Hi there,
I use Mistylook theme as well and I’m trying to configure the random header image plugin that you use. But alas, I cannot seem to get it to work. Could you explain what you did to get yours to work?
It really wasn’t easy for me either, as I am no PHP geek. What you have to do is to discover what frame is the top banner. It is not the default in Misty, which is why I had to do some digging. I found it eventually.
There are 2 things you need to do:
1) Go to the Random Header menu in WP (Options, RH)
2) Change the Header ID to “headerimage” (no “”)
3) Remember to put the random images in a folder inside Misty’s directory (mine is /blog/wp-content/themes/mistylook-101/images/
This should be enough. If you want to change the size of the banner (as I did), you may want to take a look at the CSS file. This can easily be adjusted by doing this
1) Go to the admin in WP
2) Presentation
3) Theme Editor
4) Open Style.css
5) Find this:
this is great, just what I was looking for. But I cannot seem to get it working- the plugin shows up and the images are loading in the RH area but no header is showing on the site. I made everything the same as you except the size.
my images are here; wp-content/themes/mistylook-101/images/
and I added your headerid
but I have a feeling that the CSS needs to reflect this-
background: #fff url(img/misty.jpg) no-repeat 0 0;
when I deleted the misty.jpg image there was no header image. theme is stock- no mods.
Only think that comes to mind, could be that you have to disable all images again in RH options and add them again afterwards. I think did the same, but I am not quite sure. I think RH looks for the pictures in the old DIR, but keeps a thumbnail. This makes it look like the path are still remembered by RH, but the truth is that it does not.
You should keep in mind, that I used RH before changing to Misty. So after installing MistyLook the pictures was still there, but not working. I am not sure this is a solution, but keep it in mind if you changed theme after enabeling RH too.
You should go all the way and install FireStats too. The IP2Country flag will be installed together with FireStats, and FireStats really is a cool tool too.
It’s a rip of my plugin. Both the dir and the file should be placed in your blogdir/wp-content/plugins as they are. Don’t know if it works, but think so.
Even if the images are in the list, I think you should make sure to use the path I wrote. I am pretty sure they need to be placed inside the dir of the theme that you use. I tried something like it earlier. After changing to Misty, but keeping RandomHeader installed I could pick the images from the plugin admin panel, but couldn’t see them change. So I moved the pictures to this path:
/blog/wp-content/themes/mistylook-101/images/
….then it worked. I am not sure it will solve your problem though. But may be worth a try.
FYI: Seems that the newer versions of Mistylook doesn’t work with Random header. Not exactly sure why. Trying to find another plugin that does instead.
Hi. Been reading your blog. Very interesting reading. Just wanted to know, how you and C started writing letters to each other. Was it through internet you met? Pen pals? etc….
I recently went to Hong Kong for a vacation, and visited Shenzhen too, where I meet a girl.
C and I met through a contact agency. C was dragged into it by a colleague and I still have no certain clue to how I ended up there besides using the ingredients, wine, internet, and too much time. It was a fly-by-surf that somehow ended me up having a profile. Still happy I did, and C seems to be too, but who knows what women thinks anyway :-) Married for 6½ year now, and have 2 kids. So something must have been done right.
Let me know how it works out with you and your girl. Distance relationships can be killer.
I’ve been back in the UK now for a month. Me and H (my lady friend) have still been in contact with each other, through telephone and voice messages on mobile smartphone’s.
(I should mention I’m a BBC, British Born Chinese. H speaks Mandarin and Cantonese. Where as I speak naturally English, and some Cantonese, not the greatest Cantonese but she understands it)
Anyway. I read through one of your blog’s that you both had difficulties with the language barrier to start off with. But how did you both improve on the language communication? I understood you had a pocket translator to hand, but did C have any English/Danish lessons, and you Chinese lessons?
The reason I ask is because you and C are now married, and I take it C is living with you in Denmark? Is C totally independent from you.? I mean, can she go to the shops and ask for something in English/Danish? Can she go to the doctors without you being there to translate to the doctor? Can she go pick up the kids from school/nursery? etc…… I mean is she totally reliant on you doing things for her?
Because I have a friend in the UK, who’s married to a Mainland Chinese girl. She moved over here, and they have 2 kids. But she doesn’t speak any English. He’s finding it hard to joggle work. Pick the kids up from school/nursery. Take her shopping etc…..
