9 Resolved! Issues with the Twitter Updates Gadget (and others) Wednesday, September 23, 2009 /

This issue should now be resolved. I have checked the Twitter Updates gadget (plus others) on various sites, and am now assured everything should be back to normal.

I've been made aware of the issues many Blogger users are experiencing with the Twitter Updates gadget. At present, this is showing "tweets" from the user @undefined and ignores user preferences for the number of tweets to be displayed.

Continue reading »

55 Profile Avatars for Blogger Comments - Updated Friday, September 18, 2009 /

Displaying avatars beside comments in our blogs has been a long anticipated feature. Today, the Blogger Team announced that this feature is now enabled for Blogger blogs, allowing us to see the profile image or avatar of those leaving comments on our posts:

Today we have extended embedded comments to display profile images next to the comments that your visitors write. Though profile images have been available with the other commenting options, we are happy to bring them to embedded comments as part of the Blogger Birthday feature series (via Blogger Buzz)

Continue reading »

37 Read More/Post Summaries Now Available in Blogger!! Thursday, September 10, 2009 /

One of Blogger's most requested features has been the ability to summarize our posts on home and non-item pages using some sort of "Read More" function.

I'm thrilled to announce today that the Blogger Team have now enabled this for us to summarize our posts! No more laborious editing of the post HTML or template codes is required to display only summaries on our home pages :)

Continue reading »

19 Share Posts from the Blogger NavBar Saturday, August 29, 2009 /

Yet more treats for Blogger's 10th birthday celebrations were released for us today!



An additional button in the Blogger Navbar now enables us to share our posts via Twitter, Facebook, Google Reader and by email:

When a reader clicks the "Share" link on your blog's home page, they can opt to share the URL of your blog by Twitter, Facebook or Google Reader. On item pages, the pop-up box includes the additional option to share by email:

When readers share your blog and posts, additional parameters are added to the URL which helps you track the syndication of these posts using Google Analytics in the format "?spref=nn" where the nn part is changed to fb for Facebook, tw for Twitter or gr for Google Reader.



For example:

• http://buzz.blogger.com/2009/08/share-from-nav-bar.html?spref=tw (sharing the announcement post on Twitter)
  
  


• http://www.bloggerbuster.com?spref=fb (sharing the Blogger Buster homepage on Facebook)

You can then search for URLs ending with these parameters when using Google Analytics to view details of how your posts have been shared.



Of course, this new feature is only available to those who have not chosen to hide the Blogger Navbar!



If your Blogger template does not display the Blogger Navbar and you would like to make it reappear in order to use this new feature, here is what you should do:



1. Go to Layout>Edit HTML in your Blogger dashboard.



2. Using your browser's search function, locate the following section of code:

#navbar-iframe {
height:0px;
visibility:hidden;
display:none;
}

This should be located within the <b:skin> or <style> section of your template.



Delete this section of code, then preview your template. If all is well, the Blogger Navbar will be visible again, enabling your readers to syndicate your posts with ease. Instructions to hide the Blogger Navbar can be found here.

What do you think of the new Navbar "Share" feature?

I admire the determination of the Blogger team to roll out so many new features for this platform in just a few short weeks! The addition of this sharing feature will be useful for many bloggers, though those of us who choose to hide the navbar for aesthetic purposes will need to adopt other methods of sharing our posts.



What do you think of this latest birthday gift? Will you find this useful? Is this enough to persuade you to display the navbar again (if you have currently chosen to hide it)?



Please feel free to leave your comments and opinions below.

30 Improved Label Gadgets - Now Supporting Label Clouds and More! Tuesday, August 25, 2009 /

As part of Blogger's 10th Birthday celebrations, the Blogger team have been hard at work developing enhancements and new features.



Today, Blogger launched an enhanced "Labels" gadget which now supports label clouds, and allows us to choose which of our labels are displayed within the gadget:

In April, we announced that we wanted to hear from you about your wish list for features in Blogger. Many of you said that the label gadget should be more flexible. Today we are rolling out two enhancements to the label gadget. (Via Blogger Buzz)

Blogger's Label Cloud

Label clouds are a popular way to display label lists in Blogger templates. Previously we have needed to use extensive customizations and JavaScript to enable labels to display in cloud format as opposed to a regular list, where the size of the font indicated the popularity of the label within the blog:

Adding a label cloud to your Blogger blog is now incredibly easy! Simply go to Layout>Page Elements in your Blogger template and choose to add a new gadget in the area of your choice. Select the "Labels" gadget from the "Basics" menu, and you'll be presented with a screen like this:

In the "Display" options, choose "Cloud", then save your new gadget. Now when you view your blog, you'll see your labels display in cloud-like formation, with more popular labels highlighted in larger text.

Customizing the Label Cloud

By default, the labels will be styled to fit with other elements in the same section. All labels will appear in the same color as other links in this area and size is determined by the popularity of the label, on a scale of 1-5 (where 5 is the most popular).



If you would like to style the label cloud, you can add additional CSS to your Blogger template using the following classes:

.label-size-1 a - The class of the smallest size label in the cloud

.label-size-5 a - The class for the largest size label in the cloud

Here's an example of how you could style the largest labels to get you started:

.label-size-5 a {color: #cd0000;

font-size: 3em;

text-decoration: none;

   }

.label-size-5 a:hover {

text-decoration: underline;

   }

I'll write up a full tutorial in the next couple of days explaining in more detail how the labels may be customized to your particular preferences. In the meantime, I hope these class examples will help those familiar with CSS to begin styling their own label clouds.

Choose which labels to display

The second improvement to the Labels gadget is the ability to choose which labels are displayed in the gadget.



This is an ideal solution for those who use many different labels in their blog, and find the long display or confusing navigation difficult to deal with.



To select which labels you would like to display in your gadget, add (or edit) a Labels gadget, and choose "Selected Labels".



You can then edit the list of labels and deselect any which you prefer not to be displayed:

One feature which I like best about this enhancement is that we can choose to use more than one Label gadget to differentiate between "Categories" and "Labels" - at least in the sidebar gadgets!



