Sueblimely Blogger

Friend Connect and Blogger Followers Integration Tutorial

2009-03-06T14:23:00.000-08:00

Google has recently merged the blogspot Blogger Followers feature with their Friend Connect application. Followers is now Friend Connect. From now on, when you publicly join a blog or site, that site will be added to your Friend Connect profiles/widgets on all of the sites you've joined, if you choose to follow them publicly rather than anonymously.

You will not appear on the profiles and widgets of those people you were following via Blogger Followers as Google has assigned them an anonymous status. If you want to publicly follow these people, and therefore appear or re-appear on their widgets, or choose a different following profile, you have to go into your settings and change each one. This is time consuming if you are following a lot of people but it is good that our privacy has been protected and we have been given the choice.

Instructions for Following Blogs Publicly

You change your preferences via your Blogger Dashboard page. Below your Manage Blogs area you will see your Reading List section and a list of "Blogs I am Following". Under this list you will see a "Manage" button.

Click on the Manage button and you are taken to your " Manage Blogs I'm Following" page where you can see which blogs you are following anonymously and which publicly. For those you blogs you want to change to public click on its "Settings". In the settings window click on the "anonymously" link in the line that reads " You are following anonymously. Then select the "Follow publicly" option.

>The effect of changing from anonymous to public (my avatar appears in the second image):

To this

If you also want this blog to be listed under "Sites I've Joined", in your profile on the Friend Connect widgets of all the blogs you are following, tick the "Include this site on your profile" box.

Choosing Your Profile

You can also choose to follow a blog using your Blogger, Google, Orkut, Twitter or Plaxo profiles. Changing your preferences as to which of your profiles you wish to use to follow blogs also involves editing each of the blogs you follow. (i.e. Manage Button/Manage Blogs I am Following/settings for each blog) At the top of each individual blogs settings page you will see which profile is currently being used:

Click on the change link and choose which profile you wish to use:

The advantage of choosing a different profile is that if people click on your profile in the new Google Friend Connect widget they are directed directly to the profile(s) and blog(s) you have added to these profiles rather than to the Blogger about page. I have chosen to use my Google profile because that lists my main blog as well as the other social networking sites I belong to.

You can only manage the friends who have Blogger blogs and are using that profile for Friends Connect through your Blogger Manage Blogs section. If your friends are using one of your other social networks ( Google, Orkut, Plaxo, Twitter) then you manage these friends through that network and not Blogger.

The integration brings you a wider range of possible contacts as you can become friends with any member of a blog using Friend Connect not only Blogger blogs. It does not matter what social networks they belong to and which account they used to sign up, the friends you make on a Friend Connect site will be friends of yours on any other sites you both belong to.

Blogger Post Gadget

2009-02-18T13:15:00.001-08:00

I am using the Blogger Post Gadget to write this blog post from my iGoogle page.

Here is the Blog Buzz post which explains it further. You can install the feature from here too. Publish to your Blogger blog from iGoogle

This is a nifty tool but, although you can add html the more advanced functions, such as uploading an image, are not available via iGoogle.

PS After you have published your post (or saved it to draft) via iGoogle a "View This Post" link appears so you can come along and look at your post, edit it, as I am doing now, and publish it if saved to draft

New Import Export Feature for Blogger

2009-01-14T01:54:00.000-08:00

With the new import/export feature for blogspot you can:

Create a copy of your blog./import your blog into a new blog.
Merge two or more blogs into a single blog.
Move individual blog posts and comments from one blog to another
Back up your blog to your hard drive or other storage device.
Move your blog to another platform such as Wordpress.

For instructions on using the new feature read How do I import and export blogs on Blogger? on the Blogger Help Site.

Adding Google Friend Connect to blogspot Blogger

2009-01-01T00:26:00.000-08:00

I have been trying out Google Friend Connect on my main blog and feel it has potential for networking with other bloggers and came accross a couple of tutorials on installing Friend Connect on blogspot.

Video Tutorial:

If you would rather read about the installation:

Google Friend Connect tested for blogger blogs- a tutorial

NB - when you add the dummy posts so that Friend Connect has access to the necessary javascript files, post-date the posts otherwise you will end up with two empty posts at the top of your page.