As I wrote yesterday, I’ve had some busy days recently not being much home. I think your questions justify a thorough reply, so wouldn’t waste your time with 2 lines. But here we go. :-)
First of all, I should mention that when I met C in Shenzhen, all we had was a human interpreter rented by day. The first 2 days, we couldn’t do without her, but C dragged me to a few stores the 3rd day or so, looking for an electronic translator. How she got the idea, I don’t really know, but it turned out to be worth it even though it seemed pricey at the time (round 220£). It helped us through the 2 weeks I was there even though it was error prone and we mainly used it for short sentences. Longer sentences usually got messed up by the translator (most new Android phones + iPhones? has translation software in the app store nowadays, and that works as well as what we had back then). In the end we fumbled our way through with a mix of the translator, the Chinese I picked up and the English I taught C. As you may guess, it was full of mistakes and misunderstandings, but we managed with a good sense of humour and self irony.
I’d say that you’re getting an easier start than we do, you being able to understand and speak some Cantonese. This may also be your biggest challenge later, which I’d better elaborate:
I’ve met many Danish-Chinese couples here, and the ones learning a new language fastest, are the ones that’s “forced to learn” it. C for example, spoke nearly no English when I met her. I didn’t learn enough Chinese to get by either, so that urged us to get by mixing English, Chinese and Danish (as she learned it gradually). I was also persistent that she learned Danish, and she was a good student, even though her schooling in China was average. What she miss in education, she outweigh with diligence. Denmark has a free Danish school programme that we took advantage of. It took about 1.3 year or so (can’t remember exactly) for her to pass all exams. It was hard work for her and me too by the way. We had some fights along the way, because I was wasted from work when she needed me to help her out with homework in the evenings. But she managed and was even told by her teacher, that she was the one making the biggest “jump” of all in the class. So I was proud of her.
In the end I never took Chinese lessons (they are not available here close to where we live anyway), but it turned out not to be necessary (nor wise) in the end. C now speaks Danish well enough to get by without my presence and we only speak Danish now at home. She speaks Chinese to our kids, to teach them to understand Mandarin.
I’d advice you to try to take same route (not learn, nor speak too much Cantonese), since it potentially could slow down or even halt your girlfriend’s English level and leaning your primary language is essential if you want to live in England. Well that’s if you ask me.
I’ve seen it with many Chinese-Danish couples here. If the Chinese part speaks English from the start, you both have a tendency to speak English, because it makes things flow in daily life, thus putting a brake on learning Danish. So in your situation, I’d urge your GF to learn English and you to start speaking that around her as much as possible. She won’t forget her Cantonese, and she’ll probably speak that with her future Chinese friends in UK anyway.
Speaking the native language is the door to learning the new culture and integrating in a new country. Personally I feel it’s my duty to help C to a level where she’ll be able to manage on her own if I somehow pass away too early or we should be divorced (god forbid). We have two kids, so indirectly we owe it to them too.
I think many people bring a foreigner to their country and get a shock when they find out how much work it can be. There’s still stuff I have to do after all these years. Sometimes it’s because I know the rules and customs better and it’s a rare task not worth C’s time. But sometimes it’s just plain necessary, like filling out my part of the papers to prolong C’s residence permit. It truly never ends with the extra work, when you choose to make love difficult like I (we) have :-)
So, I think you can guess that C can handle herself shopping, fetching the kids from day-care and at the doctors and so on. Sometimes there’s stuff she don’t understand and come home to ask me to make sure. She even got herself an education as a caretaker of old folks, which was hard toiling through the school. But it is well worth it. Besides upping our income, it also gives her a sense of contributing to our family and helps her integrate generally. She also took drivers exam recently so now she can manage even more tasks by herself without having me to drive her or take a slow bus.
The friend you write about, who has a mainland girl not speaking English, has made a mistake in my view. I don’t know the circumstances, nor how easy/hard it is to be Chinese in England, so I may be in the wrong, but from my experiences that will keep her enclosed to the Chinese society in England. She might have many Chinese friends, but may never learn how the English think, nor why her husband may do or say “odd” things (in her view). Also, as you write, he will be pretty busy taking care of many practical things that she could have helped with if she spoke English. So he’ll be punished for that choice and so will she probably in a way. I hope he’s a bundle of energy :-) I suspect that it might give them problems along the way, but then again, I don’t know their situation. Maybe it works out well for them.
