---
title: "Mad Trackback Disease"
date: 2003-05-19T14:30:53-04:00
url: https://blog.lmorchard.com/2003/05/19/mad-trackback-disease/
author: Les Orchard
---

# Mad Trackback Disease

I've just started experimenting with integrating
<a href="http://www.intertwingly.net/code/autoping.py" target="_top">Sam Ruby's autoping.py</a> with my blogging
rig here, and discovered that I really had rushed things a bit and didn't
understand what the thing was doing.  I think my caffeine intake for today is
way below baseline, so if yours happens to be one of the sites I mistakenly
vandalized or spammed with broken or erroneous trackbacks, I apologize profusely!
<br /><br />
<b><i>Update:</i></b>  Speaking of Trackback, I just duct taped an initial implementation on
the receiving end with a revision to my <a href="http://www.decafbad.com/twiki/bin/view/Main/BlosxomDbcomments">BlosxomDbcomments</a> plugin.  It needs some testing,
so if you see this, and don't mind, pummel this entry with trackbacks!  Next, I'm
considering integrating referrers, thus bringing this new blogging rig up to
where I was <a href="http://www.decafbad.com/blog/tech/old/oooaab.html" target="_top">a little over a year ago</a>.
<!--more-->
shortname=mad_trackback_disease

<div id="comments" class="comments archived-comments">
            <h3>Archived Comments</h3>
            
        <ul class="comments">
            
        <li class="comment" id="comment-221090575">
            <div class="meta">
                <div class="author">
                    <a class="avatar image" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://mac.against.org"><img src="http://www.gravatar.com/avatar.php?gravatar_id=fd54edc39361f4c9e875cc73904664c4&amp;size=32&amp;default=http://mediacdn.disqus.com/1320279820/images/noavatar32.png"/></a>
                    <a class="avatar name" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://mac.against.org">Rui Carmo</a>
                </div>
                <a href="#comment-221090575" class="permalink"><time datetime="2003-05-19T19:12:44">2003-05-19T19:12:44</time></a>
            </div>
            <div class="content">Funny coincidence - I've been looking at the trackback spec myself over the last couple of days (I'm patiently rebuilding my weblog engine over at http://rlogger.no-ip.com, and I'm carefully laying down a foundation to drop XML-RPC onto...).</div>
            
        </li>
    
        <li class="comment" id="comment-221090576">
            <div class="meta">
                <div class="author">
                    <a class="avatar image" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.blogmatrix.com"><img src="http://www.gravatar.com/avatar.php?gravatar_id=ae8d98ea2cc34ea2f9b6d19155894cc4&amp;size=32&amp;default=http://mediacdn.disqus.com/1320279820/images/noavatar32.png"/></a>
                    <a class="avatar name" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.blogmatrix.com">David Janes</a>
                </div>
                <a href="#comment-221090576" class="permalink"><time datetime="2003-05-20T06:31:40">2003-05-20T06:31:40</time></a>
            </div>
            <div class="content">Are you planning to do pings on the behalf of other sites?

Regards, etc...
David</div>
            
        </li>
    
        <li class="comment" id="comment-221090577">
            <div class="meta">
                <div class="author">
                    <a class="avatar image" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.decafbad.com"><img src="http://www.gravatar.com/avatar.php?gravatar_id=ebe2623392530eca9e05c71c9de7f72a&amp;size=32&amp;default=http://mediacdn.disqus.com/1320279820/images/noavatar32.png"/></a>
                    <a class="avatar name" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.decafbad.com">l.m.orhard</a>
                </div>
                <a href="#comment-221090577" class="permalink"><time datetime="2003-05-20T08:13:13">2003-05-20T08:13:13</time></a>
            </div>
            <div class="content">Pings on behalf of other sites... as in provide a sort of trackback service for site A to ping site B through me?  Hadn't planned on it, though I'd be curious to know if it'd be useful.</div>
            
        </li>
    
        <li class="comment" id="comment-221090579">
            <div class="meta">
                <div class="author">
                    <a class="avatar image" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.darkglass.org"><img src="http://www.gravatar.com/avatar.php?gravatar_id=e6a419b54a15b60646648bc0702a6c33&amp;size=32&amp;default=http://mediacdn.disqus.com/1320279820/images/noavatar32.png"/></a>
                    <a class="avatar name" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.darkglass.org">tamaracks</a>
                </div>
                <a href="#comment-221090579" class="permalink"><time datetime="2003-05-21T19:45:14">2003-05-21T19:45:14</time></a>
            </div>
            <div class="content">Where does one send a trackback to your entries? I'd like to help you test, since I'm trying to get my standalone trackback script working on my new server for sending pings. I don't see a url to use, though.</div>
            
        </li>
    
        <li class="comment" id="comment-221090580">
            <div class="meta">
                <div class="author">
                    <a class="avatar image" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.decafbad.com/blog"><img src="http://www.gravatar.com/avatar.php?gravatar_id=2ac2cffd36ada8c734b90e02a1e5c1ac&amp;size=32&amp;default=http://mediacdn.disqus.com/1320279820/images/noavatar32.png"/></a>
                    <a class="avatar name" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.decafbad.com/blog">l.m.orchard</a>
                </div>
                <a href="#comment-221090580" class="permalink"><time datetime="2003-05-21T22:54:46">2003-05-21T22:54:46</time></a>
            </div>
            <div class="content">tamaracks: Hmm, something I'd not thought about!  Now, all posts include a "tb" link, the URL of which can be targeted with TrackBack</div>
            
        </li>
    
        <li class="comment" id="comment-221090582">
            <div class="meta">
                <div class="author">
                    <a class="avatar image" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.darkglass.org/"><img src="http://www.gravatar.com/avatar.php?gravatar_id=e6a419b54a15b60646648bc0702a6c33&amp;size=32&amp;default=http://mediacdn.disqus.com/1320279820/images/noavatar32.png"/></a>
                    <a class="avatar name" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.darkglass.org/">tamaracks</a>
                </div>
                <a href="#comment-221090582" class="permalink"><time datetime="2003-05-22T00:37:56">2003-05-22T00:37:56</time></a>
            </div>
            <div class="content">Thanks! The first trackback is from me. Well, from my boyfriend's blog, anyway, which is still on Movable Type. I currently can't get the MT standalone trackback script to send pings for my Blosxom blog.

Scratch that, apparently the trackback script is working now! What the devil... It used to return a 405 Request Method not allowed or something like that. Well, thanks for the testing area. I'd given up on trying the script because I didn't have anything to ping.

I think the blank trackback is from me clicking on the link that you put under the entry. Just a thought, since I'm likely not the only person out there who would click on the link.</div>
            
        </li>
    
        <li class="comment" id="comment-221090583">
            <div class="meta">
                <div class="author">
                    <a class="avatar image" rel="nofollow" 
                       href=""><img src="http://www.gravatar.com/avatar.php?gravatar_id=2ac2cffd36ada8c734b90e02a1e5c1ac&amp;size=32&amp;default=http://mediacdn.disqus.com/1320279820/images/noavatar32.png"/></a>
                    <a class="avatar name" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="">l.m.orchard</a>
                </div>
                <a href="#comment-221090583" class="permalink"><time datetime="2003-05-22T01:37:27">2003-05-22T01:37:27</time></a>
            </div>
            <div class="content">Test</div>
            
        </li>
    
        </ul>
    
        </div>