beta test me!

[Darcy]

OK, so I've been hammering away on some new code and then going back through the available items on my site and bringing them up to speed. It's a much overdue tightening up to standards. I code it all by hand (I am a programmer) and want things to be as fast as they can go without layers of webbuilding junk in the way.

 

I'm making moves to more modern features which is going to break IE 5.5 support *probably* (Oh Barry please tell me it's gone now) but in general they are just for layout, fonts, and a new slide show engine.

 

Some presentation on my site has changed, the cheerful purple links at the beginning are now gone, I figure you guys know now there's a slideshow and can click the proper link on the right that says photos. Also it is now displayed by default at the end of the page.

 

I'm curious if the site is not working on anyone's system and version of their browser.

 

I have a magnificent Sai-jo blade to show by Bizen Kunimune, one of the three founding gents who so kindly made forges in Kamakura so that we could one day have marvelous Soshu swords. And it is a real beauty, described as a masterpiece by the NBTHK. So I basically wrote a book on the thing much my last last entry, and this one too as it was a very interesting blade to research and has some unusual aspects to its history. As always the NBTHK comments are translated and the sayagaki is translated so you can get the benefit of other experts opinions on these items and try to catch me BS-ing.

 

But I'd primarily like to see if you can break this page somehow, as I'm moving all over to this technology and this is the one that will stress it the most.

 

A good new feature is that there is a full-screen slideshow mode. I am keeping my handheld photos now in resolution of 2048 wide, which is good enough for a high def TV. If you go into full screen mode then you should get a screen sized display of the handhelds in your slideshow.

 

This is a very very pretty blade in almost original health, quite rare, so will give you something interesting to look at while you try to break my slideshow.

 

And if it breaks, just toss your info here and I will see what I can do about it. I only tested it out mostly on Firefox, Safari and Chrome (both of which have the same rendering engine).

 

anyway, have a look and enjoy. We've been working every time out on new photo techniques and technology and these are getting pretty good.

 

http://www.nihonto.ca/saburo-kunimune

 

This is not yet live on my site but it is a good educational read of one of the most important Kamakura smiths.

[Geraint]

Dear Darcy.

 

That is truly beautiful blade and a very informative article, not least because of the light it throws on the naginata/nagamaki issue.

 

I'm viewing it on Chrome and on your slideshow the only way of moving images is using the keyboard keys, the on screen icons don't function for me. Not sure if that's the kind of thing you needed to know......?

 

In any event thank you, that was a lovely start to my day.

 

All the best.

[zentsuji2]

Works well on my handheld Darcy, good clear pictures and zoom,

I love the history given on each sword you sell,it's excellent, i prey one day there is one in my budget.

Your site is an inspiration to beginners,the go Yoshihiro is stunning,as is the kunimune,sadly the sadakazu has sold.

Your site runs o.k so far on my phone,thanks for a great site,wonderful write ups,clear pictures.

Best regards. Ian bellis

[Marius]

Works beautifully on a MacBook Air, Mac OS X 10.9, Safari 7.0. Navigation in the slideshow easy with clearly visible arrows on both sides of each pic.

 

No problems on an iPhone 5s with iOS 7.

 

And what a sword

 

Quite a write-up, too :-)

 

Thanks Darcy

[Uechi]

Works great on my my computer with Windows XP. Now if I only had a lot of money hanging around, oh well nice to dream and drool.

 

JDromm

[cabowen]

Works on my mac firefox browser....Very nicely done!

 

Could you clarify this comment:

 

"The NBTHK writes that the habuchi is tight, which as above indicates the great degree of health of this blade."

[nihonto1001]

Awesome, as usual. Big fan of naoshi swords.

[nagamaki - Franco]

Windows 7, just fine.