Thanks for the reply. Its good reading your opinions and thoughts, really constructive.
Well I wouldn’t say H is my GF at the moment, we only met a few times when I was visiting Shenzhen. I’d say more like two people getting to know each other better, like dating, but long distance dating (if you get what I mean?)
Anyway we’ll see how this relationship develops through time.
Hi there,
I use Mistylook theme as well and I’m trying to configure the random header image plugin that you use. But alas, I cannot seem to get it to work. Could you explain what you did to get yours to work?
Thanks alot;
Adrian
Hi Adrian,
Tnx for dropping by and happy to help.
It really wasn’t easy for me either, as I am no PHP geek. What you have to do is to discover what frame is the top banner. It is not the default in Misty, which is why I had to do some digging. I found it eventually.
There are 2 things you need to do:
1) Go to the Random Header menu in WP (Options, RH)
2) Change the Header ID to “headerimage” (no “”)
3) Remember to put the random images in a folder inside Misty’s directory (mine is /blog/wp-content/themes/mistylook-101/images/
This should be enough. If you want to change the size of the banner (as I did), you may want to take a look at the CSS file. This can easily be adjusted by doing this
1) Go to the admin in WP
2) Presentation
3) Theme Editor
4) Open Style.css
5) Find this:
6) Now adjust the height: 200px to the wanted height of your banner. Mine is set to 100 now.
This should be enough.
Hope it works, or feel free to contact me again.
Yup, got it working.
Misty Look is a great theme, although it is coded a little differently than others. Thanks for the tip;
this is great, just what I was looking for. But I cannot seem to get it working- the plugin shows up and the images are loading in the RH area but no header is showing on the site. I made everything the same as you except the size.
my images are here; wp-content/themes/mistylook-101/images/
and I added your headerid
but I have a feeling that the CSS needs to reflect this-
background: #fff url(img/misty.jpg) no-repeat 0 0;
when I deleted the misty.jpg image there was no header image. theme is stock- no mods.
any help?
Hi Erik,
Tnx for dropping by. Sorry for the slow reply, but your comment was caught by Akismet somehow.
Sounds strange. My CSS has the same and works with no problem:
background: #fff url(img/misty.jpg) no-repeat 0 0;
I think the problem must be elsewhere.
Only think that comes to mind, could be that you have to disable all images again in RH options and add them again afterwards. I think did the same, but I am not quite sure. I think RH looks for the pictures in the old DIR, but keeps a thumbnail. This makes it look like the path are still remembered by RH, but the truth is that it does not.
You should keep in mind, that I used RH before changing to Misty. So after installing MistyLook the pictures was still there, but not working. I am not sure this is a solution, but keep it in mind if you changed theme after enabeling RH too.
Let me know it it works. Good luck.
it got caught by the “f o r e *” in the url- figured out what it is,
yahoo hosting doesnt seem to have the php module installed- because rotate.php script gives an “image error”
but thanks for your help!
Peter, welcome to InterAalborg :o) http://interaalborg.dk/blogs.htm You’re blog is number one! Keep up the good job
Tnx Caros.
Saw the referer in my FireStats list the other day. Funny to get a link from Aalborg :-)
I better repay with a link to Inter Aalborg.
Hi Peter.
I was wondering how you make WP show the little flag icons i the comments?
Is it a plugin.
I recently wrote about making an IP location script at my blog: http://wp.8deg.com/2007/02/19/lab-hvor-kommer-du-fra/
Mads.
I just found it (http://firestats.cc/wiki/EasyIP2Country), sorry.
Hi Mads,
Np :-)
You should go all the way and install FireStats too. The IP2Country flag will be installed together with FireStats, and FireStats really is a cool tool too.
Wow, cool i found someone who did the randomheader in mistylook running…
but the small problem left for me, is that the link of your plugin in your plugin section doesn’t work anymore…
Can u tell me where to find that plugin?
Hi Timo,
Tnx for dropping by.
I can’t get the link to work either. I guess the author stopped supporting or something.
I am not sure this will help you, but try this:
Randomheader zipped
It’s a rip of my plugin. Both the dir and the file should be placed in your blogdir/wp-content/plugins as they are. Don’t know if it works, but think so.