Sites related to Friend Connect:

Friend Connect Directory find other Friend Connect members

2008-12-31T04:15:00.000-08:00

‹‹ Return home

2008-12-31T04:10:00.000-08:00

Templates

2008-12-28T09:32:00.000-08:00

Blogger Template Showcases

Template Posts

15 Beautiful and Free Blogspot Templates July 09
125 free Blogger templates - August 08 by Blogbuster
70 Fresh And Modern Blogger Templates May 08 by Mashable

Contact Me

2008-10-08T11:19:00.000-07:00

Coming along as soon as I get a confirmation email from Kontactr so I can set the form up.

About Me

2008-10-08T11:18:00.000-07:00

Coming soon - it is late and the only thing that comes to mind right now is sleep.

Please Excuse These Strange Posts

2008-10-08T10:32:00.000-07:00

The last two posts and the next three to follow may seem strange but I am compensating for Blogger not having a page feature by creating posts, which I am then linking to in the top menu.

I have moved the templates and Blogger blogs blogrolls from the sidebar and they are now accessible from the top menu.

I will do an about me page, rather than using the default Blogger profile page which does not allow me the flexibility I want.

I am also setting up a contact form via Kontactr so please feel free to let me know of anything you would like to see in this blog. If you have a blog that focuses on, or even has a major section on, the topic of Blogger let me know and I will come and take a look. I intend this blog to be a general resource on the subject and am happy to point readers in the direction of anything worthwhile on other blogs

Blogs About Blogger

2008-10-08T09:51:00.000-07:00

Followers - New Blogger Feature

2008-09-02T16:50:00.000-07:00

I have added the new Blogger page element gadget 'Followers' to my sidebar.

This widget shows who is following you via a gravatar image and allows readers to add you to their follow list. Once I get some followers you will be able to see what I mean.

You can view those you are following from your dashboard and read their latest posts either from here or in your Google Reader.

Blogger in Draft New Features - Inline Comments Too

2008-06-27T19:07:00.000-07:00

Blogger in Draft is the testing ground for new Blogger features before they are released into general use. You can login to Blogger in Draft and use the features that are being trialled.

One thing I am sure all Blogger users will be pleased to hear about is that there is now the option in Blogger in Draft to have your comment form embedded into your post window rather than appearing as a popup or separate page.

To enable this feature in Blogger in Draft go to "Settings/Comments/Comment Placement form" and choose "Embedded below post". If the comment form is still not showing after you have done this then it could be that you need to make some minor changes to your template. The tutorial on Blogbuster How to add a comment form beneath your blog posts will help you do this.You can find further details in the Blogger in Draft blog post New Feature: Embedded Comment Form.

Other new features include:

Ability to import/export your posts - if, for example, you want to move across to Wordpress you do not have to be using Classic Blogger to be able to transfer your posts across.
A new layout for the post edit window
A star rating system for posts
Integration with Google Webmaster Central
If you are using word verification for comments, the word verification form now appears after you click on "Post Comment"

The embedded comment form works with Classic templates too. Add the tag <$BlogItemCreate$> tag to your page template. I have enabled embedded comments in this post so please give it a go and let me know what you think of this new feature :-)

Two New Blogger XML Template Sites

2008-06-19T10:25:00.000-07:00

I have added two new Blogger xml template sites to my blogroll: both by established bloggers who have decided to highlight their templates by creating a dedicated home for them.

Exotic Mommie has transported her templates to Candy's Templates - 22 templates to date. She is asking for suggestions as to the type of templates we would like to see there.

Little Miss Blogger is a new template site created by Kathleen of Kathleen & The Dreaded Opium She says her inspirations are drawn from "steampunk, vintage, retro, shabby chic, victoriana, edwardiana, dolls, burton, nordic, shaker, folk art & puritan" which should give a wide range of design to choose from. Kathleen creates both free and OOAK (One-of-a-Kind) Templates at £7.50 each.

Good luck to both of you with your sites and congratulations to Mommie on her beautiful brand new baby girl.

Blogger Templates Tutorial 1

2008-05-20T20:20:00.000-07:00

This is Part One of a beginners guide to Blogger templates and how to edit them.

