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Just finishing off work, on Gluon, to allow pinning of the discover emoji, so it’s easy to get back to your favourite ones on the discover timeline.

Happy Friday/weekend everyone. There is a new build out on iOS TestFlight for both fast-track and slow-track.

Now that my brain had the chance to let go of some steam by releasing Sublime Ads I could finally get back into the swing to give Gluon some ongoing love.

In this build there are a few new things.

Native privacy focused, and friendly, ads.

I built Sublime Ads so I can add promoted content/ads into Gluon (and other things too!), so I took the time to integrate those.

Super happy with the result, which is not obtrusive and actually looks really great.

Here is the discover timeline:

And here is the discover "more" section:

Now I totally get that not everyone likes ads or promoted content. For this purpose I have some settings for you. However, these ads are only relevant to Gluon and the community on Micro.blog. I think it's one of the best places on the internet and, as such, I'd love to promote anyone with a podcast or even an indie app.

You may disable ads on the main discovery timeline for 5 days. After this time it will reset and you'll have to toggle once again. Ads will still show on the "discover more" screen because I think it's relevant.

I am also building a permanent off switch into that screen for anyone that has supported my work. More time is needed to make that happen — it will ship within the next few weeks though.

Here is the settings screen:

And here is the little toggle when you turn them off:

Micro Monday

I gave the Micro Monday section some care and attention. Now we have a nicer preview of what it is, including a special header linking to the website, profile and the podcasts.

There is a little more I want to do here and perhaps surface it on the discover timeline when it's Monday. I'll make it an option so you can hide it of course, might get a bit too cluttered there.

Here are the screenshots:

Inline images

You can now inline images in the compose window when creating a new post, if you have a hosted Micro.blog account. It's simple, but I hope you like it. Just tap the image after it uploaded and select the inline option.

Before Gluon sends the post it will check if it can see the special URL for that image in the text area. If not, it will fallback to appending the image as usual. I think that's a good tradeoff.

There is more I want to do here, for example multi image uploading and displaying all the media you have and being able to use those. More details on that as I go with the build. And nope, I won't add a "uploaded with Gluon" or anything.

More to come

There is more to come as the weeks go. I am happy to be back in swing with this.

Let me know how you get on... and if you want to see your own podcast or app on there, let me know: [email protected].

Steady as she goes.

✌️❤️

It's been a busy week, so I wanted take some time and look at my testing set up for Gluon on iOS.

As you may be aware I run a few different TestFlight versions for Gluon. There is the official one on the Gluon website and then there is one that I link to when someone asks me to be on the "beta" or otherwise.

Over time I have started giving people the option of a "fast track" and a "slow track".

The problem is the way I work. I like to make little changes, push them up and build a new TestFlight version, and then release. However that means you can sometimes get 5 - 8 builds a day when I'm actively working on Gluon.

I do this because mentally I am "done" with a certain task, it's ticked off and I don't need to do anything else. Mental baggage gone.

However, this also means that you're going to get bombarded with "NEW TESTFLIGHT!!!!" notifications (if you have them enabled) on your devices. For some this is totally fine. For others it's just plain painful.

I get it!

So, going forward I will offer everyone two versions.

Slow track - once every one/two/three weeks, during development:
https://testflight.apple.com/join/RwbLiFcR

Fast track - overkill, on the edge builds, sometimes multiple a day followed by longer breaks:
https://testflight.apple.com/join/2sbnWuMK

I urge you to have a look and see if you want to switch around.

Thanks for reading. You always know where I am.

616 commits for Sublime Ads as of today. This week alone I added 32 haha…

Guess I’ll work on Gluon tomorrow then… was instead working on a few bits for Sublime Ads. I think I managed to shave off a few milliseconds of loading through the main sections (especially concerning stats). API for embeds should be faster too 🤪. Blog update tomorrow.

For tonight’s entertainment I’ll be reworking the challenges screen in Gluon. Needs some love and I feel inspired after adding those ads/promotions yesterday.

Aren’t these the sexiest ads you have seen in a while? I know, I know… ads… urgh. But I’m proud because they look nice and are served by Sublime Ads straight into Gluon.

If anyone is interested, I am looking at adding podcasts and indie apps ads to Gluon. This is only a test (during the current TestFlight and a few months), so no money will exchange hands. For active Micro.blog users only.

Get in touch: [email protected]

Just putting it out there — Sublime Ads is built 99% with server side rendered HTML with a sprinkle of Javascript. It’s the only way and you still can have fun! ✌️🧘‍♂️ I’ll do a write up of the "stack" one day (might be vey short though!).

I’m allowed to self promote my self promotion, right?