In the words of the dead you were never among

[sovay]

Can anyone advise me on the process of going through past entries on DW/LJ and tagging them? I've avoided the use of tags for years because I didn't see any use for it, but now that I've built up a backlog of reviews to which I wish to be able to refer, I'm beginning to think it might be useful to the reader. I didn't start crossposting from Dreamwidth until November 2013, so I'm guessing I won't be able to link a lot of my older writing about film, but at least the Patreon stuff should be covered. In other social media news, LJ Support has not gotten back to me at all about the HTML issues with my current journal style; I am going to have to make myself change it for something newer and I am sad about that. It's been more than two weeks. I miss my icons.

I meant to post this last week and lost it in the insomnia: astronomy applied to Sappho fr. Adesp. 976. I have translated that fragment myself; it's famous. I like the idea of knowing what time of year it was written.

Comments

[the_rck]

I have found that the crossposter from DW to LJ will not update LJ if the change to the entry is only in the tags. Beyond that, I don't know anything useful.

[sovay]

I have found that the crossposter from DW to LJ will not update LJ if the change to the entry is only in the tags.

That's very specifically unhelpful! Thanks for warning me in advance, though, before I expected an import to save me any time.

[the_rck]

The cross poster is not very smart, so you can get it to work with a null edit like adding and deleting a letter, a space, or a return. If you do that, it will cross post the tags as well.

[sovay]

The cross poster is not very smart, so you can get it to work with a null edit like adding and deleting a letter, a space, or a return.

Heh. Thanks!

[thistleingrey]

Makes sense--it's a metadata update, not a database one. WordPress works similarly, though the code base is different.

[nineweaving.livejournal.com]

Pleiades! O my!

Nine

[sovay]

Pleiades! O my!

Now you know!

[lisefrac.livejournal.com]

I started using LJ in 2003 (!) but I wasn't reliably using tags until recently, so I have lots and lots of "buried" content I'd like to dig up again. But using the default tools, re-tagging entries is a strictly manual process; you have to repeat it individually for every single one.

If you find a better solution, I'd love to hear it; I've literally considered hiring someone to go through and retag my old entries for me, because the thought of doing it myself is about as appealing as self-dentistry.

[sovay]

But using the default tools, re-tagging entries is a strictly manual process; you have to repeat it individually for every single one.

Yikes. Thanks for the heads-up. If I tag entries on LJ, will they import to Dreamwidth? Can I tag on Dreamwidth and have them save to LJ?

If you find a better solution, I'd love to hear it; I've literally considered hiring someone to go through and retag my old entries for me, because the thought of doing it myself is about as appealing as self-dentistry.

It sounds intensive, yes.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

When I've wanted to find something in one of your reviews that's more than a few days ago, I've searched for it using LJ's search function on your journal. You may be able to use that to locate all reviews that you've used a term in ("noir" or an actor or director name). That doesn't cut down much work, though....

[sovay]

You may be able to use that to locate all reviews that you've used a term in ("noir" or an actor or director name). That doesn't cut down much work, though....

I can actually find almost anything I've written about in the last dozen years because I have offline copies of all my posts—that's not the issue! I just feel like it might not hurt to have my Patreon posts searchable by actor or director or genre or some other quality like queerness or the sea and right now that's not possible for anyone who isn't me. I have really no idea how to tag entries and make sure they'll work on both sides of the crossposting divide. I've never used them in my life.

[moon-custafer.livejournal.com]

This is probably not detailed enough to be helpful, but when I created a Dreamwidth account I was able to upload all my previously-created LJ content, including tags, and I believe it can be updated; so if you can at least add tags to old LJ entries once, you might be able to add them to Dreamwidth without having to do all the work over again.

[sovay]

so if you can at least add tags to old LJ entries once, you might be able to add them to Dreamwidth without having to do all the work over again.

That's actually quite helpful, since one of my concerns about the process was exactly this question, so thank you!