Googling Aikido Techniques / Site Redesign Oct 11, 2011

Aikido Waza Journal is coming up more and more in search results for aikido techniques and shihans. Google is even doing that cool auto-formatting they do to display the menu items of a site for quicker navigation (see below). The pending updates to the site have been in beta for a long time now. With the traffic that this site gets, as well as how often it comes up in search results, I will make it a priority again to relaunch the site for several media device formats.

Currently under consideration is what operating model to display videos that have been deleted or removed as all videos on this site are saved automatically.

Google: wazajournal

Google: doshu nikyo

Hombu Dojo’s Schedule On AWJ Jul 16, 2011

Update: 2011.07.21 – The schedule is now in English and Japanese.

Update: 2011.07.19 – There is an iPhone version of this schedule at http://wazajournal.com/hombu. Also, I’ve added annual events like exam days, mid-summer training days, and special events.

Hombu’s training schedule has been added to the main page of AWJ. It is updated every 30 minutes or so, and confirms the schedule well into the future. It uses three layers so visitors can filter schedule times by training floor. The calendar also keeps track of schedule changes such as last-minute teacher replacement. It was added because it is more convenient for at-a-glance reading than the official calendar. It can also be used to look back in time to see who was teaching in the past whereas that information is lost every day on the official calendar.

It is still in testing. If you notice a bug or mistake, please contact me via the comment form on any page. It uses heuristics to interpret the official schedule which may be prone to the occasional data entry gaffe. I hope this calendar is useful for some. Eventually it may be moved to another page on the journal. Enjoy.

-Eric Draken

Some Changes Jun 26, 2011

Yes, version 2 has been in beta for a long time. I know many people have been looking forward to the new version, and in this time I have been planning different server architecture, and an entirely different back-end using multiple database sources. Version 2 has mostly been a re-write of the search engine using beautiful dynamic page loads. However, the back-end architecture needs to be rebuilt as well to support a more robust contributor experience. That is the goal: to make the experience better for visitors and contributors, and to make the search engine smarter by using fuzzy searches.

Please be patient with me as life has turned upside down since moving back to Japan to train almost exclusively.

The only real change so far is the addition of a ‘todo’ category. This is used as a placeholder for research that an individual wants to do at at later time. This category is open to all contributors and can be used for complex todos, or even simple ones.

I’ve taken steps to make more development time available to me. This project goes on much like my training.

-Eric Draken

Status Update on WJ 2.0 Mar 01, 2011

WJ 2.0 has been in the works for months. I was about to release it at the end of 2010, but I had to completely relocate myself and re-setup my systems and machines. Time is precious these days, so I have been working on it a piece at a time. To make matters more interesting, the framework I am using just made another major update so I have to go back an do integration and penetration testing for all the modules again. It’s becoming a full-time job. Here is a preview of how it is coming.

WJ2.0 search system preview

WJ2.0 search results preview

Waza Journal 2.0 Nov 29, 2010

Hello Everyone,

Waza Journal 1.5 was scheduled to be released a couple weeks ago, but it was mainly upgrades and new features. I instead want to release version 2.0 which is a complete rewrite – this was planned for January or February, but I decided to push it for early release this year. The new 2.0 version will be something completely different and easier to use. This will take another few weeks but it progressing smoothly.

- Eric Draken

Aikido Waza Journal v1.5 Nov 01, 2010

Aikido Waza Journal version 1.5 with several enhancements and new features will be released this week. The most noticeable new feature will be the search system with its highly dynamic flexible query and display design. More details to follow.

Minor Update Sep 10, 2010

Videos in posts are automatically detected so you do not have to select the category ‘video’ any longer. If you later remove the video from your entry and save it, the ‘video’ category will be removed automatically as well.

This is a small update. There are a great many improvements pending testing, but this one was simple to add immediately. Enjoy.

New Category: Injury, Prevention and Care Aug 08, 2010

A new global category called “Injury, Prevention and Care” has been added. The goal is to learn from each other about how injuries happen, how to prevent them, and how to care for them once they occur. This doesn’t seem to be a well-documented area of Aikido training so let’s start something new together.

To go with this new theme, a new private category has been added called “Personal Health Record”. If you have an injury, you may privately document your progress healing, what you are doing to heal yourself, and what advice was given to you. For example, is acupuncture working, or is acupressure more effective for you? Does swimming help your shoulder injury? How is your blood pressure or weight this month? Things like this. The goal is to keep a personal health record so you can reflect back on it.

If you have advice for everyone else, instead please make the category Injury, Prevention and Care.

Archived Videos Aug 04, 2010

Hello, Journal Helper here.

I’ve backed-up most of the YouTube videos to our servers (several gigabytes), so if a video gets removed, a copy can be uploaded in its place. I will we backing up videos a few times a month, but it is still a good idea for YOU to save videos to your own hard disk before you post them. I recommend getting Firefox with the add-on called DownloadHelper. It lets you save high-quality videos that you may not even know YouTube has! If your video video gets removed before I have a chance to back it up, send me a message letting me know you have a copy if you really, really want to keep that video.

-WJH

Aikido Waza Journal Helper Aug 03, 2010

Hello, I am the Waza Journal Helper. My job is to archive embedded videos in case they get deleted, tag people in videos, clean up titles and fix category selections. In short, I am helping to keep the site clean and consistent for easy searching. Sometimes I have to modify your posts, but usually just tags and categories.

I cannot see private posts.

Just so you know, I will not modify spelling or terminology in your posts. It is still up to you to check these things yourself.

Keep up the great entry writing!

-WJH