged by the simple look and feel of yours and other drupal sites. so well done on that front, I for one think its’ working.
Now, on the subject of OST categorisation, my view is that it needs leadership. I know Open Source can seem “organic”, but even Organic things grow because of their dna in prescribed ways, and yet the True Vine apparently needs pruning *jn 15* just as the most fruitful organic ones do too (eg. wine vines etc.)
The difference with OST is that it’s open to change, to development, not that is demands an absence of leadership. So the categorisation may need to develop to allow OST to develop in the way the Spirit of God is leading it to develop. The role of an administrator / moderator / leader is to best reflect that kind of mediation. The idea that it is spiritual (and i’m certainly not ascribing this to you) to have an absence of leadership is, to my mind, unbiblical and unhistorcial. But, yes, leadership is provided in many different ways. Story-telling and poetry, for example, though who credits their exponents with leadership? As far as i’m concerned, you’ve already provided leadership by starting this site and others have by contributing to it….
Perhaps then, it’s something that could be opened up for comment: the beginnings of a structure for OST? or is that happening elsewhere, eg. through the CA group etc. Perhaps I haven’t understood where exactly you are on the curve, since i’ve only just started looking around.
Nevertheless, I think the time is undoubtably right for OST to develop. The model provided by the practitioners of OS software is something we can learn a great deal from. The collaborative synergy speaks to me very much of a “body” functioning. Much more so than any model that a local church can even attempt to echo. Could it be that the .net has come to the kingdom for such a time as this…!
More to come, God willing (and we believe he is…) shalom! John
www.ambassadors.org.uk
recommended websites www.worldchristians.org www.healingeverynation.org www.watchman.net www.wnd.com www.benisrael.org