You will find the template features of your blog under the Layout tab of your dashboard. The tabs under Layout are:

Page Elements - this allows you to easily include additional features in your blogs header, sidebar and footer areas. Blogger has a good range of add-ins which it calls page elements. You may wish to include features from external sites, in which case you are provided with the code to add to your template. This is normally done by copying and posting the code into a new HTML/JavaScript Page Element.
Fonts and Colors - This allows for some basic styling of your blogs font and background colors.
Edit HTML - Here you will find all the coding for your template. Edit xml would have been a more appropriate title for it as these are xml rather than html templates. Before you do any editing it is wise to download a copy of your current template using the download function at the top of the edit html screen. You can then restore this if anything goes wrong or you just change your mind.

The main reasons you may want to edit this template are:

To alter your blogs styling over and above what you can do in the Fonts and Colors section.
To change your template to one that is not included in the Pick New Template Tab. i.e. a template you download from another site or one you create yourself.
To make alterations to your existing template, add new features that cannot be added via Page Elements or to add the ability to add more page elements.

Pick New Template - to change your template to one of the Blogger default templates.

New to Blogger blogspot?

2008-05-20T20:15:00.001-07:00

My daughter has just started blogging using blogspot and this has given me an incentive to pay attention to this blog again.

I will be answering any questions she has as well as posting on topics I think would be useful for her. If you too are a newcomer to using Blogger please feel free to ask questions too.

Blogger Top Menu Tutorial

2008-03-22T02:00:00.000-07:00

I have just posted a tutorial on Blogging Sueblimely on how to add and style a top menu in Blogger. - Navigation Menus 4 - Dessert

There are a couple of examples there that you can just copy and paste into an html page element. If you want different colors it is simple enough to do by editing the CSS coding.

If time permits I am going to create a whole set of menus with different colors and styles.

Blog Launch

2007-11-18T12:29:00.000-08:00

I have made the move away from Blogger to host my main blog using Wordpress on my own domain at Blogging Sueblimely.

To start with my main topic will be the move itself - why I made the move and how I did it. If you are thinking of doing the same my posts may be of some use to you.

Firefox and Blogger layout problems

2007-11-09T19:11:00.000-08:00

Having just reinstalled Firefox from scratch and coming up with a few things I needed to tweak to get it back to how I want it, I found this post of use: Blogger layout problems in FireFox

Blogspot Hack Resources

2007-10-23T14:20:00.000-07:00

If you are game to try a little customization of your blog the following sites give excellent information on hacks to.

Hoctro's Blogger Hack Directory - a round up of recent articles from most of the blogs listed below.

Comments Form

2007-07-31T06:44:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Ramani from Hackosphere for pointing me in the direction of the Comments Form feature on Blogger. Text typed in the Comments Form, which can be found in your blogs Settings/Comments section, is displayed just below the 'Leave your Comments' heading in the write comments window.

I have used my form to add a message about informing readers that I have removed 'nofollow' and requesting input as to new blogger features or add-ins. If you want to learn more about 'nofollow' please see my guest post on BlogBlond's site at: NoFollow, NoGood for Bloggers

You can use this for other purposes too. For example Digital Inspiration is using it for displaying a Comments Policy. Their article about it can be seen at New! Add Visitor Comments Policy to Your Blogger Blog.

I would be pleased to hear about how other blogs are using the feature.

Polls for Blogger

2007-07-08T08:14:00.000-07:00

Blogger is trialling a poll element, as you can see by the poll in the left sidebar which will be in place until the poll closing day on 31st July.

Please give it a try and I will report back on how it works. It will also give me valuable feedback as to what you would like to learn.

16 Widget Sites For Your Blog

2007-06-30T18:23:00.000-07:00

I have done some research on widget sites and have come up with a list of those that I think provide the most variety and choice. They are in alphabetical order rather than bypreference.

I have created a custom search which will search all of these sites for any word.

Widget Search

You can also use this search from the sidebar of this blog.
Sites that provide information and keep you up to date with new Widgets:

Archive Calendar - New Blogger

2007-06-26T12:39:00.000-07:00

I have been playing with my template, yet again, and have transformed the archive list in the sidebar into a 'calendar'.

Thanks to Phydeaux for creating this feature, which I think is an excellent way of displaying archives. His instructions can be found on his site at:

Blog Archive Calendar

Themes for the calendar with their instructions and copy and paste styling can be found on Phydeaux's Blogger Archive Calendar Styles page.