{"id":389,"date":"2026-10-23T02:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-10-23T09:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rainier-it.com\/blog\/?p=389"},"modified":"2026-10-21T19:50:33","modified_gmt":"2026-10-22T02:50:33","slug":"shop-orting-whats-new-fall-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rainier-it.com\/blog\/shop-orting-whats-new-fall-2026\/","title":{"rendered":"What’s New on Shop Orting: Road Alerts, Cardinals Scores, Daily Puzzles and a Facebook Page"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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A town site earns a place on someone’s phone by being right about today: which road is closed, whether the river is up, who won Friday night.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

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Earlier this month we wrote about building Shop Orting<\/a>, the free directory of every business in our hometown, and about Orting News<\/a>, its self-hosted local news feed. The site hasn’t sat still since. It now lists 110 businesses<\/strong> (up from 99), and it does a lot more than help you find a plumber.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This post covers what’s new: live road and emergency information, scores for every Orting High team, a daily Sudoku and crossword, a Facebook Page that mostly runs itself, and a long list of tools for business owners. As before, there’s some of the code behind it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Three
Roads, Cardinals scores and the daily puzzles, on a phone.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Be ready, in real time<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Orting sits between two rivers in the shadow of a volcano, so the Be ready<\/strong> page matters more here than on most town sites. It already showed Mount Rainier’s alert level, the river flows and recent earthquakes. Now it keeps itself current while you look at it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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  • Roads near Orting.<\/strong> Collisions, closures and roadwork on the state highways around town (SR 162, 165, 161, 410 and nearby), from WSDOT, checked every 10 minutes. Each alert gets its official route shield and a road-sign icon for its type, and opens a map pin.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • A page that updates itself.<\/strong> With the page open, it re-checks every 5 minutes and swaps in only what changed, without losing your place. “Updated 3 min ago” tells you how fresh it is.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • A banner across the whole site<\/strong>, only while something official is happening: a flood warning or watch for Orting, the Puyallup at Orting reaching its action level, or a message from the school district (snow days, late starts).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
    \"The
    Right now, and Roads near Orting, on the Be ready page.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

    The road check is a small Python job on a plain systemd timer:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    <\/circle><\/circle><\/circle><\/g><\/svg><\/span>