For example, we could title one label gadget as "Categories", and choose to display only a handful of descriptive, "category" labels as a list. Next, we could add a second label gadget named "Tags" which displays as a label cloud and shows all tags used in the blog.



Of course, this does not yet perform the same differentiation for posts as true "categories" would, but it is a good start and enhances usability for our blog readers.

Final Thoughts

Overall, I am very impressed with these enhancements to the Blogger Labels gadget as they enable us to customize the navigation experience for our readers.



I'm sure the Blogger team have even more great features and enhancements to roll out as part of Blogger's 10th birthday celebrations and look forward to reporting and explaining more about these in the coming weeks.



Feel free to let us know your own opinions and experiences of these enhancements by leaving your comments below.

25 Happy 10th Birthday Blogger! Sunday, August 23, 2009 /

Today marks ten years since Pyra Labs first unleashed Blogger onto the world! And how Blogger has grown: from humble beginnings to a multi-national, multi-lingual, Google-owned, highly powerful publishing platform which hosts over 300 million blogs (not counting those hosted on custom domains...).



In celebration of this remarkable date, the Blogger Team have planned some wonderful treats for the Blogger community:

Wait, what? What we could give you? That's right. This is our birthday — but we're celebrating your contributions over the years. Over the past decade, millions of people around the world have made Blogger what it is today: a vibrant community of real people telling their stories. [...]

As we turn ten, we wanted to give you some presents to commemorate this milestone and thank you for letting us be part of your story. Over the next several weeks we will be releasing a number of new features on Blogger. Some presents are because you asked for them this spring. Other presents are because they meant a lot to us. And some are because our friends (both inside and outside of Google) wanted to chip in and give you something... (via Blogger Buzz)

Already a few of these blogging treats have been released:

• Support added for the PubSubHubbub protocol which enables our feeds to be syndicated in real-time by supporting feed readers, such as Google Reader. Learn more


• Blogger support added to Google Reader's "Send To" feature, which enables easy syndication and sharing of posts. Learn more

There's a few more features which I suspect (though cannot confirm) will be released soon, and one striking, great big feature which I know will be welcomed by all...



I can't tell you about that yet.



But I promise, the wait will be worth it!



Wishing Blogger and the entire, hardworking Blogger team a wonderful 10th birthday! We're all looking forward to these new, interesting and useful features you have planned for us.



Here's to many more decades of "push button publishing" with Blogger!



Image credit: D Sharon Pruitt (via Flickr Creative Commons)

54 Blogger Read More/Post Summaries - The Best News Yet! Tuesday, June 9, 2009 /

One of the functions most voted for in Blogger's recent Product Ideas forum was the ability to summarize blog posts on non-item pages.



I've written about a few different approaches to this, but these methods were never so easy to implement.



Luckily I came across this tutorial from Quite Random which offers the simplest - and most useful - method of displaying post summaries automatically for our Blogger posts, complete with a thumbnail from images used in our posts.





This customization is very easy to implement (there are literally only two steps) with very little editing of the template required. I installed with immediate success on several templates to test it out, and with only a little tweaking on one of my most customized designs.



In short, this is a fabulous implementation of post summaries for Blogger. Be sure to pop over to Quite Random to check out this post and learn how to install this hack for your own Blogger blogs.



However... This is not my only source of good news regarding post summaries for Blogger!



The Blogger team are in the process of implementing this function in Blogger! Or at least, I'm pretty certain they are.



Take a look at this screenshot which was taken from a clean installation of Minima (a default Blogger template) on a new blog (click the image for a larger version):

These tags look suspiciously like tags which could be used for implementation of post summaries. What's more, it seems we can choose whether or not to summarize our posts, and also the text used for the link to read the full article.



I can't say for sure when this implementation will become available, though I believe this will first be rolled out into Blogger in Draft so any issues can be resolved before the summaries become available to us all.



There's not yet been any mention about this on the Blogger in Draft blog, Blogger Buzz or even by the team on Twitter, but since this code is now appearing in new templates I'd guess this will become available in the very near future.



Stay tuned, I'll get more news about this as it happens and will (of course) explain how to use summaries in customized templates too.



This is a feature I'm very excited to know is in progress, so if anyone does have any news to share, please let me know!

24 Google Blogger for Dummies - Full Review Thursday, April 30, 2009 /

Some time ago, I was able to preview Susan Gunelius' new book, Google Blogger for Dummies, which is now available to buy from your local bookstore. After receiving my own copy, I've spent the past few weeks reading intently in order to provide you all with my full review of this "Dummies" guide.

Blogger for Dummies?

The "For Dummies" series of reference books published by Wiley are complete guides on a range of subjects which present information in plain English. "Dummies" books are offered as complete guides on the given subject, where the information presented makes the subject easy to understand even for a complete beginner.



In Google Blogger for Dummies, Susan Gunelius offers a simple and comprehensive approach for understanding and making the most of the Google Blogger platform. Chapters range from "Setting up your blog" right through to "Making Money With Blogger" and "Boosting your Search Engine Ranking". This ensures that readers learn far more than how to use Blogger to publish our blogs: we can learn how to use Blogger to create an authoritative, income-generating and professional blog on the niche project of our choice.

What's covered in the book

Google Blogger for Dummies is split into six main parts, with each part containing several chapters which comprehensively detail an aspect of blogging with Blogger. Furthermore, each chapter is segmented further into mini-sections (usually no more than a page long) which offers detail, advice and information on the aspects of blogging you may encounter.

Part I: Introducing Google Blogger

This section offers a complete overview of Blogger and blogging in general, which is especially useful for those who are creating a blog for the first time.



By covering in brief the aspects of using Blogger which are detailed more fully in later chapters, Susan creates an excitement about choosing Blogger and anticipation of Blogger's effectiveness as a powerful blogging tool.

Part II: Using Google Blogger

In this section, we are presented with detailed instructions for creating and maintaining a Blogger blog, including how to initially create a blog; how to manage archives; comments and backlinks; writing blog posts; enhancing the appearance with templates, and using gadgets/widgets in the layout.