[Jean]

Darcy,

 

Pictures are getting better and better, fantastic pictures. I wish I were in the States to have Ted picturing my swords :D

 

Edit to add, I cannot use the mouse with pictures, only keyboard arrows. Unable to go full screen by clicking on the icon "Full Screen"

 

I am using Chrome

 

I tried with IE and it works

[Gabriel L]

Safari 7.0.2 on OS X 10.9.2, the slideshow arrows did not seem to work on first load, but worked on reload. Perhaps it needed to buffer several (or all) images first? Works in Firefox, Chrome, & Opera, all up to date. Works on the most current iOS though the nav arrows are difficult to hit; might suggest enabling clicking the image to progress to the next one.

 

Everything else appears functional.

[Darcy]

I've had this slideshow be a bit sketchy in terms of the navigation buttons not working too. There are like 100 thumbnails (photos not finished yet, I had to give up last night and will finish this today) and I think that there is some interference with this gallery. So I'm going to probably put a note on it to reload if it seems stalled.

 

Could you clarify this comment:

 

"The NBTHK writes that the habuchi is tight, which as above indicates the great degree of health of this blade."

 

The as above refers back to this paragraph:

 

" Due to the age of the works he made, not many are left in good

condition, and those that have seen extensive polishing show a blurred

and whitish area in the habuchi which is a kantei point in works of

this smith. We can generally then estimate the preservation level of

his works by careful examination of the border between the hamon and

ji. The Nihonto Koza writes, the habuchi on healthy works of Kunimune

tend to be very lively and which make them popular among collectors."

 

 

This is somewhat counter-stated in the zufu:

 

" Also we see some cloudy parts along the nioi-guchi but which are thought to be intended and remnants of Kunimune´s characteristic feature, the hajimi."

 

So it would seem that whatever he is doing to produce the hajimi, is on purpose, but when you polish this down it degrades in clarity more than normally.

 

As far as I understand it.

[Rich S]

Darcy -

 

Runs fine on Firefox on Win 8.1.

 

Only two suggestions:

First, the sword in the background of the links page makes

the links hard to read.

 

Second, the email auto connects to Microsoft mail (which I don't have an account or use),

instead of allowing the user to use his/her own email software. (PS - I hate Javascript!)

 

Nicely done.

Rich S

[Darcy]

Darcy -

 

Runs fine on Firefox on Win 8.1.

 

Only two suggestions:

First, the sword in the background of the links page makes

the links hard to read.

 

Second, the email auto connects to Microsoft mail (which I don't have an account or use),

instead of allowing the user to use his/her own email software. (PS - I hate Javascript!)

 

Nicely done.

Rich S

 

Thanks Rich, that seems to be an old version getting turned on in the links page... somehow got turned on when I brought it up to date with current standards.

 

The thing about your mail program, that's a setting on your computer, you have your browser configured to open mail links in that manner. I have no control over that kind of thing, I just tell the browser to open a mail link when the user clicks that. You should be able to change it in your preferences to open mail links with the email software of your choice.

[Rich S]

Thanks Darcy, I found the mail option on Firefox and set it to use my Mozilla Thunderbird as my mailer.

Didn't see it in there before. Works fine now. Still learning to use Win 8.1 (so far it's ok, but I liked my

Win XP much better).

 

Rich S

[Darcy]

Darcy,

 

Pictures are getting better and better, fantastic pictures. I wish I were in the States to have Ted picturing my swords :D

 

 

He's good but not flying free yet! I am still tapping with the little hammer and doing the post production. We built a version of the rig down in Montana.

 

But the last set of results we got were really really good for the Kunimune, I think the best yet.

[seattle1]

Hello:

I'll leave the "beta test" challenge to the more computer literate among us, but congratulations (!) on the very educational and excellent post on the Saburo Kunimune nagamaki-naoshi. As one of our mutual Canadian friends once said, the nagamaki is the ultimate weapon of mass destruction, and what a beauty that blade is.

Arnold F.

[Jussi Ekholm]

Awesome sword, great writeup, as for beta testing part, the site works perfectly on my phone (Galaxy 2). Unfortunately I don't know my phones browser, but I have found out that many sites are not designed to work on mobile devices at least not with this one. However on your site everything worked like a charm.