Broken Links

Alva’s blue. Her links a broken. A couple of weeks ago she decided she needed a more sophisticated image evolved by professional web designers but to start the process she was asked to think of a new name to be used as her site address. Well, that was easy. She’d use the name of her subsidiary, eAlvaInk, and when the site was done, she’s switch back to Alva Press, Inc.

So the new Alva Press/eAlvaInk web site was built and Alva’s mentor (and owner) Roberta, liked it. The site had a light and area quality about it. The Alva Logo and the eAlvaInk Trademark both were displayed beautifully. The pages were coordinated in theme and the text was well set and read easily. So Roberta was ecstatic. Alva looked great!

And then Roberta went out on the net and lo and behold all the old links to two and a half years of three blog entries a week were broken. But that was not the worst of it. They were also housed at a separate site and because pointers had been used to tie them to the new eAlvaInk (really Alva) site, they not only were broken, there would be no simple way to repair them.

So here I am on tender-hooks as Web.Com and Register.Com discuss a trade and swap process that will bring all the sites, subsites, and links to one site under the name alvapressinc.com Except that Web.com is closed on weekends so we will not be able to figure it out until Monday so right now I’m just worried that my readers will think I have abandoned them or that they will abandon me. After all, what’s the sense of trying when every decent link you knew, whether for the alvapressinc/robertamroy, or the alvapressinc/writerpublishersweblog, or the alvapressinc/robertamroyonnuclearsurvival, is broken. (Which is why I started to blog here anyway.)

But this too shall pass, and come Tuesday at latest, expect to see all the old alvapressinc.com links working. But as for the new site, it is up for grabs as it is possible that despite its lovely appearance I may be forced to abandon it for my old register.com do-it-yourself site which–although I’d prefer its appearance to be a bit more sophisticated–at least works!

Roberta in Po-Town, Displaced

Not everybody works on Saturday

Saturday. No matter. In our efforts to better define ourselves, as usual, Alva and I continued our struggle with the elusive eWorld. Our challenge today was to get our new ‘professional’ web site up and looking good. Not that we have not tried before. Except for us, today took off with a running start from between three and seven a.m. at which time I finally fell asleep. Waking again at nine thirty, I dragged out of the house by half past ten– too late to prevent a ticket for wrong-side of the street parking.

Sick by then of even the thought of more time dedicated to proofing and repairing the Alva web site, I was happy to have figured out by break of day at least what the problem was. Snatching my ticket from the windshield, I hopped in the car and took off to run errands.

My first stop was Office Depot where I gave a wave to Herman, my favorite associate, and picked up a copy of the 2011 Quickbooks Accountant. From there it was to the post office to mail two certified letters containing rebate requests on a laptop I purchased last week for my son and his family. As neither of the pens on the counter worked, I borrowed one from the post mistress. Attached to its top was a large white rose–the cause of at least one benightedly knowing smile being observedly cast by a woman patron who pulled up to seal a letter across from me.

After the post office it was on to Dunkin’ Donuts. Sweets are not my thing in the morning, but they were out of biscuits and corn muffins so I indulged myself in some coffee cake. Then home again and back to the computer. And the web site.

By that time I had a strategy to address my broken link problem. First, I assumed that my past Do-It-Yourself website provider and my current Professional website provider wanted me happy–especially as one had recommended the other. And as it turned out, Amy was just as nice as everyone there had always been–but I think just because she is generally that way.

Amy is with my old web site provider and although she could not solve the problem she thought for sure that if she were to call my new provider on Monday that they could work it out and she would then call me to let me know in what way it had been resolved. If I could have reached through the phone, I’d have hugged her!

The reason I was so happy with this solution was that from the beginning, the problem had been two-fold with the first part being that it was a link between the two providers that was broken and the second being that I work on Monday while my current provider does not work on Saturday.

More anon,

Roberta in Po-town on the Hudson River in New York State