Each chapter is enhanced by screen-shots and useful tips to ensure we can easily follow the instructions and advice given. I especially enjoyed reading Susan's advice about choosing which subjects to write about, and issues of copyright/fair usage. Such considerations are often misunderstood (or even overlooked) by those who are new to blogging, and her expert advice shines light on what is otherwise a cloudy issue.

Part III: Making Money with Blogger

As pointed out in Google Blogger for Dummies, many people choose to start a blog in order to earn money from it. By devoting an entire part of this book to the subject of making money, Susan understands the needs of many Blogger users (both newly initiated and seasoned bloggers) and offers information most relevant for those using the Google platform as their publishing tool.



In this part, we can learn about the many different types of advertising we can add to our blogs to generate an income, including text links, paid posts, contextual ads, and of course Google Adsense.

Part IV: Growing your Audience

This section of the book offers practical, useful advice for growing the audience of our Blogger blogs which is presented and explained in a very "down to earth" manner.



Most bloggers are concerned with growing their blog's audience and increasing their authority in search engine rankings. I'm often asked about this aspect of blogging by Blogger Buster readers, but since this is something I've learned through a combination of gradual experience and "trial and error", it is not something I am expressly confident in explaining.



Susan's explanations are very clear and easy to understand. She explains the nature of relationship building for bloggers, how to network with other online writers and particularly how to optimize our blogs for search engine rankings. Advice to help track blog statistics, effective linking and keyword analysis are also included which I feel is a boon to new bloggers who may have little understanding of what these buzzwords mean.

Part V: Extending your Blog

This section offers details for growing and downsizing our blogs. By "growing", Susan refers to adding team members, writing for other's team blogs and creating a new blog linked to our blogger profiles. "Downsizing" refers to the practise of deleting a blog we no longer wish to own.



In this section, we can also find details of blogging with different media (such as email posts, video blogging and posting via a mobile phone). Custom domains and FTP blogging are also discussed for the benefit of those who prefer to associate their blogs with their own domain name.

Part VI: The Part of Tens

In all "Dummies" guides, the "Part of tens" is used at the end of the book to reference key points or resources appropriate for the particular subject of the book.



In Google Blogger for Dummies, the Part of Tens includes:

• Ten useful social networking and social bookmarking sites


• Ten common Blogger problems and possible solutuins


• Ten places to find free Blogger themes and templates

The "Blogger problems" section was the one I found particularly useful as it covers problems which Blogger Buster readers have contacted me about with regularity. These issues are explained in detail, along with problem-solving solutions and ideas for prevention so these issues do not occur again.

Excellent Presentation

One of the reasons I am a fan of Dummies books in general is the overall presentation of these guides which enables readers to locate the information they require with ease and literally "dip in" at any stage to find useful tips or references.



The front cover is bold and unmistakably part of the Dummies series with a bold yellow background. Key points of the book's content are presented on both the front and back covers, along with a brief biography of Susan Gunelius - a professional blogger in her own right with expert status in marketing and branding.



A key aspect of presentation which I find useful in any technical guide is the use of headings and points to break up text, and appropriate hints relevant to the main content at key points. In this respect, Google Blogger for Dummies comes up trumps: the content is very well organised making it easy to follow; icons refer to tips, warnings and technical areas of the content, while highlighted text boxes enhance basic instructional sections with advice based on Susan's professional experience on a given subject.



The contents section actually comes in two segments: the first offers a brief overview of the parts and chapters, while the second is a comprehensive guide to include all major sub-headings (the individual topics) which are covered in the guide.



Near the end of the book is a comprehensive glossary which provides easy referral for key terms associated with both Blogger and blogging in general. Finally, a complete index offers a means of easily locating any terms or subjects with which we need particular guidance.



Unfortunately the screen-shots in Google Blogger for Dummies are in black and white, rather than full colour. Having read other Dummies guides before, I had not expected colour images; however, colour in some sections (such as when discussing templates and layouts) would have been more beneficial for readers of this guide to offer a more complete analysis of the sections being discussed.

So is it a complete guide to Blogger?

Almost, but not quite. The range of subjects discussed is very comprehensive in Google Blogger for Dummies and Susan Gunelius' expertise in blogging offers a highly comprehensive guide for building and maintaining a successful blog. However, there are a few small areas which I feel could be further enhanced, particularly as many readers of this guide will have little or no experience using the Blogger platform.



For example, in Chapter 16 when explaining how to purchase a domain from a third party, more information regarding changing the DNS settings would have been much appreciated. This aspect of using Blogger is often difficult to navigate, and while I understand that the process does differ between domain providers, an overview explaining key terms or a link to Blogger's help pages on this subject would lift the fog and enable new bloggers to manage this important aspect of Blogger much more easily.



I'm also concerned that the subject of editing the Blogger template is virtually skimmed over in this guide. Although the Layout>Edit HTML tab is briefly mentioned as a menu item and is referred to in the process of uploading third party templates, no explanation of how to manually edit the Blogger template is given. This may be a personal opinion, since editing templates is a key aspect of my experience with using Blogger; however, I'm sure that many readers of this book would have appreciated at least some advice, if only an overview of how Blogger template files are coded combined with HTML/CSS resources where more could be gleaned on this complicated subject.

In summary...

After having read most of the books available about the Google Blogger platform, I can honestly attest that Google Blogger for Dummies is the best and most comprehensive guide available. Rather than simply explain how to use Blogger, this book offers a complete guide to building a successful blog with Blogger, an interesting and wholly useful standard which few other books about blogging platforms have adopted.



I do certainly recommend Google Blogger for Dummies, particularly for those who are new to blogging or who have recently decided to use Blogger as their publishing platform. While certain advanced aspects of working with Blogger could be enhanced, the basics are all included, enabling even a complete novice to build, manage and maintain their blog using this easy to follow guide.



Google Blogger for Dummies is currently available from Amazon, Barnes and Noble and other online bookstores for around $16.49.

21 Blogger wants to hear from us! Thursday, April 23, 2009 /

The Blogger Team have released Product Ideas for Blogger: a forum based on the Product Ideas platform which enables us to suggest and vote on new Blogger features, gadgets and even Blogs of Note:

One of the primary factors that drive innovation and improvements on Blogger is the voice of our users. We always take your feedback to heart, and we use it do help make Blogger the best service it can possibly be.

