Ando is a blogging engine. There are many blogging engines, but this one is mine.

It's not the first attempt, and it's not done. It may never be done. But I'm okay with that.

Note for people who forked or followed the previous versions of Ando: I've archived the previous ando and ando_plus_plus repos as detached branches of this new repo. This newest version (which, if you must, you can call 'Ando Sharp' or 'Ando Prime') combines the best ideas and code from the previous two into a new, cleaner Rails 2.3 codebase with Shoulda/Factory Girl tests.

It's also got some extractions from a recent failed attempt at writing a time tracking SaaS app, and if you look closely at the authentication code and user tests, you might notice a certain Clearance-ness to them.

Two or three things you should know

• Ando will support tumblelogging, like Tumblr, but for grown-ups. Already there are Article and Link models. Photo, Audio and Code models are on the horizon.

• The idea is, all media types are paired with a Post model, to which publishing attributes like author, published_at, etc. are delegated.

• The JavaScript code isn't being managed by Sprockets yet. But it will be. Soon.

• I don't consider tests an accurate reference to how a thing works. You really should read the code.

• You can run the ando:bootstrap Rake task to set up the DB and an initial user. Of course, that user would be set up with my email and password, so you may want to change that maybe?

• The user interface is being optimized for Safari/WebKit, at least to start. Things will break in other browsers. (Yes, even in Firefox betas and IE8. "Safari-optimized" is not a euphemism here for CSS3 — I'm using -webkit-gradient. A lot.)