In and around the country of Afghanistan, there have been 2,074 U.S. fatalities in theatre with another 36 deaths on our own soil from wounds sustained abroad. The war in Iraq has claimed twice that number, with a total of 4,486 men and women dying in service to their country. That means we have lost 6,596 of our own kin, and how many of those do you suppose the average American has heard about? How many made more of a stir than a brief sentence buried in the obituaries? And how many of you think that this perceived disinterest in the loss of our own is a disgrace not just to those who died but to the country itself? I know I do. At any given moment, there are just over 315 million people living in the United States. Assuming, for a moment, that one tenth of the population feels as I do, that means that there are still 283.5 million people in this country that don’t give a rats ass why they have the freedom to be ignorant, greedy, self-centered, arrogant assholes. Call me crazy, but that just doesn’t add up. By that standard (which, by the way, is the one number in this article which I can’t back up), for every American who has died on foreign soil in Operations Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom, there are 42,980 people who could care less. Personally, I find that to be one hell of a disservice.

On August 24th, 2007, our brothers to the north officially designated the stretch of Highway 401 which runs from CFB Trenton to Toronto the “Highway of Heroes” in honor of the service members who have died in support of a war that is not even their own. For each of these fallen heroes, citizens line the highway and gather on overpasses draped with their colors to pay their respects. Despite sub-zero temperatures and harsh weather, they show up without fail and unite in a day burdened with mixed emotion; mourning a loss and celebrating a life.

Those of you who know me well should know by now that I’ve bled for my country in the past and, if the opportunity arose, would gladly give my life for the ideals on which this nation stands. However, I also believe that our Canadian friends have something that this great nation sorely lacks: respect. Respect for those chosen few who are willing to pay the ultimate price for their country. I’m not suggesting that everyone should believe in the war. On the contrary, many of those who serve don’t like the war any more than you do. Rather, I’m suggesting that you should respect those who are willing to die for something that may not be popular at the moment. Without men and women willing to make those tough calls, you wouldn’t have the freedoms that you enjoy today. All too often, we put our lives on the line for our country only to become social outcasts when the government is through with us and that just isn’t right. So next time you run into a veteran, have enough courage to thank them for doing something you didn’t have the fortitude to do yourself. And next time you hear about one of our own falling in combat, at the very least show the respect that they have earned through a moment of silence.

The day I shipped out
They numbered a dozen
Upon my return
Were a hundred or so
From the coast and the prairies
I bet they keep coming
Add one more name from Ontario

Chorus:
Carry me home on the Highway of Heroes
People above with their flags flying low
Carry me softly down the Highway of Heroes
True Patriot Love, there was never more

I served with distinction
No visions of glory
I served without question of personal gain
Seek no justification, it's not part of my story
And it offers no comfort to the ones who remain

Chorus:
Carry me home on the Highway of Heroes
People above with their flags flying low
Carry me softly down the Highway of Heroes
True Patriot Love, there was never more

I took up my vocation
I was called by my nation
Without hesitation
My answer I gave
Now I am not wondering
The things that I might have been
Are no consolation to the forgotten brave

Chorus:
Carry me home on the Highway of Heroes
People above with their flags flying low
Carry me softly down the Highway of Heroes
True Patriot Love, there was never more

Historically, we have added extension options to the Misc settings tab through a simple filter on edd_settings_misc. My most recent contribution to EDD core is the addition of a new settings tab for extensions. What this means for all the devs out there is that instead of filtering edd_settings_misc, you should start filtering edd_settings_extensions for all your extension settings needs!

For those who don’t know, Pippin wrote an awesome plugin called Easy Digital Downloads which has quickly become the premiere solution for selling digital downloads through WordPress. Now… EDD has a dedicated support team (of which I am a member), and a recent support request has brought to my attention a glaring flaw in similar support programs from other plugins.

I’ve been working with a customer who has run into an issue where clicking on the link to any of his downloads results in the dreaded 404 error. This issue appeared quite recently and, as any user would, he immediately assumed it to be the fault of the plugin it affected. After going back and forth with him a few times, we determined that the issue wasn’t caused by EDD, but by another plugin which had been upgraded simultaneously with EDD.

