Fanfiction – Nodoka’s Daughter

Posted on 2008-02-15 by Stephan Sokolow

Nodoka’s Daughter (alt) by James Lee

Length: 4 Chapters, Complete
Sources: Ranma ½, Sailor Moon
Rating: 4/5

Ever wonder what a little amnesia might do to Ranma and Nodoka’s meeting? Well “Nodoka’s Daughter” by James Lee can show you… and it’s complete! It’s also one of those things that you probably wouldn’t have found otherwise. It’s not on Fanfiction.net and the author’s site was/is on anifics.com. (For those who are unaware, the administrator still hasn’t had time to properly restore the hosted sites)

What I like most about this fic is it’s simple charm. It doesn’t try any fancy excuses to reinterpret Nodoka’s behaviour, it doesn’t delve into the less pleasant aspects of amnesia-related identity issues… and yet it doesn’t feel wrong either. In a way, I suppose you could say that it works because it’s a “1990s style” fanfic. Something with the flavor that seemed to characterize rec.arts.anime.creative and the FFML.

Anyway, it’s has the occasional typo, and the color scheme is a pain, but if you use Firefox’s View –> Page Style –> No Style option (or an appropriate bookmarklet), then it makes for a very nice read. Four nice long chapters… but not too long. I always love finding stories where the author hasn’t tried to drag things out forever.

Oh, I’d like to apologize for the poor quality of this review. I’m tired, I’m sick, and this fic isn’t easy to summarize… but I thought a poor review would be better than none… especially with how busy I am lately.

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Fanfiction – The Other

Posted on 2008-02-13 by Stephan Sokolow

The Other by JoeHundredaire

Length: 9 Chapters, Ongoing
Sources: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Rating: 3.5/5

Ok, Xander gets a different costume at Ethan Rayne’s shop. That’s fairly cliché. Physical traits linger after the whole thing is done. Also common. Xander discovers that he’s now a girl because the costume was too androgynous for him to notice…? First time I’ve seen that. Admittedly, I don’t read much Buffy fanfiction, but I have it on good authority that this kind of combination is almost unheard of.

Anyway, in “The Other”, Xander accidentally picks up a Spider-Girl costume thinking that it’s a Spider-Man costume. When the spell is broken, he’s left with the body (more or less)… including both of the main differences from his original one. (spider-powers and femininity… wouldn’t want you to over-think that like I might) Let the fun ensue.

I also love the somewhat fresh twist on the resulting character interactions. For example:

“Are you doing stuff to yourself?” Xander looked into the mirror to glance back over his shoulder. Willow had cracked the door open while he was occupied and was poking her head through. “Because when I agreed to help you learn basic girl stuff, THAT wasn’t part of it.”

Using one arm to cover his chest, Xander turned to face Willow. “Don’t worry, we’re staying PG here. Guys who turn into girls and then get all nasty and naughty? That’s the kind of thing that only happens in those stories you have bookmarked on your computer.”

I also got quite a kick out of Xander ditching buffy during clothing shopping by pointing out a potential vampire in Hot Topic. I’m not going to spoil the surprise in chapter 7, but I will say that it’s interesting. I also like the new excuse for certain cases of Xander acting “girly”.

What was wrong with her? Was this a girl thing? Or just a repressed Xander thing that was coming out now because she actually had choices to make instead of being stuck with whatever scraps life handed her?

Unfortunately, while the originality merits a 4.5 in the context of the source series and, when it’s around, the humor gets a 4, the rest gets a 3.5 because, while the grammar is good, the writing feels monotonous. Sort of like writing an excellent script for a drama or love story, but then trying to compete with modern movies using a faded, sepia-tone film. I’m not entirely certain, but I think the problem is a variant of “show, don’t tell”.

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Real Jackalopes – Shope Papillomavirus

Posted on 2008-02-13 by Stephan Sokolow

Pictures of real jackalopes: Rabbits infected with the Shope papillomavirus (Dead link)

Shope Papillomavirus @ Wikipedia

Quite the plausible explanation for the origin of the Jackalope myth, wouldn’t you say?

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MoinMoin as a plain old CMS

Posted on 2008-02-13 by Stephan Sokolow

Just a quick summary of the most expedient way to use MoinMoin as a content management sysyem, as I currently used to do for www.ssokolow.com. This is primarily about the parts which are less useful for Wikis, so visit the MoinMoin site for things like non-default themes.

