Having the separate archives page and blogroll page are a big part of speeding up the load-times – that’s a metric buttload of database queries now removed from every other pageload because they are no longer in the sidebar (the main thing slowing load-time down now is the javascript in the ads).

Just from an aesthetic standpoint, I’m really liking the new site, and especially the new-new sidebars. Nice and clean looking. Well done!

- Search box – done.
- Previous/Next post navigation – now just below the post body as well as below the comments submission box.
- Archives page tweaked – it now shows a better list of the top tags than the default sidebar listing, plus a list of the 50 most recent posts, so that if you’re looking for something you read last week you can find it easily.

With the full archives page now enabled, we can remove the tag cloud in the sidebar, and I don’t think we need the category drop-down box there either, because it’s too wide for my sidebar (pout). I’ve added a bit of text below the search box to remind people that they can browse the archives.

* I’ll tweak the styling of the blockquotes to be a more distinctive break

* search box is an easy add

* so is a drop-down box for the categories (drop-down boxes not as accessible for some readers, but that’s why we now have the separate archives page)

* the current tag cloud template is the default settings – I’ll look into tweaking it.

* I’ll see about adding in an extra set of previous/next post navigation links at the end of the post before the comments start.

lia, re the feeds for individual comments threads – I’ve shifted all our feeds over to Feedburner, because a lot of the traffic that was throttling the blog was coming from bots spidering the feed. I hadn’t fully considered how that would bollix the single-thread comments feeds – I’ll see what I can do. I should also add in a subscribe-to-this-thread-by-email feature, because I remember a few folks liked that over at the back up blog.

As for nested comments, I find them personally to be aggravating. It makes it almost impossible to come back and pick up a discussion at a later time.

Could you keep the tag cloud but also add the old sk001 categories, maybe in a drop down, as mk suggested? I know some WP templates support using both.

And as mentioned, search function is a biggie.

Small point: is it possible to have a drop-down for categories? I totally know how annoying it is to get everything you want in the sidebars, but it would be nice to have a navigation option for categories as well as tabs.

Huzzah for the triumphant return!