So what’s the solution? I downloaded the offending plugin and threw it up on my EDD sandbox site to see if the issue was something that I could easily resolve for the customer. No such luck. Turns out, the plugin in question is improperly handling rewrite rules to the extent of invalidating rules created by other plugins. It’s also full of syntactical errors.

Well, this plugin is a fairly large-scale project with a dedicated support team… Time to take a quick trip to their forums and see if it’s a known issue with, dare I say it, a fix. A few moments of research reveals that the issue is known, and has been for some time. Not only that, but their staff never commented on it until a month ago when they stated that “it will be fixed in the x.x.x release.”

Guess what? We’re now on the x.x.x release and this ridiculous bug is still rearing its ugly head! Not only that, but the following is a (slightly redacted) quote from one of their support representatives to a user who had reported the bug after it was supposed to have been fixed:

The introduction of new features and increased complexity in vx.x.x may reveal bugs in other plugins (as the case here).
Please contact the plugin developer of [the other plugin] to find out if there is a bug in their code that is causing compatibility issues with the new technologies introduced by vx.x.x.

Another option is to contact our associated web development company to get [our plugin] customized to work with this plugin if you need it. They charge $120.00/ hour.

We are sorry for this inconvenience.

…wat?

I generally try to keep my posts fairly G-rated, but in this case I have to make an exception.

BULLSHIT!

Really!?? Your plugin has a known bug in it that is affecting users of multiple other plugins, and instead of taking responsibility for your own shoddy, haphazard code, you’re going to suggest that other devs adapt their code or users pay you to fix it?!? WTF???

At this point, the already non-existent faith I had in this particular company took a nose-dive straight into never-never-land. I’m beyond disgusted with them. Not only is their product a pile of crap (in my opinion at least) in the first place, their support staff is the most un-professional, ignorant, ass-backwards group of rejects I’ve had the displeasure to deal with in a very long time (Technically, I can only justifiably say that one of their employees falls into the “needs-to-be-taken-out-and-shot” category, but given my overall experience with the company has sucked, I’m going to assume they’re all that way until they prove me wrong).

Ladies and gentlemen, if a developer ever and I mean ever tells you that you should pay them to fix a bug in their own plugin (I’m not talking about changing how it works, adding features, etc), it’s time to move on. As fast as you can. Find another solution. Hire someone to write one. Do whatever you have to do, but a developer that wants you to pay them to fix a known bug is not the kind of person you want to be relying on. A bug that’s as glaringly devastating as the one in this incident can cripple a website, potentially causing massive amounts of lost revenue, and is definitely NOT the responsibility of anyone but the person whos shoddy code caused it.

/endrant

After a year and change of not going anywhere with what would otherwise be a great idea, Pippin Williamson commented to me a few days ago regarding the possibility of launching precisely what I’d been considering for ages! Needless to say, it absolutely made my day! Not only is the idea being realized, but it’s being developed by a well-known and respected member of the WordPress development community! To quote Pippin on the ideals behind this project…

This will not only be for themes and plugins; it will be for all WordPress projects, whether they be contributing to WordPress core, writing WordPress documentation for the codex or handbooks, writing new plugins, etc. For example, fund Developer Y to take a week off from his full time job and contribute to WordPress core. Or, fund Developer J to devote 20 hours out of her normal work week to improving the WordPress codex. Another example would be to fund Business X to produce an in-depth WordPress development course on a specific topic, perhaps advanced plugin development.

The entire idea is to better improve the entire WordPress ecosystem, whether that be WordPress core, plugins/themes on WordPress.org, the WordPress codex, tutorials hosted on individual’s sites, WordPress events, etc.

I’m not going to beat a dead horse, the merits of this project have already been brought up more than once by better writers who have a much wider reach than I do (see the article on WP Daily, for one). However, I thought that my little community needed to know about what I think has the potential to be the coolest project of the year. Want to know more? Read Pippin’s official announcement at the attribution link below!

So what’s the catch? The status page itself is generated by the API. Consider it a proof of concept, if you will. Or me just having a bit too much fun with a project. Whatever the case may be… it’s there, keep an eye on it, and don’t forget to follow me on Twitter if you aren’t already for more frequent updates!

Update! The initial release of the new EDD API is now on Github!