Take a look at this screenshot to get an idea of how this forum works:

We can log in to Product Ideas for Blogger using our Google account, then vote on existing suggestions by clicking the tick (vote up) or cross (vote down).



When you choose a category (features, gadgets or Blogs of Note) you will be presented with a question you have not yet voted on, followed by the most popular suggestions.



You can also get an idea of the ratio of "thumbs up" and "thumbs down" votes by looking at the vote bars to the right of the suggestions:

It's also possible to view the ideas suggested by a particular user by clicking on the name below each suggestion (take a look at mine here).



I'm really excited about this new feature, and think it is the perfect way for the Blogger team to see the features (and recommended blogs) which are most desired by the Blogger community. While we have previously been able to suggest a new feature and suggest blogs of note, these forms gave us no indication of how popular these suggestions were. This forum enables us to see what others have suggested, how popular these suggestions are, and also to vote these up or down depending on our own preferences.



Take a look at Product Ideas for Blogger to vote on your favourite suggestions and make a few of your own.

32 Adsense integration now easier than ever with Blogger's Monetize tab Wednesday, April 15, 2009 /

Have you noticed the new "Monetize" tab at the top of your Blogger dashboard?

 

This new section of our Blogger dashboards makes it easier than ever to integrate Google Adsense in our blogs and see just how much our blogs are earning.





Google's Adsense program is a simple solution which many Bloggers use to monetize their sites. For some time now, Blogger have made it easy for us to include Adsense ads in the sidebar (as a page element) and around blog posts (as an option in the Layout>Page Elements section, when you click the "Edit" link for your blog posts). 



If you have already configured Adsense in your blog by adding an Adsense page element to the layout, or enabling ads between posts, by clicking on the Monetize tab you will be able to see statistics for your earnings, like this:

On this page, there are also links to view your Adsense Payment History, earnings reports and to switch the account associated with this particular blog. You can also choose to "remove ads" from all aspects of your Blogger layout at the click of a button.



For those who have not yet chosen to monetize their sites with Adsense, or who have configured Adsense manually in their templates, you will see a page like this instead:

This means that your Adsense account has not been associated with this blog. No earnings reports will be displayed, even if - like me - you have manually configured Adsense by adding the required JavaScript to your Blogger template code.



For those of you yet to add Adsense to your layout, simply choose one of the ad-layout options most suitable for your needs anc click the "Next" button. You may be required to set up an Adsense account (or associate an existing account with your Blogger profile), after which your ads will be immediately placed in your layout. Then when you visit the Monetize tab, you will be able to see details of your Adsense earnings for the ads you have placed in your layout.

What you need to know about Adsense monetization and the new Monetize tab

Although Blogger have made it very easy for members to add Adsense to their blogs, not every applicant will be successful in getting their own Adsense account.



Adsense reviews all applicants to the program before agreeing to (or denying) a new account. In order to apply for an Adsense account, you must be over 18 years old and have a website which complies with Adsense policies. If you post any questionable content on your site, you really should check these policies to ensure your site complies before submitting your application.



Also, the reports displayed on the Monetize tab will only show page views and earnings from the time that you connected your Adsense account with this blog. If you have previously linked your Adsense account with your Blogger profile, it seems the "All Time" earnings will display earnings from today onwards (one of my blogs uses an Adsense Page Element, but is only displaying earnings from today).

A new channel in your Adsense account for each Blogger blog you monetize

If you log into your Adsense account, you will notice a new channel has been set up for each of your blogs, which contains the URL of your blog in the title.



The information from this channel is what's used to present the earnings data for the Monetize section of each blog you write.

Not yet an ideal solution for everyone...

I am very happy to see that the Blogger team have put such effort towards integrating all of the Google services we Bloggers currently use. However, I am a little disappointed at some aspects of this new feature.



For my own blogs, I have added Adsense manually, by editing the Blogger template and inserting ad codes where I would like them to be displayed. For this reason, I am unable to see any reports on the Monetize tab. In fact, it appears as though I have not set Adsense up at all.



Also, the earnings displayed on the Monetize page will only include the earnings for this particular blog, not your total earnings from any different sites operated.



However, these are small issues, and perhaps these issues will not affect most other Blogger users.

What do you think?

Will this new "Monetize" dashboard feature make it easier for you to connect your Adsense account with your blogs? How well do you think this feature performs so far?



Please feel free to leave your comments and suggestions below.

60 Blogger Followers now Integrated with Google Friend Connect Thursday, February 26, 2009 /

When Google Friend Connect was introduced a few months ago, it seemed inevitable that eventually this service would be closely integrated with Blogger to enable more social interaction around our blogs and social communities.



Today the Blogger Buzz blog announced that Friend Connect has been integrated with the Followers feature, enabling readers to log in and become a follower of your blog using their preferred login details (rather than using only their Google account).



As explained in the introductory post:

[...] Your readers come from across the web, from Yahoo, AOL, WordPress, Typepad... not just Blogger. That's why we're excited to announce that we've integrated Blogger Following with Google Friend Connect.



Friend Connect encourages readers to use one account (whether it's a Google account, a Yahoo, AIM or OpenID account) to follow any site - a Blogger blog, a WordPress blog, or any other site that has incorporated Friend Connect.

This integration promises more exposure for our blogs as those from other social networks can follow our posts, be updated of new articles and share their followings with friends from other social sites.

For those who have already set up "Following" on their Blogger blogs, the integration has already been set up for you. Your Followers widget will have already changed to reflect the new Friend Connect features and enable those using other login details to follow your site.



Here is what the Blogger Buster followers widget looks like now:

I did need to alter some of the colors to ensure it matched the overall design of my blog, but otherwise this was integrated with my overall design. If you need to edit some of the font colors for your own Followers widget, simply click the edit icon or go to Layout>Page Elements in your Blogger dashboard and choose the "Edit" link. On the pop-up screen you will be able to change the colors for the different text sections of your widget.



Here also is a video which the Blogger team created to explain "How to follow" a blog:

As hinted in the introductory post for Friend Connect integration, we're likely to see even more new features based on Google's social integration features over the next few months!



