Comment Problems
I only just found today that comments aren't appearing on individual post pages. They show up fine with the peekaboo comment script on the main page though.
Going to have to look into that on Monday.
Saturday, October 21, 2006
Thursday, October 19, 2006
Windows Live Writer continued again
I thought that I had found a way to use Live Writer to add Blogger Beta Labels to my posts. Unfortunately I was only half right. I was able to make labels search links in the posts, but the labels for each post itself are not transferred to Blogger.
The only workaround I have at the moment is to insert Technorati tags and then manually copy those tag labels to Blogger by editing the post. It's a pain but hopefully they will include this functionality in the future.
I think I'm done for now
It took a few days, a lot of hair ripping out as I re-taught my self the CSS coding that I had forgotten since I started doing the blog, and some poor attempts with Gimp to create a banner, but I'm finally, almost happy with the new template.
Let me know what you think about it.
Thanks go to the following blogs for providing the hacks that I have used
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
Beware of the new template
I'm switching templates tonight. This one just seemed a little simple and boring and I want to try out some of the new features of Blogger Beta. So, for the next few days, expect the blog to look a little different and possibly lose some of the stuff I have added recently.
I'll get it working the way I want it to over the next week.
Random Blog of interest
Part of my blogging experience has been to read blogs at random. Generally I just hit the next blog button at the top of my page after I check for new comments etc. Sometimes they are indecipherable, other times they are news site regurgitators, and others are like this one by May.
When I hit a new blog I generally read only the top post. If it intrigues me then I read on. It's a big challenge to always have something interesting as the first post on the page, and I'm sure that quite often my blog falls well short of interesting, but as long as I apply that rule to every site I visit then it maintains the random rule that I chose to follow.
May Day Cafe opened today with Cinderella Man. She tells of a man that she met and became attracted to at first sight. That he was gay and a Catholic priest mattered little because his personality was the main attraction. She shared a few hours conversation with him and then he was gone from her life.
It struck me that some of the most amazing people I have ever met have floated into and out of my life at random, never to be seen again. They arrive with confidence, wit, amazing stories, and the ability to hold a room full of people in the palm of their hand. After a time they leave, and everyone in the room knows that they were in the presence of someone truly amazing. But, we never see them again in our circle of friends/work.
I love these people, because they offer me an insight into who I can become. If I let go of the nagging insecurities and just be myself, I could be one of those momentary sparks of life. Or, perhaps I am already and just don't know it. You see, I don't think that these people ever understand that they affect people in such a way as they do. They are just being themselves, not attempting to play to the crowd.
Remember this, somewhere there is a person that will think you are amazing just as you are. They will always remember the moments they spend with you, and will be inspired because of you.
Sunday, October 15, 2006
Live Writer continued
I found a quite handy part of Live Writer tonight. It has the ability to insert tags such as Technorati tags etc. The html for these tags can be edited so the appear as you want them.
A quick search through the source of the blog and it turns out that the new Labels addition in Blogger Beta is nothing more than a link to a search page for the blog. A quick cut and paste job and I can now insert Blogger Labels into the posts from Live Writer, as well as adding Technorati tags.
I don't know who Bill stole the idea for this software from but it was a good idea to steal. Simple and effective blog publishing for the masses. Not too complicated like other blog clients that are out there. Most likely it will be free which gives it another tick in my book.
Thursday, October 12, 2006
Let's see if Microsoft can make a useful piece of software
That's what I am using to write this post. Now I am normally opposed to using much in the way of Microsoft products apart from the operating system itself. I refuse to use Internet Explorer. It is buggy, insecure, and is so slow and clunky compared to other options such as Firefox and Opera.
Office and Outlook are a ridiculous waste of cash. If only the myriad of users out there could be pointed to Open Office and Mozilla Thunderbird, they could find that almost all the functionality that anyone ever needs is contained in free software that is generally better supported and maintained than the hideously expensive offerings by Bill Gates.
Maybe, just maybe, the fact that Windows Live Writer is currently free, it might become a useful tool. Then again it might be made payware in the next six months and then I'll have to stop using it.
The advantages I can see right now are:
Support for Technorati tags
WYSIWYG editing that beats the Blogger Beta interface hands down
Edit, design and layout your posts in the way it will actually look on the blog
Unlike Frontpage, Windows Live Writer seems to keep the HTML code a lot cleaner and uncluttered
So far, I'm liking it. We'll see how it goes over the next few weeks.
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
The switch to Blogger Beta
I've made the switch to the new Blogger Beta. Unfortunately there is an issue with Opera and the sign in process that keeps sending me back to the sign in page. I'm not sure if it's my security settings in Opera or just a compatibility issue. The one good thing is that it works fine in Firefox so I don't need to use IE at all.
I'll let you know how the Beta works.
Edit: I got Opera working with Beta now. It seems my cookie settings were a little off and once I tolde Opera to accept cookies from the blogger.com site it was fine.
Sunday, September 03, 2006
The Drive for Renown / Duality unto others
In the past few weeks of setting up the blog, designing the site and generally trying to figure out how this whole new side of the interweb works, I have noticed a rather annoying trend. Much the same as anyone setting up a homepage or business website, people creating blogs seem to be caught up in the hunt to be number "1". Comments on other peoples blogs are full of spam to promote the blogs or blog search engines of others, blogs are full of internet garbage like Ebay links, porn, or just junk with repetitive keywords to produce a better Google or Technorati result.
I've spent a large portion of today looking for interesting blogs. Not just groups of people who have only barely evolved from MySpace, or sites that are no more than a replica of a business website so that the company gets more exposure to search engines. I've found some that were vaguely interesting but hard to decipher, many that do nothing other than regurgitate CNN and BBC:Worldwide feeds, and only one or two that seemed as though they had something worthwhile to say.Now, I am the first person to put my hand up and say that I am probably not the most interesting or innovative person on the 'net. I will however, endeavour to make every post here an original post. If I quote a news site it will be because I have something to say about that article, and I will say it.
So, now that I have made that rather worrying promise, I can point you to a site that I found today on my searches. This site is called Strangers Among Us. It is a collaborative blog by a few guys who take photos around their towns that capture people in action. Not posed or planned, but people living their lives. The post that really grabbed my attention was this one - Errands at Box Stores. More specifically the photo of the cashier at a coffee shop in the process of being abused by a customer. There is something in that picture that, I think, captures the duality of life. This poor cashier has no choice but to assist the customer, no matter if he was at fault, or if the person is just plain unreasonable, and all the while he must be thinking that he is better than this.How many times have we all been in a situation where we have been on the receiving end of something that was undeserved and yet have had to bear it because at that moment we have no other option. It seems obvious to me that if people would only remember those times in their life, that we would be treating each other a lot better. What ever happened to "Do unto others.."?
Customising the site
I've spent the last day or so getting the site redesigned a little. You can now subscribe to an RSS feed of the site or use the email subscription to receive a daily digest of any posts that I make.
I'm slowly working out the whole CSS stylesheet stuff and figuring out how I want the site to look so check back regularly to see what I come up with. Due to limitations in Blogger I haven't got categories sorted out properly as yet. You can search some basic categories from the sidebar but it doesn't really work the way that I want it to yet.The next step is to get a calendar navigation widget added but that has a lot of editing etc that I haven't quite gotten my head around. Maybe some time over the next week or so.
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