Let me know if it works. :-)
Hi Peter,
Thx for that quick answer and your help. The Admin of the Plugin does work quite nice! All fine, but without a result to the page… Donno what it is.
I can add the images out of the theme/images Folder and they are in the list, I changed the ID of the Header to “headerimage” but nothing happens…
Still got an idea?
Thx for your comment on my blog too :)
Hmm… Thats a tricky one.
Even if the images are in the list, I think you should make sure to use the path I wrote. I am pretty sure they need to be placed inside the dir of the theme that you use. I tried something like it earlier. After changing to Misty, but keeping RandomHeader installed I could pick the images from the plugin admin panel, but couldn’t see them change. So I moved the pictures to this path:
/blog/wp-content/themes/mistylook-101/images/
….then it worked. I am not sure it will solve your problem though. But may be worth a try.
Well, just like i did they are at
blog/wp-content/themes/mistylook-101/images/
How do u call them? Does it matter?
did u change anything else – in the header.php oder the css?
I named all the pictures 01.jpg, 02.jpg, 03.jpg and so on.
Style.css: I fiddled a bit with some text colors, but thats way later than this. Besides that I only made the written changes.
My header looks like this if thats any help.
I don’t recall doing anything else besides the google thingey, but not entirely sure. It’s been a while since :-)
Oh, btw: I sent an email for the author of the plugin, to hear whats up with RandomHeaders future. Hope he answers that it’s just temporarily down.
Btw, the author didn’t answer my email. Guess he has dropped the developement.
FYI: Seems that the newer versions of Mistylook doesn’t work with Random header. Not exactly sure why. Trying to find another plugin that does instead.
Hi. Been reading your blog. Very interesting reading. Just wanted to know, how you and C started writing letters to each other. Was it through internet you met? Pen pals? etc….
I recently went to Hong Kong for a vacation, and visited Shenzhen too, where I meet a girl.
Hi Jim,
Thanks for dropping by here.
C and I met through a contact agency. C was dragged into it by a colleague and I still have no certain clue to how I ended up there besides using the ingredients, wine, internet, and too much time. It was a fly-by-surf that somehow ended me up having a profile. Still happy I did, and C seems to be too, but who knows what women thinks anyway :-) Married for 6½ year now, and have 2 kids. So something must have been done right.
Let me know how it works out with you and your girl. Distance relationships can be killer.
Cheers
Hi Peter,
I’ve been back in the UK now for a month. Me and H (my lady friend) have still been in contact with each other, through telephone and voice messages on mobile smartphone’s.
(I should mention I’m a BBC, British Born Chinese. H speaks Mandarin and Cantonese. Where as I speak naturally English, and some Cantonese, not the greatest Cantonese but she understands it)
Anyway. I read through one of your blog’s that you both had difficulties with the language barrier to start off with. But how did you both improve on the language communication? I understood you had a pocket translator to hand, but did C have any English/Danish lessons, and you Chinese lessons?
The reason I ask is because you and C are now married, and I take it C is living with you in Denmark? Is C totally independent from you.? I mean, can she go to the shops and ask for something in English/Danish? Can she go to the doctors without you being there to translate to the doctor? Can she go pick up the kids from school/nursery? etc…… I mean is she totally reliant on you doing things for her?
Because I have a friend in the UK, who’s married to a Mainland Chinese girl. She moved over here, and they have 2 kids. But she doesn’t speak any English. He’s finding it hard to joggle work. Pick the kids up from school/nursery. Take her shopping etc…..
Your thoughts and input would be great.
Thanks.
Jim
Hi Peter,
Forgot to say thanks for replying back to me with my earlier post.
Thanks
Jim
Hi Jim,
Sorry for not replying yet. Way behind on everything these days. Will get back to answering when I get a minute.
Peter
Hi again,
As I wrote yesterday, I’ve had some busy days recently not being much home. I think your questions justify a thorough reply, so wouldn’t waste your time with 2 lines. But here we go. :-)
First of all, I should mention that when I met C in Shenzhen, all we had was a human interpreter rented by day. The first 2 days, we couldn’t do without her, but C dragged me to a few stores the 3rd day or so, looking for an electronic translator. How she got the idea, I don’t really know, but it turned out to be worth it even though it seemed pricey at the time (round 220£). It helped us through the 2 weeks I was there even though it was error prone and we mainly used it for short sentences. Longer sentences usually got messed up by the translator (most new Android phones + iPhones? has translation software in the app store nowadays, and that works as well as what we had back then). In the end we fumbled our way through with a mix of the translator, the Chinese I picked up and the English I taught C. As you may guess, it was full of mistakes and misunderstandings, but we managed with a good sense of humour and self irony.