Feel free to let us know what you think of Friend Connect and the updated Followers widget by leaving your comments below.

49 Bx-Errors When Uploading New Templates? The Problem and the Fix Tuesday, February 24, 2009 /

For around a week now, many Blogger users have experienced Bx-error codes when attempting to upload a new template to their blogs when previously these templates had worked just fine.



I discovered the reason for this on the Blogger Help Group after reading this post from Gatsby, a Blogger Employee:

Recently we changed the way our template editor accepts certain third party code, so that it is now less tolerant of certain templates. We did this because we had seen a lot of data corruption due to 'bad templates,' and we are trying to stave off some of these issues pre-emptively.



Now we realize that this has caused some inconvenience to folks, so we are re-thinking our decision and will post an update on that shortly. 

At the time of writing this post, I have not found any notification that this issue has been fixed, and many of my own custom templates do not work in their initial state (I'll explain the fix later in this article). Since there are so many bloggers complaining in the Blogger Help Group, I would imagine the Blogger Team will resolve this issue shortly.



However, in the meantime, many of us are stuck wondering what to do about our templates:

• Those wishing to upload a new template will at present need to fix their template in order to be able to use it.


• Those of us who design and distribute Blogger templates are facing complaints from our readers (and in some cases, from buyers of our premium themes). Should we "fix" all of these templates or wait for the Blogger team to resolve the template editor issue?

Personally I would prefer to wait a few more days for the Blogger Team to fix the issue (and hopefully provide some clarification of what is expected from third-party templates!). In the meantime, there is a method which we can use to fix the templates which initially receive a Bx-error code.

How to upload templates without receiving a bX-error code

Many Bloggers who have been unable to upload third party templates have received the following error codes:

• bx-bliced


• bX-ev85ll


• bX-39cc9q


• bX-y6cz0v 


• bX-982020

There are several other codes too, though the issue appears to be the same for all.



Thanks to joleneliow from the Blogger Help Group, many Blogger users have reported that the following fix resolves the issue, and they have been able to upload a new template successfully. Here are the steps you should take:

1. First of all, try to upload your new template in the Layout>Edit HTML section of your dashboard. Not all templates have been affected by this issue, so it is advisable to check before attempting to edit your template significantly. If you do receive a bX-error code when trying to upload your template, you should proceed to step 2.


2. If your new template is an XML file (with the .xml entension), browse to where this is located on your computer and right click the file. Choose to open with Notepad (or your favorite basic text editor). If your template is contained within a text file (for you to copy and paste into the template editor), simply open this with your text editor.


3. Search for every instance of b:widget id= in your template, for example:
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   • b:widget id='Header1'
   
   
   • b:widget id='Blog1'
   
   
   • b:widget id='Label1'
   
   
   • b:widget id='HTML1'
   
   
   
   
   Replace each of these IDs with the next number up. For example, Header1 should become Header2; Blog1 should become Blog1, HTML3 should become HTML4 and so on.
   
   


4. Once you have changed each and every instance of widget id to a different number, you should save the template under a slightly different file name (to be aware of your altered file). If this is an XML file, be sure to save with the XML extension.


5. Now you have made these changes, attempt to upload your file again in the Layout>Edit HTML section of your Blogger dashboard. Now you should not receive the error code and will be able to upload your template.

If after following these steps you are still unable to upload your revised template, it is worthwhile to close your browser and delete all temporary internet files and cookies. Then restart your browser and try to upload again. Clearing all of these temporary files from your browser will ensure you receive a fresh page when editing your template. Previously when I have received error codes while editing Blogger templates, this technique has resolved the issue.



It may also be worthwhile using CCleaner to remove all such temporary files from your system. This is a free program which I use on a regular basis to clean up (and speed up) my computer.



I do hope that these techniques will enable you to upload a new template to your blog if you have previously received a bX-error code. If you know of any alternative solutions please do let us know about these by leaving a comment or sending me an email.

A message for the Blogger Team

I completely understand your concerns that certain third party templates may contain code which causes data corruption (and I'm sure most other Blogger users do too!). None of us enjoy experiencing issues with our blogs, and of course ensuring all templates contain no malicious code is of the utmost importance in maintaining a safe and enjoyable environment for Blogger users.



If it would be possible to post some guidelines for template developers, this would be truly appreciated! This way, those of us who design templates for Blogger can ensure we meet these guidelines in order for our templates to work correctly, without causing issues or bX-errors.



Another possible solution would be to provide a repository of "approved" third party templates, much like the one provided by Wordpress.com. I do understand that this would be a huge development and require much work, though I'm sure there would be many volunteers willing to help check templates before they become publicly available (myself included) and the Blogger community in general would be thrilled to have such a feature available!

9 Google Blogger For Dummies to be released in February! Thursday, January 29, 2009 /

If you're familiar with the "Dummies" series of books, you'll understand how helpful and insightful these textbooks can be in dealing with any subject.



That being said, I'm happy to announce that Google Blogger for Dummies is due to hit bookshops on February 3rd. It's available to pre-order now from Amazon.com

 (priced at $16.49) and will be available in Barnes and Noble, Waterstones and other bookshops, and also directly from Wiley.



The author, Susan Gunelius, has been kind enough to send me a 60 page preview of this book, complete with a full and detailed table of contents and two sample chapters for my preliminary review. Also, when the book is released early next month, Susan has graciously offered me a copy of the book so that I can review it in it's entirety and offer Blogger Buster readers my insights.

What Google Blogger for Dummies will cover

Being a "Dummies" guide, Google Blogger for Dummies will cover both the basics of using Blogger (creating and setting up a first blog) and also some advanced techniques and insights which even experienced bloggers will find both useful and insightful.



There are 16 chapters in all (plus the "Parts of Tens"): the first five chapters explain how to set up and manage a blog with Blogger, while the remaining chapters offer insight into building a successful blog including advice about social networks, publishing blog posts and managing your template. All of this is written with particular reference to Blogger.