# Set these in wikiconfig.py

sitename = u"Your site's name here"
theme_default = 'rightsidebar'
theme_force = True

page_front_page = u"SiteContents"
language_default = 'en'
language_ignore_browser = True

acl_rights_before = u"YourUserName:read,write,delete,revert,admin"
acl_rights_default = u"All:read"

html_head = ''
logo_string = u'YourSite.com Logo'
page_footer2 = """Google Analytics Code Here"""

page_credits = ["this sets the",
 "credits like 'Valid HTML'", "in the footer"]

navi_bar = [
    u'%(page_front_page)s',
    u'RecentChanges',
    u'FindPage',
    u'ContactMe',
    u'OtherPageYouWant',
    u'AndSoOn',
]

…and then delete pages in the underlay which you don’t need. You can use the WantedPages page to figure out what needs to be edited to no longer refer to them.

To change the name of the sidebar’s top section from “Wiki” to “Site”, copy rightsidebar.py to data/plugin/theme and edit line 23. (Before you edit, it should look as follows)

    u'<h1>%s</h1>' % _("Wiki"),

The Project Wonderful ads are a little more involved, but it looks sort of like this: (again, in rightsidebar.py)

    def header(self, d):
        . . .
        self.userpanel(d),
        """<div class="sidepanel"><h1>Ads</h1>
            <!-- Begin Project Wonderful ad code: -->
            . . .
            <!-- End Project Wonderful ad code. -->
            </div>""",
        u'</div>',

Of course, keep in mind that this is Python code and make a backup if you aren’t familiar with the syntax.

Finally, to embed bits of HTML into pages like I did for the ContactMe page, make sure that only trustworthy people have edit privileges and then install the raw parser.

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Interesting Tech Blogs

Posted on 2008-02-13 by Stephan Sokolow

I finally got around to switching my main site (www.ssokolow.com) over to a decent web host (the new look still isn’t ready, but I decided to make a little change anyway) and, in the process, I added some ads to pay for it. Nothing annoying and the space wasn’t being used anyway.

However, while I was doing so, I encountered a rather nice bonus. Some of the ads were for really nifty blogs. Here are the links since, last I checked, they’d been outbid by less interesting stuff:

It’s not easy to get someone as prone to procrastination as I am to subscribe to an RSS feed, but I’m considering it for these three.

Update: Possibly in response to StumbleUpon driving a bunch of people to this post, another interesting ad showed up and immediately got outbid: Technically Easy (A blog composed almost entirely of computer-related “how to” articles)

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Cheat Sheet – mod_rewrite

Posted on 2008-02-12 by Stephan Sokolow

mod_rewrite Cheat Sheet

…because, for voodoo like mod_rewrite, we need every advantage we can get.

I have linked to this before but there have been so many changes to my blog since then that I figured it’d be a good idea to mention it now that people actually read my blog for more than just the fanfiction reviews category.

UPDATE 2017-01-02: If you need something that explains in more detail at the expense of being less printable, this article may be more to your liking.

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Fanfiction – Willow Destine

Posted on 2008-02-11 by Stephan Sokolow

Willow Destine by Wispr

Length: 24 Chapters (as FanFiction.net counts them. Some contain multiple declared chapters)
Sources: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Gargoyles
Rating: 4.5/5

Well, I was feeling too sick to do something that required deep thought, so here’s a review of “Willow Destine” as mentioned in my review of Willow the Gargoyle. Please excuse any reduction in quality. I don’t think well when I’m sick.

Anyway, when I compare these two stories, the main differences I see are that this one takes a more serious tone and has many more grammatical errors. The two stories share quite a few plot points in the beginning, but given the knowledge I have as a beta, I can say that they will diverge soon.

They both feature Willow getting part of her costume from Ethan’s shop, turning into Demona/Dominique, and then keeping the form (with a few changes) when the spell is broken and they also both feature Dominique arranging to adopt Willow. However, the approach to this differs with this story taking a more realistic but less pleasant route.

However, I feel that, in spite of the unpleasant nature of Dominique’s actions in this fic, I have to admit that, both in those actions and in her general character, she feels more realistic in this story. I suppose part of the problem is that you can’t really capture Demona without showing off a few of the skeletons in her closet.

Anyway, the story is a very enjoyable read. Aside from the grammatical errors, my only real complaint is the use of baddies from Stargate: SG-1 (beginning in the most recent chapter) when ones from a more compatible series could have been used just as easily. It leaves a bad taste in my mouth to imply a secondary “gimmick” for the story. (In this case, that BtVS magic and Gargoyles exist in the same verse as Stargate)

Of course, the rarest pleasure to this story is probably that “Willow the Gargoyle” exists. It’s rare for me to find two plots which start from the same basic stuff but then use different presentational tones. 🙂

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