I’d say that you’re getting an easier start than we do, you being able to understand and speak some Cantonese. This may also be your biggest challenge later, which I’d better elaborate:
I’ve met many Danish-Chinese couples here, and the ones learning a new language fastest, are the ones that’s “forced to learn” it. C for example, spoke nearly no English when I met her. I didn’t learn enough Chinese to get by either, so that urged us to get by mixing English, Chinese and Danish (as she learned it gradually). I was also persistent that she learned Danish, and she was a good student, even though her schooling in China was average. What she miss in education, she outweigh with diligence. Denmark has a free Danish school programme that we took advantage of. It took about 1.3 year or so (can’t remember exactly) for her to pass all exams. It was hard work for her and me too by the way. We had some fights along the way, because I was wasted from work when she needed me to help her out with homework in the evenings. But she managed and was even told by her teacher, that she was the one making the biggest “jump” of all in the class. So I was proud of her.
In the end I never took Chinese lessons (they are not available here close to where we live anyway), but it turned out not to be necessary (nor wise) in the end. C now speaks Danish well enough to get by without my presence and we only speak Danish now at home. She speaks Chinese to our kids, to teach them to understand Mandarin.
I’d advice you to try to take same route (not learn, nor speak too much Cantonese), since it potentially could slow down or even halt your girlfriend’s English level and leaning your primary language is essential if you want to live in England. Well that’s if you ask me.
I’ve seen it with many Chinese-Danish couples here. If the Chinese part speaks English from the start, you both have a tendency to speak English, because it makes things flow in daily life, thus putting a brake on learning Danish. So in your situation, I’d urge your GF to learn English and you to start speaking that around her as much as possible. She won’t forget her Cantonese, and she’ll probably speak that with her future Chinese friends in UK anyway.
Speaking the native language is the door to learning the new culture and integrating in a new country. Personally I feel it’s my duty to help C to a level where she’ll be able to manage on her own if I somehow pass away too early or we should be divorced (god forbid). We have two kids, so indirectly we owe it to them too.
I think many people bring a foreigner to their country and get a shock when they find out how much work it can be. There’s still stuff I have to do after all these years. Sometimes it’s because I know the rules and customs better and it’s a rare task not worth C’s time. But sometimes it’s just plain necessary, like filling out my part of the papers to prolong C’s residence permit. It truly never ends with the extra work, when you choose to make love difficult like I (we) have :-)
So, I think you can guess that C can handle herself shopping, fetching the kids from day-care and at the doctors and so on. Sometimes there’s stuff she don’t understand and come home to ask me to make sure. She even got herself an education as a caretaker of old folks, which was hard toiling through the school. But it is well worth it. Besides upping our income, it also gives her a sense of contributing to our family and helps her integrate generally. She also took drivers exam recently so now she can manage even more tasks by herself without having me to drive her or take a slow bus.
The friend you write about, who has a mainland girl not speaking English, has made a mistake in my view. I don’t know the circumstances, nor how easy/hard it is to be Chinese in England, so I may be in the wrong, but from my experiences that will keep her enclosed to the Chinese society in England. She might have many Chinese friends, but may never learn how the English think, nor why her husband may do or say “odd” things (in her view). Also, as you write, he will be pretty busy taking care of many practical things that she could have helped with if she spoke English. So he’ll be punished for that choice and so will she probably in a way. I hope he’s a bundle of energy :-) I suspect that it might give them problems along the way, but then again, I don’t know their situation. Maybe it works out well for them.
Cheers
Peter
Hi Peter,
Thanks for the reply. Its good reading your opinions and thoughts, really constructive.
Well I wouldn’t say H is my GF at the moment, we only met a few times when I was visiting Shenzhen. I’d say more like two people getting to know each other better, like dating, but long distance dating (if you get what I mean?)
Anyway we’ll see how this relationship develops through time.
Thanks for your advice and thoughts.
Jim