Here is the "At a Glance" Table of Contents of Google Blogger Dummies:



Part I: Introducing Google Blogger

• Chapter 1: Choosing Blogger as Your Blogging Software 


• Chapter 2: Welcome to the Blogosphere


• Chapter 3: Blogging Basics and Buzzwords

Part II: Using Google Blogger

• Chapter 4: Getting Started with Blogger 


• Chapter 5: Setting Up Your Blog 


• Chapter 6: Writing and Publishing Blog Posts 


• Chapter 7: Enhancing Your Blog with Templates 


• Chapter 8: Adding Features and Functionality with Elements and Gadgets 


• Chapter 9: Managing Your Blog 

Part III: Making Money with Blogger 

• Chapter 10: The Business of Blogging


• Chapter 11: Maximizing Revenue with Google AdSense

Part IV: Growing Your Audience

• Chapter 12: The Power of Networking and Relationship Building


• Chapter 13: Boosting Your Search Engine Ranking 

Part V: Extending Your Blog 

• Chapter 14: Growing or Downsizing Your Blog.


• Chapter 15: Blogging from Different Media


• Chapter 16: Moving Beyond Blogger

Part VI: The Part of Tens

• Chapter 17: Ten Useful Social Networking and Social Bookmarking Sites


• Chapter 18: Ten Common Blogger Problems and Possible Solutions


• Chapter 19: Ten Places to Find Free Blogger Themes and Templates

Furthermore, each chapter is further divided into useful sections which succinctly explain each aspect in detail, accompanied by tips and hints to help you get the most from your blogging experience.

My thoughts so far

After reading through the sample chapters, I can honestly say I'm looking forward to reviewing the full text. Susan's writing is pleasant and easy to read, while her advices on the "etiquette" of blogging ensure Google Blogger for Dummies explains as much about the experience of effective blogging as it does about using the Blogger platform.



Once I've received my copy and have read this in it's entirety, I will review Google Blogger for Dummies in detail here on Blogger Buster. In the meantime, keep an eye out for this title as it's sure to be landing on the shelves of a bookstore near you.

9 Import blogs from another service to Blogger with the Google Blog Converters Project Friday, January 9, 2009 /

A few months back, Blogger announced the ability to import and export Blogger hosted blogs. At the time, it was not possible to import blogs from any other service to Blogger, which left many of us a little disappointed though wondering when this service could be made available.



Well it seems there is hope that Blogger can make such a service available through our Blogger dashboards soon enough! Today the Google Code blog announced the Google Blog Converters project: an open source project which aims to make available the ability to import/export feeds from many different blog platforms:

This new Open Source project provides the ability to easily move blog posts and comments from service to service. This initial release provides Python libraries and runnable scripts that convert between the export formats of Blogger, LiveJournal, MovableType, and WordPress.



In addition, the source code includes templates for hosting these conversions on Google App Engine. Future additions to the project will include support for BlogML and synchronization tools between various services that do not provide a import/export feature but do provide APIs for accessing and modifying blog contents.

At present, the scripts provided by the Blog Converters Project are not so user friendly for those unfamiliar with scripting languages (though I hope those of you fluent in Python or familiar with the Google App engine may be able to make significantly more progress than I have!).



Instead, you may be better advised to check out these existing online projects if you need to convert a blog from another host over to your Blogger blog:

• Wordpress2Blogger - Import posts from a Wordpress blog to your Blogger account


• LiveJournal2Blogger - Import posts from a LiveJournal blog to your Blogger blog

I look forward to seeing how this progresses and hope we can expect to see an official Blogger application in the near future enabling us to import directly from our Blogger dashboards!



Please feel free to leave any comments or suggestions about this project below.

2 Get the latest Blogger updates via Twitter! /

The Blogger team have (finally) decided to embrace Twitter as a means of publishing updates for Blogger users. By following the official Blogger feed on Twitter, you can now receive news of status updates, blogs of note, service interruptions and fabulous new features even sooner than before.



If you already use Twitter, be sure to follow these official Blogger tweets.

2 Blogger's new Geotagging feature (and how to use it!) Monday, December 15, 2008 /

The Blogger team have added a new "Geotagging" feature to Blogger in Draft which enables you to add a location to each of your blog posts. This will then display in your post-footer section (near your post labels, timestamp, etc), and will act as a link to a page on Google Maps where readers can learn more about the location.





Here's an example of how this would appear, as taken in screenshots from the explanatory post on the Blogger in Draft blog:

When you click on the linked location, this will open a new page from Google Maps which shows you the exact location which the author has attributed to the post, like this:

RSS support for Geotags

Your post locations will be included in your blog's RSS and Atom (XML) feeds using GeoRSS which is a web standard for Geotagging. This is important as it allows feed readers, map readers and search engines to associate your posts with particular locations. For example, if you tag your blog posts "New York", these posts can be found more easily by those searching for content based on the New York area.

How to tag your posts with a location

In order to Geotag your posts (add a location) you must create or edit your post through Blogger in Draft. This is because this feature is still experimental, and has not yet been rolled in to the main post editor.



When you create (or edit) a post through Blogger in Draft, look to the left of the Labels area to see the "Add location" link:

This will bring up a pop-up box which appears like this:

Type the location you would like to add in the search box near the top of this pop-up box, and press "Search". You may need to refine your search by adding more details (eg: country, city name, street address) in order to find the location you require.



Once you have found the correct location, you can zoom in (for more accuracy) if you prefer, and finally save your location.



Important: once you have geotagged a post, you cannot remove this tag!



If you do need to remove your geotag for some reason, Blogger recommends that you copy the content of your post and create a new one, then delete the old geotagged post. At present, this is the only way to "remove" a geotag, though it is more of a workaround than a proper solution ;) I suspect the Blogger team will enable us to properly delete or edit a post's geotag before this feature is rolled out for the main post editor.

How to make your Geotags appear beneath your posts

The first step to making Geotag links appear beneath your posts is to enable this setting in the Blog Posts widget.



To do this, go to Layout>Page Elements while logged into Blogger in Draft, and click the "Edit" link for the Blog Posts widget. On this pop-up page, you will notice a new checkbox for "Location". Ensure you have ticked this checkbox, and save your changes.



