Bells & Whistles

TGIF—time for some blog enhancements. Firstly, I am so content with the web traffic since my inaugural blog one week ago that I am proudly displaying a counter.

Secondly, I want to try out the site-flavored Google search tailored to my interests (the freebie Blog Navbar currently cannot sitesearch because my blog hasn't been indexed by Google yet). Unfortunately, the oversized logo (it's not a transparent GIF!) is less than tasteful. Impatient to wait for Google to find my blog (hopefully soon?), I decide to temporarily implement a minimal site search feature in the sidebar. I tinkered with the website search technology powered by FreeFind—voilà!—my very own blog search, though at present it works for English only.

Thirdly, I am also putting up a nifty tag board to test whether instant messaging will increase site traffic. However, I couldn't fix the layout so that it looks equally good in both IE and Firefox. Well, the Firefox view is at least not ugly.

Furthermore, to support free content, I link in the sidebar a few of my favorite references: the Open Directory Project, (English) Wikipedia, and WWW Virtual Library.

Lastly, how about the latest Top 10 News Stories for the tech-savvy? I wish that I knew enough CSS to design a better layout. So far, my crude hacks predominantly favor a Firefox experience. Yes, I can appreciate the pains of a UI designer now.