If you have recently changed your template to a default Blogger theme (or have recently started a new blog), this simple change of setting will enable you to see Geotag locations beneath your posts straight away. If you are unable to see your Geotags after this change of setting, you need to follow one of the instructions below instead.



Since this is a new Blogger feature, your existing template may not currently include the code required to make geotags appear for each of your tagged posts.



If you use a default Blogger template, the simplest way to enable the Geotags for your posts is to pick a new template. Simply go to Layout>Pick new template in your Blogger dashboard and choose the template you would like to work with. This can be the same template you are currently using.



This method refresheds the template code and adds the section required to make the Geotags appear in the post footer section. Alternatively, you could "Revert the widget templates to default" on the Layout>Edit HTML page of your blog. This has the same effect as choosing a new default template.



If you use a customized or third party template, you will need to add the code required for the Geotags to display manually by editing your template code.



To do this, go to Layout>Edit HTML in your Blogger dashboard and ensure you have checked the "Expand widget templates" box.



We need to add the required code to the "post-footer" section of the main blog posts widget. The easiest way to locate this section is to use your browser's search function to find the following line of code:

    <div class='post-footer'>

or

    <div class='post-footer-line post-footer-line-1'>

 If you cannot find either of these lines in your template code, search for "post-labels", "post-icons" or "timestamp" to locate the appropriate section of your template instead.



Once you have located this section of your template, you need to add the following section of code:

<span class='post-location'>

<b:if cond='data:top.showLocation'>

<b:if cond='data:post.location'>

<data:postLocationLabel/>

<a expr:href='data:post.location.mapsUrl' target='_blank'><data:post.location.name/></a>

</b:if>

</b:if>

</span>

Be sure to add this outside any other tags! If you did find the <div class='post-footer'> tag (or similar) in your template, the safest place is to add the code immediately after this line.



Then preview your template. If all is well, you should now see Geotag links appear beneath any posts you have Geotagged with a location (though none will appear on posts which have not been tagged).If you have made any errors when adding the code above, you'll receive a message that your template cannot be parsed. In this case, simply "Clear edits" and attempt to paste the code again.

Is Geotagging a useful feature for Blogger?

I personally feel that Blogger's integration of this new feature will prove very useful for a large proportion of the Blogger community. So far the comments I have read on the introductory post for this new feature have been very positive, and it seems many creative coders have already expanded their ideas for how Geotagging can be intrgrated for widgets and other useful features.



However, this may not be a feature which is beneficial for us all. Here on Blogger Buster, for example, the location where these posts are typed does not complement the content and has no added benefit for readers (I like to think the content posted here has international appeal!).



What are your opinions of Blogger's new Geotagging feature? Will you be using this feature to complement your own blog posts?



Please feel free to let us know your own opinions and comments by leaving your message below.

17 Fixing Custom Favicons for Blogger Blogs Thursday, November 6, 2008 /

Many Blogger users have reported that their custom favicon has suddenly been replaced with the default orange Blogger favicon.



The reason for this is that the 'all-head-content' includable (the content generated for page headers when your blog is viewed in a browser) has been updated to include the following line:

<link href='http://www.blogger.com/favicon.ico' rel='icon' type='image/vnd.microsoft.icon'/>

Thankfully, there is an easy "fix" for this issue!





Simply locate the line(s) of code you have added to your Blogger template to reference your custom Favicon, and move these just before the closing </head> tag in your template.



The reason this trick works is because the code to reference your custom favicon appears after the lines added by Blogger to reference the Blogger favicon. In all HTML documents, code which appears later in the mark-up takes precedence over any tags which appear earlier (unless of course, statements are attached to make the earlier tags preferential!).

How to link to a custom favicon in your Blogger blog

If you do not already use a custom favicon for your blog, you may be interested to learn how to create one, so here are some useful links to other articles and resources on site:

• Favicons made easy (newer version, using png or gif files)


• Create a favicon for your blog (older version, using .ico files)


• Generate your own favicon from a JPG image
  
  

Favicons and Internet Explorer

When using Internet Explorer 6, you will only see favicons appear in the address bar if you have bookmarked the site you are viewing.



The tern "favicon" is  short for "favorite icon", and as such Internet Explorer will only display the favicon of a site if the site is recognized as one of your favorites (ie: if you have bookmarked the site in your browser!).



Some people also report that the favicon will only display when viewing the particular page they have bookmarked, and not the entire site. In this case, you would need to restart your browser for the favicon to appear in the address bar of all pages.



Your internet security settings (both in Internet Explorer and any anti-virus/anti-spyware programs you use) may also affect whether or not favicons will be displayed in IE6.

Were you able to fix your broken favicon?

I hope this post has provided a useful overview of how to fix the link to your custom favicon in your Blogger blog. Please feel free to leave your comments and suggestions below.

15 Issues with the embedded comment form? /

Yesterday a few readers emailed me to explain that there were issues with Blogger's embedded comment form.



The issue was that the "Comment as" drop down menu was empty, preventing readers from choosing an identity for their comments which in turn prevented comments from being left.



As yet, the Blogger team have not acknowledged this issue on the Known Issues (or any other blog), and as far as we can tell, the problem should now be resolved. It could have been a browser-related issue, or perhaps Blogger was making some improvements to the embedded comment form which caused this temporary glitch?



Software Testing Zone wrote about this issue in detail, and has since updated this post to explain that this issue appears to have been resolved. I personally did not experience any problems with the embedded comment form for any of the Blogger blogs I viewed over the past few days, but I am interested to learn more about this issue in case something similar happens in the future.



For anyone still experiencing this problem when reading Blogger powered blogs, try refreshing your browser (press F5 for most browsers, which completely refreshed the page), or clear cookies and temporary internet files to ensure you have a fresh version of the page.



If you were affected by issues with the embedded comment form, please do leave a comment below with some information, such as the browser you were using (Firefox, IE6/7, Safari), whether the blog was using a custom domain or a customized template, etc.



Thank you all for keeping me informed about any Blogger issues you are experiencing! Even though I am not officially affiliated to Blogger, I will do my best to help the Blogger community in any way I can.

2 Problems Previewing Changes to your Blogger Template? Here is a solution Friday, September 19, 2008 /

On the Blogger Help forums I've noticed many people are experiencing bX-errors when attempting to preview changes to their template through the "Edit HTML" page.



This only seems to happen when the "expand widget templates" box is checked; it can even occur when no changes have been made to the template at all, or when trying to upload a new template.



I experienced this issue myself last week, and for a while I thought there was some issue with my templates (which are heavily customized). However, this also happened with new, default, un-customized templates. In my experiences of this issue, the error codes changed each time I tried to preview the template.



If you are experiencing this issue for your own blog, there is a simple solution for you: clear the cookies in your browser!





Once you have done this, refresh the page and log in to Blogger again (as clearing the cookies will clear your login information). Then when you attempt to preview your template, you should receive no errors and be able to edit your template code as required.



Note: Any changes to your template will not be saved! If it is important to save these changes, copy your entire template and paste into Notepad (or a different text editor) so you can access this after logging into Blogger again.

How to clear cookies for your browser

Depending on your browser, you may have to try a different method to clear cookies. Here are methods for the major browsers:



For Internet Explorer 7.0

1. Select "Tools" from your browser menu


2. Select "Internet Options".


3. Open the "General" tab.


4. In "Browsing history" area click the "Delete" button.


5. In "Delete browsing history" window click "Delete cookies" button and then click "Yes".


6. Click Close and then click OK.

For Internet Explorer 6

1. Select "Tools" from the browser menu
   
   


2. Select "Internet Options".


3. Open the "General" tab.


4. Click the "Delete cookies" button.


5. Click OK.
   
   

For Firefox 3

1.  Select "Tools" from the browser menu


2. Choose "Clear Private Data"


3. Check the "Cookies" box


4. Click the "Clear private data now" button.

For Firefox 2

1. Select "Tools"


2. Select "Options".


3. Select "Privacy".


4. In Private area click "Clear Now".


5. In "Clear Private Data" window put the check mark for "Cookies" and click "Clear Private Data Now".


6. Click OK.

If your browser is not listed here, take a look at this page which explains methods for all other major browsers.





For those of you running Windows, you may like to check out CCleaner. This is a freeware system optimization, privacy and cleaning tool. It removes unused files from your system, and really does make your computer run faster!



I've been using CCleaner for a few years now, and can honestly recommend using this. It usually takes less than a minute to run (unless you have not deleted temporary files for a LONG time!), and has cleared up the problem previewing my template each time it has happened for me.



Unfortunately CCleaner is not available for Mac users, though if anyone can recommend a similar program which may be of use to Mac users, please do let us know by leaving your comments below.



I'm not sure why this is happening; there is no mention on Blogger's Known Issues blog (yet), though I hope this information will be of use for those of you experiencing issues when previewing your template!



Photo by Renaissancechambara.

2 Using Blogger's New Followers Feature Tuesday, September 9, 2008 /

As many of you may have read on Blogger Buzz, Blogger has introduced a great new feature: "Followers".

This new feature allows you to:

• Show that you are a fan of your favorite Blogger blogs


• Follow a blog publicly or anonymously
  
  


• See fans of your own blog (and the number of followers you have) from your blog dashboard


• Display a list of your followers in a new "followers" widget


• Read your favorite blogs (even those not hosted on Blogger) from the reading list in your dashboard.


• Import your reading list from Google Reader


• Read posts from the blogs you are following in a special "Blogs I'm Following" folder in Google Reader
  
  

At present, this feature is not available to all Blogger users, though it is being rolled out for everyone to use over the next few weeks.







For those of you who are (like me) impatient to try out this new feature, you can enable this automatically by following a blog (use this link to follow Blogger Buster, for example). Once you have followed even one blog, your dashboard will be updated to show the number of followers, your personal reading list, and the ability to add a "followers" widget to your layout. Thanks to Ionut of Google Operating System for the tip to enable this new feature :)

Add new subscriptions to your reading list

Once your blog dashboard has been updated for the new "followers/reading list" feature, you can easily add new subscriptions to read in your Blogger dashboard.

Adding a new subscription is easy. Simply click on the "Add" button near the bottom of your reading list, where you will be presented with a screen like this:

You can add a new blog by simply typing the URL (eg: http://www.blogsite.com). This does not need to be a Blogger powered blog, nor do you need to know the URL of the blog's feed.



On the next screen, you can choose to follow this blog publicly or anonymously. Choosing to follow publicly means that your friendship with this blog is made public. Those using Blogger can see a list of their public followers, and readers of these blogs can also access follower details if a Followers widget has been added to the blog. In the future, non-Blogger sites will have access to similar widgets to display their public followers.



Choosing to follow anonymously is similar to subscribing to a blog feed in the normal manner: you would be counted among the list of followers, though your details and affiliation would be hidden.



Alternatively, you can choose to import your subscriptions from Google Reader by checking the "Import from Google Reader" option. On the next page, you can see a list of all the subscriptions in your Google Reader account, then check the ones you would like to import. It can take a few minutes to import all of your subscriptions of you have many listed in your reader, so you may need to be patient!

Managing your subscriptions

If you decide not to follow a blog you can easily edit or remove blogs in your reading list by clicking the "Manage" button.



This will generate a page listing all of your subscriptions with options on the right to delete this from your reading list and to toggle between "Public" and "Anonymous" following. You can also add new subscriptions near the bottom of this page.

Building a social network with Blogger...

In time, the "Followers" feature will also be integrated with FriendConnect which is built on Google's Social Graph API.Rather than being a social network in its own right, FriendConnect will link with other social networks and allow you to integrate your blog completely with your online social activities.



I must admit that my research on this subject is sparse, though you can read more about the possibilities for FriendConnect on Google Operating System, the FriendConnect homepage and the OpenSocial pages.

Learn more about the "Followers" feature

The Blogger Help Section has been updated with information to help you make the most of the new Followers feature. Here are links to the most useful pages which should help you get up and running:

• What is Following? 


• How do I add the Followers gadget to my blog 


• How do I use the Blogger reading list?


• Follow a blog publicly or anonymously
  
  

What do you think of the "Followers" feature so far?

I'd love to know your thoughts about the new Followers feature, so please feel free to leave your comments and opinions below.